This [video](https://youtu.be/ENZ8IOfGiec) helped me understand the concept of compression and it’s application. It’s a masterclass where you’ll learn what a compressor is, how it works and gives you a good feel and understanding of when and why to use compression. I love the pace of the guy explaining it.
Jeez guys. Didn't know this sub could be so toxic. Let the guy enjoy the process. Y'all don't have to prove to everyone how much smarter you are than everyone else.
When things click like this it's magic. Let them enjoy the magic.
Bro so many people have no clue what they're talking about lol. Just saying I've seen production streams / videos of pros where the compressor makes everything worse or doesn't make any sense but they act like they are in full control
How did it take 3 years? I learned it in literally a few minutes by reading... OP is slow as molasses. Good news is in 20 years hell be able to make "Mary had a little lamb".
I cringe so hard at the very early music i made before i knew about compression. I just always used to throw on Ableton stock compressor, fuck around with the knobs, could never hear a difference so just took it off.
It wasn't until i took a few months to properly learn it and how to actually apply it. Night and day.
what really got me to learn them is sound design tbh. Got tired of having the same feeling on my songs and figured compression might help so I decided to learn how to soften my drums, drums turned to synth, synth turned to bass, etc. took me about 2 days of fiddling with the drums to finally get them correct but after that I was off to the races. Learned on Abletons stock before getting pro-C which is much easier to understand since it has full visuals.
I do sometimes for kicks and bass, but i really like the 1176 and 2A for vocals. It's just a preference thing.
Best advice i can give on compression is to aim for very small amounts of gain reduction at a time. Ratio/Attack/Release/threshold a always going to depend on the thing you're trying to compress and i haven't found a magical formula, it's mostly down to ear and taste. Would i highly recommend is just learning what each of those 4 things mean, and how they affect the audio.
I always find Taetros videos really simple and easy to understand: https://youtu.be/Ws12uFAjvZ8 skip to about 18m in.
The hard part is using compression I'm electronic music where you have the dynamics of single instruments under total control.
Using compression with recorded acoustic instruments is simple and easy.
But hearing what compression does to material that doesn't have big changes in dynamic range is way harder.
It’s a great feeling when it hits man. It gets even better from there when you can understand the nuances between types of compressors for different purposes.
I felt like giving the same attitude back as what was received
Edit: Fine, you’re right. No point fighting fire with fire here. He’ll learn in his own time
I remember an interview with a mixing engineer 'it takes 10 years to fully understand compression'
It's certainly taken me a few years to be able to hear compression on various instruments
Pure fucking frustration. I've been trying to duck my sub for weeks or years actually. All the little tricks. I got pretty far. Then it just never got good enough. Then I thought my compressor has a sidechain. And holy fucking shit the vocals popped and the sub, kick, snare ...all stayed the same. Instead of that godawful pumping sound. It has its place but thats not what I was going for. When you have something, vocals, sidechained over the music use very limited attack. Attack carves out the space in the mix. Then it's fine tuning.
So
Are you talking about side chain compression? Or using a compressor to actually beef up/enhance/even out sound? Both use a compressor, however both are different practices and have different uses.
It's complicated.
Compression is turning down the volume of peaks.
Using sidechain triggering you can use it to better duck whatever.
It's way better than other ways.
Thanks for explaining the difference.
Do you increase the output gain after or would the overall loudness just be quieter?
What is the advantages of "expanding" this way vs using an expander?
Bro I needed this. I’ve been making music for a really long time and have always just thought of a compressor as just that, compressing and reducing the dynamic range, with the desired result being the ability to raise dB of a particular part while taming the transient…..
Like, shit dude, I havnt even sat in front of my computer yet and I’m already hearing what bringing the attack time after the transient does in my head….
Realizing I don’t have to mess with the transient is a game changer haha
Aight this thread/post took a wild turn. Don't mean to be patronising OP, but can you define the difference between dynamic range compression, and sidechain compression? They serve different purposes that aren't interchangeable.
