Beginner Compressor Course for Better Mixes

1. Welcome: Hello, Welcome to the compression like a pro course. My name is Sabina September. I've been in the pre use a mix engineer seed for mole of or seven years now. And what would the lower of indie artists and record labels? In this course, I'm going to teach you how to use the most misunderstood 2k and mixing code, a compressor I myself used to struggle with this tool and when this data to mention the different styles of compression, leg, parallel processing, multi-band compression. My mind, we'll just shut down, but a lot changed when I started studying the fundamentals and discover the simplified way to look at it. And that's exactly what I'm going to show you in this course. I have designed the course with the beginner in mind. So I'm going to break things down, a watch to understand what it is, what it does. And we're going to cover some of the popular compression tech nicks. This course would be beneficial if you are a music producer, DIY artists, or video editor who works with audio, it is time to take your mixes to the next level with these amazing tool. I'm excited and I'm really looking forward to seeing you in the course. Let's get straight to it. 2. What Is Dynamic Range: Welcome to the first lecture. Before we start going deep into compression, I want to explain a very important concept to understand first, it's called a dana mid range. I'm pretty sure you've heard it before. Maybe you wonder what it is. Trust me, it's nothing fancy. So what dynamic range is? It is the difference between the high peaks of the signal and the low peaks of the signal. So when we are compressing, we are manipulating dynamic range. Where if acting dynamic range, That's why a compressor is always under dynamic processes. Okay? So basically we are compressing would pushing down the peaks a little bit, pushing up the low sounds a little bit so that the sound or the signal is more consistent. Okay, so what is dynamic range? Dynamic range is the difference between the high peaks and the low peaks of a signal. So with our instruments with low dynamic range, like electric guitar zombies in the instruments with high dynamic range, like the vocal track, we are looking at gas. So we must always take into account that nature of the sound. For example, if we are to compress a signal with low dynamic range, that means we'll be applying very light compression with low ratios, like one comma five to one or two to one, which is very light compression. But don't get gate. We will cover concepts like ratios in the functions sections. Okay? That's it for this lecture. I will see you in the next one. 3. What Is Compression: Welcome back a quick summary on compression. What is it and what it does. Compression use a tool we use to automate volume, amplitude and to change die, not mic range. In most cases, we use compression to make the signal more consistent, more punchy in your face, and present in the mix of get, meaning without compressing, our mixes will sound flat. This is one of the most important tools you need to master. If you want to get better at mixing, please do not be intimidated by the end of this course. You will be confident enough and know the ins and outs of compression or get. So in the next lecture, I want to show you a visual representation of the effect of compression. See you in the next lecture. 4. Image Example of Compressed & Uncompressed: Welcome back. In this lecture, I want to paint an image of what compression does to a signal. Again, as you can see the first yellow image, we have no compression. You can see these are the high peaks, low peaks, low pigs, low peaks, high peaks, low pigs, low peaks are. This means when you listening to this focus track, you will still hear the vocal track, but it won't be punching enough room with a spic is just end out, Joe, we use compression to achieve that consistent punchy effect, a signal so that it can compete with other tricks in the mix again. So now let's move on to EBG number two, which is the orange one compressed signal. Okay, this is the signal before compression and after compression. So let's go ahead and look at what's the difference. I pigs very high peaks again. But look at this one. High peaks, low peaks, high peaks, low peaks. Okay? So if we put a straight line right over a year and chop off everything, but instead of chopping it off, squash it down a bit. We get this. That's what compression does. It kinda squash the signal a little bit for more consistency. Okay, so the second image, by the look of it, you can see that it's more consistent in volume punch and amplitude. Again, I just wanted to get that out of the way before we get to the compression of functions. That's it for this lecture are, we'll see you in the next one. 5. Audio Example of Compressed & Uncompressed: Welcome back. In this lecture, I want to show you another example. This time we'll be using or do you, before I start doing any fences of a 102, create a clear image and a clear goal and what we're trying to achieve and why compression is one of the most important tools in your toolbox. Okay, what I'm going to do now, I'm going to play a vocal track without compression. All for more clarity. Let's first solo it to display all my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as they still pay or does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never feel sad. Appears now. Home is lag, is prepay, the Renaissance. He's known a main man. I'm the rather great. Now let's play with the drums and the bass. This rocket sweet maid, I met him toggle was, as I say, it doesn't matter. Still pay. Uh, does it better off still paying? All right, That's the vocal track with out compression. Let's play it again. All my homies rockets, we've made great notice, paid with compression. All my homies rockets read ME and let him talk. I was there. It doesn't matter. Still pay. Let's switch off the compressor, plugin. This rock history may switch on the compressor. This rocket Street made. I met him toggle was as I say, it doesn't matter. Still pay, right? Great. For more clarity. Let's solo the Volcker played without compression again and played with compression as play? Yeah. All my homies. Right. This is with compression. Yeah. All my homies. Rocky Street. May I let him talk and was as day it doesn't matter. We still paid without compression. Yeah. All my homies, Rocky Street made a lead