REAMPING

Danny1969

I split the signal from the guitar - one to amp and one straight into desk. Record both. To split you can use a splitter post buffered pedal, GT10 or whatever. Then straight out of PT audio interface into an amp in the live room. 

I also use this technique for soak testing guitar amps as I don't have time to endlessly play them in testing. By flying in a pre recorded guitar track into the amp and then recording back into the Daw I can not only test the amp for hours but if it goes wrong I can hear exactly what it sounded like when it went wrong and what exact time. Very useful in the repair game

Clarky

via the Redeye I notice a slight loss in level and top end on the dry tone

so in the DAW I boost the level until I see the levels displayed on the Axe that are the same as what my guitars generate

also, I push from 2kHz a little from the DAW

 

without the Redeye the highs are really harsh and the signal to noise ratio is very poor

Clarky

guitarfishbay said:

I appreciate your workflow with regards to feel, that's not the bit I was talking about though.  I re-read my post and realise it is confusing.

I was talking about the start of your signal chain.

Your post makes it look like you go

Guitar -> Hi Z Interface input -> to get the DI then Redeye -> Axe FX to monitor

When I thought generally people went:

Guitar -> Redeye -> Line in Interface to get DI, using the reamp out of the redeye to monitor with the Axe FX.

Both would work just wondering why you aren't using the Red Eye for DI?

ahhh.... I understand now...

I guess I could.. but I know that the Redeye will suck out some of the tone, so I guess it's better not to place it between the guitar and DAW.

and I know I'll have to compensate for it during the reamping stage

Clarky

Danny1969 said:

I split the signal from the guitar - one to amp and one straight into desk. Record both. To split you can use a splitter post buffered pedal, GT10 or whatever. Then straight out of PT audio interface into an amp in the live room. 

I also use this technique for soak testing guitar amps as I don't have time to endlessly play them in testing. By flying in a pre recorded guitar track into the amp and then recording back into the Daw I can not only test the amp for hours but if it goes wrong I can hear exactly what it sounded like when it went wrong and what exact time. Very useful in the repair game

haaa.... very clever...

PolarityMan

Clarky;64514" said:

so in the DAW I boost the level until I see the levels displayed on the Axe that are the same as what my guitars generate

See this is what I struggle with when using a real amp, I wonder if there is a market for a level meter in a box for doing stuff like this. Would have helped in my 4cm thread too.

Deijavoo

Quality. Cheers dudes.

Now all I need is a massive arsenal of amps of mass destruction! 

ecc83

"From the AI would you aim to simply get as hot as possible without clipping the output meter and then rely on selecting the right pot value in the reamp box?"

Why would you want to record "As hot as possible"? Just your regular, average neg 18 is fine.

The pot value is non-critical, 10k log is fine but a factor of 2 either way would not matter. 

The Red Eye is, ah. Interesting! (if I have the right gizzmo http://www.fire-eye.com/red-eye_data_sheet.htm) and looks quite handy but I don't see why the FX loop in and out impedances have been compromised? If you are going to make an active in line loop box, do it right?

Dave.

guitarfishbay

Dave, usually people mean the Little Labs product http://www.littlelabs.com/redeye.html

I wasn't aware of another product with the same name.

Cirrus

Clarky;64067" said:

the cool thing about reamping guitars is that you don't commit to the toneyou only essentially capture the performancehaving done that.. you can goof around with amps and cabs to your hearts content until you nail the tones you need..

This can be a pro or a con, depending on your method of working. When I record I want to commit as much and as early as possible. I wouldn't be able to cope with a sea of choices about guitar sounds when it came mix time! :-O But, whatever works! When I record guitar I want the guitar to sound great, when I mix the whole track I find that as long as the guitar sound is in the ballpark of "acceptable" I can work with it in the context of the big picture.

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ecc83;65056" said:

Why would you want to record "As hot as possible"? Just your regular, average neg 18 is fine.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is serious wisdom here. In digital, recording "as hot as possible" is of no benefit and it's basically the only possible way to fuck up the sound of the medium. You've got no background hiss to get above, and at 24 bit resolution you could record your peaks at -48db and still be at CD quality! each 6db represents a doubling of the resolution, so do the maths - there's no point recording hot to get better resolution. In fact, the hotter you record the harder you're pushing the (almost invariably) shitty op amps, Nyquist filters and analogue signal path (remember that a digital converter, in or out, is primaraly an ANALOGUE device), and the worse it sounds.

