Limiter/Compressor WHILE Recording?

R

Ryan Teasnob

Member
How do people typically apply limiting and/or compression while tracking? In this day and age where most folks record into an interface, I'm unsure how to do it. Would you have to have a separate preamp feeding a hardware compressor/limiter, which THEN feeds the recording interface?

Thanks!
 
Oh, good question. How many times ?

Or sidechain off the EQ and only compress the highs, lows, mids, or a single selected band. How does that help? The youtube videos are hard to understand.

I seen one video where the EQ is flat and he just raises one of the eq bands and it compresses that band for a new interesting pump.
 
I usually record live things to a Zoom R24, and I tend to add some limiting to that, just to keep the "overambitious players" under control, especially with drummers. I also have changed from 16 to 24 bit, just to give a bit more room.

In a controlled environment, there's not a lot of reason that I see to compress things going in. I don't see a lot of difference between applying compression before or after the recording when you've got 120dB of range to work with already. That said, the Tascam interface here at home does have compression and EQ in the interface, so I could apply it if I thought I needed it.
 
I have inserts on the first two channels of my interface, and I have them connected to a dbx compressor. This allows me some control over the input levels when dealing with with wayward singers.
 
^^^What GZ said. The only other time i use compression on the way in if I want to record a particular coloration/effect, usually on bass guitar amp mics, sometimes on DI bass
 
I've never used compression or limiting on the way in for my own work in a DAW. I've always applied it in the box, if needed, but that's probably because I'm a veteran when using a mic.....having played live for years and having recorded my own work for years as well. It's easy to see how some limiting or compression on the way in might be a good idea when micing someone who has less ability to control their delivery. I can also see how maybe some compressors / limiters might be particularly "colored" in a way that you can't quire capture in the box....so using them on the way in is worth a try.

As with so many things here.....there's no hard and fast rule.

As always....just my 2 cents worth.

Mick
 
Well, the way I do it is with a medium format analog console, a rack of compressors, a patch bay and a MOTU 24i/2408 MkII/PCIe 424. But I suspect that's not going to work for most home recordists.

You could try a channel strip like the dbx 286s. You could even patch a separate compressor downstream of it on the way to the interface.

Some interfaces provide inserts between the mic pres and the ADC.
 
I used to track with compression for vocals and bass, but I was always using an outboard preamp into a line level interface. I would never compress to control level, I would compress for the sound of the compression.

Unless compression is something that the singer wants to hear, there probably isn't much of a difference between recording with it and applying it in the mix. Sometimes the added sustain of compression can help a bass player play the part better.
 
If I didn't have it all set up to do, I wouldn't go to any great effort to track with compression. The setup I'm using is for rehearsal/performance/recording, so it's just already patched and tuned for inputs I'm familiar with. Some of the compressors are nothing special, dbx 166/266. But there is a Drawmer 1960, which I have on kick and bass, and an ART Pro VLA, which I have on a vocal and a guitar.
 
I track my vocals with compression, because even though I sound good when I perform well, I sound terrible when I perform badly, and the right mic with a good compressor make me perform very differently than the wrong mic without compression.

It just so happens that I prefer my mic levels compressed anyhow when mixing, so it saves a step. Early on I over compressed the vocal on the way in for some singers, or used a compressor that had some audible artifacts, but I haven't had those issues for decades.
 
While I never recorded with anything connected, eq or compression, since mixing more and more using software and not in the analog domain (console and outboard) I have been tracking with some compression. I have been using some compression on things like snare and bass as I find the plugins are never quite the same as my analog gear. Guest engineers that pop in often want to track with my compressors and console EQ, as they love using it. In future I am modifying my setup so that I can use my analog outboard during software mixing (I can't wait) so i'll see where it goes after that.

Alan
 
When I record, I have a choice. I have an input fader and strip, and by default, a channel strip. I monitor what comes out, for headphone and speaker feeds. I usually need two things for my type of music. I need reverb, because for some sounds that benefit from it, the reverb has an effect on how I play it. One of my favourite sounds at the moment is a felt treated piano. Tiny digs at the keyboard with a very short note length, with BIG reverb. My favourite bass is quite an old one and has great tone but with fingers, not a pick, it’s sustain ability is poor. I slap on a compressor. Nothing clever, the Cubase stock one. I pop this onto the channel strip again and then play. Quite often, the song’s have direction changes and there’s too much reverb once other instruments have been added, or another bass sound from a synth means I knock the compression off the bass so it has the attack job, but the sustain isn’t needed.


It’s s how I work. I could have put the exact same processing on the input strip, but that has zero benefits and loads of issues. As the sound is exactly the same why would anyone want to take the path of no changes?

we could do all sorts pre-record but it’s like buying ingredients before you’ve picked today’s meal to cook. As there is NO need to do it pre-record, there are zero benefits. Hell, with huge dynamic range, I don’t even tweak the preamp gain knob much nowadays. I look at the channel strip and it’s a tad lower than optimum, I spin the chair and look at the interface in the rack. I think about my bad back, and I say bugger it, I’ll recover that gain later.

