M
Mistral
RyosaMusic
Deep........
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
Massive Master John hit it out of the park when he said that presets help keep one from actually learning how the device works and in turn saps one of opportunities being able to train their ears.
On the other side of that coin is exactly what ryan said; once one actually has practiced ears and knows how things sound, presets are simply unnecessary.
As far as presets providing a good starting point, may I point out that any knob already has three preset starting points built into it, and that an extra presets knob is simply extraneous and unnecessary? Those three preset positions are: all the way down, halfway up, and all the way up.
One can just as easily start at any of those locations as they can with any arbtrary "preset" starting point and still tweak in just as successfully. And it has the add advantage of actually knowing where you're starting from and observing and learning what it takes to get to where you want to be. It's much harder - or at least not so in your face obvious - when you start with the "electric guitar position 3" and tweak from there.
What the hell is "electric guitar position 3" anyway, and why was it created to begin with? I mean, just read these boards for a week and you'll see that it is *very* unusual for any two engineers to agree on what they think the best thing to do with an electric is. What makes the guy who programmed the presets any more God like in that subjective decision?
On a related idea, presets can also inadvertantly stunt creativity. Do you really want your guitar to sound the same way or one of only 3 or 5 or 7 ways all the time? Sure you can tweak beyond the presets, but once you do that you don't need the presets any more (see above.)
And finally, mshilarious brings up a good point that this stuff applies mostly to volume, compression and equalization. Except for the real golden-fingered tweakheads (can you say Brian Eno? I knew you could
), reverb is kind of a different animal with regard to presets. Usually if we want a plate reverb, one of the 3 plates we have available to us on a quality verb will usuually give us exactly what wen need.
Presets are the beginning of the end of Western civilization. I'll let others argue as to whether that's a good thing or not
.
G.
On the other side of that coin is exactly what ryan said; once one actually has practiced ears and knows how things sound, presets are simply unnecessary.
As far as presets providing a good starting point, may I point out that any knob already has three preset starting points built into it, and that an extra presets knob is simply extraneous and unnecessary? Those three preset positions are: all the way down, halfway up, and all the way up.
One can just as easily start at any of those locations as they can with any arbtrary "preset" starting point and still tweak in just as successfully. And it has the add advantage of actually knowing where you're starting from and observing and learning what it takes to get to where you want to be. It's much harder - or at least not so in your face obvious - when you start with the "electric guitar position 3" and tweak from there.
What the hell is "electric guitar position 3" anyway, and why was it created to begin with? I mean, just read these boards for a week and you'll see that it is *very* unusual for any two engineers to agree on what they think the best thing to do with an electric is. What makes the guy who programmed the presets any more God like in that subjective decision?
On a related idea, presets can also inadvertantly stunt creativity. Do you really want your guitar to sound the same way or one of only 3 or 5 or 7 ways all the time? Sure you can tweak beyond the presets, but once you do that you don't need the presets any more (see above.)
And finally, mshilarious brings up a good point that this stuff applies mostly to volume, compression and equalization. Except for the real golden-fingered tweakheads (can you say Brian Eno? I knew you could
), reverb is kind of a different animal with regard to presets. Usually if we want a plate reverb, one of the 3 plates we have available to us on a quality verb will usuually give us exactly what wen need.Presets are the beginning of the end of Western civilization. I'll let others argue as to whether that's a good thing or not
.G.
