Voxengo Elephant 3

[Arksun]

Thought this deserved a thread in the Mastering forum section as limiters are a tool used a lot in mastering.

Soo, Voxengo have finally updated their Elephant limiter to ver 3, with a new algorithm type (EL UNI) and much more precise control over how it deals with transients (classic/sharp transient control switch, trans time knob, trans shape knob and an EL Dyn knob to control the amount of temporal masking, whatever that is).

I've always been a fan of Elephants limiting but just wished it could also deliver the kind of transient snappyness that Ozone or the Sonnox Limiters manage to pull off.

I've literally just bought the update to this in the past minute so am only just starting to try it out myself, but am dying to hear what some of the engineers here think of how Elephant sounds now in comparison to the other limiter plugs like Xenon etc...

*edit* initial impressions VERY favourable. Doesn't smear transients half as much as Elephant 2 did using the new EL UNI mode. Comparing to Ozone, Ozone now for the first time makes the soundstage seem a little brittle in comparison to Elephant 3s sound. This is good stuff. uses a hell of a lot more cpu now though if you have 8x oversampling enabled.

(I was going to ressurect the old limiter comparisons with sound thread and apply the processing to the original sample, but the links dont work anymore :( )

[kjg]

Last time I tried Elephant, it was not bit transparent when not in GR. A null test showed so signal at around -60dBFS if I recall correctly. So I uninstalled it and forgot about it. Is this resolved in version 3 Arksun?

Regards,
kjg

[bmanic]

Originally Posted by kjg

Last time I tried Elephant, it was not bit transparent when not in GR. A null test showed so signal at around -60dBFS if I recall correctly. So I uninstalled it and forgot about it. Is this resolved in version 3 Arksun?

Regards,
kjg

There are a few possibilities why this is the case:

1) Your DAW does not have latency compensation which resulted in failed null test
2) You forgot the dither or DC filter on while doing the null test
3) You had oversampling on (some presets have this on by default)
4) There was a bug that I've never encountered before (I just tried v2 and it is 100% bit transparent)

In short, ever since version 1.0 Elephant has always been completely bit transparent, that is it completely nulls with the original signal when no gain reduction is happening.

Version 3.0 sounds awesome and is very much better sounding than Elephant 2.0 (which was already fantastic) and thus puts it in a league of it's own, at least in my opinion. As a reference I have tried these following limiters: iZotope Ozone (my former favorite), Sonnox Limiter, Waves L1/L2 and L3 (yuck!), Image Line Maximus, Buzz Room LM1, TBT Pocket limiter and his other limiters (can't remember names now) and finally I've compared it against purely clipping a high-end (Prism) DA stage and GClip.

In my opinion Elephant is the winner of this bunch (try the Master Punch preset, works well on lots of material if you need it loud). However, I do prefer a combination of Elephant 3.0 and clipping the Prism converters.

Cheers!
bManic

[macc]

^ That's a glowing endorsement... Might have to get it - only 35 quid!

Before I do though, has anyone tried it against Xenon? I do like Xenon and would be interested to see how it compares.

Aleksey does make great plugs though, no question!

[kjg]

Originally Posted by bmanic

In short, ever since version 1.0 Elephant has always been completely bit transparent, that is it completely nulls with the original signal when no gain reduction is happening.

I guess it was my mistake then, or maybe a bug. I'll surely give the version 3 a try sometime then.
Thanks for the reply, bmanic.

[kragg]

Couldn't it be some things related to DC filter ?
I may be wrong, and i am not tech guy, but i guess i know DC shifts the phase a bit to correct DC errors (below 20hz), so an anti-phase summing test could not be the best thing to do in such a case ?

(my 0.00002 cents of rupies)

[kjg]

Originally Posted by kragg

Couldn't it be some things related to DC filter ?
I may be wrong, and i am not tech guy, but i guess i know DC shifts the phase a bit to correct DC errors (below 20hz), so an anti-phase summing test could not be the best thing to do in such a case ?

I wasn't using the DC filter at any point, so I'm sure this was not the reason why it didn't null. I'm also pretty sure it wasn't the dither, cause that would result in a very noisy signal around -90 dB in a null test, where what I was hearing was still recognizable as the signal being processed.
It could have been the oversampling though, or a latency compensation issue.
I'll see if I can reproduce it, _and give version 3 a try.

