A little disappointment about the profiling results

  • Hi all!
    After watching every single video on YouTube, i finally decided to have my own profiles. I went to the studio owned by a friend of mine and profiled 4 different amps. Then today, i DI profiled my JVM 410 C's 2nd channel and orange mode. Well i'm kinda disappointed on the difference between the reference amp and the profiled amp sounds. I'm not a professional musician nor a mixing guy in a studio. Just an ordinary bedroom player. So my ears are not that much "educated". If i can easily hear the difference, then it means the profiles are far away from being identical with the original amp sound. On every profiling session videos i watched, i could not hear any difference between the two sounds. Is it because of the compressed youtube sound? Or am i doing something wrong when profiling? Well the DI profile of the JVM still sounds good with one of Till's cabs added. But it's the %80 same sound. If some users who are more advanced in profiling can respond, i'll be glad. Thanks.

  • Hey Stratosurfer,


    did none of the profiles sound good?
    Did you A/B compare them when you were in studio, through studio monitors from the mixing room? This is the only comparison which makes sense.


    Also, check whether the amps you profiled appear in the list of "unprofilable" amps. Feel free to d/l the pdf from my sig.


    Let us know :)

  • Ok sorry i should've given more details.


    The amps i profiled in the studio were a Fender Deluxe, an old Fender Super Twin, A Jet City and a Carvin Legacy. The amp i DI'd at home is a JVM 410C.
    I A/B'd them through a good pair of big Yamaha studio monitors (sorry i don't know the exact model). Especially for the dirty profiles, the difference was to easily noticed between the real amp and the profile. The first profile was the Super Twin clean sound which totally satisfied all of us. But as the sound gets dirtier, the difference is too clear. We used an SM 57 for all profiles (on axis). I can not say that we mic'd like they do for the commercial profiles. But i think even if we use the worst mic in the world, the profiled sound should copy the sound of the reference amp mic'd with that mic right? Of course the better skills you have in miking, the better sounds you have. But what i'm talking about is not having a good sound. It's about having the identical sound. Good or bad.


    There is a difference in eq mostly. But in the DI process, the profile had like less definition compared to the reference amp. And less highs and lows. I even saved it and dialed the definition and eq to match the reference amp. But couldn't succeed. I must point out again that the profile itself sounded good enough for my ears. But it was not identical with the reference amp. I play chords in different positions to give a full range of tones to the Kemper for like 40 secs. In most attempts, i refined like two or three times.


    I was very excited to do that blind test like the Anderton's guys have done. But the sounds differed too much that anyone could tell which is which :(


    What are your experiences? Am i the only one to hear a difference or am i doing something wrong?

  • @ Ingolf; it was quiet weird that on one of my attempts to profile the JVM, the refining took the sound away from the original. The unrefined version was closer. The refining process did not do magic tricks for me.


    @ sheguitarplayer; i used a Behringer GDI 21 to di the profile. Guitar input -> Kemper, Kemper send -> Amp input, power amp out -> DI in, DI balanced output -> Kemper return (XLR), DI 4" out -> amp's cab.


    By the way i started di profiling starting from a different profile in the Kemper. When it's done, i saved it. I then re profiled starting from the last profiled sound. This time, the result was way better. But still not %100 satisfied. I thought making a profile, saving it and reprofiling it from that profile gets a better result. But it means profiling twice for every different sound. I wonder how pros like And44 and sounside do this profiling thing.


  • I was very excited to do that blind test like the Anderton's guys have done. But the sounds differed too much that anyone could tell which is which :(

    The Anderton Profiles, Amp Factory and Armin Profiles were all done with mic's.
    The Kemper was designed to make Profiles using a microphone, not DI....DI Profiles take practise and technique.


    Was the amp isolated in the studio, in a separate room, and you were listening/comparing through studio monitors in the control room?

  • Guitartone; in the studio, we used an SM 57. The amp was isolated in another room. We were in the control room. We only had the sound of the real amp coming from the studio speakers. The reference sound was fatter. But i think that gap between the two could be filled by doing some eq adjustments. (I'm not sure, i only guess) The di profile needed sone more definition compared to the reference.


    I must say that it's not only having a good sound. It's having the identical sound. If you reach having the identical copy, the better sound you get from the real amp, the better sounding profile you will have and vice versa.


    Now i feel like even if i had the amp in a million dollar studio room and have the best mikes and the best engineer, the profiled sound will be different than the original.


    I hope someone can get me out of this and show me the way. The power head is incredible when it's connected to a 4X12 or to FOH. It just sounds like a real tube amp. Even the most picky guitarist won't tell it's a digital amp. I just want it to do the same magic on profiling since it's a profiler. :/

  • Hi.


    On every profiling session videos i watched, i could not hear any difference between the two sounds.


    right, the profiling process has been proven to create an exact copy of a miced tube amp countless times in countless studios - for more than two years now. :)


    Or am i doing something wrong when profiling?


    Simply start with a miced tube amp in an isolated recording room and monitor only the signal the mic picks up.


    Get your levels right(!), profile the amp, refine the profile and compare.


