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Post by drbill on Jul 24, 2019 11:23:22 GMT -6
donr - are you using saturn Don? Thoughts on it? Not yet, Bill, but I'm intrigued with what Eric Valentine did with it. AFAIK, he just drove the upper frequencies into distortion while leaving the fundamentals largely untouched. I was also impressed with his endorsement of the FabFilter gate. Saturn seemed to enhance everything he put it on, even as he followed up with Decapitator, which I'm familiar with. As an amateur recordist, I'm impressed how much of perceived punch and power in tracks is distortion. yeah, pretty much ditto to everything you said. The upper harmonics distortion is a key thing I think I've been missing out on. A lot of hardware does exactly that, and I use it accordingly, but it's often kinda random, and not so easily tweaked and dialed to perfection like Saturn does.....
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Post by drbill on Jul 24, 2019 11:25:49 GMT -6
Do you think if there was an overall reverb or ambience on all the drums the gates wouldn’t bother you? It doesn’t sound like ‘80’s gated or keyed noise snare. What catches my ear is when the gate closes. I don't mind the distortion at all, I love distorted drums. It's the combination of the exaggeration of the decay with the sudden end that gets me. I get the same kind of distraction from cymbals that have washy wah wah wah compression on them. So yeah, maybe a verb over the top to take the punch and decay it out would fix it. Good insight! Bricasti M7 - Studio A. Miracles happen.....
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Post by christopher on Jul 24, 2019 11:41:12 GMT -6
And room mics!
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Post by Vincent R. on Jul 24, 2019 11:46:57 GMT -6
Can’t wait to give some of these a watch.
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Post by christopher on Jul 24, 2019 11:47:31 GMT -6
Upper distortion is where you can get that “pointed” attack. Careful though.. like I said in another thread... ITB distortion IME doesn’t match a guitar pedal. So you can parallel a snare onto 5 tracks, and gate and process them in multi-band, the distortion on the highs makes it more exciting- BUT getting that distortion OTB would be ideal. It’s just a pain! So sometimes I’ll do a distortion pass knowing I’ll filter it and place it in parallel.
- also wide band highs like Saturn or MBcomps are cool for this,- I like to use a super narrow surgical EQ on the highs and bring out tiny details, you can really focus on the stick or part of the head that way.
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Post by ragan on Jul 24, 2019 12:29:32 GMT -6
Super cool videos. Ever since Queens of the Stone Age "Songs for the Deaf" came out (and has been on periodic, heavy rotation for me over the years) I've been a fan of Valentine's. And I love how these videos have no pretense. He just goes through the stuff carefully and talks about why he did what and shows you, without fanfare or subtle self-aggrandizing.
The drum vid is really cool. It's a bunch of the exact same things I do, to a surprising degree to me, he's just of course a lot better at it.
I'll be devouring all these vids and I'm super thankful he's putting them up.
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Post by Blackdawg on Jul 24, 2019 13:47:49 GMT -6
I love these videos. Such a down to earth guy and the videos are super informative and chill. Not pushing products or anything just showing cool stuff.
Love it.
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Post by svart on Jul 24, 2019 14:00:02 GMT -6
Upper distortion is where you can get that “pointed” attack. Careful though.. like I said in another thread... ITB distortion IME doesn’t match a guitar pedal. So you can parallel a snare onto 5 tracks, and gate and process them in multi-band, the distortion on the highs makes it more exciting- BUT getting that distortion OTB would be ideal. It’s just a pain! So sometimes I’ll do a distortion pass knowing I’ll filter it and place it in parallel. - also wide band highs like Saturn or MBcomps are cool for this,- I like to use a super narrow surgical EQ on the highs and bring out tiny details, you can really focus on the stick or part of the head that way. Snare through a bluestripe 1176. Plenty of distortion added..
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Post by drbill on Jul 24, 2019 14:10:45 GMT -6
I love these videos. Such a down to earth guy and the videos are super informative and chill. Not pushing products or anything just showing cool stuff. Love it. Yes! No obvious agenda's or bias's - just here's how I did it, and here's what I like.
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Post by chessparov on Jul 24, 2019 14:18:31 GMT -6
Great thread. Now there goes my weekend, studying all this... Chris
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Post by the other mark williams on Jul 25, 2019 0:30:35 GMT -6
Haven’t gotten to watch the videos yet, but I’ve had Saturn for several years, and it’s nice. I like the MB features, but on the whole, it doesn’t often beat other distortion plugs in my arsenal. For me. I’m glad I have it, because the MB feature really is great, but it’s not the first thing I reach for generally. Maybe it ought to be! I’ll watch the videos to see how Eric is using it.
