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nowaysj wrote:

test recordings wrote:There's mention of how they do what they do though , and I can just find out myself. You think transformers , vales etc aren't electronics?

By this point in this thread, does anybody know what it is you are asking, or what you want to know?

nowaysj wrote:Automatically doing what though? What are you trying to do? A compressor can be used to do several different things.

Are you just trying to control volume?

Then there are the "Attack" and "Release" controls. So what do these do?

If you've followed this explanation so far, you'll realise that a compressor is a bit like having a smart guy hanging onto a volume control and adjusting it by hand according to the music. But how quickly can this "person" respond? Well, the "Attack" control, adjusts how quickly this "person" is, at turning down the volume when things get too loud. The "Release" control is how quickly that same "person" can turn the volume back up again when things have calmed down.

But why would you want to adjust this? Surely you would want it to be instantaneous? (after all, it *is* supposed to by an automatic system...)

It turns out that in practice, in many situations, you don't want the volume to be "instantly" cranked down the moment things get too loud. Under certain conditions you can really *hear* the volume being pulled down, and this is very undesireable. Instead, it *sometimes* sounds better if the "person" is a bit sloppy and slow at yanking the volume down. The "Attack" control affects this sloppyness.

What about the "Release" control? Well, in a similar way, if the compressor is too fast at turning the volume control back up again, you can hear it working (the audible effect is known as "pumping"). It just sounds "artificial". So the "Release" control adjusts the speed at which the compressor "recovers" after yanking down the volume. The exact speed which sounds "correct" depends on the music, so that's why you can adjust it by hand. The examples following in a moment give some suggested settings, but by all means experiment in order to find the most "natural" sounding setting.

And that leads us to another control. It is a switch, and it is sometimes marked "Automatic" and sometimes marked "Peak/RMS". So what does this switch do?

Well, as I mentioned before, the "Attack" and "Release" settings really depend on the music you are using the compressor on. But music continually changes. What the "Automatic" or "Peak/RMS" switch does, is to switch on an automatic setting that attempts to "listen" to the music and continually set the correct "Attack" and "Release" settings for you. Of course it doesn't always do the best job, and that is why you also have manual control if you want it. It is important to realise that with this switch turned on, the "Attack" and "Release" controls are disabled and will do nothing. Some compressors (unfortunately) don't have "Attack" and "Release" controls at all, and are either set to preset values, or permanently set to RMS (automatic).

nowaysj wrote:Yeah, I know a few comps with auto release. WHAT OF IT?

nowaysj wrote:The only thing here that I have no idea of, is what he is trying to do. At this point in the thread though, I'm in it just for sport.

I've enjoyed TR through the years over in the snh, so have been playing along, but the mf is being extremely obtuse here. He has been asked several times what he is trying to achieve, and there has been no reply forthcoming.

I've asked several times because depending on what he is trying to do, there may be more appropriate tools.

FFS

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SunkLo wrote:RMS != automatic A/R
I dunno what that guy's on about.

There's plenty of auto release compressors because that actually makes sense. You want it to let go before the threshold is triggered again. So the plugin can look at how often the threshold is triggered and set the release accordingly.

But auto attack? I don't see how that'd be helpful at all. You could measure the previous transient and then... what? How does the compressor know how snappy you want it? There's no objective measure of what an attack time should be like there is with release. There is level dependent attack which I previously mentioned but that doesn't seem to be what you want.

I hope you're not basing this whole search on that one Angelfire-ass article from '99.

mks wrote:I forgot, there is one VST that I would recommend. I'm not at my DAW right now, so I was trying to remember off the top of my head.

The one I have used is the Stillwell Audio Major Tom. Check it out!

http://www.stillwellaudio.com/plugins/s ... ompressor/

SunkLo wrote:NI has a DBX160 emu as well.

SunkLo wrote:LA2A is a classic compressor with minimal controls. Tons of emulations of it.

test recordings wrote:

SunkLo wrote:RMS != automatic A/R
I dunno what that guy's on about.

There's plenty of auto release compressors because that actually makes sense. You want it to let go before the threshold is triggered again. So the plugin can look at how often the threshold is triggered and set the release accordingly.

But auto attack? I don't see how that'd be helpful at all. You could measure the previous transient and then... what? How does the compressor know how snappy you want it? There's no objective measure of what an attack time should be like there is with release. There is level dependent attack which I previously mentioned but that doesn't seem to be what you want.

I hope you're not basing this whole search on that one Angelfire-ass article from '99.

Auto attack and release adjusts the attack and release time based on how fast they happen. It means the compressor calculates when to set the times, or in analogue hardware, just reacts electronically in some way.

Here's a relink of the KVR article I posted on page 1: http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5300182. Like I said before, it's not uncommon, but not common with free stuff, hence why some people may not know what it is.