Tag Archives: technical

Magic Numbers: Rounded Fractions

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🧠Memorizing Sucks.
As audio engineers, certain numerical values become often-used and thus can become useful to memorize. If you suck at memorizing stuff like me, graphs and charts can be helpful.

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🎛0—127.
In Ableton Live and other programs, range values are often scaled from 0 to 127, rather than 0 to 100. So it can be useful sometimes to know certain fractional values to type in (either mathematically perfect for extreme precision, or rounded values for quick input).

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⚖️Precise Midpoint (63.5) vs Rounded Midpoint (64).
The most common of these is 63.5, the value to input for the precise halfway point of a macro control in Ableton Live.

⚠️Note that Ableton Live only shows the rounded value in the display, and it always rounds all decimals down. (Why?!?) Often if you see a macro that says “63”, it’s actually set to 63.5. If only Ableton Live gave the option to display at least 1 decimal of macro values for this reason.

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🌓FRACTIONS TABLE
Here’s a nifty table of basic simple fractions down to 1/12, provided in precise (to the 5th decimal place) and rounded values for both the 0-100 (aka percentage) and the 0-127 scales.

Fraction0—127 (rounded)0—127 (precise)0—100 (rounded)0—100 (precise)
1/26463.55050
1/34242.333333333.33333
1/43231.752525
1/52525.42020
1/62121.166671716.66667
1/71818.142861414.28571
1/81615.8751312.5
1/91414.111111111.11111
1/101312.71010
1/111211.5454599.09091
1/121110.5833388.33333

⚗️Takeaway / Distillation.
I wouldn’t expect anyone to memorize all of these, but recalling certain key values to pop in in at-whim can be useful. I personally always remember 31.75, 63.5,and 95.25 as precise quarter, half, and three-quarters for macro values — since I’ve had to input them so many times, whereas I tend to round one-eighth to 16 because I forget the exact value and don’t want to do math in my head.

Peace!


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Tempo Dynamics

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When applying dynamic effects, we are rarely going to need the entire timing ranges available, depending on the tempo, right? The new Tempo Dynamics pack provides go-to racks with minimum and maximum values hard-wired to ranges most potentially useful, given the chosen tempo — avoiding values that are likely too fast or too slow to be helpful.

Want to limit, squish, groovify, level, expand, or gate something? Reach for one of these racks in the nearest available tempo, and with handy knobs available to fine-tune, then dial it in quickly without worrying about the numbers or graphs… all while retaining the human element of your personal touch still in place. The macro knobs are also useful for automating in an arrangement, say to let something breathe more during one section and then clamp down during another.

I started devising these effect racks back when Live was still on version 9, so I’ve been testing them quite a lot over the last few years. They can be quite handy!

PACK CONTENTS

• 23 Tempo Compressors ranging from 20 to 240 bpm in 10bpm increments.
• 15 Tempo Expanders ranging from 25 to 235 bpm in 15bpm increments.
• 8 Tempo Gates ranging from 30 to 240 bpm in 30bpm increments.
• 12 Tempo Gluers ranging from 20 to 240 bpm in 20bpm increments.
• 23 Tempo Limiters ranging from 20 to 240 bpm in 10bpm increments.
• Bonus for Live 11: 23 Tempo Multibanders ranging from 20 to 240 bpm in 10bpm increments.

The Tempo Dynamics pack costs a paltry $12.
Grab it here from Isotonik Studios.

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Ableton Live 11 Key Map Guide & Template by PerforModule

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The PerforModule Key Map Template for Ableton Live 11: mapping computer keyboard keys to as many potentially helpful functions as practical.

The Template

There are three parts to the template:
•a Live Set pre-loaded with the recommended key mappings,
•a Diagram showing color-coded key functions, and
•a Spreadsheet listing custom-mapped and built-in key mappings, also explaining some quirks.

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Mosey on over to this dropbox folder to download the Key Map Template Live Set, Key Map Plan Diagram, and Spreadsheet Guide. Read on for nauseatingly meticulous details below.