Excuse the random format changes, I don't know why it does that.

ecc83

Thank you Cirrus for your agreement. "Bending the VU meter needle" should be left back in the bad old tape days (even then it was not common practice you know? The BBC kept to very strict levels as did most studios recording classical and jazz. The advent of Dolby A was used by many tape men to reduce peak LEVELS by 3-4dB or so and just enjoy a 6dB noise improvement. The improvement in intermodulation distortion was deemed a worthy trade)

But I hope you will forgive me Mr C if I wax on a bit about digital bits and bobs? I am NO expert here! But I have read a great deal of arguments and articles in the last 8 trs that I have been dabbling in digital recording and have come to trust a few noted experts and their views...So.

Resolution: Not a word the top blokes use. There is no real analogue between photography, i.e. dots on paper and digital sound. Nor are the "staircase" or "slices" pictures really valid. The facts, as I understand them are these...

Going from 16 to 24 bits when recording JUST lowers the noise floor. It goes from a theoretical ~90dB to an impossible to realize 144dB, and yes, it is true that every  "bit" gains you 6dB but in NOISE reduction NOT "resolution" A 16 bit recording is just as "fine grained" as a 24 bit one.

Increasing the sampling rate simple increases the HF BANDWIDTH. Again, the signal is not sampled any "better". Unless you need to hear what bats are up to there is no point in exceeding 44.1kHz (48k for Vid) . Yes, there are certain technical processes that work better at higher sampling rates but it will not improve the basic sound quality one jot.

Flack jacket on. Kevlar helmet at the ready!

Dave.

ICBM

I've posted this before but it's well worth reading.

http://xiph.org/~xiphmont/demo/neil-young.html

(Don't be put off by Neil Young's name in the link! It's about why he's wrong about high-resolution digital audio. I love Neil Young's *music*, too .)

PolarityMan

Cirrus said:

Clarky;64067" said:

the cool thing about reamping guitars is that you don't commit to the toneyou only essentially capture the performancehaving done that.. you can goof around with amps and cabs to your hearts content until you nail the tones you need..

This can be a pro or a con, depending on your method of working. When I record I want to commit as much and as early as possible. I wouldn't be able to cope with a sea of choices about guitar sounds when it came mix time! :-O But, whatever works! When I record guitar I want the guitar to sound great, when I mix the whole track I find that as long as the guitar sound is in the ballpark of "acceptable" I can work with it in the context of the big picture.

----------------------------------------------------------
ecc83;65056" said:

Why would you want to record "As hot as possible"? Just your regular, average neg 18 is fine.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

This is serious wisdom here. In digital, recording "as hot as possible" is of no benefit and it's basically the only possible way to fuck up the sound of the medium. You've got no background hiss to get above, and at 24 bit resolution you could record your peaks at -48db and still be at CD quality! each 6db represents a doubling of the resolution, so do the maths - there's no point recording hot to get better resolution. In fact, the hotter you record the harder you're pushing the (almost invariably) shitty op amps, Nyquist filters and analogue signal path (remember that a digital converter, in or out, is primaraly an ANALOGUE device), and the worse it sounds.

Excuse the random format changes, I don't know why it does that.

Thing it's not the digital realm is it. I'm talking about how you get the output to the amp from the AI correct when you have no way if metering at the amp input which I'm assuming is just a regular valve amp (at least that's what I have access to)

Clarky

@Cirrus - I totally know what you mean about 'too much choice"

in the Axe-FX I have 100+ amps and a 100+ cabs

I don't really suffer with too much choice though..

I know exactly what I want to use and it's setup..

so... the benefits of reamping:

- punch-in / out

when you're punching in to fix that little "scuff" you played, you get a far nicer and more invisible transition

and even if it's a little noticeable on the dry track, most often [especially if your final tone has any amount of drive] it'll vanish during reamping...

