C300 PROCESSING
Comp/Lim mode - C300
Wideband Compressor
The wideband/fullband compressor type is
applied in the drum presets. The compression
is trigged by the entire signal.
Multiband Compressor
Where the wideband compressor excels in
limited frequency areas the multi-band
compression excels on more complex preset
material with a wider frequency range. This
being both composite material but also sources
such as vocals, horns and guitar that despite
their immediate simple structure can suffer from
the “breathing syndrome” where the
compression of the lower frequency bands
ends up controlling the upper frequencies also.
The multi-band compression style splits the
signal in three frequency areas and
compresses these bands individually. Attack
and Release settings are prepared and tuned
on the C300 presets giving you excellent
starting points. Threshold and Ratio are set on
the front.
De-Ess
The De-Ess presets also utilize the multi-band
compression type and is fine-tuned to reduces
sibilance from “s” sounds that can be far too
dominant.
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For the compressor to be used as a musical
tool the set attack times are relatively long.
(from 10 to 200ms) This gives the disadvantage
that certain peaks can pass. Therefore a limiter
with an attack time of as little as 0.1ms and a
ratio of 1:infinity prevents close to all
overshoots.
For different purposes there are different Limiter
types. The C300 limiter is a peak type limiter
and it is automatically active on all preset types
using the multi-band compression style. (see
pages 14-15).
Though a peak limiter is applied on all
multiband compression presets (not on
de-ess presets), it is worth noticing that
C300 holds an exceptional tolerant headroom
structure. In combination with the Peak Limiter
that ensures that occasional peaks are tamed
you can actually operate very close to max
without any risks of overshoots.
Gate/Expander mode - C300
Set the mode selector to “GATE/EXP”
position.
Noise, whether it is hiss, hum or just
background noise is always a parameter to
evaluate and deal with. Initially noise must of
course be reduced to a minimum from the
source, but with a Gate/expander it is also
possible to reduce the noise on channels when
no significant signal is present.
Basics
A Gate - or downward expander, - is used to
attenuate the signal when the signal is below a
certain threshold. When talking about attack
and release times in reference to a noise gate:
- the attack time is the time is takes to for the
gate to “open” when the signal rises above the
threshold and...
- the release time is the time it takes for the
gate to reach the specified attenuation.
C300 Gate presets
All presets except for Hiss/Hum trigger
dedicated Gate/Expander settings tuned to the
various preset materials.
Hiss & Hum presets
Dedicated presets for hiss and hum elimination.
C300 PROCESSING
C300 - New style compression
- an innovative approach to compression
Do you recognize the situation where you read
about a technology, maybe even in details, and
feel that you really understand the concept?
Then, once you are in a stressed environment
and try to apply you new found wisdom you
loose the overview and though it looked really
good on paper you now don’t seem to pull its
full potential.
Parallel compression could actually be one
those “understandable when read” technologies
that you tend to mess up in a real life situation.
With the C300 New Style Compression NSC™
you can avoid this unsatisfactory situation.
C300 gives you a totally new approach and
some stunning results based on the thoughts
behind parallel compression in a one touch
operation with no unintended side effects.
Furthermore you don’t have to deal with
complex un-tweakable relations between time
constants, gain structures and ratio settings.
The optimized presets do the job for you. Just
add music, tweak a few parameters and you
are flying.
Parallel Compression
As described earlier, compression is a matter of
controlling the peaks in the signal in a way that
doesn’t decrease the quality of the incoming
audio signal. An example could be if you
experience peaks in the vocal or the instrument
signal that changes the feeling of the incoming
source’s position in the final mix, or if the preset
materials you are working with are way too
different in volume. A good example would be a
snare drum drum with various outputs from
beat to beat.
Or how about the situation where you have an
extremely dynamic vocal with significant
differences from the highest to the lowest
peaks. At the same time you want to enhance
the singer’s breath and the low-end frequencies
to make it more present and sounding as if the
singer is just a few inches away.
You still want to maintain the signal’s dynamic
range and keep the peaks in the signal to make
it more musical to listen to.
How is this done?
Well the answer is complex parallel
compression. Normally this is setup on the
mixing console.
When setting up a traditional “parallel
compression”, you
- route the direct and uncompressed signal to
a stereo bus (bus A)
- simultaneously you route the signal to a
stereo bus with a stereo compressor
inserted.
- then you route the processed signal to bus A
also.
Seems pretty simple, but there are definitely
downsides to that method. - If you make any
level changes on the compressed or the direct
signal it will affect your stereo mix due to the
lack of level-compensation in the two signals.
Also - you cannot mix digital and analog
devices in the chain unless time-align all
signals correctly. So there are several pitfalls
that invites to mistakes, - especially in stressed
situations.
DON’T WORRY. The C300 New Style
Compression will assist you in setting up
parallel compressions fast and easy. A unique
feature that so far is unseen in a compact unit.
The main object
- is mixing the unprocessed signal with the
compressed signal. Mixing is easily done using
the MIX knob. Setting MIX to 100% lets the
C300 operate as a regular compression.
Setting MIX in any position between bypass
and 100% applies “new style compression”.
Why?
What does it do to the sound? The higher
dynamics are better preserved and at the same
time the details from the lower dynamic parts of
the signal.
Try to apply parallel compression on a
drum kit. You will discover that all the
lower details are smack in the face,
while all the bells and high dynamics of the
snare and cymbals are preserved and
“uncompressed”, so to speak.