Electronic Music Producer’s Guide: Dynamics & Compression
Adam Pollard aka Multiplier, now focuses on Dynamics and Compressors and how they’re used in the Electronic Music genre to tame signals as well as create interesting effects and colors.
Videos
• Introduction (00:49) - Multiplier welcomes you and goes over what the series is all about.
• What is Compression? (03:05) - Discover what is compression, and what are dynamics, as well as why do we compress sounds.
• Why Compression? (03:29) - This video explains why compression is talked about so much in the music production world. Basically, real life sounds are more dynamic than we would like for electronic music.
• Limiters (02:14) - Learn all about limiters, the simplest type of compressor.
• Compression Basics (01:45) - Learn how a compressor works (attack, release, ratio, threshold), and see and hear a simple example of it in action.
• Ratio (01:15) - Develop an understanding of what compression "ratio" actually does.
• Attack Time & Makeup Gain (04:13) - Attack time is the most important parameter. Learn about this, as well as compressor "makeup gain".
• Combining Makeup Gain & Limiters (02:02) - Compressors often make mistakes, and so it can be useful to combine makeup gain, and limiters. Multiplier shows you how.
• Setting Release Time (04:28) - Learn how to set release time, by understanding what happens when it's too fast, and too slow.
• Each Compressor Behaves Differently (03:27) - Compressors don't do exactly what you tell them to do. This video shows three examples. Attack/release times, Ableton's Glue compressor, and a limiter that doesn't "limit".
• Input High Pass Filtering (03:51) - Multiplier explains what this is, and why it's so powerful, by explaining how we hear different frequencies, differently.
• Saturating with Analog Compressors (03:20) - Discover how "analog" compressors saturate, and how they can also be a bit unpredictable.
• Don't Always Use a Compressor (01:41) - Here, Multiplier gives three examples showing how you shouldn't view every situation, as an opportunity to use a compressor.
• Compressing Inconsistent Audio (02:12) - Multiplier discusses why you must be careful when compressing inconsistent audio, such as reverb!
• How Much to Compress (08:02) - Quite simply, how much should you compress? Multiplier reveals all.
• Distortion as Compression (01:33) - Learn how it can sometimes be better to use distortion, instead of compression to tame signals - usually on drums or basses.
• Gates (01:11) - Multiplier gives you an introduction to gates.
• Transient Shapers (02:05) - Wrapping it up, Multiplier delivers an introduction to transient shapers, and how again, they don't always work as expected.