im trying to set up my RNC to duck the beater side kick mic by having it key off my snare signal. problem is, im not sure how to do it. sidechains make my head hurt....

My only experience with ducking was ducking the bass with the kick drum. We put used the kick drum to trigger the the bass to be compressed for that short amount of time that the kick drum is present. I think we used the kick drum level in the sidechain of the compressor to the bass, don't really remember though. The whole point was to make the kick more apparent and get rid of some of the masking going on between the kick and bass. I've never heard of ducking the kick with the snare.......I don't have much hands on experience though.

You want to send the snare signal into the side chain, and run the compressor as normal on the beater side kick mic.
Try setting the compressor really hard and fast to start with, then work it out so it doesn't sound TOO unnatural when the rest of the mics are in.

so, having the beater side mic plugged into the comp as per normal, just inserting a line from the snare into the sidechain, and this will default the compresser to react to the sidechain signal and NOT the main input signal? i didnt realize the compresser would ignore the main line-in signal once something is plugged into the sidechain. amazing concoction, this sidechain.

secondary question: how is the snare signal being split to go to two different places (to the compresser and to it's main destination) or is the snare signal being taken back out from the board in these cases?

I think on most tape machines, if you're using a 2" tape machine...there should be two different returns to the console. That way you can dual process, use in a side chain, whatever your need may be.

Degradation wrote:I think on most tape machines, if you're using a 2" tape machine...there should be two different returns to the console. That way you can dual process, use in a side chain, whatever your need may be.

and if you're not using a 2" tape machine?

If you don't have two returns, I'd patch the single return to an 2 aux sends. Then I'd buss the aux outputs to the sidechain and send it to the stereo output as desired.

stephensolo wrote:secondary question: how is the snare signal being split to go to two different places (to the compresser and to it's main destination) or is the snare signal being taken back out from the board in these cases?

You can just send off of a pre-fader aux send. You can also send it to a mult on your patchbay. You also can send it as a direct out from your board. If using a DAW, you can Copy 'n' Paste it to another track and send it out of its own dedicated soundcard output.

also:
If other sounds are bleeding into your snare mic and triggering unwanted compression, you can use one or both of the following techinques:

-carefully gate the snare signal going into the sidechain (only the
send, not the snare going to your main mix), effectively
cutting out extraneous noise that may cause unwanted compression.

-EQ the send going to the sidechain by cutting the lows and boosting
the attack of the snare, emphasizing the snare hits. This can help
avoid compression caused by the kick drum bleeding into the snare
mic.

mtar