Compression

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Tide

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I own a recording studio, yet compression seems to be my nemesis, are there any good links that would benefit me to the pleasures of using compression and gating. I'm looking for that professional studio sound and someone with some expertice on compression would greatly benefit me. One area would be should compression/gating be used during recording or mix down. thanks for the inputs
 
Try a search on the BBS. I found some interesting things by doing that. But the thing that has helped me the most is to play with the the compressoe and see how each knob on the affects the sound. It also can give you a good feel of your compressor. Try compressing the hell out of something. Then try less attack. Ect...... That is how I somewhat got a hold of what to do. Although I'm still getting the hang of doing it. I just remember not to over do it.
 
Thanks for the input, I really appreciate it, you wouldn't have any input on recording drums would you, I'm about so fed up with trying to get the best tonal quality out of an acoustic set of drums...(Rogers), that I am thinking of purchasing an electric drum set and set in the sound I want...LOL, whatcha think would be appreciated....

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by copper96:
Try a search on the BBS. I found some interesting things by doing that. But the thing that has helped me the most is to play with the the compressoe and see how each knob on the affects the sound. It also can give you a good feel of your compressor. Try compressing the hell out of something. Then try less attack. Ect...... That is how I somewhat got a hold of what to do. Although I'm still getting the hang of doing it. I just remember not to over do it.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
 
hey TIDE, ROLL TIDE from Mt Olive, Al !!

I share your difficulty with getting a decent,acceptable sound from an accoustic kit. I have tried every technique that I could think of or read about, all damping and tuning setups and I'm still not satisfied.

My son has a Roland Electronic kit that I fed into my Mackie / XT setup and----- This will be my next major purchase-- Some brand of elec kit.( when I can come up with a couple grand )
 
Hey Tide,

Most make the mistake of putting the microphone entirely too close to the a drum while recording. The problem with this is that it is like putting your ear right next to the drum. Try doing this sometime. You will then get a feel for what the microphone is going through.

Pulling the mics back to anywhere from 6-8" from the drum will produce more natural sounding recordings. You will definately get more room sound as well as more of the overall sound of the drum.

I can never stress enough the tuning of the drum. Most drummers do not know how to tune a drum. Some of the local "experts" don't know how to tune drums. I can't counnt the number of drummers I have worked with who never touch their bottom heads, and who will just turn one lug on the top.

A few tips on tuning.

1 - Both heads should be almost the same exact pitch. To get more resonance, bring the bottom heads pitch down a bit. For less resonance, tune it up a bit. When I say a bit, I mean just a bit.

2 - While tuning, place your finger very lightly on the center of the head and then use a stick to tap about 1-2" from the rim at all the lugs. Tune so that all the spots by a lug are the same pitch.

3 - Thicker heads will have less resonance that you can actually hear. Their weight keeps the shell from doing it's job. Clear batter heads on top and bottom on toms usually give the best resonance. On a snare, clear batter on bottom, and coated batter on top.

Good luck.

Ed Rei
Echo Star Studio www.echostarstudio.com

P.S. I have quite a few songs available for download on my site. In particular, if you want to hear the result of above tuning techniques, download something by The Heavy Brothers, or Love Lode (any of them except Changes and Fear as I did not record the drums on those two) Go to www.echostarstudio.com/Download.html and click on the speaker next to the song that you want to download.
 
Does anybody have any links to the actual articles on prorec.com pertaining to compression?
 
thanks for all you input, if you guys would like to check out my website, feel free at http://www.freeyellow.com/members5/sweetwaterproductions

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by kmarsh:
hey TIDE, ROLL TIDE from Mt Olive, Al !!

I share your difficulty with getting a decent,acceptable sound from an accoustic kit. I have tried every technique that I could think of or read about, all damping and tuning setups and I'm still not satisfied.

My son has a Roland Electronic kit that I fed into my Mackie / XT setup and----- This will be my next major purchase-- Some brand of elec kit.( when I can come up with a couple grand )<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
 
thank you sonusman for the information, I basically have tried every mike placement known other than sticking the mikes outside the booth and getting a bucket for a kick and a couple of tin cans for the toms..LOL, no seriously, I'll certainly try anything at this point. Again thanks for the input...

