All you Beercompressors out there!

 

This is exactly what I wanted to hear! As you type this are you aware that the fabric of the musicverse is collapsing in on itself! :D I mean, it may as well say: to really understand the dynamic level of ("spoken") sound we count the number of unicorn tears collected in the leftmost fairy well so long as more than 57% of dolphins swimming in it say that they are happy with the taste. This gives a good approximation of something related to sound, but we've forgotten wtf this ever was because drugs probably!

Anyway, I'm still looking forward to the diagram. With or without shiny / non-shiny unicorns.

 

I think modern source material confuses newcomers as to why compression is needed in a mix and how it's properly applied. There's not much basic training for most people now in the way I knew it when every instrument was live and needed compression before and after recording. I work mostly ITB these days but a piano part I recorded had notes disappearing and notes jumping out. I could have simply reined in the velocities but I would have lost the expression. It didn't take long to fix. But in a sense it was the culmination of 30 years of listening for this kind of thing to quickly find a solution.

 

For the work I do they prefer not to have stuff compressed since I was more or less a stem factory for certain clients, considering the processing already in samples. This lesson was a game changer for me, flawless explenation from @Satai

 

Not challenging your statement....just genuinely wondering...is it any different than say, using compression on the drum buss...but then compressing again at the master??? I mean if I'm using a drum track based off all one shots from a sample pack and it's been compressed, I'm not going to use it on the drum buss...but it's going to be hit a compressor again somewhere along the way, no?

 

You guys are the best

 

i was talkin bout inserts not busses....to compress a newly bundled buss makes sense to me also when the one shots are all compressed

 

Holy crap, where are my manners?

I suppose you're not talking about the block wiring diagram of the inner components? Because that would be like looking at the anatomy of the internal organs of these dolphins and fairies. You might know more afterwards, but it would also spoil their fascination and magic.

Anyways this is how opto compressors work on principle (different colours for different frequencies)



and this is the measurement of the world's most famous opto compressor, the Universal Audio LA2A

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2019

You compress a signal if you need to. What was done before with the signal is not relevant. Maybe they're also equalized and processed with harmonic enahncement what do you do then? No Equalizing and no more harmonic enhancement .

There are some situations where this technically doesn't make any sense but mostly it's subjective.

 

XD also OMG did you notice how crazy it acts after about -10dB, (skiing accident knee "compression"? =) esp @ 115 Hz? I'm starting to wish they'd used unicorn tears like sensible audio engineers! It rly feels like someone is just making this stuff up for an elaborate prank, or they had a load of spare parts lying around somewhere. Or both.

 

Yep, when I saw this curve for the first time I thought 'who on earth needs such a crappy compression curve?' It turned out there were one or two...

 

If you're going into the details of any technical component you always have to ask what the technical point behind such decisions is because this is everything what those engineers care for if they come to specific conclusions.

This processor is the 3rd generation of the first compressor ever (LA1). LA stands for "Leveling Amplifier" the LA2A is the variation "A" of the second generation the LA2 with a higher signal to noise ratio. The relevant thing is not directly this diagram but more the coherence of the frequencies with the amount of compression and the attack and release times (this is the reason why there are no controllers for that). All behaviors of this thing are proven for the technical use of the frequency ranges of the most common instruments (there is a special version for percussive signals).

To be clear, I do not use this compressor but there were times not so long ago where I've still used it. It were used mostly in broadcasting studios in the early days what should already make someone think about the usability of this thing. All I wanted is to make clear that there are very clear and explainable reasons for the decisions of engineers how they "think" a module has to behave.

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2019

Compression, I'm not sure I do understand it now... I thought it's like pooping, just bear down hard on the stuff 'til you feel the splash.

sorry, i'm a little giddy 'coz i've got a place to live now.

 

Last edited: Mar 5, 2019