One of the nice things about Live is powerful and simple to configure remote control. Manipulating Live’s interface using MIDI controllers or the computer keyboard is incredibly simple once you get started. However, you occasionally run into things that aren’t possible, or you want to automate a remote control action for live performance. For example, […]
THE BEST THING EVER
Yeah, that’s right. I velcroed a NanoKontrol to my macally keyboard. Read it and weep, people. Go ahead and cry like a little girl. Let it all out. For me, this really is a big deal because I’m constantly working on improving the ergonomics of my workspace. And, in particular it addresses an issue that […]
THE MID-SIDE RACK
If you really want to get busy with Mid-Side processing, your best bet is to build a Rack. All you need is an Audio Effect Rack with two chains: Drop a Utility device into both chains. Set the Width of the one in the Mid chain to 0% ….and the Sides chain to 200%. Now, […]
MID-SIDE WITH UTILITY
Another way to get some Mid-Side processing into your life is with Live’s Utility device. Have a look at theWidth control: When Width is set to 0%, Utility will eliminate the sides of a stereo signal and pass through only the mono information. At 200%, the middle is discarded and only the purely stereo information […]
MID-SIDE EQ
One very cool thing about Live’s EQ is it’s Mid-Side mode: This allows you to apply different EQ settings to the middle and the sides of a stereo signal. If you’re not familiar with Mid-Side, the concept is pretty simple. The Mid is the mono information in a signal – the stuff that’s identical in the […]
SUBTRACTIVE EQ
There’s a common rule about using EQ in mixing: cut instead of boost. Like many rules, there are about a million exceptions. This one isn’t even really a rule. For me, it’s more of a workflow: first improve the sound of the mix by removing frequencies that sound bad or aren’t necessary, then boost to […]
LOOKING AHEAD
While we’on on compression, have you ever wondered what the Lookahead menu is all about? This value specifies how large of a buffer Compressor uses. A larger value means that the device has longer to analyze the incoming signal, which means that the attack can be more accurate. The nature of analog compressors is to […]
BEWARE THE MAKEUP!
Unless you’re already a master of compression, beware of the Makeup switch. What it does is automatically apply “makeup gain” to the signal. As the Threshold and Ratio are adjusted, the compressor determines how much gain reduction it is applying and then raises the output signal up by that amount. This may seem totally counter-intuitive, […]
GET THE GAIN RIGHT (ALL THE TIME!)
Whenever you’re processing a signal in a way that changes it’s gain (whether you’re doing it with EQ, compression, distortion, etc.) the only way to really hear what the processor is doing is to match the volumes of the processed and unprocessed signals. The reason for this is a principle well known to any experienced […]
EQ: CHECK THE GAIN
A simple but useful feature of Live’s EQ 8 is the Gain control: It’s just a simple volume control, but it comes in handy for A/B-ing your EQ setups. If you’re making an EQ adjustment that raises or lowers the volume of a signal noticeably, you can cut or boost the gain a return the […]
