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DJ & Sound System volume levellers
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AJ113 View Drop Down
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Originally posted by gen0me gen0me wrote:

...Moreover some tracks percived loudness is like ~6db quieter than another but both are mastered to 0dbOuch Try to fight thatBig smileAlthough this one may be exaggerated due to shitty mp3s
Perceived loudness is not measured in DBs, it's measured in LUFS (USA - LKFS).

Originally posted by gen0me gen0me wrote:

It happens on the production level during mastering. Basicly when compression is applied the sounds appear to be more quieter. So the only way to make them appear similarly loud is to put faders up of some vocals and hats when the bass is coming in.
I mean, that just doesn't happen as a rule, you are either mistaken or misinformed.

Originally posted by gen0me gen0me wrote:

But that has to be done in chain before compressor on production level. And moreover the mastering party has to have the hole project with seperate tracks for instruments.
No, this does not happen. While it's true that some mastering houses prefer to use stems if the client is willing to provide them, mastering engineers do not operate on each individual channel, because that is mixing, not mastering.
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I occasionally have a situation where there are 3 DJs doing a b2b style set. each of these DJs have different track gain structuring/matching levels than the other. 

Often one of the DJs will be running much hotter out of the mixer than the others and into 3-6db of protection on my Drawmer SP2120 before the LMS when the others are not. The system is protected but one of the DJs is noticeably louder when they come on each 15-20mins or so in the set.

Would this device bring down the input level reaching my Drawmer/LMS of the gain happy DJ in the 3-way b2b set without me needing to stop over at the rack each time they come on to adjust my input gain on LMS?
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RC1 Sound System View Drop Down
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Originally posted by vertx vertx wrote:

I occasionally have a situation where there are 3 DJs doing a b2b style set. each of these DJs have different track gain structuring/matching levels than the other. 

Often one of the DJs will be running much hotter out of the mixer than the others and into 3-6db of protection on my Drawmer SP2120 before the LMS when the others are not. The system is protected but one of the DJs is noticeably louder when they come on each 15-20mins or so in the set.

Would this device bring down the input level reaching my Drawmer/LMS of the gain happy DJ in the 3-way b2b set without me needing to stop over at the rack each time they come on to adjust my input gain on LMS?
 
Yes, that's a good example of where the device would be very useful.  We sometimes have similar situations even with only single DJs where they are so fixated on the crowd and beatmixing that they don't pay attention to level matching their mixes, or perhaps as they get more excited they just keep adding a db or two every few minutes, and this device would just keep slowly tweaking the gain to keep the perceived volume in the crowd consistent.
 
Of course a Drawmer SP2120 or similar will "catch" a signal that is too loud, but if it is then left to manage the sound with a permanent gain reduction it will spoil the dynamic range of the show and cause regular significant gain and perceived level fluctuation.  As a crude way of protecting a sound system that may be ok, but the resulting performance isn't up to the standard I would be proud to offer when I'm being paid good money because the event wants to sound as good as possible.
 
I can see lots of people would find this device incredibly useful once they actually appreciate what it is capable of, but I guess we will see, it's still early days!
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Honestly, the Drawmer doesn’t work like you describe on the previous page, especially if set correctly.

It doesn’t increase the level of quiet parts - it isn’t a compressor. It also only maintains a preset volume level, after a certain time period has passed. It is also multi band, at least in trigger threshold. It lets short peaks through smoothly for example, and it shouldn’t be audible even when it does kick in. Again, if set correctly. Sometimes you might think that you have to make it work hard to comply with environmental health, but in those cases I would personally pad the overall input before the unit to avoid having it sit over the threshold all night - that’s just a properly configured gain stage.

Can you bypass the part that boosts the level? I personally hate it when an engineer rides the fader like that - the DJ might be intentionally having a quiet part to build up to a big track - if you keep the level constant you’re interrupting their mix. Maybe this is more common in the world of 4/4 than the drum and bass you guys do more of but I would lose a LOT of work if I did that every set. This is where the 10EaZy is popular too because if there is a limit, it has the bar on screen that the DJ or engineer for live stuff can work with to remain under threshold but still preserve some dynamics over the set


The Dateq is a step up from that, and again it’s even better at working transparently, especially if it works from the mic. I don’t think you’re wasting your time because more options in this field are good especially if the cost is comparable to the equivalent. I call them ‘shitbreaks’ because that is what it allows you to have mid show

Let me know when you’re ready and I’ll gladly a-b it, with measurements and subjective listening.

Edited by toastyghost - 09 May 2018 at 12:57am
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RC1 Sound System View Drop Down
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Originally posted by toastyghost toastyghost wrote:

Honestly, the Drawmer doesn’t work like you describe on the previous page, especially if set correctly.

It doesn’t increase the level of quiet parts - it isn’t a compressor. It also only maintains a preset volume level, after a certain time period has passed. It is also multi band, at least in trigger threshold. It lets short peaks through smoothly for example, and it shouldn’t be audible even when it does kick in. Again, if set correctly. Sometimes you might think that you have to make it work hard to comply with environmental health, but in those cases I would personally pad the overall input before the unit to avoid having it sit over the threshold all night - that’s just a properly configured gain stage.

The Dateq is a step up from that, and again it’s even better at working transparently, especially if it works from the mic. I don’t think you’re wasting your time because more options in this field are good especially if the cost is comparable to the equivalent. I call them ‘shitbreaks’ because that is what it allows you to have mid show

Let me know when you’re ready and I’ll gladly a-b it, with measurements and subjective listening.
 
Hi Kyle,
 
Thanks for your input, I do recall that the Drawmer was better than most for the purpose, although it's been about two years since I last owned one.
 
