P.S. Re: DSEQ -- BTW don't go by the videos on TBProAudio's website -- he's not a huge developer with a big budget for slick video production. He's a small indie developer, and his videos don't show what this plugin can do. Just download the demo and reach out via email or in the various forums where he lurks to ask questions. Here's one of the threads you can catch him at on Gearslutz: https://www.gearslutz.com/board/new-...-mac-os-x.html
Also, I found his username here in the Reaper forum: TBProAudio (pretty obvious, duh), but again, I don't know how often he check in here.
For de-essing, I have completely switched my workflow to TBProAudio's DSEQ, which is my vote for plugin of the year. I've got many or most of the top de-essing plugins, endless other plugins and tools, tried so many techniques/approaches over the years, and they all have now taken a back seat to DSEQ for de-essing.
Once you get the hang of how the pre-filter response curve works in conjunction with the selectivity/threshold/attack/release/etc., you can fine-tune the response of the bank of dynamic EQs to get as surgical or as broad as you want to. There are a couple of similar plugins on the market, very good ones in fact, but none have the flexibility and depth of this plugin IMO. It can be subtle and incredibly transparent, or brutal and aggressive. And everything in between.
DSEQ is far more than a de-esser, BTW. It's a resonance killer, frequency-taming genius, de-masking superstar, a re-balancing powerhouse, and a mastering secret weapon. But yes, also the best de-esser I've ever used. Ever.
I probably need to spend more time with DSEQ but currently I still prefer Waves sibilance by a large margin. With Sibilance I dont have to deal with pre-filter, slope, sensitivity, attack, release, etc. The default setting or 1 of the presets work 95% of the time with some minimal adjustments.
That said I agree with you that DSEQ is the plugin of the year. Its on every mix now. Fantastic for de-resonating and/or de-harshing vocals, overheads, distorted guitars, etc, etc. Indispensable.
I probably need to spend more time with DSEQ but currently I still prefer Waves sibilance by a large margin. With Sibilance I dont have to deal with pre-filter, slope, sensitivity, attack, release, etc. The default setting or 1 of the presets work 95% of the time with some minimal adjustments.
That said I agree with you that DSEQ is the plugin of the year. Its on every mix now. Fantastic for de-resonating and/or de-harshing vocals, overheads, distorted guitars, etc, etc. Indispensable.
Yeah, nothing wrong per se with the various Waves de-essers, or any of the many good ones out there (and as we all know, there are MANY)... I should have prefaced my post that everyone will have different requirements/needs, source material, etc... And Waves Sibilance is good IMO for many situations, can be purchased on sale for super cheap, and will do the job that many people might want. I've seen it on sale for under $30, which is great, and I was happy to have it as an option in my plugin library before I ran into DSEQ, and now I don't bother with any other plugin when I'm focusing on that task, especially any challenging de-essing task.
But honestly, if my plugin library was just getting started, and I had very limited resources (and I was NOT allowed to have DSEQ, which does way way more than de-essing of course), I'd actually get a super flexible dynamic EQ TBH. My two favorite workhorse, trusty, day-in, day-out dynamic EQs right now are FabFilter Pro-Q 3 and TBProAudio dEQ6. They get a lot of work on many tracks for many kinds of purposes, and they can both handle de-essing tasks pretty well for 80%+ of what I have to deal with if I had to. Truly, a good dynamic EQ (and those two are my favorites right now) would definitely be a "desert island" plugin for me, good for many important tasks.
Besides music, I do more post production, and sometimes I get the nastiest, most difficult source files, far worse than the worst I've ever gotten from a studio recording, and that's when I discovered DSEQ could tame things that no other plugin I've ever used could pull off. For example, I spent many hours comparing and getting used to the subtleties of it to fine tune the de-essing of one single horrible field recording I had, and nothing in my plugin collection (which is very large) could come close to what I could do with DSEQ. It was a game changer for me at that point, not to mention all the other magic it can do, so I don't even bother with anything else now. It has become a "desert island" plugin for me. However, it can be a deep plugin, and there is a learning curve to get the most out of it. I'm still getting used to it TBH, and the developer keeps on adding new features. So yeah, I'd agree in the sense that if someone wants something fast and simple, then there are other options like Waves Sibilance (on sale!). But if you're willing to take the time, DSEQ becomes, as you said, an indispensable plugin.
