off axis mic placement

[gtrgriff3]

This may be a feature request, or a trick, I'm not sure...

When I mic an amp with a 57, I almost always (actually, it is always) turn it slightly off axis. I like what it does to the high end and really balances the sound for what I do.

With the WOS or Torpedo Live, I can't do that. I can adjust the mic forward and backward, left and right, but it always is facing the cab perpendicular instead of at about 20-35 degrees off axis as I would use it in real life.

I've discovered that I can, in WOS, setup 2 cabs with a 57 exactly the same as far as mic placement, and use variphi at about 12% on one of the mics to simulate this off axis sound and it does a really good job of it... I've just started experimenting with it and already I love the results.

But obviously, the Torpedo Live can't do that because it can only run 1 cab at a time.

Is there any way to simulate this behavior in the TL? And if not, can you put it on my list of features requested?

I can certainly make IRs from the WOS, but it gets tedious and I'd love to be able to tweak it on the fly at a gig.

Thanks again for such great products that have made my workflow so much better over the last few years.

 

[walkontx]

Very cool. I will try this out. I've been frustrated too with getting a more realistic sound, as I haven't heard enough in the room sound, which to me makes it feel very real. So I've been trying out the mellowmuse plug in. Can do up to 500 milliseconds, and feels crazy realistic with ownhammers. Have you tried that plugin? The only downside is you can't use the WOS IR's, but can still use the load of the torpedo.

 

[gtrgriff3]

Very cool. I will try this out. I've been frustrated too with getting a more realistic sound, as I haven't heard enough in the room sound, which to me makes it feel very real. So I've been trying out the mellowmuse plug in. Can do up to 500 milliseconds, and feels crazy realistic with ownhammers. Have you tried that plugin? The only downside is you can't use the WOS IR's, but can still use the load of the torpedo.

I haven't used them with that mellowmuse plugin, but I have most of the Ownhammer IRs and the new ones with 500ms do sound great.

However I don't really notice that so much once the band kicks in unless I'm doing blues or more rootsy music where I want the room heavy in the guitar tone. And if that's the case I haven't found a replacement for actually micing up the amp (although the Ownhammers do really good too in a pinch.)

Anyway, I don't know if this trick will help much with that problem, but it does remove the "57 fizz" that I always seem to notice and don't care for.

 

[djd100]

Long 500ms IR's are baking the room tone into the IR, which is a disadvantage for a number of reasons...

a) You can't change the baked in room aspect, and often you'll want to.
b) If you want to have a selection of room tones and mixes your IR collection will grow exponentially.
c) Third party static IR's are already cumbersome to handle due to their sheer numbers and naming conventions.

So, use the Torpedo's Room Sim/reverb to in this case, mimic the 500ms OwnHammer by adding a 500ms room sim to Two Nots cabs (or shorter IR etc).

In WOS III use another plugin until it's upgrade which will include a room sim/reverb as I understand it is released.

This is the much better way to go as you can change your room settings independently of your cab/speaker/mic settings (the IR).

 

[walkontx]

Long 500ms IR's are baking the room tone into the IR, which is a disadvantage for a number of reasons...

a) You can't change the baked in room aspect, and often you'll want to.
b) If you want to have a selection of room tones and mixes your IR collection will grow exponentially.
c) Third party static IR's are already cumbersome to handle due to their sheer numbers and naming conventions.

So, use the Torpedo's Room Sim/reverb to in this case, mimic the 500ms OwnHammer by adding a 500ms room sim to Two Nots cabs (or shorter IR etc).

In WOS III use another plugin until it's upgrade which will include a room sim/reverb as I understand it is released.

This is the much better way to go as you can change your room settings independently of your cab/speaker/mic settings (the IR).

I would love to try the realness of the reverb rooms two notes offers whenever they decide to to release it on WOS III. Until then, mellowmuse seems to work great for me. I haven't successfully been able to add an additional room sound that makes it feel as good as the mellowmuse. And I've tried a lot of room sounds.

If I want a more direct sound, I'll switch to WOS III. But sometimes I find it too direct if that makes sense...

 

[walkontx]

Very cool. I will try this out. I've been frustrated too with getting a more realistic sound, as I haven't heard enough in the room sound, which to me makes it feel very real. So I've been trying out the mellowmuse plug in. Can do up to 500 milliseconds, and feels crazy realistic with ownhammers. Have you tried that plugin? The only downside is you can't use the WOS IR's, but can still use the load of the torpedo.

I haven't used them with that mellowmuse plugin, but I have most of the Ownhammer IRs and the new ones with 500ms do sound great.

