Need a little bit of guidance with Superior 2.0

JoeJackson

JoeJackson

Member
Oct 9, 2007
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Germany
Hey guys.

Three days ago I got my copy of Superior 2 and I fear that I'm not worth having it :D

I admit ... part of me thought that with buying S2.0 my drum-sounds will become instantly awesome. Pure Ignorance :D

I feel like I could need some guidance here. I want to have the preset mixed in S2's interface - at least as much as possible, to save system-performance.

I have a hard time struggeling with the balance of room and overhead-sounds.

Here is a drum-only clip (I posted a clip with guitars and bass in another thread).
http://soundclick.com/share?songid=6752350

And here is the preset-file (if anyone is interested or want's to see, where my flaws are.
http://oneononehc.de/randomshizzle/Empathy.s20

Hope to see the usual suspects here ;)
Cheers
 
I don't own SD 2 and i don't know what kind of sound you're aiming for but I'd say the following :

-snare has too much bottom mic or something.
-kick drum needs more "click" to it.
-a bot too much room sound IMO. A question : is the room sound getting the cymbals/hi-hat/ride sounds also or only kick drum/snare/toms ?
 
Djabthrash said:
I don't own SD 2 and i don't know what kind of sound you're aiming for but I'd say the following :

-snare has too much bottom mic or something.
-kick drum needs more "click" to it.
-a bot too much room sound IMO. A question : is the room sound getting the cymbals/hi-hat/ride sounds also or only kick drum/snare/toms ?
Click to expand...

Hey Dude, sorry ... been on tour for a week.

I'll check the snare, but the bottom-mic should be pretty low in the mix. But you're right, there is something nasty on the snare I can't get out.

Actually I don't like uber-clicky kicks - but a bit more would be okay ;)

The room-sound is pretty high in the mix, you're right. The close room-mics capture only cymbals/hats, so do the mid room-mics. The far capture only snare, kick and toms.

A week ago I was nearly pleased by my Superior 2-sound. Getting back home and listening to it again it nearly makes me vomit :D

I'm going for a relatively natural drum-sound, but with cutting-through snare-attack and a bit more than just-enough room. I was really impressed by the drum-sound on the last throwdown-record http://www.myspace.com/throwdown
 
Man..... sorry to use your thread....but there's no individual keys for right and left hands in S2.0?????
 
If you want a fairly natural snare like in Throwdown, perhaps try using an Overhead sample as your main one, and then gating/compressing so its nice and tight. Then back it up with whatever room sounds or close-mic sounds you need to make it beefier? I've had good results doing this with toms, and I can't see why it wouldn't work on a snare.

I dont think the drums sound AWFUL..but I'm listening on laptop speakers atm, pretty much have nothing below about 600Hz.. ;p
 
Dom Ostarig said:
Man..... sorry to use your thread....but there's no individual keys for right and left hands in S2.0?????
Click to expand...

Nope, don't think so ...

Morgoe said:
If you want a fairly natural snare like in Throwdown, perhaps try using an Overhead sample as your main one, and then gating/compressing so its nice and tight. Then back it up with whatever room sounds or close-mic sounds you need to make it beefier? I've had good results doing this with toms, and I can't see why it wouldn't work on a snare.

I dont think the drums sound AWFUL..but I'm listening on laptop speakers atm, pretty much have nothing below about 600Hz.. ;p
Click to expand...

That's what I want to try next. Well, at least something similar.

I'll try to use the room-sounds as my main-source and then I try to bring everything else up to "beef up".

Here's what I came up with so far. Pretty standard approach - definitly usable - full mix of some random riffs:

soundclick link
 
Listened to your new one but its a bit hard to compare with one with guitars and one without.

One thing I've noticed in both (listening in headphones now) is that you seem to have a reverb on that mainly high freqs? And its way too high up in the mix. Mostly audible on the snare but on the toms. Sounds like crap XD Either that or you've EQd the topend of the room sounds too dramatically, but it sounds more like a reverb to me :)28 in the new one - if thats not a reverb shoot me).

