Quote:
Originally Posted by yep
In all seriousness, if you go back to the "useful" part of this thread, or at least to the part that I had anything meaningful to contribute to, the point of it was never to tell you what reverb setting to use for guitar, or anything like that.
To re-phrase the questions in your post, the point was not "how to make a starter violin sound like a Stradivarius", it was "how to make a recording of a violin sound as good as it actually sounds", with a dose of "how to then flatter that sound or sit it favorably in a mix of other sounds."
The thread title is "Why do your recordings sound like ass?" not "Why does your music sound like ass?".
I absolutely recognize why a great many people care just as much about the former answer as the latter, but an audio-recording software forum is not the place to explore that question.
This started out as a "how to get your recordings to sound as good as your live performances" discussion, but has increasingly turned into a "whether you need this or that magic box or setting to sound good" thing. I personally think that kind of discussion is a waste of time. I don't object to it, if people are contributing meaningful and substantive input, but I have yet to see such a discussion provide meaning and substance, much less better music.
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right, i completely agree with you. i think i may have miscommunicated things i was trying to say. what i'd really like to improve on is not make my crap sound good. not musically but sonically. because i know my shit is shit, and there's only so far as i can go given my physical setup.
what i'd like to know better, is a "using this effect in this case, yields this result, for this sort of effect."
you know, how to orchestrate things. and, to me, there is no right way, or wrong way really. i mean there are ways that don't sound good. for sure. but there are imo, multiple ways to produce a song that are all good. all very good. just like you could paint a portrait in many different ways and styles and it will be good, just different. but some brushes are good for painting some specific shapes. i'm not talking about comparing one compressor with another, or saying one tool is better than another, and the end all be all. to me, there is no such thing. there are tools that do things and sound certain ways. and in some cases every can be used and be great. it just depends where and at what time, and how you used it. but, i've not tried a bazillion compressors. i don't know fully all the sorts of effects i can get out of all of them really. or even layering multiple plugins. i mean every tool has a character, and so needs to be used in different ways and over different. but examples of which tools in which situations is really what i'd like to bombard myself with. we could argue all day on whether a stratocaster is better than a les paul. one is not better than the other. they are different and good in different ways. but if i didn't know guitars, then i wouldn't know that. but if i heard and saw types of music in which each guitar is used, and with which sorts of effects they tend to be used, then i would have a good idea about the differences.
i can lsiten to music, and get ideas, of pan and things like that. but how which tools got yo uto which sounds, i can't tell. i often try to figure it out.
but if i was a really expert recording artist, i would imagine i could listen to a finished mix, and have an idea of which compressor, or another similar compressor i know, was used on the vocals to get that sound, or at least know how i would go about doing it exactly. to watch and listen to things getting EQ'd even.
but for me, like i said, my shit sucks. i don't have quiet, i don't have awesome microphones. i don't have an awesome bass. all my software shit is good. that's ok, so it's tough too for me to know how much of the sucky sound i get is from my crappy noisy room and my piece of shit bass etc... and how much is my failure to use my tools correctly. or how far i could get them.
now i know i just need to listen, and i'm not horrible at mixing i don't think. but sometimes certain effects have many settings, and layering plugins can yield certain results, and i don't have the foreknowledge of which sorts of results to expect, and strive for and exactly how to get myself there.
i have to do trial and error. and sometimes i do well at it, and other times less well, but either way it is more time consuming than knowing exactly where i'm going and exactly how to get there.
iow, i don't care what tools one has. just how it is they apply them.
and ya, for sure, there will be cases, for certain types of music, certain scenarios, that someone might really depend on a specific plugin. but i don't think that discussing that is bad. it can be helpful to someone else who might like that specific character of that plugin as well.
i just don't like it when people say one plugin is better than another.
which guitar is better than another? there are so many and so many different styles. in art there is different, different for different things. distortion and metal can be good, clean and crips can be good, smooth and mellow, there are all sorts. and ya, one plugin might one job better than another. and some plugins might suck, or be difficult to use and different people have different preferences. but arguing like children about it, i'll agree is a waste of time.
sharing what one gets out of which plugin in which situation by using it in which way however, this, i find invaluable.
personally, i would hope that my recordings sound leaps and bounds much better than live recordings.