Thank you for the replies.
kjg

[Aleksey Vaneev]

It's probably related to oversampling since oversampling on most settings produces a partial sample delay - this is nothing to worry about, but it does not allow to perform nulling tests.

[strave]

I've got to say I'm extremely impressed with the new elephant on first tests. I bought version 2 and was basically using it for a tiny bit of leveling because it killed my transients but this new one seems very promising. I'll be bringing it to the studio today and trying it out in a more critical environment. We'll see how it holds up...

[Lupo]

Hi Aleksey!

Good to see you around here.


Got a question regarding one of the points in the original post:

Originally Posted by Arksun

.. and an EL Dyn knob to control the amount of temporal masking, whatever that is).

Is it true? Do you use psychoacoustics to hide artifacts?

That's genius! =)

Is it possible to tell some more about it?


Best regards,

Andreas Nordenstam

[Bob Yordan]

Originally Posted by Lupo

Hi Aleksey!

Good to see you around here.


Got a question regarding one of the points in the original post:



Is it true? Do you use psychoacoustics to hide artifacts?

That's genius! =)

Is it possible to tell some more about it?


Best regards,

Andreas Nordenstam

+1

[Aleksey Vaneev]

Originally Posted by Lupo

Is it true? Do you use psychoacoustics to hide artifacts?
That's genius! =)
Is it possible to tell some more about it?

Well, there is nothing 'ingenious' in the approach I'm offering via EL Dyn modes. They simply change the "post-compression" dynamic response a bit, and that naturally affects perception. EL Dyn modes do not change achieved RMS loudness boost, but indeed may make limiter sound a bit "clearer". No fancy theory or modeling is in use. You may try yourself if your hearing is good by switching between "Off" and different EL Dyn modes.

[yarrick19]

Anyone else had a chance to try this limiter out?

[virtualaudio]

I have several Voxengo products, and love them all; after recently purchasing the Elephant 2, I stopped using Ozone's Loudness Maximizer. (Waves doesn't come close to either, imo)
The V3 update is even better, in several ways, not least the increased control. I would recommend it to anyone.
One thing I did notice is that the v3 RMS output level reading does not match the V2 readout; going by the same numbers, my masters were more smashed. Of course I should rely on my ears %100, but in rough master runs, it was handy to have figured out a good rms number for the typical music I work with (rock) and get around +6 to +8 using K-14 readings. I wonder why it is different, and will ask Aleksey on his forum, if he does not respond here.
Overall, though, an incredible product for an unbeatable price.

[Aleksey Vaneev]

I've replied on Voxengo forum. From my tests, both Elephant V2 and V3 show same RMS level on same input gain setting. Make sure you had equal input gain settings during comparison.

[_gl]

Anybody want to sell their v3 Elephant license?

[mastertone]

Originally Posted by _gl

Anybody want to sell their v3 Elephant license?

What? Come on guy! Really, its to affordable to try to get it 2nd hand.

This limiter holds its own! Buy it from Voxengo.

[bcgood]

I like both the Xenon and Elephant 3 for different things. Both are great sounding plug ins.

Elephant still seems to retain a lot of depth and sounds very musical as far as limiters go. Xenon sounds very clean yet more of a glass wall type thing going on similar to L2007 but maybe a little better.

[bonne]

Originally Posted by mastertone

What? Come on guy! Really, its to affordable to try to get it 2nd hand.

This limiter holds its own! Buy it from Voxengo.

I tried to upgrade to v/3 when it first came out.

Voxengo's payment service wouldn't accept my VISA card ( - accepted by all other companies I deal with). Voxengo offered no help to rectify this, so I'm still on 2.5.

Other people may have had similar problems.

[Audio Enginerd]

I just bought Elephant 3.2 yesterday because I was impressed with it when I tried the trial version. It definitely preserves the low-end as well as the transients. It doesn't thin out and flatten the drums like the L2 does. I have grown to loathe the L2 plugin over the years. However, it sometimes feels as though it has used me. A local studio I work at every now and then has the hardware L2, and it is leaps and bounds better than its plugin counterpart to me. It's not cheap though, and there are so many other pieces I have my eye on that are ahead of it in line. I have only done a few songs with the Elephant at this point. I am currently experimenting with the features. I am using 2 at the end of the Master bus. This first one is clipping a little and the other one is in the el uni mode and dithering with the noise on tdpf (sounds maybe a little more open or bright?) with the equal shaping. I haven't had a chance to read all of the manual. I'm actually about to do that now after I post. Anyone else have any setting they can recommend. I know different situations require different things, but what is your favorite starting point with this guy?

