Hello and welcome back to the channel.
Today we're going to talk about the
combinator.
The combinator is behringer's multi-band
compressor plug-in that you'll find in
the x-32, the x-air, the midas m32,
and the midas m air as well. The
combinator is a multi-faceted plug-in
that can do
several things for your mix... or to your
mix! So the first thing we should talk
about is what the controls do,
and what some of your options are. We'll
follow this section up with the controls
in action, with some audio examples.
These are the default settings of the
combinator. From left to right, at the top,
we first have the mix control.
Normally you'll want this fully to the
right. The mix control allows us to do
parallel compression.
In the center position we'd have a mix
of a fully compressed signal
and an unaltered signal. Fully to the
left, and we'd only have the
uncompressed signal. Parallel compression
is a great tool for certain applications,
and not just with the combinator. But
parallel compression is an entirely
different video on its own!
For these purposes we'll keep the mix
control fully to the right for full
compression.
Next we have the attack control. The
attack control is how quickly the
compression begins working on the signal.
For uses like overall mixes
vocals, or sustained music in general, the
default setting is actually pretty good
where it's at.
On the other hand, for percussive sources,
many times you'll want to have a slower
attack
so that you can allow the initial
transient through unaffected,
and then clamp down on the signal. Next
we have the release control.
The release is the rate the compressor
releases its grip on the signal.
Once again the default setting is pretty
good for typical uses,
But beyond that, we have the option of an
auto release setting that's even better
for most uses, when it's on a full mix, a
vocal mix,
or any type of sustained mix. You can
turn it on or off via the encoders on
the surface of the x32 or the m32.
Or by clicking on the little indicator
light in the x air edit, or x
edit software. And on the mixstation app,
on the android,
there's an auto button that enables the
auto release. On the x32 and the m32
you can get to these settings with the
encoders under the screen.
And on that note, the combinator has two
layers, or pages,
to get to all the adjustments when
you're working on the surface of the
mixer
instead of in the software. Next we have
the sbc
speed control. sbc stands for spectrum
balance control.
If we engage sbc in the coming steps,
this will allow us to adjust how quickly
sbc will act on the signal. It's
essentially an automated makeup gain
control.
I'm going to recommend not using sbc.
You can certainly give it a try, but i
feel it will make some incorrect
decisions sometimes in regards to the
dynamics of live music.
On the other hand, for mastering songs in
a studio situation, that's a place I
might be more inclined to try
sbc. Next we have the crossover control.
Since the combinator works on multiple
frequency bands, each of these bands
crosses over to the next.
While we can't change the crossover
points individually, we can use the
crossover control to move them globally.
Watch the frequency area of the meter
section as I change the crossover
control.
You can see the width of the bands changing
globally with this control (crossover points are moving).
This is a control you're going to want
to start with in the center
and tweak this on a case by case basis.
This is another one of the settings that
you definitely can
leave in the default setting and be okay,
But if you hear an area of the mix that
seems to be not impacted enough by the
combinator,
adjusting this control to widen/change that
area you're listening to is usually the
answer.
That brings us to the global ratio
control.
Even though the combinator is a
multi-band compressor with five separate
frequency areas that we can control,
some of the settings are global. Our
compression ratio is one of those
settings.
The default setting is three which is
three to one (3:1)
fully to the left is one point one to
one (1.1:1) so that's not really much
compression at all.
Fully to the right is full limiting. I
think most people will find three to one (3:1)
to be an acceptable setting...
And for uses like we'll be focusing on
here, i could see between two to one (2:1)
and four to one (4:1) being the range that
will give the best results.
So that default of three to one (3:1) is going
to be exactly where i would start more
times than not. And many times, probably
leave it right there.
That brings us down to the next level of
controls.
Here we have our global threshold. We'll
use this slightly differently than we
would with the threshold on a normal
compressor.
Since each of the frequency bands has
their own threshold control,
we'll be using this global threshold to
fine-tune the window
those will be working in. I'll explain
this more in the next part of this video,
when we start putting signal into the
unit, with real examples of these in
action.
Next we have the global gain control.
Depending on what we do with our
individual gain and threshold controls
for each frequency,
this is where we compensate the overall
level of our mix
to keep the level coming into the
combinator, and what is leaving the
combinator,
consistent. Therefore you'll always start
with this control
centered. In many cases you'll end up
leaving it
centered. We'll talk more about this in
the next part of the video.
Next we have this box with four things
that we can enable.
The first thing in the box is sbc. This
is where we enable it via the software
in the x32 or the xr by clicking. On the
surface of the x32 or the m32
you'll do this on the encoders under the
screen.
Below this is the 48db option.
