Spent the evening getting aquainted with my gear.

Recording Techniques, People Skills, Gear, Recording Spaces, Computers, and DIY

Moderators: drumsound, tomb

Post Reply
User avatar
linus
re-cappin' neve
Posts: 674
Joined: Thu Nov 27, 2003 10:03 pm
Location: New York City
Contact:

Spent the evening getting aquainted with my gear.

Post by linus » Mon Nov 07, 2005 8:09 pm

Worked on a song tonight and got it to the point to laying down rough mixes. I recorded the same mix 8 times with varying levels of compression across the mix. It was really a good exercise in learning this piece of gear. In this case it was a BBC compressor made by Glennsound. I got it off Ebay after leaving Studio G one night. Joel has the same one and while there I realised I had bid against Joel for his when he had bought it a couple years before.

I haven't really used compression across the whole mix before (usually compressed during tracking or on individual tracks while mixing). I'm sure others would find it really boring but I was surprised by a couple things:
1) How hard it was to really make the mix sound BAD. Yeah, I finally squashed it so hard it was pumping like a SOB and the track had lost depth but it was still listenable. (kind of nice in a weird way)

2) I was able to get quite a bit of thickening of the track before it flattened out and got weird.


I also spent part of the afternoon recording through a pair of Auditronics 110B mic pre/EQs I bought a while ago. The input control is a bit course. It is a step attenuator but the jumps in gain between settings was pretty large. I found that I had to turn down the source (guitar amp) because one setting on the Auditronics input was too loud and the next one down too soft.

The overall sound was great. Very pleasant and the best part was the EQs. They really were very useful. I ended up tracking with the EQ off but I was happy with them when I was experimenting.

I have several other pieces of gear that I really need to get aquainted with. Anytime I start lusting after more gear I need to remind myself that I have lots of gear I barely know. I can almost hear my Mom saying, "But you have LOTS of toys AT HOME! You don't NEED anymore!"

User avatar
soundguy
ghost haunting audio students
Posts: 3182
Joined: Wed May 07, 2003 12:50 pm
Location: NYC
Contact:

Re: Spent the evening getting aquainted with my gear.

Post by soundguy » Mon Nov 07, 2005 8:51 pm

linus wrote: The input control is a bit course. It is a step attenuator but the jumps in gain between settings was pretty large. I found that I had to turn down the source (guitar amp) because one setting on the Auditronics input was too loud and the next one down too soft.
if you have a limiter free while tracking, like the glensound for instance, just run the output of the pre at the proper or "too loud" setting into the limiter and use the variable gain on the limiter to do your fine trimming. You can chose to use the limiter function or not but the real point is to use the limiter as a buffer amplifier to fine trim your gain. Yes, you are adding an extra gain stage and yes it will add this color or that, but its an easy way to add the proper gain staging.

what auditronics modules do yo have? do you have a schematic for them? they came out of a console so there should be an easy peasy way to add a pot in place of where the fader was on the console and then you'll have the fine trim you need.

You can also do it passively, if you look on ebay you can often turn up daven attenuators that will have 1 dB steps for 10dB or you can look for a decade attenuator which usually have three attenuators in them with different x10 resolution.

dave
http://www.glideonfade.com
one hundred percent discrete transistor recording with style and care.

joel hamilton
zen recordist
Posts: 8876
Joined: Mon May 19, 2003 12:10 pm
Location: NYC/Brooklyn
Contact:

Post by joel hamilton » Mon Nov 07, 2005 9:08 pm

Linus:

I have some spare auditronics faders I could sell you.... For real.
PM me if you are interested in having some for those strips.

Once people try the EQ in those things (the ones you have are the little brother to the 501, which is what my custom console is based on) they freak out and realize why I built a whole console around them. The 501 is the Four band version of what yyou are rockin on the 110.

The glensound compressor section is rocking too, yet another weirdo that TOTALLY kicks butt. The EQ section is pretty cool, if a little lacking in the headroom dept...
But you get SIX channels of decent EQ and 2 channels of AMAZING compressor...