him toggle was as they doesn't matter, still pay. Uh, does it better off still pay? I'm pretty sure you can hear that the one with compression sounds more punchy, more in front, war in your face. And it's because of what I explained before, its amplitude, you might think its volume, we just increased volume. No, its amplitude. And the more consistent the sound is, the more punchy it's going to feel. Okay, so let's played with the whole beat, played with the keyboard and switch off the compressor plate. All my homies rock three main and let him talk. I was saying it doesn't matter. Now let's paint with the compressor. This rock Street made and let him talk. And it was a thing. It doesn't matter. Still paying a does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never fear saying a pair down his leg is prepaying. The Renaissance is known as red. I'm pretty sure you can hear that if a vocal sounds more present now, it is taking up its own space that mix with everything else play, okay? That is the power of compression, okay? And I'm pretty sure that you can hear some annoying shop S's. That's another concept we're going to cover later because that also requires compression. Okay, so I'm going to switch on another compressor and explain what it is and give you a more unique and deeper insight into it. Okay, so let's enable the DSO. Let's play it without the DSA. Let em tag and was as day, it doesn't matter, it will still pay, right? Let's play it with the ds. Yeah. Ama homies, rocket Street made I let him talk and was as they it doesn't matter. You still pay a does a better. Still paying is crazy, right? I'm pretty sure you can hear now the sharpness is a goal and all they have been softened. What happened is applied a compressor called the DSA. A lot of people know it as a plugin you just throw in and it magically eliminates a sharp S is that's not the case. It's a compressor plugin designed to save time and focus on specific frequencies. Okay? So normally in the frequency spectrum, if we're looking at an EQ, okay, I'm just gonna go off topic real quick just to make my point. For example, looking at the frequency spectrum from the left-hand side, that is the low end and going up mid-range, and that is the top end. Okay, so around here, five key, six case seven key on most vocal shrinks and where you go in to find shop S's. Okay, if we just use EQ and deep sharp as frequency, what's going to happen is we're going to have a permanent adjustment. So even when that frequency is not too high, it's going to be dipped or limited in volume. Okay? But the power of compression, it's more like an automation to when that frequency gets too aggressive, the compressor 1000 down. That's where the DSA comes in. It is a composite tool, but it is a DSA because it's a compressor designed to focus on specific frequencies. Okay, so for example, look at this DSA plug-in. The focus is on 6,700 heads. And that's where the sharp S is. On this focal, you can always zip around to find them and you can see these threshold. I will explain all of that stuff later. Okay? But my whole point bringing in the DSA concept in this example video is to show you how inputting, how compression has a role in so many things and in achieving so many things in mixing. Okay, So I want to get to the real work and I want to explain one, we doing something because I want this course to be a more practical one. Okay, So we'll be delving deep in more concepts. So we'll be covering the functions, everything about the compressor, how to use it. Great. And then we move on to covering normal compression, which is achieving consistency punch and everything. And then we'll move on to parallel compression. We'll move on to side chain compression, multi-band compression, done with the examples is time to get to the practical stuff. And that's it for this lecture, I will see you in the how a compressor works section. 6. Ratio & Threshold: Welcome back. In this lecture, we're going to start focusing on a ratio and threshold. So we're going to use the same vocal track. Let's disable this mix. I want the independent window one, hit Command 2 on your Mac. So I'm going to go ahead and it inserts on audio effects. Hit dynamic. It's a dynamic processor. Remember, heat compressor, it is a mono signal. Over here we have a ratio knob and a thresh hold, NEP. So what I'm going to do now, I'm quickly going to explain what is the threshold, basically a threshold ease appoint you sit whenever the signal reaches that threshold point. If it's 10 dBs or minus 15 dBs, whenever your signal reaches that point, the compressor will start working and compressing the signal makes us great. And we have the ratio K. These go together. Again, it's more like a pair. One doesn't work without the other. For example, if a set Marie shoe to one to one with a one-to-one ratio simply means for every one decibel, we let in the compressor, we let one disable pus without being compressed. What does that mean? There is no compression going on. If I set it to one to one. If a set it to two to one, for every two disable we compress. We'll let him one plus same with four to one for every four disapproval with compressed relative 1 plus, plus 4 to 1. What I'm going to do real quick, I'm going to set my tick to one-to-one. Remember, what did I say one-to-one? It's no compression. Okay. And I'm going to play the signal and pull down the threshold. Let's Play yeah, my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter who still pay or does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never feel sad. I'm sure you can hear that nothing is going on. At the ratio is super high, it's like minus 50 but nothing. The compressor is not picking up the signal because why it is set to one, to one. Wow. All right, so I'm going to go ahead and set it to two to one with that crazy high ratio, which is minus 50 and play the signal again. Yeah, AMA homies, Rocky Street made I let him talk and was hey, it doesn't matter if we still pay. Now the compressor is acting. What happened? The ratio is telling the compressor to do the wet in a certain amount, which is two to one in this case. And I'm going to push up the ratio to 41 and play. Yeah. All my homies, Rocky Street made. I'll let him talk and was it doesn't matter. You still pay. Now you can hear it's crazy high compression. Okay, so what are we going to do now? We're going to go easy with the threshold. Let's