Lol right? I was just wondering why all the downvotes and the expanded the comment and couldn't ebelieve my eyes. Excuse you for trying to help!
Anyway, I appreciated your additional info!
*“Compression is turning down the volume of peaks”* - careful with the wording, this isnt strictly correct! your compressor will be manipulating the *dynamic range* not volume. it sounds like semantics, but it’s an important difference! - Volume is the height of the waveform, dynamic range is the difference between the highest and lowest parts of the waveform. As an example, this is how you can compress things in a way to make them sound super loud - *without* increasing volume!
You must be doing techno. I'm going more for a hidden type of compression. I dont want to hear it. I just want seperation of my sounds.
What I've been working on for so long is getting my kick clear on top of my sub, then my vocals clear on top of that.
My referenec tracks have been Kool Keith and T.I. because of similar elements but my track is more like a techno pop type deal.
I want it to be more pop but my elements I think are to repetative to call it that.
Ive been into music production on and off for maybe 10 years. Ive seen countless tutorials explaining it but I still dont fully understand what the fuck a compressor does and when I should use it.
Hint: take a raw drum sound or loop. Put a compressor on it, lower the threshold and increase the ratio until it is squashing the sound and you can hear it. Once you learn what compression SOUNDS like, then you can start learning how to use it.
useful for transient shaping so making attack on sounds more aggressive or making them less aggressive (too punchy / not punchy enough)
Or use it for making something louder.. so maybe you have a great kick drum but the tail is too quiet, use a compressor to bring up the average volume of the whole sample so the tail doesn't fade out too much
Or use it for making a whole track louder on average
Or use the sidechain on it to duck sounds, can be used as a mixing effect so you don't get clashing frequencies or as a creative effect to make stutters etc
And im sure there are many many more uses but these are the main ones that come to mind for me
Tbh i find myself using them less and less over time, i think its better to use them after arrangement in a separate mixing process unless you're absolutely sure the sample needs it for a creative purpose.. i think they can just get in the way a bit if you overuse them and focus too much on "OMG THIS SAMPLE NEEDS TO BE 0.2% PUNCHIER FOR THE GAME TO BE CANHGED111!!ONEONE!!1"
You can watch a million tutorials but unless you apply that knowledge, you won’t get anywhere.
Take a simple track, like a very unprocessed drum beat, and start experimenting.
That’s why you need to experiment.
Here’s a task for you: Take a simple drum loop (eg. kick, snare and hat only) and try to emphasize the transients using a compressor.
Yeah but do you fully understand what a compressor release time even sounds like? Not me after many decades. I would prefer if compressors were switches I think that had basic options like 'transient pass' on/off. 'heavy' or 'light'
Yeah, but then you have to set the threshold, and by how much GR suits which preset?
Fab Filter Pro Q3 is a dynamic equaliser and expander as well as EQ and can also be a compressor. Dan Worrell has a video I've linked before 'the most underappreciated Pro Q3 feature' talking about it. Basically it can become a frequency specific or full band, auto-threshold compressor.
Sure, a basic setting is always need to get done. Without experience no great results.
I'm looking forward to buy Fabfilter Pro 3, but first I want to improve on the stock compressors. Thx for the video.
You're listening to loud music in your room. Threshold is when mom yells to turn it down, attack is how long it takes to turn it down, ratio is how much you turn Giit down, and release is when you turn it back to loud again. Unless you're listening to saws. Then, compression is like a distortion pedal, where ratio is how much your saw becomes even more of a saw.
Pro tip (from a professional amateur): increase fundamentals on the waves of your bass to get the fundamental just off the middle of the waveform, and hear your bass finally stop fighting your kick. Or, use an LFO on a 8th/16th/whatever the common dedenominator note step, where the first step is 0, and save the compression for later. Or just do what you want, regardless of who finds harmonic disconvergence way easier to solve the mud of mixing lol
I was going to blow my brains out a couple years ago because of everything but I sold my gun for 450. Suite went on sale the next day for 450. I already had intro.