This is the crossover slope used for our
crossover points between the frequency
bands. When the indicator light is on it
is
48 db slopes. Click it, and the indicator
light will go off,
and it will be 12 db slopes. I think 12
db slope sounds a bit more natural with
how the combinator operates.
You can try both settings and listen for
yourself to see what you prefer.
There's no wrong or right answer here.
One thing i've noticed...
there can be a pop in the system when
changing between the 12 db
and 48 db slopes! At least if there's
signal present.
Muting the mains before changing this
will eliminate that issue.
Below that we have a solo function. This
lets you solo whichever frequency band
that you're working with
to hear only that frequency. If you
recall
earlier I mentioned the crossover
adjustment and how you might adjust it
to widen or narrow a section where you
thought maybe a wider or more narrow
bite might sound best.
This lets you hear only your selected
frequency section
and it makes it really easy to hear what
the crossover adjustments doing.
Except one thing to remember...
It's a destructive solo. When you select
solo here,
directly on the combinator, everything
else going through the combinator
is muted muted in the house!
So this is something you'll only want to
use at the sound check and not during
the show.
If you're familiar with soloing channels
in the studio, and studio monitoring,
then this concept is probably more familiar
to you.
Finally there's the bypass. We can bypass
the effect here to compare between the
combinator
in and out of the signal path. Moving on,
now we have the area where we can choose
which frequency band we want to work
with,
one at a time, high, high mid,
mid, low mid, and low. Whenever we choose
one of these frequency ranges
it latches with these two controls-
threshold
and gain, for that specific frequency.
This is where we set our threshold and
adjust our gain
for each individual frequency. We'll
start with these settings as our
baseline.
So now it's time to talk about how to
insert the combinator and the decision
process on where to insert the
combinator,
And to start putting some sound into the
unit and demonstrate these functions in
action.
The left right main bus is a pretty
common place to insert the combinator.
You'd do that if you want the combinator
to smooth out and compress your mix
individually over different points in
the frequency spectrum.
Or you'd do that if your system sounds
good at lower and medium volume levels,
but starts getting harsh or muddy when
things get loud. Adjusting the eq could
help those problems
but it's hurting your sound at those
lower and medium volumes when you didn't
have any harshness
or other issues for the eq to address.
The eq is engaged full time.
The combinator is only going to begin
working when the signal hits the
thresholds that you
set. Another popular place it can be
inserted is a vocal bus.
Maybe you have a singer whose voice is
nice and round at normal levels but gets
harsh or shrill when the singer gets
loud.
While you could insert the combinator on
the vocal channel itself,
if you're doing monitors from front of
house that is likely not going to sit
well with the vocalist.
Inserting the combinator in a vocal
subgroup allows you to get the effect of
the combinator
on the voice in the house but not impact
the monitors.
And even in the case of vocals, since
vocals are normally at the forefront of
the mix,
inserting the combinator in the mains
can still be an acceptable alternative.
That might allow you to cover more than
one base. So that's the general concept
and you can morph that thinking to other
sources. So let's insert it now.
For this demonstration we'll use the
left and right main bus.
The combinator can only go in the first
four slots of the x32
or m32 fx rack. In the xr18
there are only four slots and it can go
in any of those four slots.
So for our demonstration i'll put it in
slot number four in both the xr18
and the x32. Only choose the dual
combinator
for mono sources. Dual means it's two
separate
and independent combinators and you will
have an
a and a b side to adjust independently
for those two separate sources.
For our STEREO bus we'll need to choose
the other option,
and it will either be labeled combinator
or stereo combinator,
depending on the platform we're on. There
are three different routines for
enabling
an insert in slots one through four
depending on whether we're on the x air,
the x edit software, or the actual
surface of the x32 or m32.
So i'll go through them all here. For the
x air,
on the x air edit software, we can choose
to insert it like this-
click the fx tab and choose our
combinator slot-
which is going to be fx4 in the drop
down-
choose main left right-
next i need to hit the insert button to
highlight it-
and then that brings up two other
buttons, and i need to enable the
combinator insert point
by pressing one of them to highlight
them. That's the procedure for the x air
on the x air edit software.
And now let's walk through the procedure
for the x32 on the x edit software.
Tab over to fx 1-4 -go to slot 4-
(Which is)
our combinator slot. In both drop downs
choose
'insert' - now mouse over and choose the
main left right bus -
select it by clicking in the fader tray
like this - mouse over to the top
left and select -channel- in the drop down -
choose the combinator slot,
which in this case is fx4. Below that we
have an option to insert the combinator
pre-eq
and (pre) dynamics, or post. I would suggest post
so that our house eq changes won't
counteract what our combinator is doing.
Since i'm choosing post that means the
pre button won't be highlighted.