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Post by ragan on Jul 25, 2019 0:38:07 GMT -6
Haven’t gotten to watch the videos yet, but I’ve had Saturn for several years, and it’s nice. I like the MB features, but on the whole, it doesn’t often beat other distortion plugs in my arsenal. For me. I’m glad I have it, because the MB feature really is great, but it’s not the first thing I reach for generally. Maybe it ought to be! I’ll watch the videos to see how Eric is using it. When I've demo'd it, I've absolutely loved the functionality of the plug but found the actual distortion to not sound anywhere near as nice/convincing as a lot of other harmonic goo boxes available today. If they do a MKII with distortion that's on par with the better offerings of today it'll be an instant buy for me.
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Post by the other mark williams on Jul 25, 2019 21:19:14 GMT -6
Haven’t gotten to watch the videos yet, but I’ve had Saturn for several years, and it’s nice. I like the MB features, but on the whole, it doesn’t often beat other distortion plugs in my arsenal. For me. I’m glad I have it, because the MB feature really is great, but it’s not the first thing I reach for generally. Maybe it ought to be! I’ll watch the videos to see how Eric is using it. When I've demo'd it, I've absolutely loved the functionality of the plug but found the actual distortion to not sound anywhere near as nice/convincing as a lot of other harmonic goo boxes available today. If they do a MKII with distortion that's on par with the better offerings of today it'll be an instant buy for me. well said.
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Post by johneppstein on Jul 26, 2019 3:15:00 GMT -6
donr - are you using saturn Don? Thoughts on it? Not yet, Bill, but I'm intrigued with what Eric Valentine did with it. AFAIK, he just drove the upper frequencies into distortion while leaving the fundamentals largely untouched. I was also impressed with his endorsement of the FabFilter gate. Saturn seemed to enhance everything he put it on, even as he followed up with Decapitator, which I'm familiar with. As an amateur recordist, I'm impressed how much of perceived punch and power in tracks is distortion. It has been known for quite some time that the human ear interprets distortion as "volume".
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Post by swurveman on Jul 26, 2019 10:01:04 GMT -6
Haven’t gotten to watch the videos yet, but I’ve had Saturn for several years, and it’s nice. I like the MB features, but on the whole, it doesn’t often beat other distortion plugs in my arsenal. For me. I’m glad I have it, because the MB feature really is great, but it’s not the first thing I reach for generally. Maybe it ought to be! I’ll watch the videos to see how Eric is using it. EV says in the video with Greg Wells that Saturn emulates tape saturation where, as the frequencies get higher, there's more distortion. Can anybody confirm that this is how tape saturation works? And if so, does Saturn do this without any tweaking of the parameters? Or, is EV's ear so tuned to tape distortion of specific frequencies that he knows how to apply Saturn's parameters correctly according to the frequency he's hearing. The other element is the crossover point. Does anybody know how he determines that? Is it visually obvious? I've never seen anybody use Saturn like he does. I wonder if he uses it on every instrument.
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Post by Calvin on Jul 26, 2019 10:17:14 GMT -6
Valentine's youtube channel has been a way-too-secret resource since he launched it. He makes fantastic records, and he's very open with sharing a lot of how he approaches things. I've enjoyed every video he's released, and I look forward to whatever he delivers next.
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Post by johneppstein on Jul 26, 2019 14:32:24 GMT -6
Haven’t gotten to watch the videos yet, but I’ve had Saturn for several years, and it’s nice. I like the MB features, but on the whole, it doesn’t often beat other distortion plugs in my arsenal. For me. I’m glad I have it, because the MB feature really is great, but it’s not the first thing I reach for generally. Maybe it ought to be! I’ll watch the videos to see how Eric is using it. EV says in the video with Greg Wells that Saturn emulates tape saturation where, as the frequencies get higher, there's more distortion. Can anybody confirm that this is how tape saturation works? And if so, does Saturn do this without any tweaking of the parameters? Or, is EV's ear so tuned to tape distortion of specific frequencies that he knows how to apply Saturn's parameters correctly according to the frequency he's hearing. The other element is the crossover point. Does anybody know how he determines that? Is it visually obvious? I've never seen anybody use Saturn like he does. I wonder if he uses it on every instrument. I think with (real) tape distortion it's specific to the model of machine, speed, and the tape formulation being used. Some machines have response up to 50k with the right tape - without actually having measured I suspect that those machines don't have much, if any HF distortion that's in the audible range. And there's also machine setup....
