How do you use a Multiband limiter/compression tool?

[Vindellama]

Hi!
I recorded another.
This time I tested. And dropped the compression.
Just the high pass, soft limiter for unwanted peaks, but still used the binaural pan to a lesser degree (it still sounded a bit centered).
In this one I used the "above soundhole" position around 8 inches:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/u57x8saet2...20pan.wav?dl=0
There was too much breathing noise so I changed to below the soundhole 14 inches:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/c6lr3uxvyx...20pan.wav?dl=0

[Doug Young]

Both sound better than your earlier recordings. Still a *lot* of noise. And I still don't understand the binaural panner. Why? "Binaural" is an effect intended to sound good to people listening in headphones, tho I don't know exactly what the plugin you're using is. But why not try the pure XY sound? The ideal would be for that to sound good - get a good sound going in, then there will be very little to do, other than maybe adding some reverb.

[Vindellama]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

Both sound better than your earlier recordings. Still a *lot* of noise. And I still don't understand the binaural panner. Why? "Binaural" is an effect intended to sound good to people listening in headphones, tho I don't know exactly what the plugin you're using is. But why not try the pure XY sound? The ideal would be for that to sound good - get a good sound going in, then there will be very little to do, other than maybe adding some reverb.

I think that at least in my house, if I want to make some outside recordings/shots I won't be able to get much less noise than this. I could turn off the water pump from the "lake" but there still an avenue close by, and a new noisy electric fence that the new neighbor put in.

That makes sense... I'm listening to it with headphones. So I guess that's why I think it sounds better. (the plugin increases or decreases how wide is the stereo image).
Maybe I should buy a pair of speakers in the future.

[Brent Hahn]

So let's say that, for the moment, you're not going to have a quiet spot to record in. Don't let that stop you. You can still get better at recording -- both the playing and the technical part. You can still develop your ears. For that matter, you can get better at using that multiband compressor that everyone's telling you not to use at all. Keep going.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by Vindellama

I think that at least in my house, if I want to make some outside recordings/shots I won't be able to get much less noise than this. I could turn off the water pump from the "lake" but there still an avenue close by, and a new noisy electric fence that the new neighbor put in.

That makes sense... I'm listening to it with headphones. So I guess that's why I think it sounds better. (the plugin increases or decreases how wide is the stereo image).
Maybe I should buy a pair of speakers in the future.

Headphones aren't ideal, unless you think all your listeners will be wearing them - not as off-the-wall as it would have been once. It's a good idea to listen on lots of things, studio monitors, headphones, home stereo, car, etc, etc.

As far as noise, at least you could trim off or silence the beginning so listeners aren't treated to 2 seconds of noise at the beginning. You could also try a noise reduction solution, like iZotope RX if you can't get rid of the noise. Noise in home recording is a fact of life. For serious home recording, I often do throw the breakers in all of the house except the studio. I used to have a Koi pond in the back yard, I'd shut it off, even tho getting it started back up was a bit of a pain. Or just live with it - it depends on how much you care, what you plan to do with the recordings, and so on.

I'd personally avoid anything that claims to be Binaural, but who knows, if you like it, that's fine. But I'd learn to get a good sound without such things first. If you like a wider image, try a spaced pairs mic setup. You can control the width thru placement.

To Brent's point, I agree, keep trying things, get to know all the plugins, compressors, reverb, EQ, even binaural doo-dads, and keep comparing what happens when you use them. Compare your recordings to others you like, even your own past recordings. You'd probably have better luck listening and comparing over studio monitors. The main reason you're getting advice against the multi-band compressor is that the examples you posted using it didn't sound very good. If you have a situation that can benefit from multi-band compression, then it's a useful tool. I don't hear anything in your recordings that would suggest the need for one.

But I'd start with basics - try to get a raw recording of a solo acoustic guitar, no plugins, no reverb, that sounds good. Then you can tweak to taste. If the raw track isn't right, then you're trying to "fix it in the mix", which people joke about...

[Doug Young]

If you'd find it useful, I'd be happy to try to do a quick mix for you and show you what I'd do. It'd just be one example, not that what I'm doing is "right", but might give you a data point. If you'd post a raw example - no processing at all, and leave the intro noise on so I can use some tools to clean it up, I could give that a shot.

[Vindellama]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

If you'd find it useful, I'd be happy to try to do a quick mix for you and show you what I'd do. It'd just be one example, not that what I'm doing is "right", but might give you a data point. If you'd post a raw example - no processing at all, and leave the intro noise on so I can use some tools to clean it up, I could give that a shot.

Thx for all the useful information so far!
I already rendered the video, but it would be interesting to hear what someone with experience could do. (And I could do in the future)

I'll plan into getting a couple of speakers in the future and a couple of mics for spaced pair.
So far with the recording and experimenting I got to this result.:

At least the video aspect of it is starting to get really good.
Next step would be to go with the suggestions a couple of mics and a proper speaker for listening when bringing things to normal lvls.

[Vindellama]

Here is the raw:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/mx4abextyr...M0024.WAV?dl=0

[FrankHudson]

Originally Posted by Vindellama

Here is the raw:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/mx4abextyr...M0024.WAV?dl=0

First off, like your playing.