Now I need to mouse up to my insert
button and click it
to highlight it. And now the combinator
is inserted
and enabled. If you're on the surface of
the x32 or the m32,
the routine is similar to the x-edit
software. First
press the effects button. Tab over to the
fx rack window -
choose slot 4. We need to use this
encoder to scroll through the options
until we find the combinator.
As i mentioned earlier, we want the
regular combinator and not the
dual combinator.
Choose -insert- for both places here.
Now select the -home- button at the top
right -
and then select the main left right bus -
Now go to the configuration tab.
In the main window choose the combinator
effects slot in the drop down at the
right -
and in this case fx4 has the combinator.
On the insert button option choose pre
or post.
I'm choosing post so that it will be
inserted after the house eq.
And now press the encoder to enable the
insert to make it active on the left
right bus.
So now we're ready to put some signal to
this.
I've intentionally added some harshness
to the chorus of this song to give the
combinator something obvious to work on
and demonstrate. The first thing i would
do to begin to set things
is turn on the band gain reduction
meters. You can do that by
the encoders on the surface of the x32
or the m32.
And on the x-air edit software and the
x-edit software,
just click inside the meter section and
it will change through the options.
In mix station on the Android the meters
are active by default.
With the band playing, and at show level,
adjust the global threshold. That is the
control marked
trim threshold. Lower it until you see
the gain reduction meters just begin to
flicker.
What this did was to adjust the
threshold to our actual console
main bus level. And that means the
individual frequency threshold controls
are now right in their operating range.
The individual thresholds can be
independently raised or lowered.
For this example i'm going to show how
to smooth the harshness that is
appearing especially in the louder chorus part of
this song.
I can hear that it's harsh in the high
mids so i'm going to reduce the
threshold in the high mid
section. I can adjust it down to not hit
the threshold during the normal parts, or
only
barely hit, and then it should come in
more during the louder parts
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we can even get more aggressive with the
threshold-
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[Demonstration]
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In this example i did not adjust the
global gain. As you can see by the gain
reduction meters, we're only really
compressing that high mid region,
and overall, there's not enough signal
reduction going on to really need makeup
gain.
In this example we were aiming for that
high mid harshness that we could hear.
It could have been a low mid mud getting
worse at high volumes in the mix though.
We'd make the same moves just in the low
mid region,
or wherever the problem presented itself.
It's a case of listening to the mix
and really hearing the frequency balance
and how it changes with dynamics.
The changes you hear with level
increases and decreases, and
then smoothing those areas with the
combinator. You can also click over to
the band level meters and see what the
meters tell you about the signal. They
might show you an area in the frequency
response
that is hot and help you confirm what
your ears are telling you,
and to help you zero in on exactly which
area. But that said,
if the problem is happening after the
mixer, and a product of the room
or your sound system, then those meters
won't show you that.
But none of this is the only way to use
the combinator.
At its root it's a five band, wide band
eq.
With individual compression on those
bands. So let's look more at that.
Let's click back over to our band gain
reduction meters.
Let's choose low for this example. If we
go to the low band gain control
and we turn it up,
it's essentially just a low end EQ, so
even though we increased the low end in
this example,
we're limiting that increase, and the
dynamic range,
with compression and fattening things up.
In this case unlike our first example
where we were trying to remove harshness,
or smooth a problem area, now we're
adjusting to complement and mold certain
frequencies,
If you tend to do heavy compression, when
you compare between bypassed and
processed,
if you hear a drastic decrease in level
with the processed
sound, use the global gain control to
make up for that level loss.
If you're reducing one frequency band 3
4 or even 5 db,
i'd leave the makeup gain alone. Even a
couple bands doing that, i'd leave it
alone.
Don't mistake a little more or less of a
prominent frequency or two
as overall volume. On the other hand, if
you're averaging 5 db of gain reduction
across all of the bands,
then i'd add 5 db of makeup gain.
Like I said at the beginning of this
video, the combinator is a multi-faceted
processor.
I've touched on just some of the ways it
can be used here.
I'd encourage you to experiment with the
crossover control,
and just get more familiar with it, and
also do some listening tests between the
48 db slopes and the 12 db slopes to see
what you prefer.
This is a subjective setting. I use the
wave c6 compressor a lot on the sc-48
console,
and i mainly use it to smooth problem
areas, especially with vocals.
The combinator brings that same
capability to the behringer digital
platform.
Leave me some comments below about how
you use the combinator and where you
like inserting it in the signal path,
or give me some questions. This link
above is to my compressor basics video
and that can help explain some of these
compressor terms and functions that
we've discussed in this video.
Another video you might be interested in
is my five tips for better live vocal
mixes, so i'll leave a link for it right
here as well.
If you like this type of information,
please like and subscribe to the channel,
click the bell for notifications, click
the affiliate links to help support the
channel,
check out some of the other videos, thank
you for watching, and i will see you next
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