play. Yeah, AMA homies, Rocky Street made I let him talk and was as they it doesn't matter if we still pay. Does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never fill sang a pesto only slag is prepaid. The Renaissance, He's not a main man. I'm the new drug, a villa. Right? I'm pretty sure you can see the meter. The meter is telling you how much gain reduction we are doing. Because basically when you are compressing to create the consistency, right, with crushing down the peak strength to lift up or the low vol is a little bit. That's why you're hearing a little bit of some noise if the compressor is too aggressive, notice that into here, maybe cones and everything. That's why when you're recording, you gotta try to minimize background noise as much as possible. Because when we start compressing, remember we're lifting hello sounds, trying to mesh them a little bit with the high peaks. Okay, Let's set the threshold to something like 27. Let's play. Yeah, All my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter if we still pay, uh, does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never fill saying a pesto OEM is lag is prepaid. The ribosome is not a main man. I'm the new drug or villa little wagon grid stuff. And that is the pebbles off a threshold and ratio knob in a compressor. Don't worry. This course will be repeating more of these concepts in just different variation. So K, because there's so many things we can do with the compressor. So even if this vision of an explanation doesn't work for you, trust me, you're going to find one that will work for you, maybe in a parallel compression lecture or lecture or multi bed. But trust me, you're going to get it. So be patient with yourself and that's how we use threshold and ratio. I will see you in the next lecture. 7. Attack, Knee & Release: Welcome back. In this lecture, we're going to start explaining the attack knob and the release knob. Okay. And I'm also going to feature the knee. No. Okay. Great. Remember the thresholds, the point where the computer starts working, the ratio amount of compression. Now we'll see that there's an attack knob and released know what's going on here. Simply, the attack is how fast the compressor x o grabs this signal. Okay, great. So one thing we forgot to do. The last time is to switch off auto features because I like to do everything manually. Sorry about that. So let's go ahead and switch off the auto gain. We're going to do our own gain adjustments. Okay, let's switch it off. Click off. We're going to switch off, auto on this button or to release or take all the stuff we're going to switch it off. Just click it. No, It's off. Everything is on. Minute. Okay. Now let's go ahead and check what is it? It's how fast of a compressor grabs of a signal. Okay, great. So if we said the attempt to 0 and play, yeah, AMA homies, rocket Street made and let him talk and was as they, right, you can see the gain reduction meter is acting up. Okay? So if we push it to the max, which is 200 milliseconds and play. Yeah, AMA home is Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day. It doesn't matter, it will still pay previous row. You can see the gain meter and you can hear that the compressor is taking time to grab that signal, but it's still grabbing that signal because 200 milliseconds, it is pretty foster care for vocals. I like to use something like 20 milliseconds or two milliseconds. Let's Play. Yeah. My homies rocket Street made and let him talk and was as they it doesn't matter. We still paid or does it better off? Right. Like I said, a check. It's how fast the compressor grabs and acts. And we have a release knob over year. The really is, it's how long you want the compressor to let go of the signal back to the original one. Okay? So I'm going to go crazy. I want to switch to graph so that you can see what we're doing. Okay, so let's set the release to five milliseconds, which is super-fast. It's going to compress it lacO really quick. Okay, let's play. Yeah, AMA homies, rocket Street made I let him talk and walk. They doesn't matter. You still pay a does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never feel safe in our past, our OEM is lag is prepaid, right? As you can see, the waves year, this is gain reduction. This is pretty much compression. Okay? So that was fast compression. Let's push it up to five. Right? Let's play. Yeah, AMA home is Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter. You still pay a correctness. Go crazy with the threshold for more compression. Let's play. Yeah. Oh my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as they still pay, right? I'm pretty sure you can see the gain reduction wave, the compensates taken time to let go. Okay, let's set the release to something like 80. You care for vocals? I like to set something like 83 is a fuss released, but it's a decent case, not crazy fast two upon two pi, you can hear any compression. Let's play. Yeah, AMA homies rock history made and let him talk and was as they doesn't matter, who still paid, uh, does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never feel safe at home is like is prepaid released? And that is the purpose of the release. It's how fast the compressor, let's go off of a signal back to the original signal. Okay, Over here we have a Nishnawbe, some compressor plug-ins, don't have it, some do. So it's important for you to know. So basically a knee, it's how SRP with the compressor cave or grab ease or how soft erase. Okay, So if we push it back, as you can see, pushing it back, look at this image over here. Alright, we'll push it up. It's round, it's a gentle care of, right? Yeah. All my homies Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as they it doesn't matter who still. Right. If we set it to 0, It's a sharp knee. Yeah. Ama homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day. It doesn't matter, it will still pay. Does it better off still paying? Right? Let's set it to something like 0 comma three, not too sharp, not too gentle or care. Because when it comes to erupt vocals, I like that grid, that punch on vocals and that attitude. You know, let's play my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter who still pay. Uh, does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never fills as their home is lag is prepaid. The ribosome is not a main man. I'm the new drug a villa are great and that is how you