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Noise gates
Let’s talk about noise gates. Specially in my case recently recording guitar not iOS stuff but the principles are still valid somewhat so though I’d share my findings.
It’s a not often discussed part of the recording process and obvs we tend to think first about the player, instrument, mics, preamp, compressor, effects etc.
I discovered with my pedal board that with the various gain stages and inherent nature of the guitar pickup/mic that unwanted noise was a way of life. I chose a TC Electronics Sentry pedal to cut out the signal (noise/hiss) etc at a given threshold.
Life was OK.
But as I’ve switched focus from playing live to recording more and with the improvements to my recording “studio” (decent mic/DI preamp, cheeky compressor) it dawned on me that a studio grade noise gate was the next step.
Sold the TC pedal and drooled over THE studio noise gate (Drawmer DS-201) which is a 2 channel bad boy in a 1U rack space.
The older non XLR versions are banging around on eBooger for silly prices as some people think it’s kinda old classic gear so must be worth a bomb but as these units were sooooooo popular back in the day it’s a buyers market if you have nerve. Managed to get a later modern version so peanuts and it is really astonishing. It’s a grown up toy for sure.
My recordings are now pristinely quiet, no hiss etc.
Hopefully that might be useful / interesting for others.
Comments
Funnily enough I’m looking for an AU noise gate to put in front of MIDI Guitar, to stop rogue sounds getting turned into MIDI.
Looking for suggestions.
Brusfri fixes everything short of a freight train
I'm not looking for subtle, though. I want a brutal noise gate that only lets through notes when I’m strumming chords, and cuts off almost all decay.
I have Audio Damage’s Channel Strip. That’ll probably do the trick
Drambo has a fairly good noise gate module built in. It also has a side chain input and a gate envelope output if you want to add more processing tricks.
Oh, and if you want to add a range control like in the DS-201:
@rs2000 Drambo! Is there anything it can’t do?
😉
Brusfri is not a noise gate.
I want a good au noise gate. Seems ProG is the best but Im not paying that (yet
). The woodsman gate is looking like a contender. Although FAC Convolver is not too bad. Its mostly about the threshold setting for me.
I've used the Nembrini one a lot and it does the trick. Might be free.
Can you explain this to me? I’m not saying you’re wrong, please understand. Just looking to expand my own knowledge because to me…it’s absolutely a noise gate. Completely possible that I’m wrong. Certainly wouldn’t be the first or last time, I’m sure.
“ I want a brutal noise gate that only lets through notes when I’m strumming chords, and cuts off almost all decay.”
To me, it fills this requirement perfectly when recording my acoustic with it’s noisy pickup, which seems like it qualifies not just a noise gate, but the *best one I’ve found for nailing this that’s under 30 bucks. Sure ProG is great, but bang-for-buck wise, Brusfri seems pretty darn good. Interested to get your feedback. Cheers.
@boone51 Simply said:
A noise gate removes everything below a certain level threshold.
A denoiser like brusfri only removes the noise but keeps the signal.
With brusfri you train it with the frequency pattern you want to eliminate and it extracts that from the audio. This also means that it extracts it from the rest of the audio where it’s not the only thing going on. So, there is some effect on the rest of the audio. It does it in as transparent enough way that you aren’t likely to notice it, but it does have an effect.
A noise gate does what @rs2000 says, it turns off the sound when there’s nothing going on above a certain level. So, when there’s other audio signal above the threshold, it’s not doing anything and the sound is unaffected. This is an important point. If you have some buzz or other noticeable noise going on, it will be cut off during quiet parts, but will be there underlying the other audio in louder parts.
Where a noise gate does affect other audio is the attack and decay, especially decay. The gate doesn’t generally kick in instantly or you would get an abrupt cutoff as the volume falls. So, most noise gates have a decay (and sometimes attack) setting to smooth out the volume change. But, that can also mean that sustain (and/or attack) of notes is reduced. That can be good or bad, depending on what you want to achieve.
A noise gate has a lot less work to do than something like brusfri, and so is generally easier on the CPU.
Noise gate is made to remove everything below a certain threshold. Although some even have a type of mix setting to retain some of the cut signal. The idea is that by setting the attack (response speed) threshold (level where it starts to cut) and release (how long to get back to not cutting signal) you can shape the noise around the signal you want. If the threshold is to high nothing will be heard. Too low and all the signal, noise included will come through. Similarly on some material a too long release will not return to off quickly enough and may negate the entire noise gate purpose. It can only really shape the volume of the audio and there by reducing the level of noise when nothing is playing. When something is playing, a snare for example the noise will still be there.
Noise removal takes an imprint of the noise you don't want (or has preset noise types) and removes that from the whole track. So if there is any sonic material contained in the captured noise profile, it will also be removed from the snare or whatever is on the track. Usually this means using a setting or mix to find a balance between the noise you can tolerate and the least damage to desirable track material.
Wow. Thanks everyone. I asked to be educated, and that’s exactly what I got and thoroughly. Much appreciated.