Snare has too much bottom mic (snares) imo. I also think it doesnt have enough attack. The 'wierdness' may be a clipping of the low-end? Check that out..only very slightly, at the end of the new clip when guitars cut out. In the first clip, theres a little crescendo. The snare drum starts to get some REALLY nice attack at the very end of that, but that goes away for the majority of the clip. Try raisin the velocity.
Kick is too 'sticky' I dont know how else to describe it, for my tastes, but if you like stick with it. At the end of the new clip - really 'sticky' (not a wooden drum 'stick' but like a sticky substance thats being thrown at something XD)
Toms are alright..always hard to judge because they're so quick and sparse in beats. First tom seemed to have the same 'stickiness' of the kick. Rest were alright but I dunno, lacking something. Listening in the first clip theres a bit with just them. The reverb is KILLING them and they sound very thin with the amount of samples you have available (OH, Close-mics and 3 room mics, is that right?).
Cymbals sound good, ride sounds a bit programmed/sampled (Just today I experimented with using a gate with a threshold of about -3db and a reduction of about the same, because my MIDI drums are automatically exported with a slightly varied velocity, but still sounded programmed, doing this sort of accentuated the velocity differences and made it sound VERY real).
And uh, yer..
You said you'd try using a room sample for the main drums - personally I'd go more with the overheads just because there is less room sound and more drum sound, and the overheads would sound more like if you were standing right next to or sitting down at a drum kit. Also the overheads are going to have more attack.
 
Haha, yeah, I got a bit "overboard" with the reverb. Just like - "I can't hear the reverb" - up - "I CAN'T HEAR THE REVERB" - up ... common mistake, huh? Gotta turn 'em down.
Thanks for pointing that out - that's really too much - and I haven't even noticed it.

About the Kick:
I know what you mean with it beeing sticky. Hard to find words for it ;)
Yeah, I was actually totally going for that sound - and I'm pretty satisfied with the kick-sound (compared to the mentioned throwdown-sound - also "sticky).

Snare:
I'll lower the bottom-mic. I actually brought it up more because I thought, it sounds more natural - but I'll recheck it.
I still have some trouble with velocities. I mean, I can't turn every single hit up to 127 - that would be everything but natural. Or ... I can't bring myself turning every hit to 127. I have my snare-hits between 115 and 125 with single hits up to full 127.
But I can't hear any clipping of the low-end of the snare o_0

And ... no, I only use the close room-mic at the moment (simple installation method)

I'll fiddle around with it this evening or tomorrow and will post the outcome so you can rip it apart again ;)
No, seriosly, thanks for your reply - helped me a lot.
 
Djabthrash said:
Guitar sound i great.

I hear something weird though. I don't know if it's on the whole mix, or just drums or guitars or bass.

Snare sounds reminds me of some Nordstrom stuff. Not too bad IMO.
Click to expand...

Thanks, bro!
The weird stuff you hear could be a strange noise on the guitars - I have no clue, where it comes from and because it's just a test I haven't checked further, yet. It sounds like a weird radio-noise...


Machinated said:
I haven't had a chance to listen to your clip yet, but I have learned with the kicks that boosting the mids a bit can really help them cut through - dont be afraid to try it. try anywhere from 500Hz to 800Hz.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the tipp. Actually the kick cuts pretty good, an additional bit would be nice, though.

OzNimbus said:
There's a big issue right there. Re-install so you get your medium & far mics.... then blend all 3 at a conservative level with the close mics. The magic of Superior 2.0 is in those room mics.
Click to expand...

I know I know ... at the moment I have to stick with the small installation because of my tiny tiny macbook-harddisk. As soon as I moved to my new place I can install my external harddisk again and can use the full set.

How do you balance the 5 room-mics? At the moment I don't have a clue how to handle the bullet-mic.
 
Damn, why do I always end up hating snare-drums? :D
I'm clueless what I can do, to get the character "back". It's definitly there but gets buried under everything else.

Guitars are nothing really special ... its just two tracks of Revalver II. Both a bit tweaked Kitties - one side with the Engl-Impulse posted here a while ago. The other "Amp" goes into the Harley Benton-impulses (Fredman-style)
 
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