I honestly don't remember if it went through the Lavry or the Eclipse. It doesn't really matter. We had created a noise profile for the chain of Converters, Liaison, Mogamis ( ) and Gyratec (in bypass) and switched it on and off later. Did not make a significant difference. I imagine there was one, but I could be wrong, because the noise profile and thus the mess in the phase is far below the hearing threshold. So my brain tells me that I can't really have heard anything here.

The Gyratec was in S-mode, which means there were no tubes in the signal path. Only inductors, capacitors, op-amps, copper, and solder. Well, something like that.

Sure. And there shouldn't be any difference here, except that the phase shift in digital is caused by a mathematically precise delay and in analog by the distance the voltage travels through a coil. But it is measurable and can therefore be reproduced digitally. It is not witchcraft. Nevertheless, it sounds different. No better and no worse. Just different. Not only with the Gyratec. So far, no algorithmic passive EQ emulation has convinced me.

Sure

Thanks for the tip I will try it out. Have heard so far only good about it.

 

Last edited: Jan 21, 2021

Even if the click-bait title suggests it - I'm not talking about marketing trench warfare or without-the-magic-plugin-I-can't-do-my-job bullshit.

Yes, I do, because that's what I'm interested in. Most DSP techniques, with very few exceptions, are ancient, constantly recycled, and can be emulated in matlab. Convolution is also nothing new, and I'm generally not a big fan of convolution processing unless it's absolutely necessary. And yet, some nebula programs have been convincing me for a long time because I can't recreate them. I can do something similar and move on. Next step. No problem. But I like what I hear. Now is a good time to discuss how others see it. If you're not interested in the topic. Cool. Please go further. There is nothing to see here.

 

Examples using tracks from Marc Daniel Nelson MDN+EP8+Multitracks. No automation static mix (all algo).

Spoiler: Session & plugin info:

SESSION NAME: MDN+EP8+Multitracks_99
SAMPLE RATE: 48000.000000
BIT DEPTH: 24-bit
SESSION START TIMECODE: 00:00:00:00
TIMECODE FORMAT: 30 Frame
# OF AUDIO TRACKS: 26
# OF AUDIO CLIPS: 33
# OF AUDIO FILES: 28
P L U G - I N S L I S T I N G
MANUFACTURER PLUG-IN NAME VERSION FORMAT STEMS NUMBER OF INSTANCES
BG Vox Bus________________________________________________________________________________________
Summit Grand Ch 2.5.9 AAX Native Stereo / Stereo 1 active
Main Vocal Strip__________________________________________________________________________________
Weiss Deess 2.5.9 AAX Native Mono / Mono 1 active
Zener-Bender 2.5.9 AAX Native Mono / Mono 1 active
Drun Verb Bus, Vox FX1 bus, Vox FX 2 Bus__________________________________________________________
TSAR-1R Reverb 2.5.9 AAX Native Stereo / Stereo 3 active
Acoustic Guitars Bus______________________________________________________________________________
TSAR-1 Reverb 2.5.9 AAX Native Stereo / Stereo 1 active
Mix Bus___________________________________________________________________________________________
Summit Audio TLA-100A 2.5.10 AAX Native Stereo / Stereo 1 active
Softube CurveBender 2.5.9 AAX Native Stereo / Stereo 1 active
Germanium Comp 2.5.9 AAX Native Stereo / Stereo 1 active

Spoiler: Audio examples 1 thru 3 48K/24bit wave posted on Soundcloud:

Soundcloud still had a short track I created in 2018 using only Reaktor. Used same mix bus FX chain from earlier example with a ratio of 2 and output set to around -7 on the Germanium Comp.

Spoiler: Reaktor Music examples:

Original


With Softube Mix Bus 001 FX chain

 

Last edited: Jan 21, 2021

Jesus Christ Spiderman, it's a figure of speech. And no, I don't think you're Spiderman.

