Ableton Shortcuts Hotkeys and Tips

Have you ever seen a seasoned producer or engineer rip apart a DAW without hardly touching the mouse?  If you haven't it's something to be enjoyed before you pass this part of the universe on.  However, instead of watching someone else, you could always just teach yourself.  With a bit of good old fashioned brain memory fueled by the right study material you too can be a hot key champion.  Below is a list of shortcuts pulled from a post over at the Ableton Forums authored by the user autogen.  I thought they would be useful to all of you as there is also quite a bit of other tips aside from just the hotkeys.  Check them out, I'm willing to bet they will make your workflow quite a bit more efficient once memorized.

Elysia's Niveau Free Filter

The German audio processing powerhouse Elysia has released a free filter plug-in for the world to go wild on. The Niveau Filter from Elysia comes from Elysia's Mpressor's EQ/filter section. Niveau is essentially dumb proof; providing two knobs for frequency selection, and tweaking to taste. 

It works like this...  First you select the frequency you'd like as your center point for the filters.  For frequencies over 2,200Hz use the "Freq x10" button to multiple the frequency selection knob's corresponding frequencies by a factor of 10.  Next, turn the EQ gain pot clockwise to increase low frequencies whilst simultaneously boosting the high end.  If you turn the EQ gain knob counter-clockwise the effect will be just the opposite.

As you can see from the above curves, Niveau's boosts and cuts are smooth and equal throughout the spectrum.  Just choose the center frequency and adjust the EQ gain knob for you preferred balance of low end and treble.  It really is that simple.  Elysia describes it as working like a balance scale, I find this to be a great way of putting what it does into the simplest of terms.  I can't really think of any easier way to say it as a matter of fact.  If you're still confused as to how it does what it does just download Niveau and put it to work!  When a traditional high and low pass aren't enough and a parametric EQ is too much just reach for the Niveau, you'll be surprised what this little thing can do. Oh yeah... IT'S FREE!!!

Niveau can be downloaded for free from Elysia's website.  Thanks for reading and happy geeking!

All the best,


Nick

DMG Audio Updates EQuality

DMG Audio has released a new updated version of their now well revered EQuality digital EQ plug-in. The first version was fantastic, a bit of a cpu hog depending on settings but none the less a fantastically transparent and well balanced EQ. When working with dance music which usually has every last bit of sonic life squeezed out of it an EQ that can make clear and precise gain adjustments is more than welcomed. I use EQuality on nearly every track I master and have no plans of getting rid of it anytime soon. DMG has also updated their compressor plug-in by the name of Compassion. I haven't put Compassion through its paces yet but if it's anything like EQuality I'm sure to be in for a treat. Below you'll find a rundown of the changes made to version 1.15 of EQuality and version 1.04 of Compassion. As always, thanks for reading and happy geeking!

Changes made to Ver. 1.15 of DMG Audio's EQuality:
-CPU Usage Improvements.
-Added ProTools metering support.
-Fix M/S / bypass latency for non-8k IR length.
-Added analyzer outlined/filled/both pref.

Changes made to ver. 1.04 of DMG Audio's Compassion:
-Fixed OSX 10.4 support.
-Fixed crash in wavelab.
-Fix AU resize.
-Fix bug whereby LP-split settings were not recalled correctly.
-Enable RTAS Automation.
-Dezipper control changes.
-Added menu to allow tabbing between advanced pages (click page-name).
-Fixed Opto-mod HPF frequency.
-Added ProTools metering support.

If you're not familiar with DMG or their plug-ins check them out at their website.

All the best,

Nick

The TapeLake

This is way too cool to not share with all of you.  I won't give anything away by writing about it. Just watch it, words won't do it justice any how. You can think about how badly you want it afterwards.



The comment below got me thinking and I decided I should add another video of the Uokahd (TapeLake) in action with all of its strange sonic glory on display for you to hear, and see.



More about the man behind Uokahd can be found at www.danperrone.com


All the best,

Nick

Audio Recording Time Calculator

Ever wondered how much space a given amount of digital audio will take up on your system? Worry no more. Sound Devices, an audio field production manufacturer has taken care of all the arithmetic for you. Sound Devices is probably more well known for their USBPre than their Audio Recording Time Calculator however, each can be just as important to a user given the gig. I stumbled across the Audio Recording Time Calculator (ARTC from here on) while doing some research on Sound Devices' USBPre as I'm about to purchase a used one from a colleague. As soon as I found the ARTC I knew I had to share it with all of you.



The ARTC from Sound Devices allows you to know precisely how much storage space is required for given amounts of digital audio. For example, lets assume you're recording a live gig for a band but don't know how much HD space the recording will take up. All you have to know is how long the performance is and what type of files you'll be writing the audio to and the ARTC does the rest of the work for you. It even works in the reverse, if you only have 500mb of space left, the ARTC will tell you how much audio 500MB is equivalent to in running time. Just, put in the file type, number of tracks, sample rate & bit depth and you're ready to go. This can prove to be an invaluable tool when HD space is at a premium and calculations must be done in advanced of the gig. Not knowing these things could prove to be disastrous when your hard drive fills up during the middle of a live recording.

More information on Sound Devices can be found at their website and here's a link to the Audio Recording Time Calculator.

All the best,

Nick

High-Fidelity Ear Plugs from Ear Peace

Your ears are ringing like crazy from a night spent underneath some line arrays and you wonder... "Why do I keep doing this to myself?"  There has to be a way for you to enjoy a live performance and your hearing afterwards. Right?  Up until now, there really hasn't been.  You had two options if you wanted to rock out to live music and still maintain healthy hearing afterwards.  Your first and most common option is to buy a set of cheap ear plugs from your local drug store.  Problem with those is that they make the show sound like the band is playing inside of a padded room.  The second option, and more professional route was to purchase musicians earplugs.  These ear plugs are specially molded to your ear canal and provide hearing protection while keeping the attenuation linear across the frequency spectrum.  These are what most performers and engineers use during gigs as they allow the person wearing them to hear the music as it sounds naturally minus a few dB's. However, these earplugs are expensive and require a trip to the doctor to obtain.  So, the cheap ear plugs make concerts lifeless and the good ear plugs cost an arm and a leg.  What to do???