okay, I test out my vocals with and without my compressor, and well the distortion is an issue without the compressor, but with the compressor the vocals are flatter. I am confused cause I know someone that has songs on the radio, excellent quality, and he uses the 3630, I got a dbx 266xl. Maybe I am using it wrong?
Compressor or no compressor?
- Thread starter Jackrip
- Start date
First of all there is no reason not to get a clean recording even with out compression. The gains and levels need to be set correctly, and leave some spare room above your loudest peaks.
Once that's out of the way, add in the compressor. With no additional gain on the dbx, set it for 'Auto Mode, 2/1 ratio, threshold to reduce 3-6 off the loudest parts.
Let's call this Mode 1- Transparent Mild Control.
Once that's out of the way, add in the compressor. With no additional gain on the dbx, set it for 'Auto Mode, 2/1 ratio, threshold to reduce 3-6 off the loudest parts.
Let's call this Mode 1- Transparent Mild Control.
I tend to like hard knee on these kind of comps, but at really low ratio it won't have a big effect. Your ear will tune up to this kind of stuff as you go. 
I just wanted to set you up a start point for an example of general taming' w/o a lot of noticable 'effect going on. dbx in auto' does pretty well. Gets in and out fairly fast, right out of the box'.
I just wanted to set you up a start point for an example of general taming' w/o a lot of noticable 'effect going on. dbx in auto' does pretty well. Gets in and out fairly fast, right out of the box'.
Jackrip said:
Right, that's the trade off in compression... compression is the reduction of the dynamics... so if you over-compress, you're getting rid of dynamics to the point where they don't exist anymore... flat vocals in your case.. so easy up on the compression ratio and/or threshold