However I don't really notice that so much once the band kicks in unless I'm doing blues or more rootsy music where I want the room heavy in the guitar tone. And if that's the case I haven't found a replacement for actually micing up the amp (although the Ownhammers do really good too in a pinch.)

Anyway, I don't know if this trick will help much with that problem, but it does remove the "57 fizz" that I always seem to notice and don't care for.

I assumed all the ownhammmers were up to 500 milliseconds. Interesting. Do you know which ones exclusively do that?

Will definitely try your 57 trick.

 

[djd100]

Any decent room sim can add what you need, it's up to you to set it's parameters (and mix it well).

I use Altiverb a lot for this, sounds amazing (stereo convolution reverb), as does the Two Notes room sim/reverb (though it's mono in the CAB/LIVE), but any quality room sim will work just fine as it's a subtle effect, with none of the disadvantages baking in 500ms of room tone in the IR present.

That totally makes sense as unless you're in a anechoic chamber or outside away from anything (desert, salt flats etc), you're always hearing room tone/early reflections which your brain uses for point-source location. It's unnatural for them not to be present etc.

What room sounds have you tried?

I would love to try the realness of the reverb rooms two notes offers whenever they decide to to release it on WOS III. Until then, mellowmuse seems to work great for me. I haven't successfully been able to add an additional room sound that makes it feel as good as the mellowmuse. And I've tried a lot of room sounds.

If I want a more direct sound, I'll switch to WOS III. But sometimes I find it too direct if that makes sense...

 

[djd100]

No, only a few special ones he made AFAIK, check the Ownhammer site.

I assumed all the ownhammmers were up to 500 milliseconds. Interesting. Do you know which ones exclusively do that?

 

[walkontx]

Any decent room sim can add what you need, it's up to you to set it's parameters (and mix it well).

I use Altiverb a lot for this, sounds amazing (stereo convolution reverb), as does the Two Notes room sim/reverb (though it's mono in the CAB/LIVE), but any quality room sim will work just fine as it's a subtle effect, with none of the disadvantages baking in 500ms of room tone in the IR present.

That totally makes sense as unless you're in a anechoic chamber or outside away from anything (desert, salt flats etc), you're always hearing room tone/early reflections which your brain uses for point-source location. It's unnatural for them not to be present etc.

What room sounds have you tried?

I would love to try the realness of the reverb rooms two notes offers whenever they decide to to release it on WOS III. Until then, mellowmuse seems to work great for me. I haven't successfully been able to add an additional room sound that makes it feel as good as the mellowmuse. And I've tried a lot of room sounds.

If I want a more direct sound, I'll switch to WOS III. But sometimes I find it too direct if that makes sense...

I've tried ocean way, altiverb, lexicon, valhalla. None of them sound as realistic with the mellowmuse plugin. But we still don't have the update for WOS III room sim, so i haven't compared. Do you have any sound clips you could post? Would love to check them out.

 

[djd100]

"Realistic" is a subjective term, and I've used countless room sims starting with the Quantec, Lexicons, and AMS etc, up through modern DSP with no problems creating a virtual room for a virtual guitar cab. It's a subtle effect in most cases, but critically important when going DI'd with IR's.

Don't for get that you can EQ your room sim's output as well, as likely the biggest difference you're hearing is the room tone's freq spectrum etc. Don't forget that the room sim should just do the room, and additional delays/reverb are usually used post etc.

Since you have a freq analyzer, just freq analyze just the tail of the perfect 500ms IR, and EQ match some other room sim's output. That should get you where you want to go.

The Two Notes room sim/reverb in the LIVE/CAB is mono, but sounds great. Any of the decent room sims available can do the job, nothing exotic is needed IMO.

Any decent room sim can add what you need, it's up to you to set it's parameters (and mix it well).

I use Altiverb a lot for this, sounds amazing (stereo convolution reverb), as does the Two Notes room sim/reverb (though it's mono in the CAB/LIVE), but any quality room sim will work just fine as it's a subtle effect, with none of the disadvantages baking in 500ms of room tone in the IR present.

That totally makes sense as unless you're in a anechoic chamber or outside away from anything (desert, salt flats etc), you're always hearing room tone/early reflections which your brain uses for point-source location. It's unnatural for them not to be present etc.

What room sounds have you tried?

I would love to try the realness of the reverb rooms two notes offers whenever they decide to to release it on WOS III. Until then, mellowmuse seems to work great for me. I haven't successfully been able to add an additional room sound that makes it feel as good as the mellowmuse. And I've tried a lot of room sounds.

If I want a more direct sound, I'll switch to WOS III. But sometimes I find it too direct if that makes sense...

