cfg
Member
I am still very much in the learning stage with Reaper and capturing some rough tracks to experiment on here and there to hone my recording skills. I just tried recording a simple acoustic guitar with a CAD M179, which I understand is a half decent condenser, and the raw track was as flat as anything, truly lifeless. So I started throwing on plug ins, free ones, but good free ones I've discovered after much reading.
After quite a bit of tweaking and tinkering, I actually have a sound that I think is very respectable. The acoustic guitar track (blues/rock style) is now punchy, with real body and presence, and I wouldn't be ashamed to let someone listen to it. Here's the problem. On the track I've got no less than three (probably four) compressors or effects that claim use subtle compression. Now it's not a problem in the sense that I like the sound I've cultivated with the plugins, it's a problem because according to my internal thinking, there is some recording engineering law against stacking so many compression effects. I'm not sure where I got this notion from or whether I just conjured it, but in any event, I can't seem to capture the sound I want from just one compressor, even if it's capable of a lot of compression. From this keyboard, there seems to be some sonic advantage of using smaller quantities of compression across a number of compression (or compression leaning) plugins.
So, what is the prevailing theory on this topic of using more than two or three compressors on a track to get the sound one likes? Is it acceptable? Should I only be concerned with what the listener might think?
After quite a bit of tweaking and tinkering, I actually have a sound that I think is very respectable. The acoustic guitar track (blues/rock style) is now punchy, with real body and presence, and I wouldn't be ashamed to let someone listen to it. Here's the problem. On the track I've got no less than three (probably four) compressors or effects that claim use subtle compression. Now it's not a problem in the sense that I like the sound I've cultivated with the plugins, it's a problem because according to my internal thinking, there is some recording engineering law against stacking so many compression effects. I'm not sure where I got this notion from or whether I just conjured it, but in any event, I can't seem to capture the sound I want from just one compressor, even if it's capable of a lot of compression. From this keyboard, there seems to be some sonic advantage of using smaller quantities of compression across a number of compression (or compression leaning) plugins.
So, what is the prevailing theory on this topic of using more than two or three compressors on a track to get the sound one likes? Is it acceptable? Should I only be concerned with what the listener might think?