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Hey Leif,
I’ve recently been racing Live and BBP against an Orban 8500HD. The music, of course, sounds incredible when run through BA, but the jocks are drowned out in just about every case.
Couple ways that I tested this to make sure:
1) Live jock breaks required the music to be turned down very low (unnaturally low) in order for the talkover to be heard.
2) Voicetracking is less-than-savory if the music is hot.
3) Spots coming from production have the VO being slammed by the music bed/effects.
All 3 of the above scenarios sound great on the Orban, and I think I know why. The midrange is accented on all of our on-air processors, where as it seems like the high-end is more accented in Breakaway. The only preset that didn’t completely drown the jocks out (and was acceptable for our format) was Cleveland, but even that wasn’t spot-on.
Any chance of adding a midrange boost slider to the core specifically for this purpose? Seems like a midrange boost really makes certain genres of music cut through, as well.
Thanks man,
AdamSorry for the delayed response…
The mics are processed with Presonus Eurekas and Symetrix gear. The jock mics are even EQ’d to accentuate midrange so the vocal audio cuts through.
Unfortunately, I am not able to get samples due to some corporate policy, but the problem can be easily reproduced. We normally use the Rock preset, but switched to Cleveland in an attempt to get more midrange. I also rolled off some of the highs, but that didn’t really solve anything.
The best way I can describe it is to say that the jock gets swallowed up by the music. The Tom Lord-Alge’s of today are smashing the shit out of every piece of audio that leaves the studio, and it turns into a wall of sound when you run it through on-air processing. Sounds awesome when the jocks aren’t talking, but when they are, the results are less-than-savory.
Adam
G’day Adam,
Have you tried the New York preset with the Speed backed down?
It tends to have a bit of vocal boost and might do a better job of controlling the music levels.
Cheers,
Matt
[quote author=”bofh”]G’day Adam,
Have you tried the New York preset with the Speed backed down?
Matt[/quote]
That would have been my first guess, too. You said you have to force the background way down when talking over it. That would seem to indicate that you must have everything (range, power & speed) way over the mid-points that the presets all come with. If the processing pulls the backgrounds up so fast that it drowns your vocals, you must have something set pretty fast.
If you want to even out the processing with the music, maybe less mic processing would give BA something to work with… especially with aggressive settings.
Hey guys,
Thanks for the responses. I don’t mean to sound condescending, but this is being tested in a $20 million dollar facility. All of the equipment has been fine-tuned by Harris, so backing the mic processing down is not an option. Doing that would actually make the problem worse.
As far as settings go, power is at 35. Speed is set to 70, and the reason behind this is that the attack is not solid without it being this fast. The downside is that the release is way too fast, and Leif is aware of this issue. Because of this, he is considering separate attack and release sliders. Range is at 60, but that setting is not really relevant to this conversation if you are maintaining solid input levels to begin with.
I’m not so much interested in switching to a new preset. That doesn’t solve the underlying problem. The rock preset is extremely solid music-wise, and I would hate to abandon it when the issue is not difficult to fix (or maybe it is 😉.
Adam
I once had a friend that was working master control over a LIVE feed of one George W. Bush, going out to the world. I dared him to insert 2-3 frames of porno into the feed, and he indicated it would have been akin to signing his own death warrant. 😆 (of course it was a joke)
But yeah, "mission critical" is still applicable, for a Presidential feed, a $20,00,000 plant, or a 100 watt LPFM (which wishes to remain compliant). No differences in what *should* be done. Just sometimes what *is* done.
AdamH, check your PMs. 🙂
What is the solution to this, by the way? I did notice when A/B’ing BBP with an O6 that some v/o over music spots got swallowed by the music through BBP, but the v/o popped out with the O6. Not all, but some.
There’s some obvious solutions, I realize…curious to hear from you.
The info in the PM dealt with a new preset that is being tested, but I do not have access to it. I would be curious to get Leif’s take on this, and maybe hear his thoughts on the midrange boost slider.
Adam
[quote author=”AdamH”]
As far as settings go, power is at 35. Speed is set to 70, and the reason behind this is that the attack is not solid without it being this fast. The downside is that the release is way too fast, and Leif is aware of this issue. Because of this, he is considering separate attack and release sliders. Range is at 60, but that setting is not really relevant to this conversation if you are maintaining solid input levels to begin with.
[/quote]
I’ve noticed too that turning up the Speed does improve the attack (the bass can sometimes get BA by surprise when it’s not turned up high, for example), but it also seems to speed up the release, which can give a bit of a muddy/processed sound. If the release could be adjusted to not be as fast, I think that’d be about as good as it gets i.e. Leif has done an excellent job with the overall processing.
[quote author=”AdamH”]The info in the PM dealt with a new preset that is being tested, but I do not have access to it. I would be curious to get Leif’s take on this, and maybe hear his thoughts on the midrange boost slider.
Adam[/quote]
And I would love to give one! First of all, how about some recordings? Board-feed pre breakaway should suffice, along with the exact breakaway settings you were using.
///Leif
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