I've tried ocean way, altiverb, lexicon, valhalla. None of them sound as realistic with the mellowmuse plugin. But we still don't have the update for WOS III room sim, so i haven't compared. Do you have any sound clips you could post? Would love to check them out.

 

[walkontx]

"Realistic" is a subjective term, and I've used countless room sims starting with the Quantec, Lexicons, and AMS etc, up through modern DSP with no problems creating a virtual room for a virtual guitar cab. It's a subtle effect in most cases, but critically important when going DI'd with IR's.

Don't for get that you can EQ your room sim's output as well, as likely the biggest difference you're hearing is the room tone's freq spectrum etc. Don't forget that the room sim should just do the room, and additional delays/reverb are usually used post etc.

Since you have a freq analyzer, just freq analyze just the tail of the perfect 500ms IR, and EQ match some other room sim's output. That should get you where you want to go.

The Two Notes room sim/reverb in the LIVE/CAB is mono, but sounds great. Any of the decent room sims available can do the job, nothing exotic is needed IMO.

Any decent room sim can add what you need, it's up to you to set it's parameters (and mix it well).

I use Altiverb a lot for this, sounds amazing (stereo convolution reverb), as does the Two Notes room sim/reverb (though it's mono in the CAB/LIVE), but any quality room sim will work just fine as it's a subtle effect, with none of the disadvantages baking in 500ms of room tone in the IR present.

That totally makes sense as unless you're in a anechoic chamber or outside away from anything (desert, salt flats etc), you're always hearing room tone/early reflections which your brain uses for point-source location. It's unnatural for them not to be present etc.

What room sounds have you tried?

I would love to try the realness of the reverb rooms two notes offers whenever they decide to to release it on WOS III. Until then, mellowmuse seems to work great for me. I haven't successfully been able to add an additional room sound that makes it feel as good as the mellowmuse. And I've tried a lot of room sounds.

If I want a more direct sound, I'll switch to WOS III. But sometimes I find it too direct if that makes sense...

I've tried ocean way, altiverb, lexicon, valhalla. None of them sound as realistic with the mellowmuse plugin. But we still don't have the update for WOS III room sim, so i haven't compared. Do you have any sound clips you could post? Would love to check them out.

It's possible I'm not advanced enough to eq room sim's. That's why I dig mellowmuse as it's straight to the point. How do you frequency analyze the tail end of a 500ms room sim? I'm happy to try.

Also, would love to hear some clips of successful room sims clips you've done. Maybe I have picky ears...

 

[gtrgriff3]

@djd100 I'm also curious about what you're talking about with the room sims. I haven't really gotten into that but I have little doubt I'm missing out on something.

Can you give me some general settings you use? I have several reverb plugins so if it doesn't require anything special I should be able to use your settings as a starting point.

 

[djd100]

If you're using a shorter IR sans room tone, then just about any decent reverb/room sim can create the sense of space/volume of the room with a short room setting, generally between 250ms and 600ms if you're trying to simulate a decent recording area. You can simulate the size of it via the reverb/room sim's pre-delay setting, and the the acoustic treatment with the duration and tone controls. You can control the distance the virtual mic(s) is from the source via predelay/tone control/mixed level.

It's typically a subtle effect, so mix it in low to start, and bring it up until you like it sitting in your mix.

This is why it's best to not bake the room tone into the cab sim, lots of options are lost as well as your standard static IR count rising exponentially if you try to have all these options available via long IR's.

If you're simulating a concert hall or or something then a real hall reverb or something, though typically one would record in a acoustically treated room in a studio etc if desiring to mix the track with others (and use whatever delays and reverbs post that).

 

[djd100]

Simple, just put your room sim on a aux track with a EQ after it, and use a send from your source track.

There is no perfect room or IR, so hearing clips to define a mythical "best" is pointless.

It's all totally subjective, though the room tone needs to be present in some regard if ultimate realism is the goal.

I'd suggest as an exercise where you have two identical source tracks, put Mellowmuse and the 500ms IR on one, and then make a copy of the 500ms IR, truncate it down to 20ms, and put that in WOS III on the second source track. Next use the WOS III EQ or a outboard EQ to match them as much as possible.

Last, compare them in context of your mix.

P.S. Sorry, I mixed your post up with the guy using a freq analyzer in Logic.

It's possible I'm not advanced enough to eq room sim's. That's why I dig mellowmuse as it's straight to the point. How do you frequency analyze the tail end of a 500ms room sim? I'm happy to try.

Also, would love to hear some clips of successful room sims clips you've done. Maybe I have picky ears...