gate/downward expander plugins
Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2023 11:42 am
What gate and or downward expander plugins do you have and use? What do you use it on when mixing (ie kick drum, toms, etc)?
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gate/downward expander plugins
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Re: gate/downward expander plugins
Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2023 4:03 pm
Call me simple, but I Rarely need more than the gates in my SSL channel plugs. Either the Waves or the Plugin Aliiance SSL channel plugs. . Even stock Logic gates to the trick just fine for me. I wouldn’t say there aren’t some better than others but gates are kinda Utility style plugs. It’s not hard for even free ones to actually be an effective gate
Re: gate/downward expander plugins
Posted: Tue Feb 07, 2023 4:14 pm
When micing a whole drum kit, I used to always gate each tom, kick and snare in the mix.
You get way better drum sound (mic'ing the whole kit) especially when adding eq, pitch changes and adding reverb/gated reverb.
Today, its become popular with hipster engineers to use only 2 or 3 mics on the whole kit but, I will never not mic each tom, kick, snare and I will always us two overheads. I hate the minimal mic approach on drums - you'll never get the control you need for a good drum sound.
I never mic the bottom of the snare and I don't mic the hi-hat (maybe I would if I had recorded a jazz band).
It can be time consuming to set up a gate on the toms, kick and snare tracks but, it's worth it.
With digital recording, it's usually faster to just edit out any noise at the beginning or end of guitar and bass sections.... if you use a gate, you have to listen to the whole song and keep adjusting the gate to make sure nothing gets cut off that isn't supposed to get cut off.
I sometimes gate vocals in the mix but, it usually easier (and cleaner) to just edit out the non-singing areas.
I've been using Plug & Mix Gatevader. It does the job and has low cpu usage so you can run multiple instances with no issues.
You can get the whole Plug & Mix Bundle when it goes on sale for under $50.
https://www.plugandmix.com/products/p2492-Gatevador/
I forgot that I recently purchased the Nomad Factory Gate Expander!!!
Nomad Factory makes excellent, low artifact plugins - I have quite a few.
I tested it out the Gate Expander and it's a good one but, I never used it in a mix... yet. So many plugins, so little time!
https://www.nomadfactory.com/products/p ... -Expander/
I have their Analog Studio Rack that includes a mic preamp sim, comprerssors, eq and the gate/expander.
The modules can be run separately - you don't have to use the Rack.
You get way better drum sound (mic'ing the whole kit) especially when adding eq, pitch changes and adding reverb/gated reverb.
Today, its become popular with hipster engineers to use only 2 or 3 mics on the whole kit but, I will never not mic each tom, kick, snare and I will always us two overheads. I hate the minimal mic approach on drums - you'll never get the control you need for a good drum sound.
I never mic the bottom of the snare and I don't mic the hi-hat (maybe I would if I had recorded a jazz band).
It can be time consuming to set up a gate on the toms, kick and snare tracks but, it's worth it.
With digital recording, it's usually faster to just edit out any noise at the beginning or end of guitar and bass sections.... if you use a gate, you have to listen to the whole song and keep adjusting the gate to make sure nothing gets cut off that isn't supposed to get cut off.
I sometimes gate vocals in the mix but, it usually easier (and cleaner) to just edit out the non-singing areas.
I've been using Plug & Mix Gatevader. It does the job and has low cpu usage so you can run multiple instances with no issues.
You can get the whole Plug & Mix Bundle when it goes on sale for under $50.
https://www.plugandmix.com/products/p2492-Gatevador/
I forgot that I recently purchased the Nomad Factory Gate Expander!!!
Nomad Factory makes excellent, low artifact plugins - I have quite a few.
I tested it out the Gate Expander and it's a good one but, I never used it in a mix... yet. So many plugins, so little time!
https://www.nomadfactory.com/products/p ... -Expander/
I have their Analog Studio Rack that includes a mic preamp sim, comprerssors, eq and the gate/expander.
The modules can be run separately - you don't have to use the Rack.