- editing

if you need to go in and do some surgery [correcting a moment of bad timing or cleaning out some spurious noise / sound in an otherwise nice take], it's much easier with the dry track than it is with a track recorded via an amp. Especially if the tone is quite gainy [because palm muted notes with a gainy tone have a large 'bloom', and therefore less or no separation between one mute note and the next]

- I like to actually play with much gainier tones than I drop to tape [cos I like the feeling from the gain]

so my recorded tones are the same amp / cab combinations, but with the wick turned down a little

- imagine cutting the solo of your life.. and then thinking "jeez... I overdid it with the bass [on the amp itself]... if only...."

reamping captures the performance.. so you can if you wish re-record the solo through your amp with less bass without having to play that stellar solo again..

- session work: you send your many hours of guitar tracks off to the producer... he loves the parts but you sound 'a bit metal' for example.. or a little too clean 'can you play that exactly as it is but rock up the tone just a little?'

you don't have to spend hours re-recording..

you set up the 'tone he asked for' and it then takes the length of the song to re-record.. which is nice..

- tone creation: imagine you're creating this 'wall of metal' and you want to blend a few different amps / cabs

you don't have to play them all..

just record a single take, reamp different amp / cab combinations you think will work best and then try blending them to find out which combinations work best for your 'metal wall formula'

I actually did this for a funk tone [for the Civilians album], and oddly enough I loved a 70's Hiwatt and JCM800 [set clean] working together.. totally not what I expected..

Cirrus

ecc83;65398" said:

But I hope you will forgive me Mr C if I wax on a bit about digital bits and bobs?

Forgiven!

And you're quite right about the resolution thing. Sure there's more "vertical" sampling points when it's all ones and zeros but at the end of the day what comes out the D/A converter is an analogue signal that is continuous, curvy and has no "steps".

The argument for higher sampling rates makes more sense on cheap converters - if you raise the sample rate, you can ease off the low pass filter that stops frequencies above half the sample rate making it to the convertor (which would cause artifacts in the digital). The gentler the slope and the higher it can start, the less it affects frequencies in the audible frequency band with phase shift/ resonance etc that screws up the high end. I find that to hold true on my MOTU 828 mk2, but any time we've been in a well kitted out studio 44.1 has sounded exactly the same to me as anything else.

Heartfeltdawn

Cirrus said:

ecc83;65398" said:

But I hope you will forgive me Mr C if I wax on a bit about digital bits and bobs?

Forgiven!

And you're quite right about the resolution thing. Sure there's more "vertical" sampling points when it's all ones and zeros but at the end of the day what comes out the D/A converter is an analogue signal that is continuous, curvy and has no "steps".

The argument for higher sampling rates makes more sense on cheap converters - if you raise the sample rate, you can ease off the low pass filter that stops frequencies above half the sample rate making it to the convertor (which would cause artifacts in the digital). The gentler the slope and the higher it can start, the less it affects frequencies in the audible frequency band with phase shift/ resonance etc that screws up the high end. I find that to hold true on my MOTU 828 mk2, but any time we've been in a well kitted out studio 44.1 has sounded exactly the same to me as anything else.

If you're working in the box, plug-ins do sound better at 88.2 kHz to my ears. That's really only been the case since I upgraded to an external DAC though. Prior to that, running the soundcard at 44.1 didn't sound any different to 88.2kHz. Now I've got the DAC, there is a difference in my opinion.  

Clarky

I only ever work at 44.1KHz / 24-bit

it seems ok to me..

Danny1969

48K here, pretty much the industry standard  although the converters can do 192Khz if desired. 

Maxi

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

ecc83

guitarfishbay said:

Dave, usually people mean the Little Labs product http://www.littlelabs.com/redeye.html

I wasn't aware of another product with the same name.

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

guitarfishbay

ecc83 said:

guitarfishbay said:

Dave, usually people mean the Little Labs product http://www.littlelabs.com/redeye.html

I wasn't aware of another product with the same name.

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

Maxi said:

Ive done a little re-amping mainly with bass but I never used a special impedance matching re-amping box or anything TBH I dont really understand the impedance issue but I think I got better results by choosing the amp tone after capturing the performance , I think it just felt clearer when I had a mug of tea in one hand and said pre-recorded track playing its self in mix as apposed to a guitar slung over my shoulder .

Worth remembering to choose pickup tone carefully Some basses have quite a lot on board before capturing performance since no amount of re-amping will fix that .

I know it isn't your fault Dave, the quotes don't always work here but that is the funniest quote error I've seen so far.  Hopefully the quotes bug will get fixed soon.