[macc]

For drum-driven 'dance' music where punch must be maintained at all costs;

Start with the release at its shortest, El-Uni, transient time at 0, transient shape at 1, 'dyn' thing off (!!!!). Set desired loudness and if need be (deep sub) start moving the transient time up/transient shape down/release up to alleviate any unpleasantness. If you go beyond 3 or so with the trans time then you may get better results switching to dyn 3 and keeping it lower, maybe not.

It took me ages to figure out what it was that was making everything 'smoosh out' - almost as if the drums softened into the background. It's that dyn thing. Switching it off makes El-3 the best transient preserver I know.It is awwwwesome.

[adl]

I usually start from the "Master Punch 3" Preset.
I do Techhouse stuff.

[macc]

I was starting from there too but found that too smooshy. I dunno where I got smooshy from, but it is definitely the word

Seriously, try starting from the master punch but just turn off the dyn thing, it is on mode 3 in that preset. Transients just stick out how they should, rather than softened.

FWIW Customers were picking up on this, so I was really glad to get to the bottom of it.

[adl]

Originally Posted by macc

I was starting from there too but found that too smooshy. I dunno where I got smooshy from, but it is definitely the word

Seriously, try starting from the master punch but just turn off the dyn thing, it is on mode 3 in that preset. Transients just stick out how they should, rather than softened.

FWIW Customers were picking up on this, so I was really glad to get to the bottom of it.

Thanx for the hint!
Will definitely give it a try

[lerone]

Originally Posted by _gl

Anybody want to sell their v3 Elephant license?

What!? Don't be cheap skate. £35 is a bargain and I wouldn't think anyone with an ounce of taste would

Mr Vaneev, I do have a slight problem. I love the sound of elephant, but it crashes both sequoia 10 & tracktion 3 if I open the interface more than 3 or 4 times. Very strange indeed. Haven't got any dodgy software or viruses / spyware / trojans either!? My system is rock solid other than that. Can you think of a reason this may be?

Cheers mate!

Toby

[macc]

As we're on it, Mr Vaneev (sorry)

I think the 'hold ctrl and click' to bring the output down as you raise the input, is broken in the last version. I can get both knobs to move, but they both move in the same direction!

[lerone]

Originally Posted by lerone

What!? Don't be cheap skate. £35 is a bargain and I wouldn't think anyone with an ounce of taste would

Mr Vaneev, I do have a slight problem. I love the sound of elephant, but it crashes both sequoia 10 & tracktion 3 if I open the interface more than 3 or 4 times. Very strange indeed. Haven't got any dodgy software or viruses / spyware / trojans either!? My system is rock solid other than that. Can you think of a reason this may be?

Cheers mate!

Toby

Sorry to be a pain in the arse....crunchessor does the exactly the same thing too. The old versions are fine, no probs at all, but I really would like to be able to use the new versions without losing my work. Cheers!

Toby

[Aleksey Vaneev]

I'm not checking GearSlutz often, sorry - you should have posted a problem to me personally or via Voxengo forums.

I can't comment about Sequoia and Tracktion crashes - it is possible that the next update will fix this problem as we had defeated a couple of crash bugs in the code lately. Elephant update will most probably be released in a week or two from now. Crunchessor, VariSaturator and LF Max Punch will also get this fix soon.

Inversed knob linking is engaged differently to v2.0 now - you have to use the right mouse button, no need to hold the Ctrl key.

[macc]

I'm an idiot. Thanks Alexey!

If you check back here I would like to let you know hoooow much I like Elephant 3. With the EL-Dyn setting off it is the best limiter I have ever used. Incredible!

[Jesse Graffam]

I second that... Elephant 3 is on top of a very steep hill for me right now, as far as publicly available DSP is concerned anyways. My #1 public fav. :)

The only other limiters I even bother to load are Crysonic SpectraPhy (my #2 public fav, great for a "vintage" sound while still retaining almost as much transients as Voxengo), and a very advanced non-public (yet) limiter/clipper (my #1 fav, totally sick).