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Free Loudness Meter VSTs

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“WTF are Loudness Units?” you may ask. Well, they are simply a measure of loudness, just like decibels.
One LU actually is equivalent to one dB. However, an important difference is that Loudness Units are “shaped” according to the human ear’s proclivity to hear certain frequencies more easily than others. Effectively, LUs tend to feel more consistent to our brains than dB will when measuring varying frequency content, and therefore LU meters are preferable to use (compared to, say, RMS meters) for assessing the overall loudness of music.

Below are shown six free LU (aka Loudness Unit) meters, listing features of each. The most important value when matching the loudness of songs is IL (Integrated Loudness), which is the average loudness over the entire course of given time (with very quiet material gated out).

These devices are available as VST effect plugins for any capable VST host (such as Ableton Live, for example).

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Dither Presets for Metal

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(intro)

It’s a set of free presets for Dither, optimized for the Metal genre.

They were made for the mastering of the upcoming metal album, Lust & Insecurity by Animus Invidious.

Noise-shaping dither algorithms are theoretically optimized to “bury” the noise in the frequencies you hear least, while avoiding so much in the preeminent tonalities (in this case, distorted electric guitars focused around 2.5kHz).

Download

You can DOWNLOAD HERE and open the .fxp presets using your DAW of choice. If you happen to use Ableton Live 11, you can additionally access the .adg Racks which allow for more easy snapping-to or fine-tuning of the intensity value.

⚠️ You are also going to need to grab the free TB_Dither_v3 VST2 plugin if you don’t have it already, which has been graciously set free amongst a slew of other awesome legacy TB plugins.

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Parallel-Friendly Native FX Racks for Live 10+: “ParallAux”

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Which Effects Work Best In Parallel?

So one day i got it in my head to figure out which of Ableton Live’s Effects are the best to use in parallel.

What is the criteria for this? Simply, which processes alter the phase of audio passing through them, either to the least degree, or in a nicely summable way.

Why does this matter? Because phase offsets, when summed in parallel with the original signal, will inevitably cause changes to the frequency contour. Sometimes slight amounts of this phase offset can add a nice creamy touch to the sound of things (and pretty much all analog gear causes it to some degree), but when being surgically technical like during the finalizing stages of a track, they are generally just not helpful.

An example of not altering phase at all is Live’s Compressor effect which is phase-neutral; it can be used safely in parallel with no unwanted frequency coloration whatsoever.

An example of altering the phase in a “nicely summable” way is Live’s Reverb. Technically, it’s altering the phase a whole bunch, but it’s doing so in a time-smeared fashion which results in far less likelihood of perfectly-lined-up frequency cancellations, and so, when at 100% wet, reverbs can be just fine to use in parallel, and are often preferred this way.

After carefully checking the phase response of all of Ableton Live Ten’s native Audio Effects, i came up with five distinct racks providing combinations of the most parallel-friendly native effects, optimized for specific purposes with maximal versatility of application.

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>Check Out ParallAux via Isotonik Studios<

>Download ParallAux PDF Manual<

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PerforModule Recommends: Effects Order

by in Tute, Uncategorized and tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

While we all know that there is no such thing as a perfect or ideal FX chain order for all situations because it totally depends on context, i have eventually developed some general preferences for the order of effects in a signal chain. Recently updating all my templates for Live 11 has further honed my thoughts on the situation.

We can of course swap around the sequential ordering of effect devices, either for a specific intended result or as a matter of experimentation just to see if an alternate routing happens to sound better on given audio.

As usual when sharing my ideas, it is recommended that you not simply adopt the structure as presented, but rather that you test it out in practice and modify things over time to suit your particular style, keeping notes and updating your own templates as you go. Maybe you think the way i place transient shapers before compressors is idiotic. That’s totally fine!

