thehitman2375
New member
I don't want to speak for him, but the uses are pretty pedestrian...
1) This would emulate an old opto-compressor. It's great for vocals, bass, or anything that needs to be compressed pretty hard without stepping on the transients too hard.
B) This is like the ducker on the radio. When you talk, the background music gets quiet. But you don't actually want the music to pump along to how loud the person is talking. You want it to go down to a certain level and stay there.
III) This one is kind of the opposite of #1. This gives the effect of starting off compressing at a lower ratio on lower signals and ramping up to a higher ratio as the signal gets hotter. This makes the compression seem more transparent.
not sure what u mean by pedestrian.
using the sidechain to emulate an old opto compressor just seems like a lot more work to me than using an old opto style compressor. i can't think of any situation where i'd prefer to set up and program a sidechain to emulate something, instead of actually just using the thing i'm emulating. i also can't think of any compressors that i would ever want to use that offer a sidechain path that didn't have soft knee style compression. i'm curios what the names of them are. regardless, if i wanted soft knee compression, using an external compressor on the sidechain signal path to emulate soft knee style compression on a hard knee compressor is a whole lot of work that could be avoided by just using a soft knee compressor.
in theory, these things make sense, but i can't imagine that anyone would find them more practical than actually using the right tool for the job. if you genuinely have a hard knee compressor, with a side chain, that doesn't have a soft knee, and u want soft knee compression, then it's not the tool your looking for. you wouldn't drive from philly to NYC by traveling through nebraska unless you had a real reason to go to nebraska. if that reason is for you to get directions to NYC from philly, then wow, just...wow. thanks out of my league. that's some advanced stuff that i've never encountered in all the times i've driven to NYC from Philly. the same for all the songs i've ever worked on. if you encounter a situation where that technique works best, sounds best, or in any way fits the situation, then it's perfect for that. just because i've never encountered it doesn't mean that it's not something worth trying, but in order for me to understand what makes it a practical thing to do, i'd need a practical reason to do it. really, how many compressors, and i'd like names here, don't have soft knee that have sidechains? if you can give me a name, then also, give me an instrument/vocal/fx/sound/other where you would want to use that method with that compressor INSTEAD of just using a different (soft knee) compressor. if i had compressors that didn't do what i wanted them to do, then that wouldn't be the tool to pick. there's a lot of great compressors out there. all kinds of them. just pick the right one instead of picking the wrong one and then trying to fake it.
what you guys are talking about is an intellectual exercise. there's no crime in that. it's actually kinda neat. but so far, i gave 7 very good examples of what, when, where, why, and how, and now you're telling me this idea of dynamically processing the sidechain of a dynamics processor and that's it's such a wonderful and useful thing, but you haven't given any examples of what you would use it on, and how it can help the mix. so far the justification has been: well if you don't have a compressor with a sidechain that isn't soft knee, and well because i like old style compressors but instead of actually using one, we'll fake it. how does that make sense in any practical way? my applications could be used with anybody's dynamics processors, and you're giving me this in return: "well in the event you want to use a compressor that doesn't have the right sound" technique. seriously, that's what you are actually using as an example. it's kinda blowing my mind. no matter how correct your numbers are, or how many different ways you can do something, is it really helping anybody to point out that it can be done but not even cite an actual (real life) example?
i'm sorry guys, i don't get it at all. please, forgive me for being so blunt. it's like to me you want to hold a mallet with a wrench to drive a nail, instead of using an actual hammer. at this point, i simply have to just straight up admit, that i'm not advanced enough at this to get what you are talking about. i'd like to, and a real life application would help me out here fellas. i fully endorse that what you have written is a good theory worth exploring as an academic exercise. if you want to write a thesis on this and turn it into your teacher for a letter grade, i'd give you props for thinking this through. but beyond that, my understanding is too limited to see the genius of it.