Home » R/E/P » Brad Blackwood » Sound of limiting
| Sound of limiting [message #337546] |
Tue, 29 April 2008 01:35  |
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 Viitalahde
Messages: 581
Registered: April 2004
Location: Helsinki, Finland |
Gold Member |
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It's funny to see how some clients seem to want a bad squashed sound. I do everything I can to retain the transients, impact and open sound, and I'm good at it.
Then I get a request to make it "tighter", which usually means less clipping and more limiting. After it breathes and whizzes beyond being annoying, they're happy. I've got a couple of requests like this.
Is this a case of being accustomed to such a sound? It's not a cool sound at all, it's simply a bad sound.
Jaakko Viitalähde
http://www.virtalahde.com
http://www.studiokuu.fi
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #337614 is a reply to message #337546 ] |
Tue, 29 April 2008 11:10  |
Dave Davis
Messages: 353
Registered: December 2005
Location: Cincinnati, Ohio |
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I'm not sure I follow you... "breathing and whizzing" is a common compression artifact, but in limiting that description is apt for lousy limiting or process failure. Typically those artifacts result from pushing a good processor to far (or a bad one at all), and are easily avoided. Frankly no one's ever asked me for more pumping in a session, and when someone says "tighter" they mean LESS of it. Like you, I apply more limiting, but not necessarily any more or less clipping - rather it tells me to use a lot less compression ahead of the limiter!
The current fashion statement, Loud, seems to be less a trade off, than a sum of techniques. The brickwall sound people respond to and bring for reference sounds more like a compressed signal clipped at some processor input, followed by a couple stages of limiting (at least one of which is often multiband). If you're hearing a lot of pumping, try breaking the job up over a couple devices, including the dreaded multiband limiters when necessary. That is the typical recipe for Crush these days... as you suggest this often means leaning harder on limiters than clippers.
So I suppose clipping vs. limiting is a valid, real world tradeoff, especially in all-analog outboard process loops. I probably ought to revisit it, since fancy clipping is all the rage lately. But in my sessions intentionally clipping signals is a very rare occurrence, regardless of level pursuit. I just prefer other methods of signal mangling to get that job done. YMMV of course.
-d-
Dave Davis
Sound Images
MUSIC|MEDIA|DESIGN
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #337949 is a reply to message #337546 ] |
Wed, 30 April 2008 14:17 |
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Viitalahde
Messages: 581
Registered: April 2004
Location: Helsinki, Finland |
Gold Member |
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Nope, clipping doesn't work in all cases, but it has worked in the ones I started this topic about. The way I described the pumping effect is wrong, because it happens in the transient level. What I ment is that I've had cases in where not hearing the drums seems to be good, and it has to be loud.
Squashed can be cool, but not this kind. I was thinking where the reference came from and I figured out it might be just a case where the mixes have been quickly limited at the mixing stage for a copy and someone got accustomed to the squashed sound.
But really, the point of the topic was only wondering about tastes in sound. A sonic equivalent of standing in a room of a low height, neck constantly bent, just doesn't sound good to me.
Jaakko Viitalähde
http://www.virtalahde.com
http://www.studiokuu.fi
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #338053 is a reply to message #337966 ] |
Wed, 30 April 2008 20:02 |
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Gold
Messages: 833
Registered: April 2004
Location: Brooklyn |
Gold Member |
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| bblackwood wrote on Wed, 30 April 2008 15:59 |
In fact, I think some mastering engineers are having a hard time cutting records for newer bands as they can't wrap their heads around the fact that some people think modern, squashed, pumping records sound kewl.
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I don't get asked to do this very often. If I did I would have to spend some more time in the woodshed hacking things to bits. There are definitely good and bad examples of this. I already do stuff a little differently to get level but crushing level requires a dedication to destruction I haven't had to make. Viva la smalltime.
Paul Gold
www.saltmastering.com
On the silk road, looking for uranium.
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #338126 is a reply to message #337966 ] |
Thu, 01 May 2008 05:35 |
Oldfart
Messages: 397
Registered: May 2004
Location: Canada |
Active Member |
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| bblackwood wrote on Wed, 30 April 2008 15:59 |
Yah, Jaakko, I've seen it. In fact, I think some mastering engineers are having a hard time cutting records for newer bands as they can't wrap their heads around the fact that some people think modern, squashed, pumping records sound kewl.
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A while back, I sent my biggest client, one of those online article (with audio clips), about the volume war, and his reaction was: " believe it or not, the clients now wants that over limited L2 sound, as they consider hear it as sounding radio like!"
(sigh)
Oldfart
Denis Paquette
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #338316 is a reply to message #337546 ] |
Thu, 01 May 2008 15:50 |
escape
Messages: 126
Registered: March 2007 |
Active Member |
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| Viitalahde wrote on Tue, 29 April 2008 02:35 |
It's funny to see how some clients seem to want a bad squashed sound. I do everything I can to retain the transients, impact and open sound, and I'm good at it.