Pretty great. The BBC knew what was up....

joel hamilton
zen recordist
Posts: 8876
Joined: Mon May 19, 2003 12:10 pm
Location: NYC/Brooklyn
Contact:

Post by joel hamilton » Mon Nov 07, 2005 9:30 pm

The Glensound doesnt have any gain knobs at all. No input, no output, just a couple of switches... Thats all it takes with that thing. Has become one of my goto boxes for light guitar compression during the mix. Try it linus: 2:1, slow release, adjust level for "0"...
Amazing. Just let it flap in the breeze,. So great.

User avatar
nacho459
re-cappin' neve
Posts: 748
Joined: Wed Jun 30, 2004 10:53 pm
Location: Pasadena USA
Contact:

Post by nacho459 » Mon Nov 07, 2005 9:56 pm

I love the 110b's!

I put some 10K pots across where the fader would have connected, basically installing a rotary fader. Works like a charm. Did you use output transformers to balance them?

drumsound
zen recordist
Posts: 7474
Joined: Tue Jun 01, 2004 10:30 pm
Location: Bloomington IL
Contact:

Post by drumsound » Mon Nov 07, 2005 10:40 pm

My tech has my 110s and he's supposed to mod one of the aux knobs as an output. They're on the module so why not use them?

I hope I see those things someday...

Electricide
dead but not forgotten
Posts: 2105
Joined: Thu Jul 17, 2003 11:04 am
Location: phoenix

Post by Electricide » Tue Nov 08, 2005 2:49 pm

whis isn't everyone shouting "HEY THIS BELONGS IN THE GEAR FORUM" esp. since the topic has the word gear in it.

I'm just wondering what the baseline is.

Sorry to get "off topic" =)

joel hamilton
zen recordist
Posts: 8876
Joined: Mon May 19, 2003 12:10 pm
Location: NYC/Brooklyn
Contact:

Post by joel hamilton » Tue Nov 08, 2005 3:43 pm

It should be in the gear forum, but this is Tony's turf. i dont moderate this sucker. WHOO-HOO all bets are OFF!!!!

User avatar
linus
re-cappin' neve
Posts: 674
Joined: Thu Nov 27, 2003 10:03 pm
Location: New York City
Contact:

Post by linus » Tue Nov 08, 2005 9:36 pm

I originally posted it here (instead of the gear forum) because my point was more about spending time experiementing with different compression ratios and their effect across the mix. It didn't matter if I was referring to the glennsound, Elop, compellor, or RNC.

A secondary point was about spending time to learn the stuff I already have instead of constantly feeling like I have to acquire more gear.

Other replies that followed focused more on the particular models I had mentioned.

Some posts change direction, some fall in a middle ground between headings, some are just plain off-topic. Mine is probably a combination of the above.

User avatar
linus
re-cappin' neve
Posts: 674
Joined: Thu Nov 27, 2003 10:03 pm
Location: New York City
Contact:

Post by linus » Tue Nov 08, 2005 9:38 pm

nacho459 wrote:I love the 110b's!

I put some 10K pots across where the fader would have connected, basically installing a rotary fader. Works like a charm. Did you use output transformers to balance them?
I bought them set up with an external power supply in a homemade lunchbox. Bought them here about a year ago. I should probably have them fixed up a bit more as they only have XLR in's, no phantom, and no output control.

User avatar
b3groover
deaf.
Posts: 1977
Joined: Mon Dec 22, 2003 4:07 pm
Location: michigan
Contact:

Post by b3groover » Thu Nov 10, 2005 11:36 am

linus wrote:
nacho459 wrote:I love the 110b's!

I put some 10K pots across where the fader would have connected, basically installing a rotary fader. Works like a charm. Did you use output transformers to balance them?
I bought them set up with an external power supply in a homemade lunchbox. Bought them here about a year ago. I should probably have them fixed up a bit more as they only have XLR in's, no phantom, and no output control.
Why isn't this in the DIY forum?










Joking.
:)

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 37 guests