Has anybody used the IR Utility yet?

[autodidactic]

Has anybody used the impulse response utility? How does it work? I've never made an impulse response before but the thought of being able to walk into a cathedral with mic+laptop and capturing the room as an IR is very appealing!

[dlmorley]

Originally Posted by autodidactic

Has anybody used the impulse response utility? How does it work? I've never made an impulse response before but the thought of being able to walk into a cathedral with mic+laptop and capturing the room as an IR is very appealing!

I made some for altiverb and am looking forwards to trying the same in logic. as you say, it's an amazing thing. As an electronic musician I consider this a highly creative tool.
As long as you are careful, it works pretty well (in altiverb) so I see no reason why it shouldn't in L8

[autodidactic]

So you've done it with Altiverb. Great! What does the process involve? The laptop and mic is a given but do you just record any sound or does it have to be a specific sound generated like a sine wave or something?

[gsilbers]

does it do soundhack type shite?

[jdg]

u can already do "soundhack type shit" (aka convolution) with spacedesigner.
use your own wave/aiff file as the IR, no need for the IR tool

[gsilbers]

hmmmm... if u have used soundhack convolution reverb and saying u can do the same with space designer then thats dope!

if not you and everyone should download soundhack free. does wierd atmos sci fi stuff!

im going to try in space designer

[gsilbers]

what do u know... u can!!!

i loaded a stereo mix of sex groans as the IR and processed a siamesen lick. and used a delay designer for more depth.. check it out... what a cool ambience/filmscore thing came out...

[musikwerks]

Have you seen the "Halls Of Fame" product at soundsonline.com?

IR programs of the TC 6000 and Lexicon 960.

[dlmorley]

Originally Posted by autodidactic

So you've done it with Altiverb. Great! What does the process involve? The laptop and mic is a given but do you just record any sound or does it have to be a specific sound generated like a sine wave or something?

The full details are in each manual I guess, but basically you sweep a sine wave over a wide range and then use the provided software to convert the recorded sound into an IR. You can also do it with a single hit, but the sine wave sweep is the better way.
Pretty easy really!

[autodidactic]

Originally Posted by dlmorley

The full details are in each manual I guess, but basically you sweep a sine wave over a wide range and then use the provided software to convert the recorded sound into an IR. You can also do it with a single hit, but the sine wave sweep is the better way.
Pretty easy really!

Sweet! Thanks for filling me in. I'll check the manual for further instructions.

[noiseflaw]

Originally Posted by musikwerks

Have you seen the "Halls Of Fame" product at soundsonline.com?

IR programs of the TC 6000 and Lexicon 960.

Halls Of Fame Yes that's on my 'to purchase' list, it looks great.

[dlmorley]

Originally Posted by autodidactic

Sweet! Thanks for filling me in. I'll check the manual for further instructions.

Sorry not to be more precise but it is that easy and the last time I did it was over a year ago, so maybe there is another stage, but I don't think so...

[drycounty]

Hey can you give detailed instructions as to how you did this? I LOVE LOVE LOVE Soundhack but really don't like the fact that it often takes forever to convolve two tracks. Did this take less time? Did you have to normalize afterwards, as you do with SH? Thanks for the link -- sounds great!

Originally Posted by gsilbers

what do u know... u can!!!

i loaded a stereo mix of sex groans as the IR and processed a siamesen lick. and used a delay designer for more depth.. check it out... what a cool ambience/filmscore thing came out...

[gsilbers]

Originally Posted by drycounty

Hey can you give detailed instructions as to how you did this? I LOVE LOVE LOVE Soundhack but really don't like the fact that it often takes forever to convolve two tracks. Did this take less time? Did you have to normalize afterwards, as you do with SH? Thanks for the link -- sounds great!

it actually did it in realtime so i can preview what was going on instead of waiting the results like in SH.

you open a stereo audio track and open an instance of space designer and go to space designer and in the inteface select "load & ini IR" and select whichever audio file you want.

then import another audio file and added in the track. hit play


in my example i loaded in space space designer a sample of a mix 16 tracks of 30secs each of porn movie audio so its a cacofony of sex groans and moans.
then in the track where the space designer is inserted i imported a sample of a dude playing siemesen.

there was no need to normalize or anything. the sound already came out great.

[drycounty]

Thanks, gsilbers!

I might post some here later tonight. Love the unpredictability of convolving two tracks together.

[theblotted]

pretty soon you're gonna see ppl selling convolution IR's of Neve, API, SSL, etc. using the IR utility...

(yes, i know some of them IR's are available from noisevault)

[gsilbers]

im curious,

how would u use NEVE IRs in a mix...or how would you use them?

you add an altiverb on an audio channel and load a neve IR and run a bass guitar recording or whatever and it will change the sound charasteristic of it?

will add harmonics (even order dist)?

im guessing u will bounce the outcome as its processor intensive?

so do it 1st then add other processors?

[jdg]

check out colortone by tritone digital.
same idea

[dlmorley]

The IR Utility is GREAT! Makes it very easy to make impulses. I still haven't read up on Space Designer properly. Altiverb was much simpler which was an advantage when you just want what went in to come out!
Anyway, so far, so good.