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by sonusman:
Hey Tide,

Most make the mistake of putting the microphone entirely too close to the a drum while recording. The problem with this is that it is like putting your ear right next to the drum. Try doing this sometime. You will then get a feel for what the microphone is going through.

Pulling the mics back to anywhere from 6-8" from the drum will produce more natural sounding recordings. You will definately get more room sound as well as more of the overall sound of the drum.

I can never stress enough the tuning of the drum. Most drummers do not know how to tune a drum. Some of the local "experts" don't know how to tune drums. I can't counnt the number of drummers I have worked with who never touch their bottom heads, and who will just turn one lug on the top.

A few tips on tuning.

1 - Both heads should be almost the same exact pitch. To get more resonance, bring the bottom heads pitch down a bit. For less resonance, tune it up a bit. When I say a bit, I mean just a bit.

2 - While tuning, place your finger very lightly on the center of the head and then use a stick to tap about 1-2" from the rim at all the lugs. Tune so that all the spots by a lug are the same pitch.

3 - Thicker heads will have less resonance that you can actually hear. Their weight keeps the shell from doing it's job. Clear batter heads on top and bottom on toms usually give the best resonance. On a snare, clear batter on bottom, and coated batter on top.

Good luck.

Ed Rei
Echo Star Studio www.echostarstudio.com

P.S. I have quite a few songs available for download on my site. In particular, if you want to hear the result of above tuning techniques, download something by The Heavy Brothers, or Love Lode (any of them except Changes and Fear as I did not record the drums on those two) Go to www.echostarstudio.com/Download.html and click on the speaker next to the song that you want to download.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>
 
Read the "White Paper" on compression, over at the dbx website: http://dbxpro.com/compression101.htm for an excellent and highly readable overview of how to use compression. Also gives settings for certain tough situations, and outlines some of the common problems of using compression.
 
well what everyone is telling you the right stuff, cause i was there like 5 mos. ago and ill say it again, the first education on recording in my opinion is:
1.mic placement
2.eq
3.compression
then go from there, but to get to your question i was in a session and i was in a situation where (now keep in mind when i first started i had a hard time hearing what the compressor did so....)i had to mic a shaker, i used a AKGC1000s, and the ALESIS 3630, and started tweeking the compressor and oh man i saw the light i actually heard every move the compressor made and thats how i figured it out, try and let me know if it works.
Jal
 
I just got home from a session and am fresh with drum micing stuff. Tonigh, I mic'd the bass drum with an akg d-112 and ran it through a tl audio tube pre. drove the pre to almost distortion and used the attack on the compressor to shave a little of it off. My ratio was around 5:1 a with a moderately fast release. snare was compressed 3:1 and softly limited also doing the same touch of distortion trick. Overheads (AT3525's)went through stereo compression and digitech class a tube pre first with a 4:1 ratio medium fast attack and fast release. I had them "looking" at each half of the drumset at a pont where they caught a bit of everything. The threshold was set at -10 about and there was a sidechain filter so the bass drum's bass wouldn't trigger compression. I leave the toms open i don't know why but i do. they ring enough on their own, sound fine, and don't bleed enough to call it unmusical.

I also mic'd the bass drum with an ev-pl20 and fed it into the pa system(4000+ watts)through a pair of 15" subs and 18" subs. Boom it went!! I mic'd the snare with a sm58 with the ball off and had it looking kind of at the drummer's crotch instead of the head. Kind of accross the drum more pop less ring more snare....who cares floor tom mic was a 57 aimed at the center of the head and 6 inches away. the single rack tom was mic'd with a 57 about 2 inches from the head similar to the snare--some ring more head

This worked for me and the music, rather, the song I was working on at the time but i hope it helps. At mixdown i will probably do a stereo submix of the drums and run em through a tube pre or light compression most likely pre though.
 
Check out the "Compressor 101" article at this site, for an EXCELLENT overview of compression and how to use it:
http://dbxpro.com and then head for the compression section.
 
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