Acoustic Drums WIP

Need some fresh sounds? Want to show off your sound design skills? Here's the place!
Post Reply
User avatar
totjoss
Posts: 7
Joined: 23 Nov 2020

11 Apr 2021

Hi everyone,

I'm currently working on a personal combinator of acoustic drums, and I'd be interested in having your thoughts about it.
N.B.: This demo doesn't have compression applied.



I wonder what kind of compression I should use, and how I should spread the instruments in stereo.
Music composer / Modern Classical, using Reason essentially
https://soundcloud.com/thomasjosseau

User avatar
selig
RE Developer
Posts: 11685
Joined: 15 Jan 2015
Location: The NorthWoods, CT, USA

11 Apr 2021

That sounds pretty good to me! As for compression, what exactly are you trying to achieve? Compression can be used to add attack, add sustain, duck one sound when another plays, control dynamics, make it louder, etc, and this can be applied to individual drums or the entire kit (or both), among other things! 🤓
Selig Audio, LLC

User avatar
totjoss
Posts: 7
Joined: 23 Nov 2020

11 Apr 2021

Well first I'd like to make them louder. A bit punchier too but especially louder and natural without being too much compressed/flat.
Music composer / Modern Classical, using Reason essentially
https://soundcloud.com/thomasjosseau

User avatar
selig
RE Developer
Posts: 11685
Joined: 15 Jan 2015
Location: The NorthWoods, CT, USA

11 Apr 2021

totjoss wrote:
11 Apr 2021
Well first I'd like to make them louder. A bit punchier too but especially louder and natural without being too much compressed/flat.
I'd start with compression at the individual level, on kick/snare/toms/overheads etc. A little can go a long way, especially since I'd also add bus compression across the entire kit. Subtle saturation can also go a long way to adding punch and loudness to drums without adding too much color (or WITH adding tons of color - your choice).

I'm a long time SSL user, and a long time fan of the simple channel compression approach on both individual and bus drums. I basically start with the default settings on each drum, increase ratio to max and release to min, and lower threshold until one LED flashes (which equals around 3 dB gain reduction). In the default setting you are compressing with RMS (average) detection, which basically means a slower attack/release and thus the attack is allowed to pass. This has the end result of making the drums sound punchier, but be aware that the "auto makeup gain" is a bit heavy so you also add overall level (which makes you think things are better than they are because "louder = better" to our ears). So you may have to pull levels back in an insert or on the drum bus input to keep levels consistent.

There are many other classic and modern approaches to drums/dynamics, such as using a parallel drum bus for heavy limiting/saturation and blending a bit of this with the main bus, using classic compressors such as an 1176 on drums, and modern approaches using multi-band compression and/or upwards compression. All are valid, I find a bit of compression/saturation at multiple stages is better at keeping things fairly natural (but still aggressive) sounding as opposed to crushing the sound at one stage (which is good for "obvious" effects such as industrial drums etc.).

Explore your options and find which approach(s) best produces the sound YOU are looking for!
Selig Audio, LLC

User avatar
Ottostrom
Posts: 845
Joined: 13 May 2016

11 Apr 2021

totjoss wrote:
11 Apr 2021
Hi everyone,

I'm currently working on a personal combinator of acoustic drums, and I'd be interested in having your thoughts about it.
N.B.: This demo doesn't have compression applied.



I wonder what kind of compression I should use, and how I should spread the instruments in stereo.
Dude, these drums sound really nice!
I love the room-feel in the recording and can imagine how good they would sound with some serious processing :)
You thinking about selling these?

Seligs compression tips seemed very reasonable so I would use that as a staring point. Personally I think a combination of normal compression and upwards compression could be good on these.

User avatar
Rising Night Wave
Posts: 1217
Joined: 03 Sep 2019
Location: Vransko, Slovenia
Contact:

11 Apr 2021

totjoss wrote:
11 Apr 2021
Hi everyone,

I'm currently working on a personal combinator of acoustic drums, and I'd be interested in having your thoughts about it.
N.B.: This demo doesn't have compression applied.



I wonder what kind of compression I should use, and how I should spread the instruments in stereo.
now this is some serious shit! damn. i love it. so realistic.
Rising Night Wave & Extus at SoundCloud
HW: Asus ROG Strix G513QM | Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 3rd Gen | M-Audio M3-8 | M-Audio Uber Mic | Shure SRH1840 | Shure SE215 | LG 49UK6400
SW: Windows 11 Pro | Reason 10 | Reason+

User avatar
totjoss
Posts: 7
Joined: 23 Nov 2020

11 Apr 2021

selig wrote:
11 Apr 2021
I'd start with compression at the individual level, on kick/snare/toms/overheads etc.
[...]
Explore your options and find which approach(s) best produces the sound YOU are looking for!
Thanks for the advices ! I'll see what I can do with each instrument. Oh and by the way, I do have the Softube FET Compressor and Kratos 2 Maximizer. I was thinking of using the MClass compressor for individuals, and the FET for the whole.
Ottostrom wrote:
11 Apr 2021
Dude, these drums sound really nice!
I love the room-feel in the recording and can imagine how good they would sound with some serious processing :)
You thinking about selling these?

Seligs compression tips seemed very reasonable so I would use that as a staring point. Personally I think a combination of normal compression and upwards compression could be good on these.
Rising Night Wave wrote:
11 Apr 2021
now this is some serious shit! damn. i love it. so realistic.
Thank you very much !
I couldn't sell these, because all the samples come from the good old ReFills from Sonic Reality "SR Reality Drums". ;) Which, in my opinion, sound better than the Reason Drum Kits.
The trick is to use multiple instruments to make one. The snare for example is composed of 5 NN-XTs from different snares, each tweaked to keep only what matters from it, and some random levels to avoid sounding too repetitive.
And for the room, at first I didn't know how to do it, then while trying the Reason Drum Kits I understood it was basically just a reverb.
Music composer / Modern Classical, using Reason essentially
https://soundcloud.com/thomasjosseau

User avatar
Ottostrom
Posts: 845
Joined: 13 May 2016

12 Apr 2021

totjoss wrote:
11 Apr 2021
Thank you very much !
I couldn't sell these, because all the samples come from the good old ReFills from Sonic Reality "SR Reality Drums". ;) Which, in my opinion, sound better than the Reason Drum Kits.
The trick is to use multiple instruments to make one. The snare for example is composed of 5 NN-XTs from different snares, each tweaked to keep only what matters from it, and some random levels to avoid sounding too repetitive.
And for the room, at first I didn't know how to do it, then while trying the Reason Drum Kits I understood it was basically just a reverb.
Ah okay understandable!
I think I might even have that Refill laying around somewhere but never really used it. Will have to go check out the samples :)
I've always been pretty lazy when it comes to layering drum sounds but clearly that is the way to go.

Post Reply
  • Information
  • Who is online

    Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 8 guests