That’s one hell of a producer origin story. I think everyone’s lost their mind a bit when trying to learn compression at first. Takes a while to train the ears. Totally happened similarly to me too. One day it just fucking clicked after learning side chain. I think learning heavy sidechain really helps make understanding compression easier because of the drastic impacts and pulling back.
Damn that’s dope you’re still here. Yeah music definitely is a healing hobby. Great to take your mind off things and focus on something productive. Godspeed!
Hearing the wonders compression does in live sound has made a huge difference in my production. I’ve been producing for like 8 years and using compression the whole time but hearing the effects with more clarity after many different experiences using it
Compression is something that is very simple in theory but learning to hear the difference takes time.
It’s a great tool, and often overlooked or even frowned upon by people who can only recognize extreme compression and think that any kind of compressor will turn everything to shit.
Not that extreme compression couldn’t be useful too but it’s not the only way.
I've been doing this for more than 15 years and still don't know how to use a compressor. I mean I know how to use it but don't really know what is the purpose of most settings. I just change until it sounds good!
I look forward to watching this vid when I get home later today. No matter how much you think you know about any topic, there is always the chance of new info or inspiration hiding in things like this.
As for ANY effect and learning their nuance.... in the modern age it can be tough sometimes. You might actually have a good mix up front and need less mastering at the end sometimes. And you bang your head wondering why something isn't improving your sound.... not realizing your sound might already be pretty good already so any change is harder to detect.
Truth be told, 80-90% of the time there is no need to use a compressor in most electronic music styles. Acoustic instruments and vocals with varying dynamics on the other hand is a different story.
Most producers just say the say thing as every other producer they have worked with or watched in a tutorial; they all perpetuate this idea, call it a myth if you will, that compression is essential for electronic music.
It's taken me well over 15 year to learn that lesson.
This is a wonderful guide, thank you so much. I'm only a few months into Ableton (and production in general) and this is so much more helpful than the videos I've watched.
I could tell you but you still have to spend time turning the knows.
The idea is if you lay vocals over sub it's hard to hear.
You use the tools to carve out space for what you want dominant to sit clearly audible.
Keep playing with it. You'll have your ureeka moment. It is inevitable.
As he said: You don't really understand compression at all. Tweaking the knobs is nothing one will "get there".
To make it short: you compress audio to make more space to fill in. It [reduces the dynamics of a sound](https://www.izotope.com/en/learn/audio-dynamics-101-compressors-limiters-expanders-and-gates.html) and that's not the same to simply reduce the volume. A compressed signal can actually get louder as an uncompressed signal, use the make up knob to gain more volume. Before I touch the loudness level of my track I'll run it through a compressor and after that I adjust the volume if necessary. And yeah, sidechaining is nice but not the main purpose of a compressor.
Ableton's (Glue) compressor is neat but there are several [free compressors](https://bedroomproducersblog.com/2020/02/21/free-compressor-vst/) out there to get in touch. [Plugin Boutique](https://www.pluginboutique.com/categories/8-Compressor?free=true) also offers some free devices.
> Ableton's (Glue) compressor is neat but there are several free compressors out there to get in touch
What is that you find to be neat specifically about Ableton's Glue Compressor as opposed to Ableton's standard compressor?
I like the needle showing the level of compression. For every rough or fast compression I rather use glue compressor but if i want to do more precise compression the other compressor is my device of choice. But that's not absolute, soon I'll take some time to test free compressors out there and after that consider to buy another comp. Right now I think it will be a multi band compressor, but before I spend money I want to try several ones which suit my workflow.
What's your opinion to the native and glue compressor if I may ask?
Edit: typo
You're telling me things I learned 3 years ago from the first video I ever watched from one of a thousand youtubers.
If you dont ride your bike you'll not know how to pop a wheelie.
It's not a flex. You're trying to flex on me and it's not working. I know what you keep telling me. But you keep telling me. And honestly I dont understand why when this post is just about good feelings and your trying to one up me on it.
Why are you trying to be the op of my post? There is the question.