X
xstatic
New member
I say go ahead and try it, just don't be afraid to change it, at least to see if you can make it better. Generally EQ presets will need change (well almost always) but every once in a while, they just may work. Reverbs are a lot easier to get away with using presets, and compressors can get you pretty close. The problem is that everyones stuff sounds different, is recorded different, and at different levels no less. This creates issues with compressors concerning things like thresholds. I do like using presets to quickly see what a plug in will do. I like to see what the manufacturer considers the usable and unusable limits of the specific plug in. In general though, after this initial stage, I resort to making my own presets. With simple basic plug ins (UAD 1176, LA2a, Pultec) I do not even bother. With more complexed plugins (Golden audio channel, waves audiotrack etc...) I make presets. The reason I do this is not so much for the EQ points and boosts and cuts, but because there are often multiple things that I typically need to set up on each that controls its functionality. For instance, in the Golden channel. I have to select each EQ curve for each of 8 bands of EQ, the type of EQ I want, the type of compression setting etc... 1 click to load a preset is far more efficient than the two dozen or so clicks just to format the plug in before I can even use it. I think it is important to remember that presets are there for us as a starting point, and not necessarily as a fix all. A bass compressor preset can be useful. Many people tend to gravitate towards certain settings for certain things. There will still be some tweaking to be done, but thats perfectly acceptable. If you are just blindly throwing presets on something though without giving it proper thought and trying some adjustments of your own, then you are selling yourself short and robbing yourself of all those opportunities to learn.
peopleperson
I'm so sorry.
Whatever works, works.
Geesh.
Geesh.
slidey
New member
peopleperson said:
didn't Al Schmit say "I just turn the knobs till' it sounds right"
X
xstatic
New member
peopleperson said:
I think that is the point of most of the comments in this thread so far. To take your comment one step farther though, maybe it shoudl "whatever works the best". Many of the posts in this thread are about the fact that presets rarely are what actually work the best. Following that logic, every post here is in agreement with your comment
noisewreck
New member
Good point, but one doesn't have to know how to make pasta noodles from scratch to make one mean Linguine PomodoroSouthSIDE Glen said:
B
Bulls Hit
Well-known member
Some excellent points made here. I particularly like that 'painting by numbers' analogy. I agree that diving straight for the presets every time is self defeating.
However in my case, recording drums in the back room for the last 4 years, I've been tweaking and experimenting with the native Cakewalk plugs to try & get a decent drum sound. I've used different heads, mics, mic positions, experimented with Drumagog samples etc. etc. The drums sound good in the room, but I've struggled to get that sound onto the hard disk.
When I got the uad card, before I'd bought any of the optional plugs, I opened up the channel strip. It's got, like 40 or 50 knobs, buttons etc to fiddle with so I pulled up a preset on the snare mic. To put it simply, I was gobsmacked. I'm sure everyone here has heard the lifeless pop of a 57 an inch from the rim on a snare. Well this preset changed that so I could suddenly hear just about the whole damn kit through the 57. And it sounded Great. I could have thrown the rest of the drum tracks away - the kick, snare and that preset had given me a sound I hadn't been able to achieve in 4 years.
I know not all presets are as useful, but suffice it to say I'm pretty happy with this one
However in my case, recording drums in the back room for the last 4 years, I've been tweaking and experimenting with the native Cakewalk plugs to try & get a decent drum sound. I've used different heads, mics, mic positions, experimented with Drumagog samples etc. etc. The drums sound good in the room, but I've struggled to get that sound onto the hard disk.
When I got the uad card, before I'd bought any of the optional plugs, I opened up the channel strip. It's got, like 40 or 50 knobs, buttons etc to fiddle with so I pulled up a preset on the snare mic. To put it simply, I was gobsmacked. I'm sure everyone here has heard the lifeless pop of a 57 an inch from the rim on a snare. Well this preset changed that so I could suddenly hear just about the whole damn kit through the 57. And it sounded Great. I could have thrown the rest of the drum tracks away - the kick, snare and that preset had given me a sound I hadn't been able to achieve in 4 years.
I know not all presets are as useful, but suffice it to say I'm pretty happy with this one
Massive Master
www.massivemastering.com
And that's wonderful - But hopefully, you've studied what the preset is doing and understand it.
So if that preset didn't exist, you could still make it happen...
So if that preset didn't exist, you could still make it happen...
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
You're right, they don't. But I think that's a faulty and misleading analogy, because there's nothing that says that the pasta provided by the presets is any good to begin with. One could pick a "pasta" preset and have mueslix come out the other end.noisewreck said:Good point, but one doesn't have to know how to make pasta noodles from scratch to make one mean Linguine Pomodoro
That's the problem with presets in a nutshell; their names are meaningless. It is just not possible for some design and marketing engineer a thousand miles away and a couple of years before the fact to know what my guitar or vocal is going to need today. If they get it even close, it's frankly a miracle.
Presets are for those that fall into the trap of believing that there are common, regular settings for everything, that vocals need to be compressed to 4:1, that doubled guitars always need to be hard panned to the walls, that there are specific recipes that can be followed. Life just doesn't work that way, and neither does engineering. Easy Buttons are a myth.
Presets were deveolped strictly for marketing and sales purposes, not for engineering purposes. They were meant as a way to sell equipment to folks who might never buy them otherwise because they don't have either the skills, the training or the patience to properly use them. Their only purpose in life is to expand the manufacturer's market by irresponsibly putting engineering tools into the hands of non-engineers. The fact is that anybody who truely knows how to use a compressor or an EQ simply has no need for manufacturer presets.
Presets only by occaional luck give one the proper solution to their problem, they teach the user even less about why they do or don't work when they are used, and they tend to make one dependant upon them.
In that last dependancy way they are no different than the auto-dialer in your cell phone. Every preset on your EQ or compressor is like a phone listing in you auto-dialer. Ask yourself an honest question: out of all the phone numbers in your cell phone, for how many of them do you actually know the phone number? I'll bet for the average person there's maybe a half dozen or so numbers for work and close friends and family that they actually know, and then there's a whole long list of numbers for which they might not even be sure of the area code, let alone the exchange. What happens when your battery dies or you lose your phone and you need to use someone else's phone or, God forbid, an actual landline phone. You have no idea how to call them because you have no idea how to actually dial the phone. It's no different with EQs and compressors. As soon as you start to deal with someone else's tracking, or working with someone else's gear, and your comfy home presets no longer apply or are no longer just an auto-dial away, you have no idea how to actually use the compressor.
No good comes from presets.
G.
noisewreck
New member
Yep, there is... they're called earsSouthSIDE Glen said:
The cell phone analogy isn't that great either (yes, I agree with you, the pasta isn't the best, just promoting conversation here)... the stored numbers in the cell phone are not that different from a rolodex (cheat sheet), a phone book (session/studio notes), and speed dial on the old clunky landline phones, specially those made for old people (interesting FX chain diagrams... just in case, cuz you stumbled on a killer combo) ... Speaking of old people, they have hard time remembering what they said a second ago... you think they remember any numbers no matter where they're written? So, those that can memorise phone numbers do, those that don't... well...
Regardless, I'm one of those people that doesn't use presets on synths, let alone signal processors as they're never what i'm looking for... * However, to say categorically that just because you found a preset that works all of a sudden you're the type that is lazy, unimaginative, uncreative and won't learn how to use the said processor is going waaaaayyyyy too far. I can understand the root of some of this mentality though... ... the old guard mentality, the ones that had to learn the hard way, didn't have the luxury of automatic transmission (ugh... I hate those with a passion... the automatic transmissions that is)... didn't have the luxury of instant recall, and all those niceties, somehow have this thing ingrained in them that unless you use an abacus, you're not really learning the finer points of calculus
And I say, who cares? Who cares that you don't know how to calculate the square root of 2 manually to the 1/100000000000, it's the end result that counts.
So, in the end, if a preset works, GREAT! If it doesn't, well then you adjust the said signal processor to your liking (and thus learn it in the process). I just don't see why one is mutually exclusive of the other.
Just remember, always start with vine ripened, fresh organic tomatoes, and ease off on pesticides
----------------
*Actually that's a lie. There is a Reaktor ensemble called Cube that has one preset that I use from time to time w/o any alterations whatsoever.
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jmorris
New member
Thats basically what he said he is doing, starting with pre sets then tweakingmx_mx said:
Dogman
Unkle Ticklefingers
I will give a resounding YES......many great pieces of info here.....
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
Honest question here, not meaning to sound derrogatory, just trying to be honest: Do you really believe that 90% of the folks who regularly use presets have reliable ears? More of an exploration of this in a moment...noisewreck said:Yep, there is... they're called ears
It's not a question of having to learn "the hard way", it's a question of having to learn, period. There is nothing "hard" about learning to use an EQ or a compressor properly and to it's maximum effect. It's not calculus. It's easy.noisewreck said:the old guard mentality, the ones that had to learn the hard way, didn't have the luxury of automatic transmission (ugh... I hate those with a passion... the automatic transmissions that is)... didn't have the luxury of instant recall, and all those niceties, somehow have this thing ingrained in them that unless you use an abacus, you're not really learning the finer points of calculus
All it takes is training one's ears to listen inside the sound and the music and not just the surface of the song, and then learning just how the dials on any given box are related to those sounds. That sounds like a tall order, but it's not.
The first part - having the "ears" - should be the automatic #1 given for anybody to have before even laying their paws on a project studio level signal processor. If that basic rule were followed, there'd be no need for this board, and there's be no need for the turgid crap the the industry churns out as Top40 music these days.
Once one has the ears of a real musician or real - I won't say engineer, let's say "audiophile" - the second part, learning the knobs, is a walk in the park. It's not "the hard way", it's the easy way and in fact the only way.
On the other hand, it's because folks regularly put the cart before the horse - getting the gear before they are ready to use it - that they keep showing up in these forums asking inane questions like "what's the best compression setting for vocals?", "should I EQ before or after I mix?", or even, "how do I use my Waves bundle?" If they got their ears before they got their gear, they would never need to even ask these questions. They'd listen to their tracks, analyze them with their ears, and almost instinctively recognize that "man, there's a lot of mud somewhere in the 400Hz area and that hi hat is stepping all over the vocal definition" and thy'd make adjustments to their EQ and compression faster and far more accurately than most can find a preset on a list of pull down menu selections and tweak from there.
It doesn't take a whole lot to get to that point, quite frankly. All it takes is an attention span longer than your average music video, a lack of natural tone-deafness, and a month of rudimentary exercises with your favorite processors and you're already ahead of 99% of the rookies on this board and even ahead 50% of the "pros". and your mixes will be 200% better than they were a month earlier when leaning on presets.
Because if you don't pay attention to just what settings the preset represents and what they actually mean, you'll never know where you started and never learn why the tweaks were needed. If you have no idea what "Guitar presence 2" actually means and why, you'll never know how to actually use a compressor to it's best effect.noisewreck said:
I'll grant you that if a preset works, great...on two conditions; if the user actually has the ears qualified enough to judge whether it sounds great or not, and that they understand why that preset sounds great. The Catch 22 of that is once a person's ears and knowledge are at that level (and remember, if done properly, that level can be attained in a very short period of time), they then will be of a level of understanding and operation where that preset is now superfluous and unnecessary. They will recoginize that they can more often than not, do better than the preset and do it without having to find the preset first.
But if they don't meet the first condition - having the ears - then they will be constantly wondering why their mixes just don't meet their expectations and will constantly be looking for scapegoats in their signal chain.
If the don't reach the second level of understanding the cause-and-effect of actual knob settings and the resulting sound and know only canned preset names and effects, then they will never be able to get their real money's worth out of their processor because they will never have a real understanding of the feel for driving it. They will also never understand that getting a sound halfway between "Guitar 1" and "Guitar 2" often does not mean setting the knobs halfway between the two presets.
And finally, for those who are about to reply, "Geez, lighten up. This is only home recording and for some is only a fun hobby; not everybody wants to learn much beyond the presets and we're perfectly happy with the results we get from them," I reply thats wonderful, that's great, I'm happy as a pig in slop for you. There's nothing at all wrong with that. But when it comes time to ask why after working on a mix for weeks and trying all sorts of advice that you just cant get the sound you would want, if you read this post at any time in the past, you know what the answer is.
G.
R
RAMI
Guest
"What's wrong with presets anyway?"
Well, the main problem is that none of them go up to 11.
Well, the main problem is that none of them go up to 11.
T
The549
a hack
That's actually going on my album. Ha. I love punk.
I think it's really important to be able to capture an accurate sound without EQ. Because i think that tweaking a snare reso head and a perfect minute twist of 10 lugs and a nice set of heads/drums/sounds in general will always end up sounding much better. If you want a tube amp....get one....don't fx it in for God's sake.
Add your presets etc in AFTER that, and you'll have that much better sound.
I think it's really important to be able to capture an accurate sound without EQ. Because i think that tweaking a snare reso head and a perfect minute twist of 10 lugs and a nice set of heads/drums/sounds in general will always end up sounding much better. If you want a tube amp....get one....don't fx it in for God's sake.
Add your presets etc in AFTER that, and you'll have that much better sound.
noisewreck
New member
Woops, SSG, I was editing my post while you posted, so sorry for the confusion... in any case, I just added some stuff, nothing that changed anything substantially in my post.
Which comes back to your point of actually having the ears to be able to tell. My contention is, if you're able to tell by ear, then it doesn't matter how you got the sound you got. In fact, if you have the ear to tell you that something actually NEEDS a compressor, you're already 50% there. If you can also tell WHICH compressor in your arsenal that particular something needs, you're 90% there. Once the compressor is loaded, what does it matter whether you selected a preset, or adjusted the settings by hand to get the particular sound you were after? For example, let's say you purchased a new distortion plugin, loaded some different audio clips in a sequencer (let's say a drum loop that you knicked off an 80's rock song) a vocal, some ho-hum guitars... and then started auditioning the presets, noting what works where. What's the problem with loading that distortion plugin 4 months later, dialing the preset that you noted did the particular thing that it did and just went about your business?
But that goes beyond the signal processor... having the "ears" should be #1 given for anyone dealing with any aspect of music. Period... but then again, as you say, listen to todays Top 40
Well, in order to learn, one has to use the gear and ask inane questions. On another music related forum I frequent some months ago someone resurrected an old thread (think it was about 3 years old or so). The person starting the topic had asked some rather naive questions about using EQ (if I remember correctly it was exactly the type of question you scoff at, such as "should I use EQ before compression or the other way around"). He's now one of the top producers in his genre, now having other people asking questions on how HE gets the sounds that he does Those kinds of questions may be pointless to you, but it's very similar to the question I get from people who have never driven a car with a manual transmission: "how do you know when to shift gears, and what gear is necessary?". I have a hard time answering it, I just do based on the feedback I get from the car and exactly what I want to do at a given moment.
Another thing, if one doesn't ask inane questions like that, one might never get people to tell them "well, actually if you cut around such and such frequency rather than boost at the other frequency, you'll get your desired results in a more musical, transparent manner". Those kinds of things for example are not immediately apparent, no matter how good an ear you have.
But why are you assuming that a person using a preset doesn't pay attention? OK, I get your 90%/10% thing above, but I still believe that presets have nothing to do with it. Presets don't make people lazy. People are lazy by nature in general.
In the end you and I agree a lot more than disagree... the rest is just nitpicking
I get your point completely, but you're thinking backwards. I'd say that 90% of the people doing music (pro and amature alike) don't have reliable ears regardless whether they use presets or not. By the same token, the other 10% of the people that use presets, actually study them in great detail, and reverse engineer a lot of them. This is a great way to learn!SouthSIDE Glen said:
A good friend of mine, an industrial manufacturing engineer would disagree. He has no problem making difficult (for you and I) calculations by hand, or in his head, but can't tell the difference between triangle and square waves... well that's not entirely true... he CAN tell the difference and can construct the formulae for generating them, but can't tell the difference in soundSouthSIDE Glen said:
Which comes back to your point of actually having the ears to be able to tell. My contention is, if you're able to tell by ear, then it doesn't matter how you got the sound you got. In fact, if you have the ear to tell you that something actually NEEDS a compressor, you're already 50% there. If you can also tell WHICH compressor in your arsenal that particular something needs, you're 90% there. Once the compressor is loaded, what does it matter whether you selected a preset, or adjusted the settings by hand to get the particular sound you were after? For example, let's say you purchased a new distortion plugin, loaded some different audio clips in a sequencer (let's say a drum loop that you knicked off an 80's rock song) a vocal, some ho-hum guitars... and then started auditioning the presets, noting what works where. What's the problem with loading that distortion plugin 4 months later, dialing the preset that you noted did the particular thing that it did and just went about your business?
Sounds like a no-brainer to meSouthSIDE Glen said:
But that goes beyond the signal processor... having the "ears" should be #1 given for anyone dealing with any aspect of music. Period... but then again, as you say, listen to todays Top 40 SouthSIDE Glen said:
Well, in order to learn, one has to use the gear and ask inane questions. On another music related forum I frequent some months ago someone resurrected an old thread (think it was about 3 years old or so). The person starting the topic had asked some rather naive questions about using EQ (if I remember correctly it was exactly the type of question you scoff at, such as "should I use EQ before compression or the other way around"). He's now one of the top producers in his genre, now having other people asking questions on how HE gets the sounds that he does
Those kinds of questions may be pointless to you, but it's very similar to the question I get from people who have never driven a car with a manual transmission: "how do you know when to shift gears, and what gear is necessary?". I have a hard time answering it, I just do based on the feedback I get from the car and exactly what I want to do at a given moment.Another thing, if one doesn't ask inane questions like that, one might never get people to tell them "well, actually if you cut around such and such frequency rather than boost at the other frequency, you'll get your desired results in a more musical, transparent manner". Those kinds of things for example are not immediately apparent, no matter how good an ear you have.
SouthSIDE Glen said:
But why are you assuming that a person using a preset doesn't pay attention? OK, I get your 90%/10% thing above, but I still believe that presets have nothing to do with it. Presets don't make people lazy. People are lazy by nature in general.
Indeed. However as I gave you the scenario where our theoretical user has already auditioned certain presets and has made note of them and knows what to expect, presets are great time savers.SouthSIDE Glen said:
In the end you and I agree a lot more than disagree... the rest is just nitpicking
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DavidK
New member
Presets kick ass, I use em all the time.
I hear this the most with Keyboards and its absolute hogwash: A lot of Keyboards have a lot of great patches. I get good sounds by layering, not by messing with the 1000s of patches I have.
Same thing with reverb: Some of the Waves reverbs sound great and some dont. I, ummm, errr, just use the ones that sound good.
Of course the AMOUNT of verb I use changes constantly. I am not skilled enough with eq to make any significant comment, the ones I use sound better than without them. 
I hear this the most with Keyboards and its absolute hogwash: A lot of Keyboards have a lot of great patches. I get good sounds by layering, not by messing with the 1000s of patches I have.
Same thing with reverb: Some of the Waves reverbs sound great and some dont. I, ummm, errr, just use the ones that sound good.
Of course the AMOUNT of verb I use changes constantly. I am not skilled enough with eq to make any significant comment, the ones I use sound better than without them.
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
Yeah, you're right, after your last post I agree that we are actually closer than seemed at first blush. That happens soooo often in these forums; it's great on occasions like these where we acually recognize that fact after talkingthings out and don't instead let the discussion degrade into hollering and insults back and forthnoisewreck said:In the end you and I agree a lot more than disagree... the rest is just nitpicking
.I do honestly think that there is a findamental difference though that's more than just picking those darn nits. As it goes...
Here we absolutely agree.noisewreck said:
While I agree that reverse engineering presets would be very instructional, I must not be seeing the same 10% that you do. The ones that I see the most are of the ilk where if you took teir presets away from them they'd be literally taking pot shots in the dark with setting the manual controls.noisewreck said:
And I quite frankly got a D in Calculus in college (having the class at 8am didn't helpnoisewreck said:A good friend of mine, an industrial manufacturing engineer would disagree. He has no problem making difficult (for you and I) calculations by hand, or in his head, but can't tell the difference between triangle and square waves... well that's not entirely true... he CAN tell the difference and can construct the formulae for generating them, but can't tell the difference in sound
). I'm not sure just where or why you're linking knowing how to listen to sound and how to use a signal processor without presets to having to be a bookworm engineer or a natural genius. In fact, I think that belief is part of the general problem. There seems to be a general impression among many rookies that to be a great engineer without using presets requires being a rocket scientist. It really is not all that hard, and it doesn't require advance mathematics. If one can add and/or multiply a couple of single digit values, they know all the math they'd ever need to know to understand the mathematics behind the basic controls of compression, for example. But even if they don't know the math, that's OK to. While the math is very simple, and while it helps in underlying understanding, one could just follow their ears and not give a crap about the math and still be an excellent compressor driver.
Again, 100% agreement there.noisewreck said:
Perhaps I was a bit strong when I said inane, and you're right, asking questions is key and a great idea overall, no matter how "inane" they may sound. My only point there was that if one had the ears, 80% of the questions posed would answer themselves. You're right, that some answers are not intuitive; your boost vs. cut is an excellent example of that. But I think of the total number of questions asked in such a vein, more often than not the answer that most of us hold back from actually giving is, "Whatever your ears tell you. And if your ears aren't refined enough to give you the right answer, there's not much else we can do for you."noisewreck said:
As to the first question, as I answered earlier, that has been my observation. There is a reverse observation that I feel supports this too. Anybody who asks, "What compression ratio should I use for vocals?" or, "How should I EQ my kick to make the sound fatter?" is really asking for a preset answer. Maybe not a physical preset that actually exists on their box, but they are asking for a set, formulaic answer. They are asking for a custom preset. If they really knew how things worked they'd know that formulaic answers to those kinds of questions are about as useful as breast implants on a bull. They'd knwo that choosing those as starting points to "reverse engineer" makes things no more easier than picking any other arbitrary starting value and tweaking from there. The very fact that they are asking for a preset indicates that they are not interested in reverse engineering it, They are looking for an instant and gratuitous solution to their problem so they can move on to the next one.noisewreck said:
Sure there will be exceptions; there will be those who do analyze the presets and work from there. I just haven't seen that as more than the minority exception, however.
Maybe it's just how I work, but I honestly just don't see as how when one suspects from listening to a track and watching the meters, for example, that it needs some peak taming of about 3:1 at a threshold just a few dBs of negative FS, and that I have to set the attack fairly fast because it's a rapid transient, that it's faster to scroll through a bunch of presets (either in software or on a hardware dial), remember just which one does what, pick which one comes the closest to what I need, adjustthat to what i really thought it needed, and then tweak from there than it is to simply dial in 3:1 with threshold of -6dB and a fast attack woth auto release, and do final tweaks from there. It just simply seems to me (and I've tried it) that going from the preset is actually a slower and more laborious of a process.noisewreck said:
G.
fraserhutch
Flypaper for freaks
noisewreck said:A good friend of mine, an industrial manufacturing engineer would disagree. He has no problem making difficult (for you and I) calculations by hand, or in his head, but can't tell the difference between triangle and square waves... well that's not entirely true... he CAN tell the difference and can construct the formulae for generating them, but can't tell the difference in sound
I doubt someone who couldn't tell the difference between a square and a triangle wave has any business applying EQ to anything anyways.....
