What exactly is compression?

S

Spitz

New member
Well, I was reading the reverb thread a while ago and someone mentioned that reverb is as abused as compression.

While I know what reverb is, I have very little understanding of what compression is and what it does to an audio track. And after that someone said that it is "abused" as well, I thought, "hell, there might be something good about compression after all!"

Can anyone clear me up on this?

Thanks! :)
 
thread calling southsideglen, thread calling southsideglen..............

he wrote a thang called compression uncompressed & although I've not read it yet (due to laziness in downloading what I need) it would tell you quite a bit about compression

over to Glen..............
 
Imagine a hand on a volume control and every time there is a loud peak in a track, the hand adjusts the volume to compensate. That's basically what a compressor does. Precise volume attenuation. A volume peak reducer or peak remover (if set as a limiter). A limiter reacts to peaks so fast, they kind of get chopped off.

Depending on how the controls are set, compression can have audible side effects which can be desirable or not so desirable like distortion, pumping, a brickwall sound, etc. When a large amount of compression is applied, the loudest parts of a track are reduced in volume and brought closer to the volume level of the quietest parts of the track so the lower volume parts of the track will seem louder.

The threshold control sets the point at which the compression kicks in. For example, the imaginary hand begins turning down the volume when the track volume reaches -13 db, or -3db, or.........your choice. 0 db being about the loudest useful volume in the digital world.

The ratio control sets the amount of compression to be applied. For example, you set the threshold to -13 db and the ratio to 2:1. When the track volume reaches -13 db, a ratio of 2:1 compression is applied to the signal. 10:1 would be more compression than 2:1.

(think of the threshold as the volume level at which the compression will be applied and the ratio as the amount of compression that will be applied.)

The attack control sets the speed at which the imaginary hand turns down the volume. For example, you want the volume level adjusted very quickly so you set the attack to 2 ms.

The release control sets the speed at which the imaginary hand turns the volume back up after attenuating the volume.

If you can imagine how many different ways the imaginary hand on the volume control can react, then you'll have an idea of what some of the effects of compression sound like.
 
TravisinFlorida said:
oh yea, almost forgot........some people think compression has ruined modern music. can't forget to mention that.
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I ruin my music with, or without a compressor... :eek:
 
Dogman said:
I ruin my music with, or without a compressor... :eek:
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yea, i don't need no fancy compressor to help me screw up my sound either. i do a pretty good job of that with crappy playing and bad mic placement.
 
I only hve he software compressor that comes with Sonar 5 PE. It totally conffuses the crap out of me. Sometimes it just seems to act like volume or gain. Maybe its crap and one needs a hardware compressor the hear it correctly. As of now I hav'nt been using it all not, don't know enough to know if I'm missing out. Though things seems OK. But I'm sure I just need practice more with it.. I'm going to read those threads now.
 
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SouthSIDE Glen said:
| Download the full-length tutorial on compression
| that's linked to in my signature line.
|
v G.
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dude.........................are you on drugs????

just that you're not in the habit of repeating yourself :D
 
SouthSIDE Glen said:
It was an accidental double-post that I deleted inside of a minute. You're just too damn quick for me :o .

G.
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MWAHAHAHA

you've got to be living where I am

so you're not on drugs then :D ;) ;)










































neither am I.........................anymore.........................feels strange being straight..........................anyway this has nothing to do with compression :rolleyes:
 
slidey said:
so you're not on drugs then :D ;) ;)
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Nah, with the exception of the very occasional rope hit when one happens to pass within a few feet of me, which is maybe once every ten weeks on average, and the occasional bottle of wine with dinner, which happens about as often, I don't drink or drug any longer. It simply gets to be too much of a pain in the ass after a while.

Besides, that post was something like 10:30am my time I think. Waaay to early for anything anyway.

Now if I can just quit the damn tobacco... :( .

G.
 
SouthSIDE Glen said:
Nah, with the exception of the very occasional rope hit when one happens to pass within a few feet of me, which is maybe once every ten weeks on average, and the occasional bottle of wine with dinner, which happens about as often, I don't drink or drug any longer. It simply gets to be too much of a pain in the ass after a while.

Besides, that post was something like 10:30am my time I think. Waaay to early for anything anyway.

Now if I can just quit the damn tobacco... :( .

G.
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10:30 is like the middle of the night!!!!!

& tobacco........get yourself a stonking dose of bronchitis!!!!! that'll stop you smoking........................& breathing
 
Compressors have magical powers, if you know how to use them properly.
They have the ability to help a part sit within a mix, affect the groove in positive ways and stabilise a loose track.
If you know your stuff you can gel tracks together in a mix, seemingly to defy logic.
 
RDMSstudio said:
Compressors have magical powers, if you know how to use them properly.
They have the ability to help a part sit within a mix, affect the groove in positive ways and stabilise a loose track.
If you know your stuff you can gel tracks together in a mix, seemingly to defy logic.
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care to ellaborate?
 
RDMSstudio said:
Compressors have magical powers
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I emplore you not to renforce this idea and to disavow it now. :eek: There is already an overload of people who think compressors are magic boxes that'll do their engineering for them, we don't need to reenforce this rampant misunderstanding with statements like this.

G.
 
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