Greetings!
My name is Ian Vargo, I'm from The Pro Audio Files, and today, I'm going to be introducing
you to three new plugins from Plugin Alliance.
Specifically, the brainworx bx_console Focusrite SC, the Purple Audio MC77 limiting amplifier,
and the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor.
Each of these plugins is really deep and versatile, and I could probably spend at least an hour
with each, but for now, I'll be providing an overview of their controls and parameters,
discussing for which applications I might use them, and we will be able to hear them
in action.
First up is the brainworx Focusrite bx_console SC.
Brainworx has made several stunning emulations of classic Neve and SSL consoles, and this
emulation of this super rare, 1980s console is officially endorsed by Focusrite.
It features 72 channel strips, each modeled after an analog counterpart.
So not only can you use this more sparingly with only a few instances, if you wanted,
you could strap 72 channels across a large scale mix and really harness the sound of
the console.
As you can see, it's a pretty deep plugin with a lot of parameters and controls, but
fear not.
It's actually pretty intuitive, and of course, it sounds great.
It's got a clean and clear sound with just a subtle very pleasant coloration to it.
In this mix, I used it on several elements, including snare aux, but before I show you
how I used it, I'd like to show you the different components of the channel strip.
Let's take a look at the compressor section.
It's got pretty much everything you would expect out of a compressor.
Threshold, ratio, attack, release, makeup gain, and something that I love, a mix knob,
so you can blend the dry signal with the wet.
It's got a nice snappy sound, and works on pretty much everything you would want to throw
at it.
Additionally, it has a de-esser and expander, which we will discuss a little bit later.
Beneath that is a section that allows you to filter your signal before it goes to the
gate or compressor, so if your signal is driving the compressor or gate a little bit haywire,
because it has way too much low end or high end, you can control that.
Next up is the gate.
Similar to the compressor, it has pretty much everything you would want out of a gate.
Threshold, range, hold, release.
You can also select fast attack.
You have the option to expand, and if you want to play around with external signals,
it has a key section.
Next up is the EQ section.
I would say aside from how versatile this plugin is, that the EQ is its greatest strength.
It's got four bands, a low pass filter and a high pass filter.
It just sounds super musical, even when you make strange EQ moves that you wouldn't normally,
it just seems to work.
With all of its controls, you can make it pretty surgical, or you can make really broad
strokes with your equalization.
And lastly, we have this metering and channel output section, which allows you to control
the level coming out of the plugin.
You'll notice you can control the gain and you also have this option where you can switch
channels.
So brainworx went through 72 channels of this console and each of them had their own distinct
character, and they modeled each and every one of them, which is really awesome.
You can toggle over or type them in just as I did.
So I'm mixing this track, and I have used the Focusrite on snare drum aux.
I actually have five separate layers of snare, each of them are being fed to this snare auxiliary
track.
So with the plugin bypassed, let's go ahead and listen to each of the layers, and see
what they add to the overall sound of the drum, and then bring in the other elements.
[snare layers]
And altogether...
[snare]
So I will admit, it already sounds pretty good, but I wanted it to just cut through
a little bit more, so let's hear what it sounds like with the plugin brought in.
[mix]
You could tell on the choruses, it was just getting a little bit buried, and I wanted
to make it cut through a bit more.
So we've got this de-esser/expander section here.
If you turn the knob to the left you can de-ess, if you turn it to the right, you can expand.
I just really love the punch of the expander, and it will make sense later when you see
what I do to the guitars.
I really needed that snare to poke out just a little bit more.
Down here, we've go the frequency at which you want to apply de-essing or expansion.
Why don't we take a listen to what I did?
[snare]
So let's take a look at what I did with the EQ section.
I've got a boost of about a dB and a half at 2.2kHz for some thwack.
I've got a dB and a half at 120 for some warmth.
I've got over 2dB at 3.3kHz and another at least 2dB — this was kind of a weird one
— at 33Hz.
Don't know why, just maybe some subby, barely perceptible stuff happening down there.
It just felt right, and when I removed it, it didn't feel right, so that's what I went
with.
[snare]
So let's pay attention to the gate now.
I just wanted to remove a little bit of the tail.
