Klark Teknik square one dynamics, Operator'S Manual

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Applications
Square ONE Dynamics 35
Spoken word
With the compressor set to RMS and soft knee, use high ratios, for example, 5:1. Be careful not to
compromise intelligibility by using an attack that is too fast, as audio information that helps us
identify consonants may be lost.
Gating
When using noise gates, try experimenting with the attenuation depth for more subtle gating. Bear in mind
that 20dB of attenuation is equivalent to switching the pad in on your console’s mic amp!
Removal of background noise from electronic sources
Gating can be used, typically, when an electric guitar with noisy effects pedals is set at high gain. On the
appropriate channel, insert your Square ONE Dynamics’s processor, enable gate mode and, with just the
unwanted noise present, turn the threshold up until the gate closes. Set long hold and release times so that
the gate does not close on decaying notes, but gates the noise rather that closing abruptly.
Please don’t be
tempted to set extremely fast attack times; this is an electronic instrument so we want to avoid
ultra-fast transients, that is, the high-energy peak at the beginning of waveforms.
Try setting the side chain filter so that gate is more sensitive to the frequency spectrum of the instrument.
Most noise problems will have a predominantly high frequency content.
Drums and percussive instruments
Ideally, to obtain the best results you would set the threshold as low as possible to utilise the gate’s fastest
possible attack. However, in practice the threshold setting is dictated by the noise floor level, that is,
adjacent drums, cymbals etc.
A solution is to use the side chain filter so that the gate is more sensitive to the bandwidth you want to hear.
Do this by adjusting the narrow filter setting to
tune the gate to a specific frequency. Then, use the side
chain solo facility to help set the filter; you can do this without interrupting the audio by monitoring from the
solo bus output via a spare input on your mixing console.