Bass articulation / accuracy in high gain profiling

  • those are some pretty drastic measures, that shoudn't be necessary at all to get a accurate profile. I'm still convinced that something odd is going on there.


    I thought so too, but the other Hellcat clip I posted, "Hellcat red", is the "Conford Hellcat Red" profile from Einar Nysted on the rig exchange. And when the gain is matched to the profiles I ran (7.5), it exhibits the exact same issue. So I'm inclined to think this is just the way it is with my amp. Of course, if you aren't recording test clips and A/Bing, you'd probably never notice.


    I'm sure this varies amp to amp. I downloaded some Engls off the exchange, and they sound pretty clean. But those amps are famous for their extreme bass tightness at high gain -- it's almost as though they are internally high-passed. So they probably profile well.


    Nevertheless if anyone else owns a Hellcat and wants to run a few profiles on the red channel at max gain, that would be interesting to compare.


    Anyway, fascinating device, and a learning experience to boot!

    Edited once, last by hm2 ().

  • Now that you're happy with it and have it saved, out of interests sake, have you tried your Profile with a different cab, perhaps a Tills cab?


    What, cheat on my amp with some other guy's cab? Are you trying to get me in trouble??


    Just kidding. No, I haven't. Are you saying, search for author "Till" and take the cabs off his profiles? Any profiles in particular?


    The Hellcat profiles are up on the rig exchange as "Hellcat 664" -- those are the tone settings, bass/mid/treb. I gave you an SM57 and a Royer 121. Both on a pine cab with H30s. These are mid-focused speakers that mix well with more scoopy / modern sounding speakers like Vintage 30s. For example if you were to cut your rhythm tracks on a V30, you could play your leads on an H30, and they'd fit together like puzzle pieces.


    Thanks!

  • Are you saying, search for author "Till" and take the cabs off his profiles? Any profiles in particular?
    !


    The author name is 'TillS' and on the rig exchange you can have a filter to search for cabs only.
    Till has done the most comprehensive collection of cab profiling as of yet.
    I think any amp can sound at least very good with one of Till's cabs.

  • Hey hm2,


    Thanks for the detailed analysis - and of course the sound-bytes. So, while I don't really consider myself a discerning player (sound-quality wise) - I can relate to and affirm some of your findings.


    Bear in mind that the setups that I play the kemper through are not what people would call 'top-of-the-line' or even accurate setups. This is probably the reason I have quietly lived with some of my observations (and dis-satisfaction) especially in the 'bass-rolloff' dept.


    Setup 1 (studio) - KPA->MOTU ultralite MKIII->Logic Pro->M-audio AV-40s: I use this for mixing and mastering - and it has worked quite well for me - cant afford anything 'heavier' in the monitoring dept right now - so this'll have to do.


    Setup 2 (live/practise) - KPA->Allen & Heath ZED 22FX->QSC K12s. I use this to play out, and for practise.


    Now for the observations:


    With setup 1 - the KPA sounds reasonable - the bass is not as exaggerated as setup 2 (mostly a function of the dinky monitors) - but I roll off the bass anyway - since I almost always have either a bass, keyboard or other instruments occupying that spectrum. This is my mixing/mastering setup - so the guitar is tightly controlled in here.


    With Setup 2 - the bass is quite exaggerated if I keep the parametric EQ a flat-line. So I usually rolloff the bass (pretty steeply), and slightly cut the mid-low's - and then I have a sound that I really like, sits well and cuts through the mix with other instruments playing.


    Now what I always thought was that the KPA is simply a xerox machine ;) - and it copies what it 'hears', so - the excess/muddy bass I was hearing was a function of the profile, and how the mics were setup (rooms have a sonic signature and mic'ing is an art - as I have learnt the hard way ;)) when the amp was being profiled.


    Is this a correct assumption? I would at some point like to see mic'ing examples along with profiles (especially from the Kemper team), complete with settings etc. - so that I have a good idea as to how to mic this puppy when I profile my never-ending collection of exotic tube-amps (just kidding - just have a couple of blue-collar, generic tube amps - which is why I think the KPA is so cool ;)).


    What do you guys think? Am I totally off the reservation here?


    Thanks!

  • I think it would be a good idea to get the most experienced profilers (and44, Armin, ...) and CK together and produce a "Best Practices in Profiling" video series. This investment clearly makes the strengths of the lunchbox much more "accessible" to us. I wouldn't mind to pay some extra to get this in-depth video workshop, but I could imagine that they would go for free as well since they would turn out as brilliant marketing for Kemper and professional profile producers as well.


    Imho, there's no reason to let all new customers go through the painful process of learning how to do best by trial & error.


    Cheers,
    Martin

  • With Setup 2 - the bass is quite exaggerated if I keep the parametric EQ a flat-line.


    exaggerated bass is most likely due to:
    resonances/standing waves in your rehearsal space, possibly created by placing the speakers on a resonating object like a table,
    or - in the case of rear ported systems - placing the rear ports ('woofer') too cloase to a wall, or much worse, in a corner.
    and then there is the equal-loudness contour phenomenon, which causes your perception of the sound generated to change as you turn up the monitoring levels.