Melodyne is supposed to do a pretty good job at dessing, but not completely automatic.
Marc
Yes, Melodyne 5 introduced some great new features that allow it to separate out the sibilants, consonants, etc., really nicely, and treat those objects like you can other objects in Melodyne, so you can adjust the timing, gain, etc... all separately from the note. Even the breath sounds. Very cool technology. The process is different and a more involved (IMO) workflow than a regular de-esser or DSEQ-like plugin, but it is very powerful, and kind of amazing actually. Reaper supports ARA, so it would work great in Reaper. A different workflow, different concept/theory/approach, but you might get as good or even better results, depending on the material. Definitely worth looking into to see if it fits your workflow and material.
I think for speed though, working on a lot of vocals with the same vocalist, recorded with the same mic in the same room, the workflow would be much faster with a normal de-esser, a dynamic EQ, or DSEQ kind of plugin, since once you set the parameters, you can save the preset and be done with it. Way faster workflow in the sense that once you get the settings where you like them, you can apply them to any instance of the plugin on any similar track, and of course tweak on the fly while you're mixing, etc... However, the Melodyne 5 approach would take more time and requires that kind of hands-on Melodyne ARA session. But still very cool and very powerful.
I don't remember the last time I used a dedicated de-essing plugin, even though I have a few of them. As a REAPER-er (2007 and on) I used ReaFIR for many years. But when Waves released their F6 (Dynamic EQ) I did all de-essing in that. Although today, I use either Pro-Q3 or Pro-MB (FabFilter).
A funny thing is, I have a slight lisp. And as a (lead) singer that can be rather frustrating (and embarrassing) during recording sessions. The engineer goes like "Hey, hold it! Dude, are you singing off axis or something?", and I'd go like "No ... *dude* ... I'm not fucking thinging off akthith, get on with it, m'key?"
On the other hand, I can compress the living crap out of my voice without needing to de-ess it
There are so many great option around for this purpose.
I find my self using a lot the spectral edit in reaper along side with volume automation before i hit any dynamic plugin / hardware. Makes everything better.
EDIT: For me, the best de esser plugin is the DMG Essence. Has Lookahead can be linear phase, full control over the spectrum at a cost of more CPU but there is no harsh or unwanted modulation. very well built filters.
And yeah phase flip tricks are cool but IMO they are more time consuming than just using a dedicated processor. They can be really useful though.Here's one I recently heard about thats super cool for removing Hihat bleed
That is a really cool trick, but where do you get an EQ with the option to flip the phase?
Haha...You dont need an EQ with a polarity switch (aka phase flip). That part of the trick is pro-tools specific because "pro"-tools doesn't have a polarity switch ANYWHERE on their mixer. You have to use a plugin that has it.
Reaper of course has a polarity switch on every channel [NOT] including the master. I'm pretty sure most other non "pro" DAWS have this basic feature as well.
Haha...You dont need an EQ with a polarity switch (aka phase flip). That part of the trick is pro-tools specific because "pro"-tools doesn't have a polarity switch ANYWHERE on their mixer. You have to use a plugin that has it.
Reaper of course has a polarity switch on every channel including the master. I'm pretty sure most other non "pro" DAWS have this basic feature as well.
I was thinking that the phase reversal needed to happen after the FX though (not sure where it happens in Reaper). In any case, I tried using the JS phase rotator and I couldn't get the high end cancelling to work, so I assumed that the trick must require an EQ with the phase switch.
What theme are you using? I have a regular installation and 2 different portables and none of them have a phase option on the master. I can't think what it would be useful for.
Yeah I spoke out of turn about the phase switch on the master (it would be useless LOL). I was thinking about the mono switch on the master which I believe is also missing from Pro-tools.