[theblotted]

Originally Posted by gsilbers

im curious,

how would u use NEVE IRs in a mix...or how would you use them?

you add an altiverb on an audio channel and load a neve IR and run a bass guitar recording or whatever and it will change the sound charasteristic of it?

will add harmonics (even order dist)?

im guessing u will bounce the outcome as its processor intensive?

so do it 1st then add other processors?

it adds the harmonics and color, but certainly not the character... mainly b/c a recording usually is dynamic, and diff gain stage of the electronics will yield a diff character.

as opposed to putting a blanket over it. kinda like boxing a Mackie PCB into a Neve rack/console. it may say "Neve" on the outside, but the sound...

[colinmiller]

You can't really make IRs of EQs or compressors. It's all based on delays and reflections. There is another technique for capturing stuff like EQs and compressors, but there's a patent on it.

I make a lot of my own IRs in Altiverb, but have avoided Space Designer because it only allows a mono source. Anyone know if they changed this in version 8? I need a true stereo source for my IRs. This means 2 stereo pairs. A stereo pair for the left, and a stereo pair for the right. I don't deal with surround, but that would be handy too if they added it.

[dlmorley]

Originally Posted by colinmiller

You can't really make IRs of EQs or compressors. It's all based on delays and reflections. There is another technique for capturing stuff like EQs and compressors, but there's a patent on it.

I make a lot of my own IRs in Altiverb, but have avoided Space Designer because it only allows a mono source. Anyone know if they changed this in version 8? I need a true stereo source for my IRs. This means 2 stereo pairs. A stereo pair for the left, and a stereo pair for the right. I don't deal with surround, but that would be handy too if they added it.

It does true stereo (2 stereo pairs) and surround I believe!

[colinmiller]

That's awesome. That was pretty much the only reason I couldn't use it in L7.

[dlmorley]

Originally Posted by colinmiller

That's awesome. That was pretty much the only reason I couldn't use it in L7.

Here are the options when recording your impulses....
A few options

[theblotted]

Originally Posted by colinmiller

You can't really make IRs of EQs or compressors. It's all based on delays and reflections. There is another technique for capturing stuff like EQs and compressors, but there's a patent on it.

I make a lot of my own IRs in Altiverb, but have avoided Space Designer because it only allows a mono source. Anyone know if they changed this in version 8? I need a true stereo source for my IRs. This means 2 stereo pairs. A stereo pair for the left, and a stereo pair for the right. I don't deal with surround, but that would be handy too if they added it.

my reason why EQ and compressor IR's are useless:

-EQ: i never heard of a EQ curve that can tailor for all situations. makes more sense to be able to dial in what is actually NEEDED.

-Compressor: program music is dynamic dependent, so a blanket IR cannot accommodate all dynamics/volumes changes.

i still would like to hear the technique for capturing EQ/Compressors tho. you talking about Q-clone?

[gsilbers]

seems a good idea to get an IR from a manely tube compressor for examples and a GML EQ with a touch of brightness to run VA or VI synth thorugh it. well i did with the real deal and it was great. but i dont think the IR will enable that warmth asosiated with harmonic distortion.. or will it?

[slaves666]

Waves Q Clone does this as well as Focusrite liquid Channel and Liquid Mix.......still not as good as hardware, but getting better.

[duckoff]

it adds the harmonics and color, but certainly not the character... mainly b/c a recording usually is dynamic, and diff gain stage of the electronics will yield a diff character.

no it doesnt capture the harmonics as they are due to the nonlinear response of the unit sampled, it does capture the frequency response & and how the unit 'smears' the sound ( due to slew rates etc ) so i can capture 'some' of the 'character' but not the entire behavior of a device


eg. by using an inpulse of an analog tape machine you can get a very similar frequency response to tape but none of the distortion ( ie harmonic ) or compression elements.

What plugs like colortone do is simulate the nonlinearities of a device ( saturation ) then feed it through an impulse to give it more of that units character. You can do the same in logic using soft clip on the compressor followed by a relevant impulse.

BTW. you can get loads of these sorts of impulses from noisevault - including 1db steps of manley eq, so you can choose the cut / boost / frequency you desire........

[duckoff]

Volterra Kernels are the holy grail of this sh!t - it's like a waay better version of sintefexs / focusrites dynamic convolution - you can sample anything basically, including moduation effects, distortion, compression verbs etc etc & it sounds phenomenal - it is the future for sure.
There's a free plug ( on the pc unfortunately ) called nebula2 free which does it - worth running windows on a seperate machine for !!

[theblotted]

Originally Posted by duckoff

no it doesnt capture the harmonics as they are due to the nonlinear response of the unit sampled, it does capture the frequency response & and how the unit 'smears' the sound ( due to slew rates etc ) so i can capture 'some' of the 'character' but not the entire behavior of a device


eg. by using an inpulse of an analog tape machine you can get a very similar frequency response to tape but none of the distortion ( ie harmonic ) or compression elements.

What plugs like colortone do is simulate the nonlinearities of a device ( saturation ) then feed it through an impulse to give it more of that units character. You can do the same in logic using soft clip on the compressor followed by a relevant impulse.

BTW. you can get loads of these sorts of impulses from noisevault - including 1db steps of manley eq, so you can choose the cut / boost / frequency you desire........

thanks for the clarification. i understand the concept but couldn't word it with proper terms and definitions.

thumbsup