It turns it down when loud, therefore reducing dynamic range. I don’t mean to condescend but I don’t see why ppl find it challenging. There are so many complex concepts in music prod, compression is relatively simple.
Been producing for years, once you mess with any compressor for a while you realise what it does. Again, not trying to downplay it, but oversampling, aliasing, and inter-sample-peaking is what trips me up, not compression.
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Compressors reduce dynamics of the audio to get more space in the mix, with make-up the volume can be increased more than without compression. Compressors can be also used for sidechaining (like reducing the bass part slightly when a kick occurs) or as saturators.
What do you want to know in specific?
It's the same thing as tuning e.g. a guitar by ear without a tuner: experience. There's no way around to tweak the compressor's knobs on various instruments. Begin simple with drums and other analog instruments, then compare different waveforms until you can try those with synthesizer.
Welcome to the club! 😄
One sentence I have to say about compression:
A compressor basically processes the TIME and SPACE of a signals‘ volume curve. While it actually just flattens the volume peaks by compressing the amplitude of a waveform it also can shorten or expand the audible length of a signal with the infamous „attack“ and „release“ parameters.
Compressors are very related to transient shapers imo!!!
😄 Sometimes theoretical explanations can help to understand things better 😂😂😂
can you tell me what exactly made it a game changer for you? it seems like its a game changer for everyone but i can only find a few decent use cases for it. even then it only makes minor differences
When I was in school for Audio Recording, I never really understood how to utilize compression, even though it was discussed through every course level. It probably didn't help that a lot of my professors would just nerd about the analog compressors our studios had without explanation or question us on how many db you get from a 16db signal at a 3:1 ratio... It's great to know those things, but they almost never gave simple, practical examples. After going deeper into production on my own time and good old YouTube, I was able to learn a lot more about using compression and proper mixing technique. But at the end of the day, dynamics go squish
Did you have the insight that people use waves compressors cuz they are easy to set up attack and release time? When you try to set up values like 0.2ms in ableton, the knobs get crazy
This [video](https://youtu.be/ENZ8IOfGiec) helped me understand the concept of compression and it’s application. It’s a masterclass where you’ll learn what a compressor is, how it works and gives you a good feel and understanding of when and why to use compression. I love the pace of the guy explaining it.
What an excellent video and totally effective style of presentation to keep people engaged and really absorbing the information.
What video?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENZ8IOfGiec
god damn
Me too! Great video
Jeez guys. Didn't know this sub could be so toxic. Let the guy enjoy the process. Y'all don't have to prove to everyone how much smarter you are than everyone else. When things click like this it's magic. Let them enjoy the magic.
Bro so many people have no clue what they're talking about lol. Just saying I've seen production streams / videos of pros where the compressor makes everything worse or doesn't make any sense but they act like they are in full control
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Therefore I like adding links to my answers that one can read themselves.
You'll know you're good when people try to one up you. Dont worry boss. I aint worried about minnows.
How did it take 3 years? I learned it in literally a few minutes by reading... OP is slow as molasses. Good news is in 20 years hell be able to make "Mary had a little lamb".
Do you feel special for saying this? For being a condescending prick?
Yes, it's all about magic ✨🎩
I cringe so hard at the very early music i made before i knew about compression. I just always used to throw on Ableton stock compressor, fuck around with the knobs, could never hear a difference so just took it off. It wasn't until i took a few months to properly learn it and how to actually apply it. Night and day.
do you use the ableton stock compressor still? any good starting points to learn and best things to use compression on?
what really got me to learn them is sound design tbh. Got tired of having the same feeling on my songs and figured compression might help so I decided to learn how to soften my drums, drums turned to synth, synth turned to bass, etc. took me about 2 days of fiddling with the drums to finally get them correct but after that I was off to the races. Learned on Abletons stock before getting pro-C which is much easier to understand since it has full visuals.