Sometimes, when you have a lot of things happening in an arrangement, you really have to conserve
space, so I used the gate here.
[snare with gate]
So next we've got the MC77 limiting amplifier from Purple Audio.
If you look at this and think, “Oh, that looks like an 1176,” you would be correct.
Purple Audio created their own interpretation of that classic limiting amplifier in the
late 90's, and now we've got a plugin version of it.
So the controls go as follows.
We have an input and an output.
You'll notice that there's no threshold.
The harder you drive the input, the more compression you will have.
So we've got attack and release knobs, one being the slowest, seven being the fastest.
Buttons for ratio.
If you do all buttons in, it creates this really interesting overdriven tone, and a
lot of brainworx plugins have these really flexible controls down at the bottom.
Headroom, highpass/sidechain filter, monomaker, stereo width, and parallel mix.
So I used this plugin to make the guitars seem a bit more up front.
Make them seem like they're coming right out of your monitors.
Let me show you how I did that.
[guitars]
So this is a stereo instance of this plugin inserted on my stereo guitar aux.
So it's being applied to all of my guitars, and there are several layers in this song,
and what I love about what this plugin does is a little bit of a boost in volume.
It helps with the sense of space.
To me, it seems like it just pushes them a little bit further left and right, and yes,
it also brings them closer to the listener, which was important, considering I had that
snare that pops out a little bit more once the vocals come in, which you'll hear.
You really, for this type of music, at least I wanted everything to seem really up front
and punchy and prominent.
You can see I pushed the input pretty hard to get some coloration out of the plugin,
and dialed back the output.
I have a pretty slow attack, and a fast release.
So once I had all of my tracks sounding good individually, I inserted this — the Shadow
Hills Mastering Compressor on my master buss.
It can look somewhat confusing because there are so many controls and knobs, but I assure
you, once you get used to it, it's relatively easy to use, and it sounds amazing.
It's essentially several compressors in one.
We have an optical and a discrete section, so here is the threshold for the optical section,
and beneath, we have the threshold for the discrete section.
The optical section is great for just general leveling, more subtle compression, and the
discrete is much more precise and gives you more control.
So the meters here, I've got the left meter set to optical, so that is showing me how
much gain reduction I am applying at the optical stage, and to the right, I have that meter
set to discrete.
So that shows me how much gain reduction the discrete section is applying.
For this application, I usually only want about one dB of gain reduction.
I don't want things sounding pumpy on my master buss, so I try to keep it pretty subtle.
This sidechain control here.
So when you enable this, it makes it so that the low frequencies have less emphasis and
therefore, are less likely to overload your compressor, so it allows you for even more
subtle compression, and I generally use it.
And down at the bottom, we have a switch with three options — nickel, iron, and steel.
These represent different transformer types, nickel being the least amount of harmonic
content imparted onto your signal, and steel the most, so depending on if you want to add
some extra coloration to your material, you can do that with this switch.
So I'm going to bypass this compressor before we listen.
I also want to mention that this plugin has a mix control, so if you want to push the
plugin harder than you normally would, and dial back the mix, you still have some of
the original signal.
So let's hear how I used this on the track.
[mix]
So similar to how I used the Purple Audio on the guitars, I wanted my mix to sound a
bit closer to the listener, more up front and intense, and the Shadow Hills helped me
do that, using the iron setting for some coloration, let's experiment a little bit more.
[mix]
So you could hear I pushed the Shadow Hills a little bit harder there.
Not really my taste for this particular track, but I could see instances in which it would
work with that sort of pumpy vibe going on.
Perhaps dial back the mix a little bit.
Super flexible plugin.
So each of these three plugins did exactly the job that I needed them to do.
It all starts with what you want.
In the case of the snare, I wanted it to poke through a little bit more, I wanted it to
be beefier and brighter, and reduce a little bit of the tail, and I did that with the Focusrite.
The guitars needed to be a little bit closer to the listener and sound more intense, Purple
Audio handled that, and the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor, something I use very often on
the master buss to add impact and color and proximity to the overall mix.
So well done, Plugin Alliance, I'm having a lot of fun with these.
Make sure to check them out.
I hope this has been helpful.
I am Ian Vargo with The Pro Audio Files.
Thanks!