Creative Sound Lab: Creme on Mix Bus and Overheads
- 31.12.2017
- Tobias Schacht
- Creme
- Testbericht
Videos from August and September 2017 (10:41 and 10:49 min).
Ryan Earnhardt of the Creative Soundlab makes videos, which are mainly aimed at young, up-and-coming producers. He himself embodies this type perfectly. Just a good guy, who made two decent videos for the Creme.Here is Video 1:
Here is video 2:
What Happens in the Videos
Video 1 – Stereo Bus Compression: Ryan Earnhardt shows how he patches the Creme into his chain and mixes a whole mix "into" the compressor – a technique he learned from Mixerman. Everything is summed in the box in Logic, goes out to the Creme and comes back on a monitor track, so he hears the compressor and the converter while mixing and bases his decisions on that. His settings: attack 30 ms, release 0.1 s, ratio 1.5:1, 2–3 dB of gain reduction. He finds ratios 1.5 and 2 great for stereo mixes, 4 and 10 too aggressive. At the end the mix is recorded straight through the Creme onto a track – that file is the final mix, no further export needed.
Video 2 – Compressing Drum Overheads: On the overhead pair he explains his approach: judge the snare through the attack, the cymbal wash through the release. He first drives the Creme hard on purpose (4:1, about 6 dB), then goes back to 2:1 and a 0.8 s release and finally switches the EQ ahead of the compressor. His advice: no more than about 4 dB, listen at a lower volume, always decide with your ears.
What Ryan Earnhardt Says About the Creme
"My settings here, slow attack at 30, fast release at 0.1, ratio at 1.5, looking to go about 2 to 3 dB of reduction there." – Ryan Earnhardt (Creative Sound Lab), video 1, September 2017
"You really don't have to move the needle that much to get a sense of strength and kind of some glue going on in the mix." – Ryan Earnhardt (Creative Sound Lab), video 1, September 2017
"Usually for this Creme, I like these settings as is. They're kind of a standard for me." – Ryan Earnhardt (Creative Sound Lab), video 1, September 2017
"This Creme compressor in particular has a very distinct sound for each one of these ratios here." – Ryan Earnhardt (Creative Sound Lab), video 2, August 2017
What the Creme Is – and Why It Sits on the Mix Bus
The Creme is our bus compressor and mastering equalizer: a passive Pultec-style EQ and an SSL-style VCA bus compressor in one 2U unit. The order is switchable – EQ before the compressor or compressor before the EQ. On the mix bus the compressor pulls the separate parts into one whole, almost inaudibly at a 1.5:1 ratio, with a rhythmic signature of its own at higher ratios and faster timing; a side-chain filter keeps frequencies below 60 or 120 Hz out of the control circuit. The EQ offers a bass boost between 20 and 200 Hz and a high boost between 10 and 24 kHz, each 0–5 dB, every value on a rotary switch – which is why every setting is exactly reproducible. If you want plug-in recall, the Creme RC with motorized pots has it: Amazona.de reviews our Creme RC.
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Related: Creme + SM57: Acoustic Guitar Setup (Video) · Rick Beato: Recording Drums with the Creme · Greg Wurth: The Creme on the Stereo Bus
