Pro Tools vs. Analog Mixing (video)

[Starshine]

this is so repetitive.

[Storyville]

Originally Posted by Sampire

so....to those who stand by the belief that digital will never be able to replicate closely enough to compare to analogue -- Do you believe you would be able to take this test and spot the impostor?

I personally believe that "digital" and "analogue" are simply different realms - and that superiority can be found in both and in different forms. I'd like to take the test just to check it out.

[Storyville]

Originally Posted by eighttwelve

From what I've read, the huge difference is in what analog captures vs what digital captures. Digital has much clearer highs but loses much of the warmth in the mid lows and lows, whereas analog tapers off on both ends but has incredibly warm mids, mid-highs and mid-lows, giving things a bit more body (think of a parabola). Either way, it's a matter of taste and using various techniques you can still take advantage and find ways of grabbing the sounds you want to hear. Hearing these pros talk about it is pretty good evidence of that. Digital offers the ease of recording and the ease of non-destructible assets, so it's obviously the medium of choice nowadays. The advantage of analog is that you are a little bit less lazy when it comes to recording the sounds you want and need especially. At least, that's my impression.

I find this to be the rumor, but in truth I find it exactly the opposite. I prefer the upper mids and highs from analogue gear. That's why my choice eqs are the lang peq-2, clariphonic, and helios 69. I find those handle high end much better than anything I've tried in the box. I think a number of digital eqs are fantastic for low mid sculpting.

One of the reasons I like my choice analog gear is actually because I can be lazy. I find software is very exacting overall, you really have to hit the precise settings to find sweet spots - whereas the analog gear that I like makes the signal sound better just running through it - and then gets better and better from there.

[Sampire]

so Story,

is your process a mix of ITB and out?

are you using any analogue modeled plugs or opting for the real thing instead?

[bgrotto]

Originally Posted by Sampire

so....to those who stand by the belief that digital will never be able to replicate closely enough to compare to analogue -- Do you believe you would be able to take this test and spot the impostor?

These tests miss the point. A digital setup will change your workflow; you can arrive at a great mix -- every bit as good as something done OTB -- but you'll have gotten there via a different path. Duplicating settings between analog gear and digital emulations and asking a listener to speculate which is which proves very little in terms of the real-world value of the emulation. At the end of the day, the only important question is, does it sound good or not.

Don't get me wrong; accuracy is nice. But really only for users who are accustomed to the hardware and instantiate a plugin with certain expectations. For the vast majority of users, it really doesn't matter if that channel strip plugin nails the SSL sound or not. As long as it sounds good and it works in the specific context, it's a useful tool. Ironically, some of the GUIs are actually counterintuitive when ported over to a screen for use with a mouse, but it's that very GUI that can convince people of the authenticity of their user experience. For example, the hardware API 550 interface is one of the most intuitive console EQ interfaces in my studio. But manipulating it onscreen with the Waves API emulations (which I feel sound great, by the way) is cumbersome and slow. Hell, come to think of it, this is true of most emulations; hardware is designed to be operated with both hands, which makes operation via point-n-click mousing onscreen a bit of a pain in the ass.

Creating plugins that sound great is a noble cause (relatively speaking, of course), whether it requires writing an innovative new algorithm or emulating a famed piece of analog gear. But dressing it up with fancy logos and a familiar GUI is largely a marketing tool. The only people who really benefit from all that visual effort are those already intimately familiar with the hardware being emulated, which, for the plugin market, is a very small percentage of users. Everyone else is being seduced by pretty pictures.

[JoRillo]

^^^

+1 Co Sign the shit out of that post. Even the API being slow to tweak.

[Thysta]

We're here agian. Analog has something that digital doesn't have. You guys can bring 123 videos talking the opposite or get caught up in bits and kHz and voltages it will still.

If you can't hear what a good analog gear does to the sound you should improve your hearing or consider dropping this craft.

anyway, trying to test it is like trying to test whether Victoria Beckham is more sexy or Roselyn Sanchez. To me there's no competition but how can I prove that? :-)

[JoRillo]

Originally Posted by Thysta

We're here agian. Analog has something that digital doesn't have. You guys can bring 123 videos talking the opposite or get caught up in bits and kHz and voltages it will still.

If you can't hear what a good analog gear does to the sound you should improve your hearing or consider dropping this craft.

I don't think anyone has said digital sounds better this whole thread.

[Storyville]

Originally Posted by Sampire

so Story,

is your process a mix of ITB and out?

are you using any analogue modeled plugs or opting for the real thing instead?

I'm primarily ITB with a few pieces of hardware when I'm mixing from home - which is about 95% of the work I do at this point.

I'm sort of with Benny on this one. I'm not really concerned if the emulation is accurate or not. As long as it's going to do what I need it to do, that's all I really care about. I don't think I've ever chosen a digital emulation over the hardware unit though.

Anyway, I didn't see any kind of link to this test.