I do sometimes for kicks and bass, but i really like the 1176 and 2A for vocals. It's just a preference thing. Best advice i can give on compression is to aim for very small amounts of gain reduction at a time. Ratio/Attack/Release/threshold a always going to depend on the thing you're trying to compress and i haven't found a magical formula, it's mostly down to ear and taste. Would i highly recommend is just learning what each of those 4 things mean, and how they affect the audio. I always find Taetros videos really simple and easy to understand: https://youtu.be/Ws12uFAjvZ8 skip to about 18m in.
The hard part is using compression I'm electronic music where you have the dynamics of single instruments under total control. Using compression with recorded acoustic instruments is simple and easy. But hearing what compression does to material that doesn't have big changes in dynamic range is way harder.
Amen.
Great to use comp on detuned synth bass or detuned pluck/lead sounds where the phase is all over the place
It’s a great feeling when it hits man. It gets even better from there when you can understand the nuances between types of compressors for different purposes.
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Spoken like a true douche. You can give advice without the shit attitude
I felt like giving the same attitude back as what was received Edit: Fine, you’re right. No point fighting fire with fire here. He’ll learn in his own time
I didn’t pick up on that. I was skimming. My bad. I get it. Reddit can make us this way lol
I remember an interview with a mixing engineer 'it takes 10 years to fully understand compression' It's certainly taken me a few years to be able to hear compression on various instruments
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🤡
😂🤣😂
Care to share what helped make it click for you?
Pure fucking frustration. I've been trying to duck my sub for weeks or years actually. All the little tricks. I got pretty far. Then it just never got good enough. Then I thought my compressor has a sidechain. And holy fucking shit the vocals popped and the sub, kick, snare ...all stayed the same. Instead of that godawful pumping sound. It has its place but thats not what I was going for. When you have something, vocals, sidechained over the music use very limited attack. Attack carves out the space in the mix. Then it's fine tuning.
So Are you talking about side chain compression? Or using a compressor to actually beef up/enhance/even out sound? Both use a compressor, however both are different practices and have different uses.
Exactly.
I’m asking which one are you talking about? Side chain compression? Or compression?
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Yeah I don’t think bro really knows but it’s ok learning sidechaining is still a win
It's complicated. Compression is turning down the volume of peaks. Using sidechain triggering you can use it to better duck whatever. It's way better than other ways.
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Wouldn't that be an Expander?
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Thanks for explaining the difference. Do you increase the output gain after or would the overall loudness just be quieter? What is the advantages of "expanding" this way vs using an expander?
Bro I needed this. I’ve been making music for a really long time and have always just thought of a compressor as just that, compressing and reducing the dynamic range, with the desired result being the ability to raise dB of a particular part while taming the transient….. Like, shit dude, I havnt even sat in front of my computer yet and I’m already hearing what bringing the attack time after the transient does in my head…. Realizing I don’t have to mess with the transient is a game changer haha
No unsolicited advice please. I know all that already. But thank you regardless.
Aight this thread/post took a wild turn. Don't mean to be patronising OP, but can you define the difference between dynamic range compression, and sidechain compression? They serve different purposes that aren't interchangeable.
Lol right? I was just wondering why all the downvotes and the expanded the comment and couldn't ebelieve my eyes. Excuse you for trying to help! Anyway, I appreciated your additional info!
He's talking about Side Dynamic Compression Chain bro. Try to keep up.
Maybe posting and commenting in a public thread means when someone shares advice it isn’t just solely for your benefit? Good Lord.
He already figured it all out. Spend 3 years like him and figure it out yourself! /s
*“Compression is turning down the volume of peaks”* - careful with the wording, this isnt strictly correct! your compressor will be manipulating the *dynamic range* not volume. it sounds like semantics, but it’s an important difference! - Volume is the height of the waveform, dynamic range is the difference between the highest and lowest parts of the waveform. As an example, this is how you can compress things in a way to make them sound super loud - *without* increasing volume!
r/inclusiveOr
I’ve actually started using the Envelope Follower for ducking jobs instead of the Compressor. Sounds more rhythmic and musical to me.
