A few people I know on Twitch tell me that Manic compression is the best compressor in VCV but I’m too ignorant to really use it (let alone Megalomaniac Compression) what could I read that would help me grasp it?
The manic compressor has the same basic controls as most other compressors, so any YouTube video about compression would help get you started.
What differentiates MC is really the cv control over everything and some of the filter stuff (which is explained in the documentation)
There are also videos about what multi-band compression can do and that’s all the megalomaniac compressor is - just think of it as up to 5 regular manic compressors that can be applied to specific frequency ranges
Above all, just play with them and I’m always happy to answer any questions
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Many ways to spread. Generally there is
- mono to stereo spatialization
- stereo exageration
- room simulation
Mono to stereo often relies on spreading different frequency bands accross the stereo field.
Sometimes this leads to phase shifts. E.g. because the filters used to create the bands create phase shifts (not linear phase). Or…phase shifting is used on purpose to create spatial effect (e.g. Haas- effect, actually a very short delay between left and right channel). This may lead to phase cancelation when summing/mixing back to mono. E.g. on single speaker systems (phone, portable speaker) or other mono speaker systems (e.g. some large PA configs).
A more complex way to meddle with phase are allpass filters. They will mess up the phase in parts of the spectrum. The phase shifts are interpreted as sound reaching you ear earlier or later, creating the illusion of space. This is also why many Reberb implementations do not only include delays (just simpel repetition of the exact same sound) but also allpass filters (e.g. Schroeder).
And filters are also used to simulate energy absorbtion by the room and the various reflective services and by the air the sounds travels through. The longer sounds travel, the more energy gets absorbed, where higher frequencies lose energy faster then lower ones so often lowpassfilters are used for this.
Stereo exageration can be achieved by e.g. M/S processing and/or compression/expansion. But since Mono has no sidebands, M/S processing in itself is not very usefull.
Splitting Mono into L/R and use different compressor ratio/timings will of course also create differences between L/R. And will result in the illusion of space.
Loads more to this…but the words above are already pretty plentyfull.
If you have Host, try the free Izotope Ozone Imager plugin. Seems to add a lot of width.