Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Cowboy
On Thursday 23 January 2014 08:50:52 pm Jay Ashworth wrote:
 The *Compellor* does that?

 I had always heard that that was what the *Exciter* did; that was it's
 raison d'etre from introduction...

 You may be right. It's been a while.
 Looking at the Aphex site today, I can't find it, on either one.

 I'd gone to look it up once upon a time, when I'd heard
 that it did, in total disbelief.
 Who, in their right mind, would produce a piece of 
 **professional** equipment that *deliberately* introduces
 harmonic distortion ?
 At the time, I was shocked to see it touted as a feature !

 Of course, in the strictest sense, all audio processing
 intentionally distorts what passes through it.

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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Cowboy
On Friday 24 January 2014 08:45:00 am Chris Howard - CBR wrote:
 Some cuts have hum and other artifacts that would be nice
 to lose if it could be done without blood, sweat and tears.

 Relatively easy in production.
 Almost impossible with just an in-line processor.

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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Alan Peterson
- Original Message -
From: Cowboy c...@cwf1.com

 Who, in their right mind, would produce a piece of 
 **professional** equipment that *deliberately* introduces
 harmonic distortion ?


The makers of guitar fuzzboxes. Been that way for about 50 years.

I forget where I read it and who said it, but to paraphrase: its amazing how 
we spend so many years and so much money to create as clean and pristine a 
signal as possible, and then willingly and happily #$%^$! it up with a $19 box 
from Lafayette.

-ap
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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Fred Gleason
On Jan 24, 2014, at 08:47 23, Cowboy c...@cwf1.com wrote:

 Who, in their right mind, would produce a piece of 
 **professional** equipment that *deliberately* introduces
 harmonic distortion ?

Because it sounds good! 

(“Good” being, in this context, a more-or-less completely subjective, 
‘aesthetic’ judgement).

Cheers!


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| Frederick F. Gleason, Jr. |   Chief Developer   |
|   |   Paravel Systems   |
|-|
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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Cowboy
On Friday 24 January 2014 10:30:17 am Fred Gleason wrote:
 On Jan 24, 2014, at 08:47 23, Cowboy c...@cwf1.com wrote:
 
  Who, in their right mind, would produce a piece of 
  **professional** equipment that *deliberately* introduces
  harmonic distortion ?
 
 Because it sounds good! 
 
 (“Good” being, in this context, a more-or-less completely subjective, 
 ‘aesthetic’ judgement).

On Friday 24 January 2014 09:18:58 am Alan Peterson wrote:
 The makers of guitar fuzzboxes. Been that way for about 50 years.

 Well, yes, of course.
 Kinda why I added that bit about *any* kind of audio processing is,
 by strict definition, distortion.

 However, and in spite of that, it's still my opinion that anything
 that does add something like harmonic distortion, fuzz boxes,
 Yamaha Harmonizers, ( actually a REALLY nice toy ) and the like,
 belong in prod, not in the air chain.

 There is logic and sound engineering judgment here.
 Air chain boxes, like Optimod and Omnia are there to accentuate
 nuance and make it LOUDER, and more PRONOUNCED, so any
 undesirable noise had best have been already cleaned up in prod.
 The more we ask of those types of boxes, the more boring and
 bland the sound must become.
 They are both great boxes, don't misunderstand, but they also
 work best with a prod rat who knows what they do, and what to
 feed them, to make the final product that which is desired.

 Taking this back where it started, a predominantly voice book reading
 kind of thing, a slow to medium AGC is what he wants, not normalization.
 ( in my opinion, of course )
 With normalization, passages that are too low will still be too low, and
 passages that are too hot will still be too hot.
 Hum and other artifacts will still be present, and perhaps made worse.

 I'd mentioned the 424, and I do love that box.
 It essentially can do what the board op should do. Ride gain in a
 reasonably intelligent fashion, which would solve the book reading issues.
 ( except for the hum and other noise )
 Since both attack and release were adjustable, as well as degree of de-ess,
 it's the perfect box for what he's seeking.
 Just a shame it isn't made anymore, and I've told Bob that directly.
 I know of no good replacement for it, either.

 There was another, a german thing if I recall, that was similar but also
 had an adjustable slew rate, and was single channel only.
 You could really do some serious damage with that thing !

-- 
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The probability of someone watching you is proportional to the
stupidity of your action.

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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Cowboy
On Friday 24 January 2014 11:03:06 am Cowboy wrote:
 On Friday 24 January 2014 10:30:17 am Fred Gleason wrote: On Jan 24, 2014, 
 at 08:47 23, Cowboy c...@cwf1.com wrote:   Who, in their right mind, 
 would produce a piece of   **professional** equipment that *deliberately* 
 introduces  harmonic distortion ?  Because it sounds good!   (“Good” 
 being, in this context, a more-or-less completely subjective, ‘aesthetic’ 
 judgement).