use the attack, the release, the need threshold ratio. So in the next lecture we're going to cover these no Britain makeup. It's a makeup gain. I'm sure you have noticed that while we are compressing the focal lost some amplitude volume in a way, okay, For example, let's switch off the compressor and play. Yeah, AMA homies rock history made a lead them to login was as they it does. Let's switch it on. Yeah. Ama homies rocket Street made I let him toggle switch it back to me too. Possess they it doesn't matter. We still paid a ride. I'm pretty sure you can hear that we lost some of volume. Okay, so in the next lecture, we're going to start explaining the concept of the make up a game. All right, that's it for this lecture. I will see you in the next one. 8. Make Up Gain: Welcome back. Now it's time to explain the concept of a game. I'm sure you already heated. When we are compressing, we are losing some of volume. Okay. Remember we're squashing down the high peaks and lifting up a Vallis just a little bit. Okay, so since we lost some volume while we are compressing the display, does it better off? Still pay is crazy. I never fills with our compressor appears. The OEM is lagging a bit louder without compression. Okay, so to make up for the gain we lost first, we're going to check and look for how much gain reduction is happening in the compressor. Okay, we have emitter in front of us. That's telling us, yeah. Oh, my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter. We still pay, uh, does it better off still paying, right? Pretty much we are doing minus five, minus four comma five gain reduction. Okay? So what we're gonna do, we're gonna push up the makeup gain knob to five. Okay, So we're doing a gain reduction of minus five, right? And we're going to push the gain, the makeup gain knob, four or five dB boost to make up for the gain we lost. That's why it's called the makeup gain. All right, great. So let's play is crazy. I know who should appear as though OEM is lag is prepaid. The Renaissance, He's not a main man. I'm the new drug available for like 4.5 dB. Sounds good. Yeah. Ama homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as day. It doesn't matter. Save right without compression. Yeah. Ama homies Rocky Street made and let him talk and what? With compression? Yeah. Oh, my homies, Rocky Street made and let him talk and was as, hey, it doesn't matter if we still pay, uh, does it better off still paying? And those are the features you will find on a most compressor plugin. So okay, so we're done with the how a compressor works. So now it's time to start a play in compression techniques Gesso, I'm going to go ahead and start introducing and shown you how to apply popular compression techniques, please. Always more you can do with the compressor, but I'm going to cover the popular techniques, okay, and that's it for this lecture. I will see you in the next one. 9. Normal Compression Technique: Welcome back. In this lecture, we're going to start applying no compression are already showed you a basic approach of using compression. And we're going to do the same thing using a div, rent instrument. Gay, remember in the first example of why we're going through compress of functions, we were using a vocal track to keep things interesting. We're going to use a paired sample. These are ped simple here. This one. All right, I'm looking at the input chain. You can see these already, air compressor. So what we're going to do first, we'll go to listen to the impact of that compressor get, Let's switch it off and then switch it on. Switch it off again. On. Sure. You can hear that the instrument is more in front of the speaker, is more present, it's a bit more consistent. That is the purpose of compression. This is basically normal compression while we're playing a tags release ratios like we did in the previous section. Okay, so what I'm gonna do now, I'm just going to explain what's going on. And then we went to redo something close to it. Okay, let's play. If you remember in the previous section we explained what compression does with doing basically gain reduction because we're losing amplitude when we accomplished that, we're chopping off the high peaks, trying to match them with the low sounds. Okay, so in this case you can see that we are doing again reduction of something like three dB, 40 dB, right? And our ratio is light compression, which is two to one. Or makeup gain is set to three dB boost, making up for the tree dB gain reduction. Remember, so this is our threshold point. This is the point where the compressor will start working, and this is our knee attack, how fast the compressor grabs the signal. Remember, and this is the really severe. So I'm approaching this lecture in a minute whereby it won't be boring and sound like I'm repeating the same big. So I'm basically explaining the functions and the impact of the compressor. But the more we continue with the lectures, we are going to be starting from scratch and everything. Okay, So real quick, Let's switch off this compressor and play the sound with the drums. Alright, so what are we going to do now? We want to give this lead PED simple, more presence, more dominance in the truck. We're going to bring in a compressor grid stuff. Let's play the music. So it real quick, Let's switch off the auto features from minus 20 dB or to gain, we'll just switch it off, the auto release, just click on it, switch it off. Everything. Looking good. Let's play. So looking at this wave white, you can see that there's not much distance, opportunity high peaks, but the ease at distance, basically this is a MI, it the dynamic range. It's not too high. It's not to low days some distance, but not super high of a distance at their resume time, you have to keep in mind that the sound itself, it's a different sound, is not the same as vocal going crazy with compression. And this one might affect how flat it sounds. Good. So with that in mind, we're going to apply light compression before anything. We're just going to set our ratio, which is the compression amount to two to one. We just went to kiss the compressor, just light compression to lift the sun up. But I don't want to go too crazy with it because this is a paired sample or wanted to sound or original as possible get. So what I'm gonna do now, I'm going to play if a paired, Let's mu to the drums play. All right, The threshold is set by default to minus 