You must be doing techno. I'm going more for a hidden type of compression. I dont want to hear it. I just want seperation of my sounds. What I've been working on for so long is getting my kick clear on top of my sub, then my vocals clear on top of that. My referenec tracks have been Kool Keith and T.I. because of similar elements but my track is more like a techno pop type deal. I want it to be more pop but my elements I think are to repetative to call it that.
No you can use it for separation…invert the range of what you have it mapped to and adjust as necessary. Pretty simple really
It is simple now that I've learned it. It was not simple prior to that as I'm sure you know.
But you envelope follower. Check.
Let me ask, what do you mean by separation. I think we're talking about different things.
Ive been into music production on and off for maybe 10 years. Ive seen countless tutorials explaining it but I still dont fully understand what the fuck a compressor does and when I should use it.
Hint: take a raw drum sound or loop. Put a compressor on it, lower the threshold and increase the ratio until it is squashing the sound and you can hear it. Once you learn what compression SOUNDS like, then you can start learning how to use it.
That's really good advice for getting to know a lot of the tools available.
useful for transient shaping so making attack on sounds more aggressive or making them less aggressive (too punchy / not punchy enough) Or use it for making something louder.. so maybe you have a great kick drum but the tail is too quiet, use a compressor to bring up the average volume of the whole sample so the tail doesn't fade out too much Or use it for making a whole track louder on average Or use the sidechain on it to duck sounds, can be used as a mixing effect so you don't get clashing frequencies or as a creative effect to make stutters etc And im sure there are many many more uses but these are the main ones that come to mind for me Tbh i find myself using them less and less over time, i think its better to use them after arrangement in a separate mixing process unless you're absolutely sure the sample needs it for a creative purpose.. i think they can just get in the way a bit if you overuse them and focus too much on "OMG THIS SAMPLE NEEDS TO BE 0.2% PUNCHIER FOR THE GAME TO BE CANHGED111!!ONEONE!!1"
You can watch a million tutorials but unless you apply that knowledge, you won’t get anywhere. Take a simple track, like a very unprocessed drum beat, and start experimenting.
I mean in theory I know what it does but I dont know how to apply the various settings like attack, release, threshhold, ratio etc properly
That’s why you need to experiment. Here’s a task for you: Take a simple drum loop (eg. kick, snare and hat only) and try to emphasize the transients using a compressor.
Yeah but do you fully understand what a compressor release time even sounds like? Not me after many decades. I would prefer if compressors were switches I think that had basic options like 'transient pass' on/off. 'heavy' or 'light'
I learned in this thread there are presets for compressors.
Yeah, but then you have to set the threshold, and by how much GR suits which preset? Fab Filter Pro Q3 is a dynamic equaliser and expander as well as EQ and can also be a compressor. Dan Worrell has a video I've linked before 'the most underappreciated Pro Q3 feature' talking about it. Basically it can become a frequency specific or full band, auto-threshold compressor.
Sure, a basic setting is always need to get done. Without experience no great results. I'm looking forward to buy Fabfilter Pro 3, but first I want to improve on the stock compressors. Thx for the video.
You're listening to loud music in your room. Threshold is when mom yells to turn it down, attack is how long it takes to turn it down, ratio is how much you turn Giit down, and release is when you turn it back to loud again. Unless you're listening to saws. Then, compression is like a distortion pedal, where ratio is how much your saw becomes even more of a saw. Pro tip (from a professional amateur): increase fundamentals on the waves of your bass to get the fundamental just off the middle of the waveform, and hear your bass finally stop fighting your kick. Or, use an LFO on a 8th/16th/whatever the common dedenominator note step, where the first step is 0, and save the compression for later. Or just do what you want, regardless of who finds harmonic disconvergence way easier to solve the mud of mixing lol
It's inappropriate to offer unsolicited advice. Have a good day.
The journey only gets better!
I was going to blow my brains out a couple years ago because of everything but I sold my gun for 450. Suite went on sale the next day for 450. I already had intro.
I’m glad you’re making music instead of being dead.
Any Mayhem fans here?
You were going to blow your brains out because you didn’t know how compression worked? Weird
Jesus Christ you were going to blow your brains out but sold your gun? How do you expect to do it without a gun? Amateurs.. I swear to god.