I'm confident our device does have a totally new way of analysing the signal in a similar way to how a human engineer would interpret it, but it's still too early to know whether the actual end performance is going to be a big step in the right direction or not!
 
Thanks for offering to give it a try sometime, I'll let you know if and when we're ready to take you up on the kind offer.
 
Cheers, Jon Smile
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AJ113

How do you mix/master trance? Trance synths, vocals, some kick, bass hats all rest.
With classic trance silence. Just synths going louder. Than drop. Synths come in after drop with bassline maybe even vocal. You have already made holes in mix. Sidechains from kick for bassline. Cutted synths & bassline on eq not to take each other bandwidth. Put compression seperately on vocal, drums, synths and bassline. You even seperated bassline did multiband compressing. No matter what else you do without moving faders up on loud moments compression applied after on all will cut vocal and synths playing in the same bandwidth.

4:02
Bassline or "scratching" affected synths main melody. Probably could be equed separately bassline and synths making place for each other with some sound change but didnt... only way keeping the tone: synth faders up.


Emma Hewitt vocals are so strangely mixed with some echo/delay to push it into the mix after drop together with synths. But still listen to moments when she is taking a breath. Its cutted on loud moments and they are present on silent moments. By compression comming from bassline or rather producer not to cut through the bassline and silence it.

Here you can slightly hear vocals that arent pulled up on bandwidth from 1:16 and then 2:35. Background noise is different than on the drop 1:58 But that was partly done by composer not to make this compression visible. Still.
And finally 3:17 vocal + synths compress each other. Although here as there is no bassline drums and so I hardly doubt moving faders up will do it seamlessly.

Here is a beauty:
But all was done on composition level. Every line has its place. Ofc sounds dont sound as full. But still overally is amazing!


Thanks for the LUFS :)
I appreciate every like :)) https//www.facebook.com/genomesoundsystems
Mixes: https://www.mixcloud.com/gen-ome/
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toastyghost View Drop Down
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Originally posted by RC1 Sound System RC1 Sound System wrote:

Originally posted by toastyghost toastyghost wrote:

Honestly, the Drawmer doesn’t work like you describe on the previous page, especially if set correctly.

It doesn’t increase the level of quiet parts - it isn’t a compressor. It also only maintains a preset volume level, after a certain time period has passed. It is also multi band, at least in trigger threshold. It lets short peaks through smoothly for example, and it shouldn’t be audible even when it does kick in. Again, if set correctly. Sometimes you might think that you have to make it work hard to comply with environmental health, but in those cases I would personally pad the overall input before the unit to avoid having it sit over the threshold all night - that’s just a properly configured gain stage.

The Dateq is a step up from that, and again it’s even better at working transparently, especially if it works from the mic. I don’t think you’re wasting your time because more options in this field are good especially if the cost is comparable to the equivalent. I call them ‘shitbreaks’ because that is what it allows you to have mid show

Let me know when you’re ready and I’ll gladly a-b it, with measurements and subjective listening.

 
Hi Kyle,
 
Thanks for your input, I do recall that the Drawmer was better than most for the purpose, although it's been about two years since I last owned one.
 
I'm confident our device does have a totally new way of analysing the signal in a similar way to how a human engineer would interpret it, but it's still too early to know whether the actual end performance is going to be a big step in the right direction or not!
 
Thanks for offering to give it a try sometime, I'll let you know if and when we're ready to take you up on the kind offer.
 
Cheers, Jon Smile


No worries, I don't doubt that it does what you say it does if you built it mate! Just curious because there is already a market for this and it's fairly well served - but if we can do better on sound or price, then happy bloody days
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I get the aspiration here, but an AVC2 comes close, and is proven.

It will only trigger auto gain down, when 0dB threshold is breached, but it has a slow response, so fades back up slowly. You twiddle the pot on the back to set whatever volume/voltage out of it for 0dB in. That pot works like the pot on most Pioneer mixers, Vu says 0dB, but output is whatever you set it at...

If (and a big if) DJ maintains 0dB from mixer (yeah right!) then AVC2 has no effect, and you can then set "volume" by your engineer's fader, before going to system DSP. When DJ takes mick, AVC2 steps in and drops signal down. For a quiet break in track, AVC2 does nothing to gain and is effectively transparent.

Leftfield - A&H iDR4/8 both feature look ahead compressors and limiters, so they trigger from analogue input, before any DSP, and it uses the A2D latency as time for it to ready the compressors and limiters. However this is compression, and not auto gain control, so dynamics will be lost?
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The AVC2 is really noticeable though Matt, I had an install where the EHO mandated it and wouldn't budge, and frankly, I was unhappy with the final product because you could hear the damn thing working. The Drawmer is much more smooth, Dateq again a next level up. If Jon can beat them on price and sound then there's a winner.
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Agree, AVC2 is as subtle as a brick, but unless money is available to pay for real ears and a fader on finger, DSP et al is a nice aspiration, but not a great substitute, so a compromise has to be made somewhere.

A nice alternative is welcome, but perhaps the AVC2's unsubtle nature may actually get the DJ to learn? 

Yeah, right!

Only ever worked with one DJ who gave me exactly 0dB for his entire 1 hour set, in 20 years of this daft game! And that was Danny Rampling, back in 2003!
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Yeah but the Drawmer unit costs the same, sometimes less, and does the same job without sounding like turd when it inevitably kicks in.
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the only solution for an idiotic human in the signal chain is a second human who is not an idiot. if this is too time consuming get a better DJ. this debate has been had many times and there is no technical solution.
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