Then I get a request to make it "tighter", which usually means less clipping and more limiting. After it breathes and whizzes beyond being annoying, they're happy. I've got a couple of requests like this.
Is this a case of being accustomed to such a sound? It's not a cool sound at all, it's simply a bad sound.
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my $.02:
IME, to make the sound "tighter", nothing works better then a properly tuned compressor modifying transients so that there is more attack and less decay. Just a quick hit from a drum that's in and out and generally dry as far as any type of reverb.
More limiting is like turning down the contrast knob on a TV set, white static noise. I can't classify the over-limited, over-clipped sound as being "tighter" in any regard, because you're eliminating most of the microdynamics that are needed to give it a tighter sound. You're just turning it all up, including the decay, which might need to be toned down. It's all 1's and no 0's. That could be the reason why the first thing that seems to go in the over-limiting scheme is the drum section of the mix. Very important to leave the room in between the hits so that the ears and brain can distinguish a rhythm going on.
Of course in these types of discussions, real sound examples that we can download and compare might help us settle on a more refined definition of what exactly this "tight" sound is that you say more and more people are requesting.
I consider myself lucky then, because as far as the trend is going with my business, I'm getting less of these types of requests. Alot more indie bands and garage bands seem to be taking it upon themselves to learn more about all of this, and for that I am appreciative. The educated consumer is so much easier to work with in most regards..
ERIC JENSON
MASTERING ENGINEER
ACOUSTICS ENGINEER(ALMOST)
E-Scapes Mastering Services
Miami, FL
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #338328 is a reply to message #338316 ] |
Thu, 01 May 2008 17:18 |
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Andrew Hamilton
Messages: 194
Registered: June 2005
Location: Cincinnati, Ohio |
Active Member |
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As Bob Katz says, with good A/D conversion, a modicum of clipping is more transparent a means of gain make up than limiting would have been. But that's level, not sound - for the most part. For the sound effect your clients are into, you do need limiting, as Dave Davis says. Sounds like a job for the one-trick vari-mu? That input gain knob can be driven into harmonic saturation that will melt their frowns away.
I shouldn't use ADC clipping for the sound - rather for the transparency, when we need every iota of available gain makeup to get the master louder and clearer than the contemporary already-loud mix.
Now, for a kudos to our resident mastering hero, Bob Ohlsson, for suggesting the use of the Xeon limiter in front of ye olde L2. I think both really can enhance each other. I just did a CD for an indie rock band who claimed they were doing high fives when they auditioned their reference. I know that the results were greatly improved by being able to lower the threshold of the L2 and let the Xeon do the heavy lifting in its 2-stage limiter. They were easily dialed in for optimum combinations of transparency and color. The Xeon sound is like the difference in using the L2 at 2x Fs rather than at 1x Fs. Putting the two instruments together and spreading the work makes it more like 3x Fs, in terms of retained clarity...
As Bob O. recounted, I could dial in, or out, amounts of program low end by simply adjusting parameters of the fist stage of the Xeon limiter or the amount of "leveler," (which really shined on pieces with dynamics that defied normal attempts to mitigate sudden changes with segment gain manipulation alone...) and also by tweaking the amount of L2 follow-up. Sort of like the hysteresis control on the GML comps? Anyway, Xeon is a really neat plug-in which will have to become a permanent member of my staff.
Andrew
Cappin' the rap in the M&Ms.
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| Re: Sound of limiting [message #338456 is a reply to message #338328 ] |
Fri, 02 May 2008 07:05 |
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Tomas Danko
Messages: 3288
Registered: May 2004
Location: Stockholm, Sweden |
Platinum Member |
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| Andrew Hamilton wrote on Thu, 01 May 2008 23:18 |
As Bob Katz says, with good A/D conversion, a modicum of clipping is more transparent a means of gain make up than limiting would have been. But that's level, not sound - for the most part. For the sound effect your clients are into, you do need limiting, as Dave Davis says. Sounds like a job for the one-trick vari-mu? That input gain knob can be driven into harmonic saturation that will melt their frowns away.
I shouldn't use ADC clipping for the sound - rather for the transparency, when we need every iota of available gain makeup to get the master louder and clearer than the contemporary already-loud mix.
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My fave ME uses a modicum of clipping using his Pacific Microsonic on the way back in to the computer. This along with dynamic EQ by Weiss and analog limiting (NTP) seems to be his take on reaching the desired loudness. It sounds great, or rather doesn't sound much different from what I give him.
He has got a hardware L2 in his rack. It's not even hooked up, and it's half-hanging out of the rack.
"T(Z)= (n1+n2*Z^-1+n2*Z^-2)/(1+d1*z^-1+d2*z^-2)" - Mr. Dan Lavry
"Shaw baa laa raaw, sidle' yaa doot in dee splaa" . Mr Shooby Taylor
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