20. Let's try something like minus 23. Let's play this, do that minus 19, something like that. Alright, ministered just fine. Okay? So remember threshold point, that means when the signal reaches that threshold point, it will start getting compressed again. So I'll just play. All right, so the more we push it to the left. The less room the signal has, the crazy we go with grabbing the sooner or gear. For example, if it's like minus 40, Let's play it right. Minus 40 is right here. We're not giving you any room to breathe again. So we're still one those original dynamics. So we're going to do minus two a D blank. Alright? So to determine how fast the compressor grabs the signal, we're going to use the attack again. Let's push the attempt to the max. Let's play. Again. You can hear that the compressor is super late. So let's do something like 20 milliseconds fast, but not super fast display. That is released off 51 milliseconds. Sounds good to me. Let's play. All right, let's switch to graph play. Let's go a bit aggressive with the knee, which is how sharp the compressor grabs the Sigma again is play. So doing minus 4, minus 3 gain reduction. So to make up for the volume amplitude we lost, we're just gonna do a three dB makeup gain boosted display. Let's do something like four dB. 40 dB sounds good. Remember, these are not rules. Stood. A must have said four dB to say minus 20 depending on the signal and what do you hear? Maybe someone else, six dB boost, a 60 begin reduction will do for them based on what they want to achieve. But I'm happy with those adjustments again. So what do we do? We were to switch off the compressor again, played with the drums, and then we can move on again as play with compressor. Big difference. I'm pretty sure you can hear that that instrument is more present and it's taking up space in the mix. Now we have compression, okay? And that is the normal way of using compression. Okay? We're going to go ahead and explore more popular types of compression so that a well equipped for most situations. And that's it for this lecture. I will see you in the next one. 10. Parallel Compression: Welcome back. In this lecture, we're going to start applying compression first things first, what is parallel compression? Parallel compression, basically, it's a process of manipulating sound depending on what you want to achieve. Okay, here's a clear example. Let's say we have a drum track, it's pumping, it solves decent, but we feel like it can sound more punchy and have more. Okay, so what we're going to do, we're going to take of it a drum signal and send it to another trick, creating a copy of that signal. After that, we're going to apply something on that, duplicates it done. That is basically parallel processing. But in this case we'll be talking about parallel compression. So the duplicates signal would go and compress it like crazy to a punto by its sounds flat distributed. And then we mix that messed up signal with the original signal to add more texture, thickness and punch. Okay? That's how we use parallel compression. So parallel compression is basically creating a duplicate of the same signal, compressing it like crazy, and mix it in with the clean signal or the decent sounding signal, okay, in this case we have vocals, drums, pianos, paraphilic vocals will make a great tool for this example. Okay, let's play. It doesn't matter, right? This vocal songs dissonant over thin, but let's say a 12 more from the vocal. One more texture book. Great, so what I'm going to do, go to the truck, I'm going to create a bus. You can also duplicate the trek, have two of those trucks compressed the other one like crazy and slightly mix it in to get that texture. Okay, that is a simple way to do it. But I'm going to show you a little bit of advanced. I don't think it's that advanced though, but I feel like it's more efficient in terms even okay, so what we're gonna do, we're gonna go to the buses right here. Click the M21, and just select an empty bus because a one logic to creating new empty truck real quick. Okay. I wanted to do two things at the same time, which is how receiving time. All right, let's hit Bus 8, which is an empty bus. Boom. They using new centric created to get, we're going to name it. Great. Now we have Pira cup. Let's play it. A vocal truck. Yeah. Ama homies, Rocky Street made. I let him talk and I'm pretty sure you can see that there is no activity going on for this send chain to be active, we have to send signal using this tiny parameter over here. So let's send something like a lot. Even minus 40 dB. That's fine. So let's play, yeah, my homies, Rocky Street may I'm pretty sure you can hear that we have two signals now, which is a duplicate of the same thing. Let's mute all my homies, Rocky Street, unmute. Yeah, AMA homies, rocket Street, make, alright, great stuff. So we won't be talking about EQ, so I'm just going to duplicate this EQ settings. All right, I'm going to hit Option hold and drag it to this truck. Great. So what I would do now to insert a compressor to the struct, I'm going to turn this volume down the original track a little bit. And ten though the parallel compression, this is not a rule, I'm just doing it to create an example. Okay? So what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna pull up a compressor you compress. Similar to track. I'm going to push the ratio up until like ten. Ratio. Makeup gain is to something like 10. Go crazy with the hold. These rockets Street made. It still. Does it better off. Is crazy. I never. As the lag is pre-baked, the ribosome is now at a street Main and then I'm Tanya was yes, it still does. And then I'm talking on was that they still do it. Let's mute the parallel compressor play. This vocal sounds decent and everything. But listen to it when it plays with the decompress rock made of It's crazy. Yeah. I'm pretty sure you can see that the volume is super low on the heavy compressed signal. But the more and mix it in just a little bit, you don't want to overdo it just a little bit. We don't want that messed up signal to dominate the truck, would just want to edit as texture. Okay, so this is a faster way to do it. But if you're a beginner to the concept, I'll always recommend created duplicate signal. You'd have more control that way over compressed but duplicates signal and just mix it in a little bit to give the signal more bite and more points you can use it and pass