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Post by drbill on Jul 26, 2019 15:07:18 GMT -6
EV says in the video with Greg Wells that Saturn emulates tape saturation where, as the frequencies get higher, there's more distortion. Can anybody confirm that this is how tape saturation works? And if so, does Saturn do this without any tweaking of the parameters? Or, is EV's ear so tuned to tape distortion of specific frequencies that he knows how to apply Saturn's parameters correctly according to the frequency he's hearing. The other element is the crossover point. Does anybody know how he determines that? Is it visually obvious? I've never seen anybody use Saturn like he does. I wonder if he uses it on every instrument. I think with (real) tape distortion it's specific to the model of machine, speed, and the tape formulation being used. Some machines have response up to 50k with the right tape - without actually having measured I suspect that those machines don't have much, if any HF distortion that's in the audible range. And there's also machine setup.... Call it a sweetness, call it a saturation, call it a rounding, call it whatever suits your fancy, there is something going on in the upper HF of a tape machine that makes what it delivers desirable for many people. Something that digital does NOT do to the signal. As I mentioned previously, I don't know that what Saturn is doing is "tape-like" to my senses, but obviously Valentine is hearing something that is working for his esthetic.
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Post by gouge on Jul 26, 2019 15:56:58 GMT -6
I love these videos. Such a down to earth guy and the videos are super informative and chill. Not pushing products or anything just showing cool stuff. Love it. Yes! No obvious agenda's or bias's - just here's how I did it, and here's what I like. he would be making money from these videos and providing a very public profile for his software supporters. this is the new model. youtube vlogging gets him paid for 3 things at once.
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Post by drbill on Jul 26, 2019 15:59:19 GMT -6
Yes! No obvious agenda's or bias's - just here's how I did it, and here's what I like. he would be making money from these videos and providing a very public profile for his software supporters. this is the new model. youtube vlogging gets him paid for 3 things at once. I understand why he's doing it. But when he A/B's plugins vs. hardware, or product A vs. product B, he's not leaning hard into the one he's selling or promoting like 90% of the other big names are doing. That was my point.
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Post by ragan on Jul 26, 2019 16:04:46 GMT -6
Yes! No obvious agenda's or bias's - just here's how I did it, and here's what I like. he would be making money from these videos and providing a very public profile for his software supporters. this is the new model. youtube vlogging gets him paid for 3 things at once. I don't think he's shilling for anybody. He pulls up that NI thing in one video and talks about how it's really cool and then minutes later, he's chuckling about how it's funny that he used it so much on that mix cause he hasn't touched it since. Then he talks about just having seasons where he likes certain things and then seasons where he doesn't reach for them. Which is totally how things work in my experience and I don't think it's at all what you'd say if you were shilling for anyone. I think he's just making the videos cause he wants to. I mean, he can make money from ads/viewers of course. But my gut is the stuff he's espousing is just the actual way his process works, no thumb on the scale.
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Post by gouge on Jul 26, 2019 16:10:14 GMT -6
well i like his vids so dont want to seem like i'm saying he is shilling things
but lets be honest. clicks and likes equal cash in the contemporary world amd product placements are not becessarily an advert any more
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Post by drbill on Jul 26, 2019 16:11:28 GMT -6
he would be making money from these videos and providing a very public profile for his software supporters. this is the new model. youtube vlogging gets him paid for 3 things at once. I don't think he's shilling for anybody. He pulls up that NI thing in one video and talks about how it's really cool and then minutes later, he's chuckling about how it's funny that he used it so much on that mix cause he hasn't touched it since. Then he talks about just having seasons where he likes certain things and then seasons where he doesn't reach for them. Which is totally how things work in my experience and I don't think it's at all what you'd say if you were shilling for anyone. I think he's just making the videos cause he wants to. I mean, he can make money from ads/viewers of course. But my gut is the stuff he's espousing is just the actual way his process works, no thumb on the scale. Yeah, when he's comparing path A for this sound vs. path B for this sound, he states his preferences, and why, and lets the chips fall where they may. Definitely comes off as a realist with realistic financial issues that we all have in choosing his gear / software. Quite refreshing.
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Post by drbill on Jul 26, 2019 16:13:49 GMT -6
well i like his vids so dont want to seem like i'm saying he is shilling things but lets be honest. clicks and likes equal cash in the contemporary world amd product placements are not becessarily an advert any more if you look at the number of "clicks" he's getting, he'd be lucky to eat at mcdonalds once every couple of weeks. He's not getting rich, or even what I would consider compensation from these. I think it's for the pure love of sharing. The number of clicks is clearly present, and even your basic cat video is putting a couple more zeros after it in comparison. And these videos are complex and expertly set up. If you consider the time it takes to do it, he's getting pennies per hour I'd be guessing....
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Post by ragan on Jul 26, 2019 16:16:26 GMT -6
well i like his vids so dont want to seem like i'm saying he is shilling things but lets be honest. clicks and likes equal cash in the contemporary world amd product placements are not becessarily an advert any more Right, that's obviously generally true. I'm just saying it's my (totally subjective) gut feeling that that's not what's going on with these.
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