    My experience is: the flatter, more neutral a monitoring system is - the better the Profiler sounds.

  • I think it would be a good idea to get the most experienced profilers (and44, Armin, ...) and CK together and produce a "Best Practices in Profiling" video series. This investment clearly makes the strengths of the lunchbox much more "accessible" to us. I wouldn't mind to pay some extra to get this in-depth video workshop, but I could imagine that they would go for free as well since they would turn out as brilliant marketing for Kemper and professional profile producers as well.


    Imho, there's no reason to let all new customers go through the painful process of learning how to do best by trial & error.


    Cheers,
    Martin


    A profiling setup is identical to a recording setup. There's already much information about getting good sounds from a miced guitar amp available on the net, in books and video tutorials.
    Two of my favourites are The Recording Engineer's Handbook and The Mixing Engineer's Handbook by Bobby Owsinsky. It's not just about guitar but it's quite enlightening and fun to read.

  • I think it would be a good idea to get the most experienced profilers (and44, Armin, ...) and CK together and produce a "Best Practices in Profiling" video series. This investment clearly makes the strengths of the lunchbox much more "accessible" to us. I wouldn't mind to pay some extra to get this in-depth video workshop, but I could imagine that they would go for free as well since they would turn out as brilliant marketing for Kemper and professional profile producers as well.


    Imho, there's no reason to let all new customers go through the painful process of learning how to do best by trial & error.


    Cheers,
    Martin


    Buy any recording book and you will have your profiling reference (and a whole lot more). The biggest keys to profiling (other than setting the dials on the amp) really is the room, placement in the room, and placement of the mic.


    exaggerated bass is most likely due to:
    resonances/standing waves in your rehearsal space, possibly created by placing the speakers on a resonating object like a table,
    or - in the case of rear ported systems - placing the rear ports ('woofer') too cloase to a wall, or much worse, in a corner.
    and then there is the equal-loudness contour phenomenon, which causes your perception of the sound generated to change as you turn up the monitoring levels.


    My experience is: the flatter, more neutral a monitoring system is - the better the Profiler sounds.


    IME, you should almost never place an FRFR style monitor standing vertically on the floor. That's the worst position from an operational standpoint as you get a bunch of exaggerated bass due to the proximity, angle, and coupling of the woofer to the floor. For a more accurate image, the speaker needs to be operated as a wedge or on a stand.

  • Now what I always thought was that the KPA is simply a xerox machine - and it copies what it 'hears', so - the excess/muddy bass I was hearing was a function of the profile, and how the mics were setup (rooms have a sonic signature and mic'ing is an art - as I have learnt the hard way ) when the amp was being profiled.


    Is this a correct assumption?


    Hi! Thanks for the details. If I understand you correctly, you're saying that the bass response of your profiles sound different depending on the environment you play them in? If that's the case, the good news is that's most likely a monitoring issue, and not really a Kemper issue at all. As has been pointed out, room response can have a big effect on frequency response, particularly in the bass. Room modes can easily punch a big hole in key frequencies that you'd never notice without measuring.


    If you want to kill an afternoon with a fun project, download a copy of a good room acoustics analysis app and run a few impulses in your room. I've used Fuzzmeasure ( http://www.supermegaultragroovy.com/products/FuzzMeasure/ ). You'll need a cheap measurement mic. The Behringer ECM800 is a good one ( http://www.amazon.com/Behringe…-Microphone/dp/B000HT4RSA ) . You'll see right away what's going on in your space, and it's fascinating.


    Btw Allen & Heath makes a great board, and the Ultralite is a great interface. I wouldn't worry about your gear in that respect at all!

  • Thanks for the responses guys. Just to let you know - I've always had the FRFRs setup as wedges on the floor, moreover I have them (the K12's) setup to low-cut, and the same setup is used for vocals, keys and bass sometimes. With regards to my studio setup - my monitors aren't the best for bass response (I need to replace them soon :)) - which is why I thought that the bass might be a little exaggerated in the first place - but then having never profiled anything - I thought that it might be a function of the profiles I use, and how they were captured.


    I saw that you fixed this issue by rolling off the low-end, isnt that correct hm2 (this is exactly what I do by default when Im recording guitar bits with some of the profiles)? BTW - thanks for the tip on the room acoustics analysis - very cool stuff!

  • I saw that you fixed this issue by rolling off the low-end, isnt that correct hm2 (this is exactly what I do by default when Im recording guitar bits with some of the profiles)?


    My issue is actually a little different -- I'm getting too much bass *compression*, not necessarily too much bass. This can't be fixed afterward with eq. I've had some success filtering out lows during the "refining" phase, in terms of influencing the refining algorithm to run less low end through the distortion. But it's not perfect. I have tried this on a couple high-gain amps and some profile better than others. So it seems to be amp-dependent. I need to do a little more testing on high-gain amps. If I find the results are repeatable, maybe I'll submit a ticket.


    In your case: If you think the distortion characteristics in your profiles sound correct, then you're set. The exact *amount* of bass may or may not be accurate, but can always be tailored on your Allen&Heath with a twist of a knob!