 

Thanks for the clarification: I had understood it. Sounded haughty as usual from you (joking)

 

Is there a Nebula passive eq program (that has a trial mode) that convinces you? I'll be interested in trying to see what can be done with equilibrium. I am sure that your conclusions come from experience but I'm very curious about this since I have AITB Mammooth for Nebula and I'm not sure if I have Magenta too (many years since I don't use Nebula anymore) and I'm pretty sure I nailed (spoiler: not claiming anything ahahahah) the sound with algos at the time but I could be wrong.

Here an excerpt from the DMG Audio developer:
"As soon as you dial in FIR mode, it's all different. You've committed to spending some CPU, and now we can match both phase and magnitude responses. Analoguephase (or the ZL version) give you the phase response from the hardware. The phase response is UNIQUELY DETERMINED by the magnitude response (upto a 180 phaseflip). So, you're getting what the hardware gives you. It's like going and sampling the thing. Same IR = same everything."

I'm inclined to believe to this developer who is very very passionate about equalizers. He literally spent his life studying this matter so
I think (but I could be wrong) that there has to be a way to reproduce a passive eq with an algo eq like Equilibrium. With plugin doctor is possible to see the impulse response of the program and in equilibrium there are settings for messing with pretty much anything. He also says that:

"these are EQs, which have for the past 40 years been designed with the primary goal of minimising harmonic distortion. Design intent with an EQ is ALWAYS linearity first and foremost. EQs are sold with their low THD+N figures displayed prominently.Only notable exception is the Pultec, which you /can/ drive a little, but the Pultec amplifier (it's a passive unit with a post-amp) is entirely AFTER the EQ circuitry, so you can follow equilibrium with a distortion if that gets you in the pocket, without any loss of accuracy.[In other words, there's no distortion modelling, because there's no distortionto speak of. Unless you start building bizarre contrivances to overload the hardware. In the which case all you'll get is straight op-amp clipping out of 99% of units. You'll have a time because not only are they designed to have no distortion, they're also designed to have high headroom."

I don't know the reasons why you're hearing something different, and I sincerely believe you, but as I said I'm also very curious to listen to
these differences and trying to see if it's possible to make them disappear. Maybe it's not but why not trying?

 

Kanye uses R2R version of Serum, so he is one of us!

 

The name Nabula sounds better then Algo

 

I hardly use acqua stuff. most 3rd party programs don't offer trials, but I'll see tonight or tomorrow if there's anything in the acquas that matches what I'm talking about here.

I can't agree with the quote from DMG. If we stay with the topic of inductors, then they do some frequency dependent harmonic distortions under certain circumstances. Distortions with completely chaotic transfer curves (from a mathematical point of view), good luck to emulate them via DSP. So if you have several filter bands in a circuit, and thus several coils, you have many magnetic fields that can influence each other dynamically, i.e. depending on the program, shift resonaces, etc.

I don't know if it has anything to do with what I'm hearing or if nebula can capture and recreate such things at all, so no claims from my side, but the claim that the behavior of hardware EQs can be easily recreated just by using FIR filters is marketing speak. I assume that the guys at DMG are way much smarter than I am, but even they can only describe in DSP what they understand. And there is a lot that is not understood about the behavior of certain audio components. Even by those who develop the devices.

 

Last edited: Jan 21, 2021

I think that he intended that FIR can match the equalizer impulse response minus harmonic distortion and that since these equalizers were designed for having the less disortion possible he found that it was not important to model it. It can be debatable that it's sufficient or not but I don't think that what he said was for marketing since in the Trackcomp 2 compressor he circuit modeled harmonic distorion too. I think is more of a design choice for the reasons that he explained in the excerpt. Anyway it's possible that he will update equilibrium to model distortion too, I'm not sure but I seem to remember that he said it on gearslutz some time ago.

If you have access to AITB Mammooth I could try with that one or I'll wait if you find something for Acqua engine. Thanks for your contribution to this subject, much appreciated!

 

Reminds of Generate, the synth by Newfangled featuring a new oscillator type, based on 'chaos'. If they manage to do that perhaps they are able to emulate the chaotic transfer curves within distortion...