Listening to the rendered video, things sound pretty good to me. Although I've been away from this thread for a few days, I thought I'd give it a go at working with your raw file too.

I'm merely a person who likes creating musical pieces and recording them. I am sure I'm not the most skilled person at this kind of work. In my current project I do this a lot, and I need to do it fast, because for some pieces I'm doing everything: selecting the material, writing the music, playing all the parts and recording them and then mixing them and making them ready for distribution on my web page or podcast. For the last couple of years I've been using Izotope Ozone as the final tool before putting my audio pieces up. It's got a lot of features, most of which I've learned to use more sparingly, but I find working from its presets or some presets I've now created on my own, gets me results I find presentable more quickly than if I worked without it.

Here's what I did with your raw file: I removed a bit of non-musical space at the beginning and end of your raw file, and dropped that volume of a note near the end that was a few db above the rest by a 1.5 db and then normalized the whole file to - 3db. I next ran it through Izotope Ozone 8. I started with the Ozone 8 acoustic guitar preset, reduced the compression ratio in that preset (the Ozone acoustic guitar preset didn't use multiband, and I left the dynamics/compressor as single-bad) and I tweaked the EQ a bit, reducing bass a bit more from the preset's acoustic guitar profile. I added the Ozone 8 Maximizer module at the end of the chain, but set it very conservatively. I was aiming to keep as much of the transients as I could and to raise the overall level without adding artifacts.

The resulting overall level of my try is slightly lower than your video's version, and your video's audio is not objectionable to me on first listen, so I don't know that I improved things.


Here's a link to my try:

https://1drv.ms/u/s!AgXTCXtliVD2jI0L3Hxwl_zD9Lz5_w


Again, I like your playing, and the nice thing about making this attempt is that I got to listen to this piece a fair number of times as I worked on it.

[Doug Young]

OK, I made a quick stab at this, as well, so you have two people's input. My result:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/hpxakkzqvx...y_mix.wav?dl=0



Here's what I did, almost entirely using Ozone:

Opened in iZotope RX and used the noise reduction feature to try to improve the noise - basically, select a sample of the noise at the beginning, RX "learns" it, and then removes it from the entire recording.

Silenced the leading portion, and trimmed it a bit. Shortened the empty space at the end and added a slight fade to the tail.

Your recording is surprisingly narrow sounding, I'm not sure what's up with that, so I did end up widening a bit using iZotope Ozone:

Widener copy.jpg

I did use something similar to multi-band compression here, a dynamic EQ, which is sort of an EQ that is triggered when a certain threshold is passed, but rather than bands like a multi-band, you have specific frequencies, Q, and depth. I used this for 2 things - you had a kind of harsh treble note around 3KHz, most evident right at the beginning. Also, the C bass on the upbeats is pretty aggressive and dominates the sound, so I tried to soften that slightly, not entirely successfully. The nice thing about the dynamic EQ is that it only affects the sound when the threshold is triggered, so it doesn't do an EQ cut across the board.

DynamicEQ copy.jpg

I also did a little straight EQ, a gentle boost of highs, a slight low mid cut, and a bigger low bass boost. You're in a low tuning, down to a low C? I can barely hear that low C, the higher octave on the upbeat tends to dominate, so this was an attempt to bring out that low bass note a bit more. Again, not very successful, better dealt with in the playing or the guitar, assuming you'd like to hear the low bass.

EQ copy.jpg

I then used Ozone's Maximizer to add a bit of overall limiting:

Maximizer copy.jpg

And finally added a touch of reverb. A fairly short decay, and very little reverb, since this is a fast busy piece.

VSS3 copy.jpg

I'm not sure this is any huge change, but it's what I came up with for this tune. It doesn't really need much, other than I'd hope for a wider image to start with.

[rick-slo]

Latest recording still panned in to almost mono. Stop doing that!
Alternate thumbing bass notes completely overwhelming melody treble note. Try mic'ing further right (or left) of the soundhole.

P.S. Stick with headphones (but good ones). The room acoustics you probably have will color the speakers too much. Also most people will probably be listening to your stuff with headphones.

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by rick-slo

Latest recording still panned in to almost mono. Stop doing that!

Is that what was done? The file was named as it came out of the zoom, so I assumed no processing. ?? It does seem way too narrow for straight out of the recorder.

Alternate thumbing bass notes completely overwhelming melody treble note.

Agreed, I was totally struggling to fix that in my mix (and failed). But this is a style thing, maybe it's intended? I'd personally work on this as part of the performance.

P.S. Stick with headphones (but good ones). The room acoustics you probably have will color the speakers too much. Also most people will probably be listening to your stuff with headphones.

Good point, your monitoring environment is even more critical than the recording. Less sure about headphones for the audience. Depends on the audience, I guess. I never listen to music in headphones, but I may be old-school. If your intended audience only listens on their phones/ipods, then yes...