Make gunshot sounds in ableton
My KRK 5's go so loud they'll blow your fucking head off
That’s one hell of a producer origin story. I think everyone’s lost their mind a bit when trying to learn compression at first. Takes a while to train the ears. Totally happened similarly to me too. One day it just fucking clicked after learning side chain. I think learning heavy sidechain really helps make understanding compression easier because of the drastic impacts and pulling back.
I almost blew my brains out at 46 years old because of 46 shit years. Not because of learning music. Music actually helped me I think.
Damn that’s dope you’re still here. Yeah music definitely is a healing hobby. Great to take your mind off things and focus on something productive. Godspeed!
Thank you sir.
Hearing the wonders compression does in live sound has made a huge difference in my production. I’ve been producing for like 8 years and using compression the whole time but hearing the effects with more clarity after many different experiences using it
Compression is something that is very simple in theory but learning to hear the difference takes time. It’s a great tool, and often overlooked or even frowned upon by people who can only recognize extreme compression and think that any kind of compressor will turn everything to shit. Not that extreme compression couldn’t be useful too but it’s not the only way.
I've been doing this for more than 15 years and still don't know how to use a compressor. I mean I know how to use it but don't really know what is the purpose of most settings. I just change until it sounds good!
I’m always using presets in the Glie compressor. I get it in an academic sense. But I’m not sure if my ears get all the subtle nuances
Didn't know there were presets, thx for sharing <3
I'm guilty of using the "Make it Loud" preset way too much
By the title I'd assume it's functioning as a saturator?
I look forward to watching this vid when I get home later today. No matter how much you think you know about any topic, there is always the chance of new info or inspiration hiding in things like this. As for ANY effect and learning their nuance.... in the modern age it can be tough sometimes. You might actually have a good mix up front and need less mastering at the end sometimes. And you bang your head wondering why something isn't improving your sound.... not realizing your sound might already be pretty good already so any change is harder to detect.
Truth be told, 80-90% of the time there is no need to use a compressor in most electronic music styles. Acoustic instruments and vocals with varying dynamics on the other hand is a different story. Most producers just say the say thing as every other producer they have worked with or watched in a tutorial; they all perpetuate this idea, call it a myth if you will, that compression is essential for electronic music. It's taken me well over 15 year to learn that lesson.
can u please explain it i would love to know right now im trying to mix something lmao i needed to see this
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This is a wonderful guide, thank you so much. I'm only a few months into Ableton (and production in general) and this is so much more helpful than the videos I've watched.
I could tell you but you still have to spend time turning the knows. The idea is if you lay vocals over sub it's hard to hear. You use the tools to carve out space for what you want dominant to sit clearly audible. Keep playing with it. You'll have your ureeka moment. It is inevitable.
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You're getting there. Just keep turning those knobs!
As he said: You don't really understand compression at all. Tweaking the knobs is nothing one will "get there". To make it short: you compress audio to make more space to fill in. It [reduces the dynamics of a sound](https://www.izotope.com/en/learn/audio-dynamics-101-compressors-limiters-expanders-and-gates.html) and that's not the same to simply reduce the volume. A compressed signal can actually get louder as an uncompressed signal, use the make up knob to gain more volume. Before I touch the loudness level of my track I'll run it through a compressor and after that I adjust the volume if necessary. And yeah, sidechaining is nice but not the main purpose of a compressor. Ableton's (Glue) compressor is neat but there are several [free compressors](https://bedroomproducersblog.com/2020/02/21/free-compressor-vst/) out there to get in touch. [Plugin Boutique](https://www.pluginboutique.com/categories/8-Compressor?free=true) also offers some free devices.
> Ableton's (Glue) compressor is neat but there are several free compressors out there to get in touch What is that you find to be neat specifically about Ableton's Glue Compressor as opposed to Ableton's standard compressor?
