On Mon, Mar 03, 2003 at 05:22:06 +1100, Allan Klinbail wrote: > The reason for using a sidechain (in the hardware world) as opposed to > plugging everything inline.. is simplification of patching and > minimising the number of cables being used. > > In software there would be no reason other than aestethics to include a > sidechain as it is possible to plug modules into each other in series > without getting ground noise from excessive amounts of cabling. So Steve > you are correct it isn't really useful. Actually, this isn't quite correct. There are times when you want to process the amplitude of one signal (eg a bassline) with the dynamics of another (eg. a drum beat). Its pretty cheesy, but I dont think preventing things on aritstic metrit is a good precident ;) > > For example the distinction between the control output of an envelope > > follower and the gain reduction output of a compressor, the follower is > > inteded to drive eg. a filters cutoff, wheres the gain reduction is just > > inteded to be viewed by the user as a clue as to what is going on. > > Correct about control output. However gain reduction on a compressor > actually controls the output level or gain from the unit, it is not > simply for "the user as a clue as to what is going on".. Often when I was refering to gain reduction meters, which are simply a way of giving the user a clue (warning) what is going on, hence the distinction between that and an signal output. > compressing the resultant output may be larger than desired... When > compressing a signal, input level is often boosted to get more of an > effect from the compressor (usually this is controlled with the input > gain on the desk) which is why the output level would often be very > high.. gain reduction is a way of counteracting this. I think you mean makeup gain here. Its genreally used to boos t the signal level given a particularly heavy compression, but hypothetically you could use it to reduce too. - Steve