 What, where, how, something is stripping out newlines.

 I'll attempt a repost in a more readable fashion, if requested.

-- 
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http://cowboy.cwf1.com

The probability of someone watching you is proportional to the
stupidity of your action.

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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Wayne Merricks
FYI, looks fine to me.  I use thunderbird and my phone.  I've known 
Outlook and the various iDevices to mangle things beyond recognition if 
thats what you're viewing it on.


Regards,

Wayne Merricks
The Voice Asia

On 24/01/14 16:06, Cowboy wrote:

On Friday 24 January 2014 11:03:06 am Cowboy wrote:

On Friday 24 January 2014 10:30:17 am Fred Gleason wrote: On Jan 24, 2014, at 08:47 23, Cowboy c...@cwf1.com 
wrote:   Who, in their right mind, would produce a piece of   **professional** equipment that 
*deliberately* introduces  harmonic distortion ?  Because it sounds good!   (“Good” being, in 
this context, a more-or-less completely subjective, ‘aesthetic’ judgement).

  What, where, how, something is stripping out newlines.

  I'll attempt a repost in a more readable fashion, if requested.



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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread Cowboy
On Friday 24 January 2014 11:42:24 am Wayne Merricks wrote:
 I've known Outlook and the various iDevices to mangle things beyond 
 recognition if thats what you're viewing it on.

 Outlook is one of the worst e-manglers I've ever run across.
 ( *painful* memories of spam-o-matic ( dot com ) development )

 In my case, Kmail.
 Not that I love it, or even like it, but it's got some features...

 Likely, if it isn't *nix, I probably don't have it, but I might.

-- 
Cowboy

http://cowboy.cwf1.com

The probability of someone watching you is proportional to the
stupidity of your action.

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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-24 Thread drew Roberts
On Friday 24 January 2014 11:42:24 Wayne Merricks wrote:
 FYI, looks fine to me.  I use thunderbird and my phone.  I've known
 Outlook and the various iDevices to mangle things beyond recognition if
 thats what you're viewing it on.

I can confirm that it is messed up here reading with an old kmail.

drew

 Regards,

 Wayne Merricks
 The Voice Asia

 On 24/01/14 16:06, Cowboy wrote:
  On Friday 24 January 2014 11:03:06 am Cowboy wrote:
  On Friday 24 January 2014 10:30:17 am Fred Gleason wrote: On Jan 24,
  2014, at 08:47 23, Cowboy c...@cwf1.com wrote:   Who, in their
  right mind, would produce a piece of   **professional** equipment that
  *deliberately* introduces  harmonic distortion ?  Because it sounds
  good!   (“Good” being, in this context, a more-or-less completely
  subjective, ‘aesthetic’ judgement).
 
What, where, how, something is stripping out newlines.
 
I'll attempt a repost in a more readable fashion, if requested.

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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-23 Thread Jim Stewart
I think ideally you need a simple and slow AGC-like compressor that has a 
side-chain gate so that it can be adjusted so it doesn't pump up the level 
during silence periods that are supposed to exist in spoken word.

I don't know what kind of Radio station you are running, but you likely will 
have some sort of processing needed for guarantee legal operation (as well as 
generating a proper composite signal if an FM) which might be able to be able 
to be adjusted to do this already.  If you need to buy one, perhaps the lowest 
priced Omnia or Optimod products (appropriate for your type of station) would 
work once properly adjusted to do what you want.  Otherwise my vote is an Aphex 
Compeller, that I think can be slowed down enough to give the processing you 
desire.  It certainly has the side-chain gating you need.  Overall it is an 
excellent single-band AGC/Leveler product but does not provide final radio 
broadcast limiting needed for legal operation.

If you like to try to do it in software inside your Rivendell box, and have 
Jack Audio running, there are lots of processor plugins (like ones previously 
mentioned in this thread) that can be used.  I'm using a simple single-band 
compressor for a web-streamed version of our FM station and have it working 
great for our purposes (my exact choice would not be best for you as it has no 
gate, but you might be able to find one that does).
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Re: [RDD] Audio Processing -- was -- normalization (Alan Peterson)

2014-01-23 Thread Cowboy
On Thursday 23 January 2014 07:47:40 pm Jim Stewart wrote:
 Otherwise my vote is an Aphex Compeller, that I think can be slowed down 
 enough to give the processing you desire. 

 Just be aware that the Compellor deliberately generates
 even order distortion !

 The theory is that even order distortion sounds pleasant,
 while odd order sounds bad.
 To me, distortion is distortion, but that's me.

-- 
Cowboy

http://cowboy.cwf1.com

Q:  How many DEC repairmen does it take to fix a flat?
A:  Five; four to hold the car up and one to swap tires.

Q:  How long does it take?
A:  It's indeterminate.  It will depend upon how many flats they've
brought with them.

Q:  What happens if you've got TWO flats?
A:  They replace your generator.

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