tracks. Drums is true man's vocals. This is a super powerful and cool technique. So that is parallel chord progression. Always, if you have any questions, feel free to send me a message. I'm always happy to explain further or even add another lecture just to drive the 0. Okay, Great, That's it for this lecture, I will see you in the next one. 11. Side Chain Compression: Welcome back. In this lecture we're going to cover another cool comb pressing technique. This one is called side chain comb pressing. What I love about this tool, it's so powerful, you can use it in a lot of scenarios. For example, let's say you want to automate control of a specific signal. You can use site chaining for that. For example, in this case, we want to create a great working relationship between the Keq and base because you already know that the kickin BCE, it dominated the low end. They both dominate the low end to create space, we can always permanent adjustments with the EQ team. The other one a little bit, push the other one a little bit. Great. We'll get something that sounds okay, but Woodside chaining would take the mixed to another level. This means we can automate a relationship between the kick and the bass. For example, in this case, we want the base to deep in volume, creating space in milliseconds. When the kick hits and when the signal goes away, the base comes back up real quick without the listener noticing again, I'm pretty sure you're familiar with the concept. If you listen to dance music, leg, electronic dance music, blood pumping, synth, if it obeys effect. That is saved shading. But this is a hippo pop track. I don't want that type of crazy side chaining, but I'm going to do it to drive the point home. Okay, so let's solo or these 2 first and play. All right, let me show you what's happening here. Here's what's happening. We using the same compressor, but the easy feature that you can use for this compressor to be a side chain compressor. Okay, so let's look at the graph. All right, What's happening? You can see that KEQ, when it hits, remember this is a bass track and this compressor is on the bass track. But when the kick hits something pops up, yeah, and it dips Something in volume that is side-chain compression right there. Again, to make things simpler and to make muscles. What I'm gonna do, I'm going to mute this and play without the compression if it gets play. Yeah, you can hear the Keq, you can hear the bass, but they are not that sink when it comes to the listener's ear. These are clashing, these I'm fighting of territory. So we're going to use a say, chain tool so that one gets out of the way when one hates not to 0 volume just a little bit in dB's just to make room for the other one to dominate and have it out real quick. Okay, so want to do it in a minute whereby it's a fossa tickets or phosphorylase so that the listener doesn't he ate in this case. Okay. All right. This is a kick track, right? You can see it. Great. And we're going to pull up a compressor on the bass track. Okay, So if one too deep, the piano, I'm going to show in the compressor on the piano track. And that compressor will be triggered by trek, in this case, the Keq. So go to the base, pull up a compressor. Stereo compressor. This is a stereo track and guess which of the auto features wouldn't want them as plate. Right? So what we're going to do follow my cursor. We're going to switch from output to side chain compression, okay? The side chain input, it's this one. So we're going to select, say Jane, go to Audio, look for this song we want to use as a trigger. And this case it's kick audio. Five. Great. Okay, let's play. I'm pretty sure you can hear that this compressor on the bass track, but it's only active when the kick hits how it's because of the side chain feature. All right, so it's absorbing that kick signal to do whatever I tell it to do right now. Okay, So I'm going to set the ratio to something like, let's do something like 10 to one, which is a lot of compression. Let's set the threshold to something like 50. These are just guesses and adults, okay, and then we're going to adjust. Want to listening, Let's Play. All right, Let's go crazy with it. I want you to hear that EDM dipping effect. Let's go crazy with it. You're going to either when the kick hits, BCE dips in volume almost 200. Okay. Let's go gentle with this to something like minus there five gray. Look at the signal. All right, but it is a bit slow. So let's go to our attack, which is how fast the compressor act and do something like 50 milliseconds. Let's play again. Now you can see it's acting a bit faster. All right, Let's go ahead and just the release also wanted to hold for some time, but I wanted to do something, Let's do something like 10 milliseconds right here and play. Great. Yeah. Yes. Great. Let's switch off the compressor so you can hear it. With the compressor. Now you can hear that that base is dipping in volume to give dominance to the kick, but it's still there. The listener can even pick up that there's some deeply and going on. That is the power off with these technique. But you can also use it to base on general, like I said, on EDM tricks is different and these eras in amusing it this way on this track. Okay, I don't want that crazy deep ng sound. Okay, great. That is a side chain compression. So basically we're sending signal to a compressor telling that compress when this sound hits mu and some space. So like golden volume just a little bit and then come back when I'm done, it's basically that, that is the power of the side chain compression. And tick. Nick, let's play without the side chain compression effect and everything. Let's play. You can hear that Keq is not changing that much, but let's switch on the compressor. Now we can hear that. I feel like that tipping is way too much because you can hear the disappearance of the base when you're playing it with everything. And then we adjust the threshold accordingly. Some Reetu adjustment. Let's play again Mahoney's rocket street name and let him talk. I was saying it doesn't matter. It will still pay. Uh, does it better? Still paying is crazy. I never fear saying Sorry about that. Disrupt Street made and let him talk. I was saying it doesn't matter if we're still still. And that is the pebbles off side chain comb fluorescing, poll for end and nervous. Cool too. That's it for this lecture. See you in the next one. 12. Bus Compression: Welcome back. In this lecture, we're going to talk about bus comb pressing first things first. What is a bus? A bus simply a truck consisting of other tracks, for example, we create different buses based on needs. For example, we have a thrombus, which means it's one truck that is all the drum simple signals going through it again. So it's one truck consisting of other trucks. Okay. We'll create maybe a vocal bars. All the vocal tracks gone to one trip and there's one truck sends signal to the master track. What is the purpose of a boss shred? The purpose of a bus trip is simply to have control, let's say, unhappy with what a deed tweaking the individual tracks. And then I will go to the bus to do some adjustments that will affect the whole trek. Instead of doing one thing over and over again, Let's say I want to add a situation If it to all the drums, I'm going to go to the bus truck and do that. I just made there. And then you did affect everything under that bus. So literarily about Shrek is a bus for trucks. Okay, great. So bus compression is simply compression technique where we are using a compressor shoe if it at that posture. Okay, so what I'm gonna do now, I'm going to solo the drums bus. When I hit Solo, if you noticed, it doesn't affect other trucks. But listen to this. Only the drum tracks of playing. Okay? Same thing if I say solo on the folk or bus truck. Yeah, our mommy's rockets street, the vocal tracks are playing. Okay. So it's solo over here on the drum bus. Let's play. All right, Great. So let's say I want to add some on, some punch to these drums as a whole, have a whole drum loop. What I'm gonna do, I'm gonna pull up a compressor Again as play, right? The Cijang track, I don't wanna go too crazy with a two-to-one works for me. I'm just going to go is with the threshold. Push it back a little bit. I want to highlight compression. Let's play. All right, Let's do something like Tacoma 52, one play. Right? Let's push up the release. I wanted to hold a little bit less to 86 per play, right? So basically doing minus2 gain reduction or care, we're going to use the makeup gain to DBA. Lastly, let's switch off the compressor. You can hear the trunk sunlight some decent, but with the compressor, right, Let's switch off auto gain again. Always switch off the auto features you want to influence into everything manually, okay. Without with that is the pebbles of bus compression. You can hear that it's lifting up the drum track. You can use it on any posture depending on need. Always be practical and mixing. Don't just apply things as rules. If you feel like you want to add more punch to that mix, you can always use these bus compression technique. That's it for this lecture. I will see you in the next one. 13. De-Esser Compression: Welcome back. In this lecture, we're going to cover D S compression technique. A lot of people don't know it as the compressor. That you just know what DSA plugging in that major curly tames the shop S's, but that is compression. Okay, so I'm going to explain while applying the technique. So we're gonna go to our mixer in sit on the race track, would go to dynamic dynamic process. It's a compressor. Dsa, DSA mono, this is a mono track. So a DSP, basically it's a compressor, but designed to save time, which means it's designed to focus on specific free when sees gear so that you can easily team that frequency and move on. So for example, here we have the ds2 that comes with login. Let's explain the perimeters. Filters soloed here you can only hear the frequency you're focusing on. And then we have the type of filter, as you can see over here, we have a shelf with a bell type. A shelf is basically what you see on an EQ. It affects the signal from the point of adjustment going forward to the left side. Okay, great. And this is a bell adjustment which focuses on that specific frequency and closes on the sides. Okay. And then we have range with wide range, which is often a more wider frequency, and we have split, split is more focused on that frequency. Okay, we're sitting that compressed to really, really, really focus on that frequency. And you have a threshold, you already know what the threshold is, the point where the compressor will start working. And we have Mx reduction, or can say mix reduction in this case, it's a ratio amount of reduction, amount of compression in this case. And then we have a frequency, but in that adjusts where to focus care, for example, this is the EQ. Let me show you the EQ. It does the speaker moving from left to right, you are deciding where to focus. That's what that frequency knob is. Just sweeps are all frequencies. Most treks, you will find the shrub S is around seven k. That's why the default setting also is set to seven k. Let's solo that vis Shrek and play. Yeah. Oh my homies, Rocky Street. May I let him talk and was as they write pretty much, you can hear that they asked in shrub S's. Okay, Let's go crazy with the mesh reduction. Play. Yeah. Oh, my homies rockets Street made. I let him talk and was as day. It doesn't matter. And you can hear that it's taming sum of the frequencies. Some are getting away. You know why? Because we've adjusted the frequency and find where are the troubling ones in these specific. So what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna live that threshold that makes reduction. Let's leave it at default, which is the amount of reduction ratio. Let's play. Yeah, oh my homies, Rocky Street may lead them to target. All right, what are we playing and listening? We want a super on with the frequency. Look for the troubling frequencies. Okay, Let's go crazy with the Trucial little bit more. Let's play. Yeah. Oh my homies, rocket Street made. I let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter if we still pay. Uh, does it better off? Still pay is crazy. I never fill set up as their home is like is prepaid for the Renaissance. He's not a main ME numb the new drug or Ville I, Lil Wayne right there, 6.648 heads. That's where the troubling Ss on this truck. Okay. As play and adjust the Trish rode yeah. Oh, my homies Rocky Street may get is just the mix reduction and leave the threshold is yz score easy with the most reduction? Play? Yeah, AMA homies rocket Street made, I let him saga was as they write is adjust the threshold. Go easy on it a little bit. Play. Yeah, AMA homies, Rocky Street. Make again. Yeah. Oh, my homies rock history made a let