    I do this pretty much every day in my studio, absolutely no complaints :)


    Can't say from your description what went wrong, a difference in volume between the reference amp and the Profiler seems most likely.
    As always, we need recordings. :)


    the reference amp versus the refined profile, if possible re-amped.


    thanks.


    p.s.
    as stated in the documentation, the signal chain should look like this:


    guitar -> Profiler input -> Profiler send -> reference amp -> mic -> Profiler return -> Profiler main outs -> mixer/monitors


    did you have this setup?

  • The levels were ok but i did not do any fine tunings in terms of leveling two sounds. But they sounded close or the same level.
    Well it's not my own studio but if i will have a solution, i will want another favor from the owner of the studio and record the A/B'ing process. Will send a .wav file.


    A couple of questions before the second profiling session;
    if i will profile a Carvin Legacy dirty channel, should i chose a similar profile in Kemper's browser mode and go to profiler mode? How does the chosen profile in the browser mode affect the profile?
    How long should the refining be? In the manual, it says 20 secs is enough. But i've read some people's threads like 7 mins or so.
    Should i only play some chords or should i play solo notes on the high registers?

  • Hi Stratosurfer.


    No need to look for a similar profile, but I would choose one without stomps or effects, or disable them.


    I refine for maybe a minute or so, strumming and riffing, also some nice loud six string bar chords, also palm mutes etc,... single notes aren't much help here.
    All in all, it's a very straightforward and quick process, sorry you are having trouble with it.


    Could it be that you monitored the mic signal through a channel on the mixer?
    Maybe a channel that had some EQ activated (but the signal was also sent to the Profiler before that?)
    a long shot - I know...


    I'll pm you my email adress.


    p.s.
    haha
    please enable your pm ;)

  • I have no idea what went wrong - but all my experiences profiling the DI out of my amps worked fine.


    The first thing I ever profiled was my AxeFx II - and I was shocked how close it was.


    Yes, some of the AxeFx II patches were spot on others not - but this should be a problem of profiling amp modelers (as also stated in the manual) - profiling real amps works much better.


    In case you play a lot of single notes during the refine - then this may be the problem - you mentioned that the sound get even further away from the real amp when you refine.


    When I refine I may need about a minute - playing simple (barre) chords all over the fretboard, some power chords and palm mutes - works fine so for.


    Very happy with the accuracy of my profiles.

    (All trademarks are trademarks of their respective owners, which are in no way associated or affiliated with soundside.de)


    Great Profiles --> soundside.de

    Edited once, last by Armin ().

  • Hi again.
    Yesterday i had my first attempt of profiling my jvm with a senheiser mic at home. And the result is more than satisfying. i now really wonder what went wrong in the studio. Can it be the mic pre in the loop? Or maybe chord extensions? Anyway now i am a happy guy that i know my power head works properly.


    Uh a little detail; i browsed to one of the jvm channel 3 orange mode profiles that i purchesed from soundside and i made sure that the reference amp and the soundside amp had the same volume level. Then i started the profiling process. Maybe these things matter when profiling.


    i know came to the point that profiling should be taken seriously.

  • Hi again.
    Yesterday i had my first attempt of profiling my jvm with a senheiser mic at home. And the result is more than satisfying. i now really wonder what went wrong in the studio. Can it be the mic pre in the loop? Or maybe chord extensions? Anyway now i am a happy guy that i know my power head works properly.


    Uh a little detail; i browsed to one of the jvm channel 3 orange mode profiles that i purchesed from soundside and i made sure that the reference amp and the soundside amp had the same volume level. Then i started the profiling process. Maybe these things matter when profiling.


    i know came to the point that profiling should be taken seriously.


    Glad to hear things are now working out.


    Phone your friend and ask him what's wrong with his pro studio, or maybe he didn't want the Profiles to sound the same, maybe he's not a Kemper believer? :huh: :S

  • might be a dumb reply, but with the KPA profiling what you hear might not be what you get. before the readers are outraged let me say that I stand behind Don's statement: the KPA does a perfect job reproducing 100% the profiled amp. the problem is that it will be subjected to different speakers.


    I test it all the time by playing with commercial profiles. they sound ok in the demo but when put into my system I have to retouch them, almost always changing the cab (my all time loved one is Tills 1960), because they never sound the way I heard them.


    this said, hang in on there: it is impossible that you don't get the exact copy WHEN playing in the very same pa system, but be prepared to adjust things when playing your profiles somewhere else.

    "...why being satisfied with an amp, as great as it can be, while you can have them all?" michael mellner


    "Rock in Ecclesia" - new album on iTunes or Google music

  • Try it without the Mic Pre. I've seen various people bring up this issue, and I think in every case there was a mic pre in the chain during the profiling process. If you need one for phantom power, try to set everything as neutral as possible; but it's best to completely bypass.


    I haven't profiled anything yet, so I can't give any first-hand experience; but I know many people have done profiles with mic pre's and have said the profiling is perfect. Maybe it's just an issue with some mic pre's, or when some feature is engaged. or maybe i'm flat-out wrong :)