I’ll share below my go-to effects order, and (most importantly)… WHY.
While some of the choices are probably pretty unorthodox, none of them are arbitrary; they all have reasons. Are they bad reasons? Good reasons? Who knows. But i like to think they are built on logical rationale.

Keep in mind you’re seldom if ever going to need all these types of effects on any single track, but for times when you are using even two different processor types, some guidance as to their ordering might prove useful. Resist the urge to add more effects to a chain just because you can. The fewer processors required to get a sound how you want, usually the better.

Scroll to the bottom for a handy cheat-sheet!

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Organize your User Library Like a Boss ~ Live 11 Style

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 One of the most popular PerforModule articles to date is How to Organize User Plugin Presets Like a Boss in Ableton Using the Hidden Architecture and it’s understandable — it’s very helpful to be able to integrate one’s own presets into the browser’s organization structure. And it’s pretty simple to accomplish. Read that article for an in-depth rundown on the topic in which is also explored further customization options for the truly OCD, if you have the desire.
 Or just read on for a briefer summary…

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 •Basically, if you place your User Library presets into folders with the same specific names as the built-in categories, those presets will now also appear in their respective category folders in the browser.

 •Further, you can yourself customize the system, adding your own bespoke categories. Read about that in part two.

 Live 11 Has updated the default categories, adding a handful of new ones which is good news to me, since i’ll be able to integrate more stuff with the built-in system. Some of the choices are a bit odd… but hey, whatever.

 Click here to download the blank category folders, and/or copy the following lists for reference.

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Instrument Rack (Sounds) Categories:

Ambient & Evolving
Bass
Booms
Brass
Cinematic
Effects
Exotic
Experimental
Guitar & Plucked
Mallets
MPE Sounds
Orchestral
Pad
Percussive
Piano & Keys
Strings
Synth Keys
Synth Lead
Synth Misc
Synth Rhythmic
Templates
Vintage
Voices
Winds

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Instrument Categories:

For presets of Live instruments that have not been racked.

The same as Sounds categories but with the addition of…

Components

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Audio Effect Categories:

Ambient Spaces
Amp Simulation
Clean Delay
Distortion
Drums
Filter
Formant
Hall
Instrument
Mixing & Mastering
Modulated Delay
Modulation & Rhythmic
Performance & DJ
Room
Space
Special
Vintage Delay
Vocal

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Drum Hit Categories:

Bell
Bongo
Clap
Conga
Cymbal
FX Hit
Hihat
Kick
Misc Percussion
Ride
Rim
Shaker
Snare
Snare Articulation
Tambourine
Timbales
Tom
Wood

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Midi FX Categories:

Drums
Experimental
Monophonic
Polyphonic
Rhythmic

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 That’s it for today. Check here for a nifty list of all my audio production tips & tricks thusfar. More on the way!

New PerforModule Pack: “Empathy”

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EMPATHY is a pack for Ableton Live 10+ Suite containing a handful of high-end effect racks designed to consistently improve a wide possible range of audio sources passing through them. Each rack is suited to a particular purpose, with easy-to-dial-in controls. Together they provide a robust toolkit for general mixing and mastering.


Contains:

Ultimatum: “The ultimate” audio effect rack designed by PerforModule, it’s a 10-step algorithm to magically improve both the tone and dynamics of any audio source in realtime.

‘The One’: One-stop shop for suave, go-to tonal adjustment of tracks in a mix, with low & high cut focus, “light shine” focus, surgical slice, l-r twist, and M vs S intensity.

Auditory Miximizer: The PerforModule twist on the infamous sonic maximizer, with tastefully optimized frequency contours and dynamic reactivity. Comes in 3 versions: stereo, L-R, and M-S.

Dilation Warder: Combination gate and expander for when you want to increase the dynamic range, tighten things up, emphasize punch, and add more of a percussive, staccato feel.

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Skip to the bottom of this post to check out a video overview of Empathy by Brian Funk, or read on for a more detailed overview of each the included devices and what makes them special.

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