and I do love putting my hands on those big black knobs.but who cares? Just once, I want a great compressor that nobody else can have." Yah, it adds a shimmering excitement to multi buss compression by not getting in the way of the internal dynamics I've created. I'm willing to suffer the consequence of being the only one to own that anchor. "Nobody buy the Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor! Please return yours now. No one piece of gear is ever good for every project, but the Shadow Hills has, in two months use, become an essential part of my mastering set-up, affording me a perfect solution to many of the problems we encounter in the post recording studio era." Of course, the ultra-large knobs are the wow factor which all visitors to the studio have immediately remarked about. The ergonomics for the Shadow Hills are the best I ever encountered in a mastering compressor by a wide margin. The choice of iron/nickel/steel for the compressor is an ultra fine-tuning control which is the most fun part of working with the unit, as it affords a surprise in the special enhancement it provides and keeps the user from “settling” on a setting which is almost, but not quite, right. By linking the opto and discreet compressors, it is possible to nearly re-balance a mix by making the ambient elements and musical hooks move forward in a subtle and non-hyped way. It has a completely natural, smooth sound, which perfectly compliments mixes which have been done primarily in the box by smoothing many of the harsh overtones. "The Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor is a very versatile and unique sounding unit, capable of transforming a quite ordinary sounding mix into something warmer, richer and more musically glued together. The Magic eye tube follows the output meter to act as a peak meter.Īll 17 of the rotary switches are detented. The metering can reflect, optical gain reduction, discrete gain reduction, or output level. So besides being a mastering grade, and highly functional buss compressor, it serves as an excellent tracking compressor.įor instance, you might call up the chain of the optical compressor, then to the Class-A output and Iron transformer, for vocals, or select just the Class-A VCA compressor with a 10:1 plus the Steel transformer for crushing some room mics, and on and on. There is also a hardwire bypass for the entire compressor, effectively a strait wire in and out of the box. It is possible to independently bypass both compression sections and have your signal go through the input transformer and transformer selector only. The optical section has a hard-wired bypass that completely removes it from the signal path, and the Class-A VCA compressor is also hardwire bypassable, completely removing it from the chain. These selections allow you to choose between different output transformers that are in effect: clean, colored, and dirty, respectively. In this mode the signal goes through our op-amp and into a Class-A output stage then to our custom Iron transformers, the last transformer position is Steel. The first position is Nickel, which is our custom version of a famous L. Lastly the signal goes through our new Shadow Hills custom transformer-switching network. There is an insertable filter in the side chain to limit pumping with bass heavy material. And there are six release times selectable. There are six ratios: 1.2 to 1, 2 to 1, 3 to 1, 4 to 1, 6 to 1, and 10 to 1. There are no electrolytic caps or IC chips in the audio path. The second stage is our discrete Class-A VCA compressor. This section utilizes the same T4B optical attenuator as the LA2A and LA3A, but is optimized for mastering. The input stage is transformer balanced, followed by our fully discrete optical compressor. There is enough gain in each section to overdrive the hottest tape, or clip your converters, if you're into that sort of thing. Both feed our switchable custom output transformers, Nickel, Iron, and Steel. First comes our mastering grade electro optical compressor, followed by our discrete Class-A compressor/limiter. Essentially it is two compressors in series, per channel, that can act in stereo, or dual mono. The Shadow Hills Mastering Compressor has extraordinary functionality, and also provides mastering grade compression and limiting for tracking and mixing.
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