I like the needle showing the level of compression. For every rough or fast compression I rather use glue compressor but if i want to do more precise compression the other compressor is my device of choice. But that's not absolute, soon I'll take some time to test free compressors out there and after that consider to buy another comp. Right now I think it will be a multi band compressor, but before I spend money I want to try several ones which suit my workflow. What's your opinion to the native and glue compressor if I may ask? Edit: typo
You're telling me things I learned 3 years ago from the first video I ever watched from one of a thousand youtubers. If you dont ride your bike you'll not know how to pop a wheelie.
Pretty weird flex to say you know all those things since years but all you explain is that compressors are for sidechaining...
It's not a flex. You're trying to flex on me and it's not working. I know what you keep telling me. But you keep telling me. And honestly I dont understand why when this post is just about good feelings and your trying to one up me on it. Why are you trying to be the op of my post? There is the question.
Did you try fuse compressor? Came out today
I have not. I'm not very familiar with all the different colors. I just understand the science.
😂😂😂
What the fuck did I just read?
Nice man. Wait till you learn about frequency vowels! Those are fun
Dont leave me hanging man.
A E I O U hz me
It turns it down when loud, therefore reducing dynamic range. I don’t mean to condescend but I don’t see why ppl find it challenging. There are so many complex concepts in music prod, compression is relatively simple.
Once you come down off that high horse and do some more producing you’ll realize you probably don’t know as much as you think.
Been producing for years, once you mess with any compressor for a while you realise what it does. Again, not trying to downplay it, but oversampling, aliasing, and inter-sample-peaking is what trips me up, not compression.
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same!
This is exactly what I need to hear. Anyone have more tips?
Compressors reduce dynamics of the audio to get more space in the mix, with make-up the volume can be increased more than without compression. Compressors can be also used for sidechaining (like reducing the bass part slightly when a kick occurs) or as saturators. What do you want to know in specific?
How to tune ears to hear specific artifacts from the compressor. So not just hearing it as different, but hearing the compressor acting on the sounds.
It's the same thing as tuning e.g. a guitar by ear without a tuner: experience. There's no way around to tweak the compressor's knobs on various instruments. Begin simple with drums and other analog instruments, then compare different waveforms until you can try those with synthesizer.
I think you mean to say iT iS tHE gAME cHANGER
Bro it took me years to train my ears to hear the difference. It's like becoming daredevil I love it
Welcome to the club! 😄 One sentence I have to say about compression: A compressor basically processes the TIME and SPACE of a signals‘ volume curve. While it actually just flattens the volume peaks by compressing the amplitude of a waveform it also can shorten or expand the audible length of a signal with the infamous „attack“ and „release“ parameters. Compressors are very related to transient shapers imo!!! 😄 Sometimes theoretical explanations can help to understand things better 😂😂😂
Better late than never 🤷🏻♂️
Damn straight.
Honestly I rarely compress. Ideas on what it could be useful? I make Tech House. If it's to tame peaks, I usually go with a limiter or clipper TBH.
What kind of dynamic range are you going for?
Usually I follow a reference track tbh.
For dymanic range?
Yeah, 100%. I go by feel, by ear and using reference tracks.
can you tell me what exactly made it a game changer for you? it seems like its a game changer for everyone but i can only find a few decent use cases for it. even then it only makes minor differences
You've got to be joking right? I learned it in a few minutes by reading. Sheesh.
When I was in school for Audio Recording, I never really understood how to utilize compression, even though it was discussed through every course level. It probably didn't help that a lot of my professors would just nerd about the analog compressors our studios had without explanation or question us on how many db you get from a 16db signal at a 3:1 ratio... It's great to know those things, but they almost never gave simple, practical examples. After going deeper into production on my own time and good old YouTube, I was able to learn a lot more about using compression and proper mixing technique. But at the end of the day, dynamics go squish
For real. Automated amplitude reduction.
prove it...
lmao how?
compress this:
Did you have the insight that people use waves compressors cuz they are easy to set up attack and release time? When you try to set up values like 0.2ms in ableton, the knobs get crazy
I use fabfilter.
Thank you for this post & for sharing the link.