My favourite felt piano yesterday in one piece was very exposed and I was listening quite loud, to look for something I could hear and couldn’t work out where it was. I could hear hiss? Delving into the piano program, I found a hidden menu and one setting I’d never seen before had a drop down where the setting was “15 IPS Tape”. It was actually adding tape hiss as a feature!!!!!!!!
 
TalismanRich said:
I usually record live things to a Zoom R24, and I tend to add some limiting to that, just to keep the "overambitious players" under control, especially with drummers. I also have changed from 16 to 24 bit, just to give a bit more room.

In a controlled environment, there's not a lot of reason that I see to compress things going in. I don't see a lot of difference between applying compression before or after the recording when you've got 120dB of range to work with already. That said, the Tascam interface here at home does have compression and EQ in the interface, so I could apply it if I thought I needed it.
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I don't normally need it either. But I have song that starts off with a kind of intimate, quiet vocal, and then it build to an all-out scream/belt in the chorus. When levels are correct for the verses they are too high for the chorus. Right now my only option is to sing the verses at one input level. Then overdub the choruses on a different track with a muc lower input level. That's a bit tedious. What do people normally do for situations like this?
 
dkelley said:
I track my vocals with compression, because even though I sound good when I perform well, I sound terrible when I perform badly, and the right mic with a good compressor make me perform very differently than the wrong mic without compression.

It just so happens that I prefer my mic levels compressed anyhow when mixing, so it saves a step. Early on I over compressed the vocal on the way in for some singers, or used a compressor that had some audible artifacts, but I haven't had those issues for decades.
Click to expand...
Thanks. So how do you do that? What is your vocal chain? I assume you have, say, a mic preamp going into a compressor, then going into a standard interface? Or something like that?
 
bouldersoundguy said:
Well, the way I do it is with a medium format analog console, a rack of compressors, a patch bay and a MOTU 24i/2408 MkII/PCIe 424. But I suspect that's not going to work for most home recordists.

You could try a channel strip like the dbx 286s. You could even patch a separate compressor downstream of it on the way to the interface.

Some interfaces provide inserts between the mic pres and the ADC.
Click to expand...
That would certainly work. But yeah. I'm wondering if there is a way to do it while still using my current interface rather than replacing it.
 
Thanks for the tips, everyone! Some good stuff. Just to clarify, 90+% of my recordings are done with nothing applied on the way in. Standard reasoning - why print an effect onto audio that you're stuck with in the mix, when you can just apply everything in the mix? It's just that SOMETIMES there is a song with massive dynamic range - very quiet in parts and then primal scream on other parts. If my setup had a channel strip or traditional console you could patch outboard gear into, this wouldn't be an issue. But my setup is as simple as it gets, mostly because I record my own stuff 1 track at a time. so I have a Focusrite Scarlett 2i2, and the mics go straight into that. Given that setup, I was wondering what folks would do (short of just replacing the Focusrite with a channel strip like the dbx 286.
 
As far as connecting outboard gear, I think the ways that would be accomplished would be
- on the way in, via a channel insert
- on the way in, via an outboard preamp, then any other line-level processors, then line input to the interface
- in software, while tracking, using a VST that interfaces with hardware (like ReaInsert for Reaper) or hardware sends/receives
- in software, in post-processing using either a VST or hardware send/receives

If the major hurdle you're trying to overcome is how to deal with a very dynamic vocal, then probably just automation of the vocal in post-processing would be the way to go. You can turn it up in the quiet parts, turn it down in the loud parts. Or you can slice up the vocal and adjust the gain of each section that way.

For your 2i2, you can always use one of the main line outputs to feed external gear, and come back into the interface on one of the line inputs on the front. But that requires disconnecting your main speakers and disabling the master bus output, so it's a pain. But it's possible! It's easier to use an external preamp, then feed a line level signal to whatever other outboard gear, then into a line input on the 2i2.
 
Ryan, you can put a compressor on there, but a lot of singers "play the mic" a bit to allow for a higher level during soft parts, and then move the mic away when they really belt it out.

Once things are recorded, the other way to achieve it is to ride gain on the vocals. In the old days, that meant mixing down and moving the faders while the mix was going on. These days, big studios have motorized faders that memorize positions, but in a DAW you can just automate levels. I've done that in Reaper, it's really easy. I was playing with a track from about 4 years ago this past weekend, and the guitar player was very loud at the beginning of the first song, and about 15 or 20 seconds in, I dropped the fader so the overall level changed a lot. I was able to go in with volume automation and drop the level of the first part by about 6=7dB until the fader change. It evened out the guitar part to the point that you couldn't tell it was moved.
 
Ryan Teasnob said:
That would certainly work. But yeah. I'm wondering if there is a way to do it while still using my current interface rather than replacing it.
Click to expand...
Using a channel strip or separate preamp wouldn't replace your whole interface, it would just make compression possible in the analog realm before hitting the converters. Some channels strips have compression built in, or you could use a separate preamp and compressor.

Most likely you could simply set the gain to accommodate the loud parts of your take and then balance things during mixdown.
 
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