I was thinking that the phase reversal needed to happen after the FX though (not sure where it happens in Reaper). In any case, I tried using the JS phase rotator and I couldn't get the high end cancelling to work, so I assumed that the trick must require an EQ with the phase switch.
Did you try the polarity switch on the channel itself?
I am also unsure WHERE the polarity switch is in the chain - pre or post FX. I'm not sure that it matters in this technique. But I'll have to do some testing to be sure.
Also it has occurred to me that a better way to do this technique in Reaper would be putting both Snare tracks inside a folder and once you get the hi hat phase cancelled properly just render the folder.
I tried using the channel's phase switch, and inserting the JS phase rotator both before and after the EQ, but had no luck in gating the high end out of the snare in any useful way. It definitely kinda works (like it is doing some gating) but the results are nothing like what is shown in the video.
Maybe I'm missing something - has anyone else gotten this trick to work?
try the bob clearmountain method.(he might know a thing or two about mixing records)
“I don’t use de-essers. Instead, I have a patch on the SSL. I mult the vocal to the channel next to it, on which I’ll roll out all mid-range and bottom and boost around 7k as far as it will go. I’ll then send the output of the fader into its own bus, and select a compressor on that channel to pick up on that bus, so basically it becomes a sort of loop in the channel. I put the compressor on fast attack and fast release, and link it to the original vocal channel, on which I turn on the dynamics. It works like a side-chain on the compressor and it has the effect of a fast high-frequency limiter, its threshold being controlled by the fader on the parallel channel. It’s really effective, very fast, and it de-esses very smoothly and much better than any other de-esser I have ever used. Plus you can automate the threshold. It uses a lot of buttons and knobs, but once you see how it works, it’s really simple and very effective. I used it on Keith’s and Mick’s vocals"
I tried using the channel's phase switch, and inserting the JS phase rotator both before and after the EQ, but had no luck in gating the high end out of the snare in any useful way. It definitely kinda works (like it is doing some gating) but the results are nothing like what is shown in the video.
Maybe I'm missing something - has anyone else gotten this trick to work?
Besides the high pass EQ do you have an identical FX chain on both snare tracks?
Besides the high pass EQ do you have an identical FX chain on both snare tracks?
Yup - duplicated the track. That gets me thinking though - I wonder if there's something in the FX chain that has some time component to it. I know I have a transient shaper on there; not sure if that might cause a things not to cancel properly or not.
Yup - duplicated the track. That gets me thinking though - I wonder if there's something in the FX chain that has some time component to it. I know I have a transient shaper on there; not sure if that might cause a things not to cancel properly or not.
Try this technique with the RAW snare track (no FX at all) and see if the results are better.
It sounds really bad. Compare with and without and you'll hear what I'm talking about.
I found a gearslutz thread that basically says the same thing. lookahead is apparently broken. I dont even know if I use it. I just start from the preset dial it in and it works like magic. but I will do some testing now that I am aware of this issue.
^^^^
I've only casually tested Sibilance on a few short vocal phrases but haven't noticed a problem with lookahead. That's not to say there isn't one, but worth noting here that lookahead is not meant to be used for live input of course.
Agreed. Even their "free' plugins arent free. They will eventually lose supprt via the stupid Waves versioning BS and you will need to PAY to keep using your free plugin.
No. You won't. You'll only have to pay if you want an updated version after your update "contract" has expired. I've been using Waves plugins for years and haven't paid for an update (or needed one) yet, despite my "contract" expiring.
No. You won't. You'll only have to pay if you want an updated version after your update "contract" has expired. I've been using Waves plugins for years and haven't paid for an update (or needed one) yet, despite my "contract" expiring.
Yeah That's been my experience to, although I have to admit there have been times of frustration.
No. You won't. You'll only have to pay if you want an updated version after your update "contract" has expired. I've been using Waves plugins for years and haven't paid for an update (or needed one) yet, despite my "contract" expiring.
Yup. I've been using their API collection for a decade or more without paying for WUP.
That's more longevity than other software I've paid a lot more for.
Linear Mode