him talk and was as day, it doesn't matter if we still pay, uh, does it better off? Still pick, go a bit harder with the traditional Alma homies rocket Street made. I let him talk and was as pay, it doesn't matter. You still pay a does it better off? Still paying is crazy. I never fill saying without the DSA. Yeah. Oh my homies rock history made with the DSM. Alma homies, rocket street. You can hear that the shrub, as is softer now, you can adjust things to your liking. As always, these numbers are not rules of care. Filter solid at sutured on. We're just focusing on that frequency range. Okay. And that is a DSL child. We use it to fit a specific frequency. You can use a multiband compressor to do the same thing. Even if you don't have a DSLR plugin, you can use a multiband compressor or just the narrow band focus on specific frequency range where you feel like a webshop Ss, and just compress that pot whenever it pops up or becomes more corrosive based on your setting, it will be dipped in volume at the very same time. What I like about it, It's a compression tool, which means it's automated. When it gets more aggressive based on your settings, it will be tipped and like an EQ, e2 is a permanent adjustment. That's why I love a ds2. Or maybe using a multiband compressor, which is what we're going to be talking about next. Okay, that's it for this lecture. I will see you in the next one. 14. Multiband Compression: Welcome back. In this lecture we're going to talk about multi band called compression. What is a multi-band compression? Remember compression, what it is, what it does, changing dynamics for more punch, more on creating if it's all that good stuff. A multiband compressor basically does the same thing, but it is designed to focus on specific frequencies here, which means looking at this EQ, you can see from 20 to around 200 R is the low end. That's where you find the low-frequency information like a kick your basis all that good stuff, the low end of your tone and your vocal, that's where you find them. And going upwards from 200 and going up, that is the mid-range section together. So you'll find your tomes, the meat of it, Tom's the meat of your vocal. All the meat range stuff. Okay. From 401 k, if I have K six K going up, What's that as the top end, that's where you find you hi heads. Your shrub sounds, all that good stuff, get that is the high. When we're using a multiband compressor, basically, we have the frequency spectrum in front of us and we can decide which frequency we want to influence. So what I'm gonna do now I'm going to play the song. All right, so let's say we didn't have this compressor on the drum bus, right? Great. So what I'm gonna do, I'm going to go to Insert trucks, go to dynamics goal to multiprocessor, which is a multiband compressor. Here you can see these a multiband compressor. Okay, Let's say I just wanted to compress the low-end information, which is from one AD going down to 20 hertz, which is the lowest frequencies. Okay, Let's see, Are all you wanted to compress, tighten the low end on the drum glue, all pull up something called multi compressor, which is a multiprocessor. In this case, this is a stoke plugin that comes with Logic Pro again. So let's play. To make things simple, I'm going to go straight to it. You can see the breakdown, low end, mid-range, low Mead, mid-range, high meat, top range, which is the treble highs. Okay, great. You can see the breakdown. And here you can see the stuff you already know the compressor threshold, the ratio of the amount of compression that you went to get from the compressor. This is the attack. How fast you want the compressor to attack that set it to something like five milliseconds. The religious think something like servant to do. Same thing over year. These details represent number 2 and I'm Katrina before is the same thing. This is the period as the attorneys to release the subthreshold. But you have power to control each frequency band. So let's go ahead and solo the Lome play. Great. Now only hear this meet with low meets. Okay, so let's go ahead and pull down the threshold a little bit. Get firstly, the ratio to something like two comma five to one. Pulled on the threshold place. Yep. Now you can hear we're losing some volume on that low meat and that mentoring section, right? You can hate, and it's on solar so you know what you're doing plate or a, you can see minus 5. So doing something like minus 4 gain reduction in you say, Great. You're going to also use this perimeter aware to adjust the threshold. You can see it by the local things. We're doing something like minus play gain reduction now. Okay? So to make up for that gained or lost, we're going to use this perimeter over here. Follow my cursor and just do a poster. Shows three dB. Look at it over a year while they adjust trade tibialis place. To simulate for hosting. This bypass those adjustments. This is bypass. Let's enable it. By bus. Enable it. Now that it's more punches, more present. But remember, we only affected the mid-range. Everything else still sounds the same. You can also do the same thing to the top range. If you went that top range to shrine a little bit more in your mics. Same thing with the low end. If you want that low end to punch and be more tighter in the mix without affecting the whole thing. Okay, this is the odd ones too. But this is a very powerful tool because it gives you more control than a normal compressor. Okay, so now let's play the whole mix. This by post-doc mid-range boost in hate. Let's enable, enable it. Now you can hear that midrange is shining a little bit more and you can go crazy with the door adjustment. The different frequencies, make different adjustments. You can always use the solo features so that you can hear what you are doing and just play around with it. But always be open-minded with mixing and be practical and focus on numbers. Don't focus on the numbers am I just did was sitting here, just make sure you get the concept and the power is in your hand. All right, great stuff. That's it for this lecture. That is how you use a multiband compressor. That's it for me. See you in the next lecture. 15. Final Words, Thank You: Hey, we're finally done. But always remember to practice what you learn. You can get better at anything if you are willing to take action and consistently practice. Thank you. Thank you very much for enrolling and cheese to better mixes.