Tips for Cameron "Atomica High" Amp?

rsf1977_again

rsf1977_again

Power User
I recently stumbled across this amp again, and it sounds great, and tighter in your face than the Cameron CCV which sounds more scooped. So, I was reading in the Wiki about it and I was wondering if anyone had any tips on how to dial it to get it sounding it's best for massive high gain growly blah blah tones.

Notes from Wiki:
Based on: Cameron Atomica, a "brown sound" 100 watt amp. Models: low gain and high gain channels. EL34. Speakers: G12H.

Original controls: Thump (Depth in model), Presence, Bass, Middle, Treble, Master, Gain, Edge (Bright switch in model), 3-way gain switch.

Saturation is engaged by default.

Cliff: "The Atomica can tolerate high MV because it is a "Jose-style MV". The Jose-style MV imparts a very high source resistance to the tone stack which causes much more insertion loss and therefore lower drive level into the power amp"

Cliff: "In the design of some amps the lowcut frequency is dependent upon the Drive setting. In these cases the Lowcut parameter defaults to 10 Hz and the actual lowcut filtering is calculated as part of the Drive knob function"
 
Funny you mentioned this amp - I got lost for hours in it last night.

I don't recall the IR's I used but I'll post later,
 
I used one of the freebies Fremen shared (ASEM mix something something) and one of the OH Lynchbacks
 
rsf1977_again said:
I recently stumbled across this amp again, and it sounds great, and tighter in your face than the Cameron CCV which sounds more scooped. So, I was reading in the Wiki about it and I was wondering if anyone had any tips on how to dial it to get it sounding it's best for massive high gain growly blah blah tones.

Notes from Wiki:
Based on: Cameron Atomica, a "brown sound" 100 watt amp. Models: low gain and high gain channels. EL34. Speakers: G12H.

Original controls: Thump (Depth in model), Presence, Bass, Middle, Treble, Master, Gain, Edge (Bright switch in model), 3-way gain switch.

Saturation is engaged by default.

Cliff: "The Atomica can tolerate high MV because it is a "Jose-style MV". The Jose-style MV imparts a very high source resistance to the tone stack which causes much more insertion loss and therefore lower drive level into the power amp"

Cliff: "In the design of some amps the lowcut frequency is dependent upon the Drive setting. In these cases the Lowcut parameter defaults to 10 Hz and the actual lowcut filtering is calculated as part of the Drive knob function"
Click to expand...

That's my favorite model in the Axe for dirty tones. If you want grinding high gain, don't be afraid to dime out bass, mids, and depth, and then set your treble and presence fairly high (7-ish range). I keep my gain around 6 and master volume at 5. I like to pull back the Xformer Match just a touch and add a little speaker drive (2) on the Speaker page.

If you want to get a little more aggressive with it, try setting the Output Comp to Feedback and just edge it up a little bit. Also, backing off the preamp hardness seems to make it breathe a little better to my ears. I also drop off about 1.5db of 250hz on the graphic eq page.

Every guitar is different, and every IR makes a huge difference, so play around with it and see if any of those adjustments puts you in the ballpark of where you want to be.

I hope this helps. Let me know if you discover any cool tricks as well.
 
Like Justin I love this amp. It has become my go to amp. I do a couple of the same things Justin mentioned above. But also I like to add in a PEQ block right before the amp. I cut 300 about 4db. This really helps the amp sit in the mix. I also like to use the preamps mostly the 50 with drive and saturation at like 2 use high quality. This will help to warm up the amp. Lastly you can add a tube screamer in front, I like drive at 1 and tone around 6.5 mix 90% kinda pushes the front end a little bit. 90% vs 100%, 90 just seams a tad less harsh to my ears.
 
Just came back from practice and discovered a couple of things. Setting the "crunch " to zero is amazing. And turning on the fat switch is also amazing. Full, cutting and aggressive
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom