there is air and there is air ....imho
see triggerflippers first post...
see pultec obsession by some people...

i think it needs a scoop somewhere and need slight saturation maybe even homoiphatic noise

 

Last edited: Jul 15, 2024

No Avenger

could you test what brilliance pack does ? please.maybe by time.

EDIT not the rack unit vst , the 2 box's...

 

Last edited: Jul 15, 2024

I think there are a lot of people in the engineering world that like to entertain themselves by drastically overthinking things but hey, different strokes is what makes the world go round.

 

not wrong but blv me im not one of them

 

No prob, found some ancient versions:

Spoiler: RS127 Box

Spoiler: RS127 Rack

Spoiler: and while I was at it RS135

None of them added any harmonics, so they're just simple EQs, measuringwise. Haven't given them a listen just now, only back in the days and there I found them unimpressive and uninstalled them.

 

Last edited: Jul 15, 2024

short reverb or hardware EQ. "air"is just contrast of the correlated high frequencies. use a tasteful ER, instant air without extra peaks like you will inevitably get with most plugin EQ's.hardware EQ is a different story as it also has the same perception as an ER

 

I press the little button on my audio interface that says "Air". I can't hear any difference because my HF hearing is shagged but it must add air because it says "Air". Also, a little light comes on next to it so that must make it sound better. More lights = more pro.

Of course, if I want real air I just jump on my FatBoy TurboTwang 2000 trampoline. Proper air that is.

 

The best air I ever had was on the Thunderbolt coaster at Kennywood park in Pittsburgh. Although the double dip on Jackrabbit was also worthy.

 

For proper Air first Filter the crap out..
no really, Filter it dude.. moa'. That's it.

It's good to have some space between instruments,
the more snug and accurate your filtering is, the better it will all be for the next stages like Compression, and ofc adding Air..

If you boost the high on unfiltered or badly filtered material, you will be boosting all those unwanted freqs,
and so everything will be more confused..

Then there's many ways to add Air on top:
It may be a precise Digital EQ,
It may be a Vintage EQ/Channel emulation - or something in between.

It may be an Harmonic Exciter

It may be a Vintage Comp, or a Tape Sim adding harmonics

It may be some M/S rebalancing in some elements/other..

Know your Tools, and select them to achieve the desired effect.

 

Last edited: Jul 15, 2024

a true poet indeed

man, this plugin doctor thing is so cool.

 

open Windows

 

No doubt. You can also use free Bertom Curve Analyzer for freqs (and phase) and free SPAN to detect harmonics (with a sine wave generator).

 

Cool. already got span, saw the video for bertom, seems easy enough! gonna give it a try

 

Spoiler: bit off-topic

Keep in mind, when you activate the phase display, you need to enter the latency manually. Otherwise it looks like a zigzag pattern

 

@Auen Fred, what you can also do is to add a filtered delta of a parallel saturation. This gives you the option to determine exactly which freq range is saturated and how.

 

Even though I rarely (or ever) have used it in a mix, Bertom Audio Air Shelf is an excellent free alternative to Slate Fresh Air. He released it like a day or two after Slate released Fresh Air back in 2020 (I think?), which I guess was meant as a pique at Slate.

I A-B tested them both back then and Air Shelf sounded better in every single test! It's not the same kind of processor though. Slate Fresh Air is a static EQ with high-frequency saturation (i.e exciter), while Air Shelf is a static high-shelf EQ with a super fast dynamic EQ/transient shaper that removes all high frequency transients that the high-shelf otherwise boosts. This is why it sounds so damn good. You can boost the highs a shit-ton without introducing harsh transients! You can still use the "tame" function to control high-frequency transients even though you are not boosting with the high-shelf, so it's also really good at taming cymbals or bright acoustic guitars or whatever. Try it! It's free, so no harm done if you don't like it.
https://bertomaudio.com/air-shelf.html

Grab his other plugins while you're at it. Vocal Compressor is an excellent recreation of Waves R-Vox (but better IMO), Denoiser Classic is a good zero-latency noise suppressor, Phantom Center is simply a phantom center extractor which you can use as a stereo imager, and EQ Curve Analyzer exactly what it sounds like -- a analyzer that can show you the curves of any EQ you insert sandwiched in-between the two EQ Curve Analyzer instances (doesn't work on EQ's that are dynamic or has saturation).

 

The OP's question is a valid one. However, the thought of loading a plugin and turning up the "air" knob being a direct pathway to putting clarity and hardness into a track is quite amusing...

Standing down the use of those horrendous clippers and brick-wall limiters long enough to think about leaving some dynamic range and breathing room in a mix will be a much more functional path to putting true "air" in a mix. I realize this may seem to be quite a radical approach but it has been used successfully for decades before the loudness wars started... just sayin'...

 

Focusrite Scarlett interfaces have an AIR button that will certainly pump your tires.