[Vindellama]

Originally Posted by Doug Young

OK, I made a quick stab at this, as well, so you have two people's input. My result:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/hpxakkzqvx...y_mix.wav?dl=0



Here's what I did, almost entirely using Ozone:

Opened in iZotope RX and used the noise reduction feature to try to improve the noise - basically, select a sample of the noise at the beginning, RX "learns" it, and then removes it from the entire recording.

Silenced the leading portion, and trimmed it a bit. Shortened the empty space at the end and added a slight fade to the tail.

Your recording is surprisingly narrow sounding, I'm not sure what's up with that, so I did end up widening a bit using iZotope Ozone:

Attachment 12263

I did use something similar to multi-band compression here, a dynamic EQ, which is sort of an EQ that is triggered when a certain threshold is passed, but rather than bands like a multi-band, you have specific frequencies, Q, and depth. I used this for 2 things - you had a kind of harsh treble note around 3KHz, most evident right at the beginning. Also, the C bass on the upbeats is pretty aggressive and dominates the sound, so I tried to soften that slightly, not entirely successfully. The nice thing about the dynamic EQ is that it only affects the sound when the threshold is triggered, so it doesn't do an EQ cut across the board.

Attachment 12265

I also did a little straight EQ, a gentle boost of highs, a slight low mid cut, and a bigger low bass boost. You're in a low tuning, down to a low C? I can barely hear that low C, the higher octave on the upbeat tends to dominate, so this was an attempt to bring out that low bass note a bit more. Again, not very successful, better dealt with in the playing or the guitar, assuming you'd like to hear the low bass.

Attachment 12266

I then used Ozone's Maximizer to add a bit of overall limiting:

Attachment 12267

And finally added a touch of reverb. A fairly short decay, and very little reverb, since this is a fast busy piece.

Attachment 12264

I'm not sure this is any huge change, but it's what I came up with for this tune. It doesn't really need much, other than I'd hope for a wider image to start with.

Thx!
This was pretty in-dept.
The IZotope RX comes with Ozone 8?
How do you single out which frequencies to cut or boost? Is there a chart for where each note falls on the frequency range, or is it by ear?
I'm not sure what is going on with the stereo image. It was placed as in the video.
The H5 has a 90º X/Y. So... Maybe it needs to be even closer?
Maybe I should try to record in split mono and do a hard pan to see if it's a problem with the recorder?

At least in the original from Jack Rose, the fourth string usualy is dominant over the sixth, but around even with the melody.
I have better results with fingerpicks, since it evens out the melody with the alternating base.
But I had some joint pain issues in the last couple of years and been trying to change my way of playing to reduce any strain.
I tried without fingerpicks and without a thumbpick but I was still having some strain issue on the base of my thumb, until I found the fred kelly from the video that allows my thumb to remain in a more relaxed position.
But... I always struggled keeping the bass line and the melody in even volumes when playing with a thumbpick and without fingerpicks.
How should I correct it? Trying to use less force with the thumb or trying to increase force/attack of the other fingers? Or try a different mic position away from the soundhole as suggested?

[Doug Young]

Originally Posted by Vindellama

Thx!
This was pretty in-dept.
The IZotope RX comes with Ozone 8?

No, RX is a separate program

How do you single out which frequencies to cut or boost? Is there a chart for where each note falls on the frequency range, or is it by ear?

A combination - I hear something, then figure out what it is. When the sound is running there is a visual display of levels across the frequencies, so it's easy to see the frequencies of a hot note. You can of course, also associate notes with frequencies, with a chart like this:

https://pages.mtu.edu/~suits/notefreqs.html

I'm not sure what is going on with the stereo image. It was placed as in the video.
The H5 has a 90º X/Y. So... Maybe it needs to be even closer?
Maybe I should try to record in split mono and do a hard pan to see if it's a problem with the recorder?

I'm not sure what the issue is - you didn't do anything, like load the file into a DAW? I thought it was mono when I first listened.

At least in the original from Jack Rose, the fourth string usualy is dominant over the sixth, but around even with the melody.
...
But... I always struggled keeping the bass line and the melody in even volumes when playing with a thumbpick and without fingerpicks.

I don't know the tune, and that's why I wasn't sure it's what you wanted or not. Its a bit fatiguing to listen to - the song comes across as just pounding on that 4th string on the upbeat, but maybe that's the intent. It sounds like you're playing really hard, especially with the thumb. If you want that, or that's how the song goes, that's fine. If not, I'd work on playing the bass notes more lightly. You might get some small differences from mic placement, but I don't think it will radically change how this aspect sounds. A big part of playing fingerstyle is figuring out how to balance the sound and controlling which notes stand out.

[rick-slo]

Originally Posted by Vindellama

How do you single out which frequencies to cut or boost? Is there a chart for where each note falls on the frequency range, or is it by ear?

Narrow Q frequency sweep: for example
https://music.tutsplus.com/tutorials...ing--cms-19832

Don't use it much (so don't get carried away) but when I do it's usually for something in the 4500 to 7500 hertz range (a harsh frequency). Narrow band (high Q) sweep boosting 6 or more decibels. Find something awful, then cut it there by a few decibels.


The better the original recording the less Band-Aids needed post recording.