Detailed Amp Sim Tutorial Video: Matchless Chieftain

J

james...

Experienced


I know I asked about the possibility of people's interest in this sort of thing. This is my trial run, and I'm very open to criticism. There are helpful time stamps in the descriptions.

Already, I have a few nitpicks to work out next time.

-Better sounds leveling between guitar/voice over (easy fix)
-Shorter run time (hopefully)
-Less blurry screen (easy fix)
-Should have used my better mic for this.
-Include sound examples of famous tones using the amp sim.

Let me know if there are things you'd like me to add next time, or omit.

I realize 30+ minutes might be a big ask for some people, but that is kind of the point. These are for people who want to know EVERYTHING about a sim, not just the quick "how to make it sound good" videos that other YT guys are doing, which totally have a place as well. The Timestamps are also very helpful for finding the specific thing you want to know about quickly.
 
Hey, the idea is great, but yes I think I'd need it to be more precise for me to watch
Maybe you could split this into an intro video (who you are, why you are doing the series) and a seperate video on the amp?
Starting with a really good demo of the amp would be great too (IMO), then getting into your commentary.

Keep em coming, I'm sure they can only get better.
 
Cool video. I like in depth material like this. Here's my suggestions/comments.

I think you could use more playing throughout the video to show examples of what you are talking about. For example, you could play as you tweak when explaining the tone stack interactive frequencies, or the bass sweetspots etc.

The history lesson is great. I would incorporate the "who plays this amp" with the history of it. Maybe play a lick of two in the style of the more famous users.

I enjoyed the video. I think once you find your groove the length will be more consice.
 
Looking forward to the series, James.

I’m kind of old school. Reading allows me to work much faster than watching a video. And obviously I like to write. But most people like videos and this is the age of YouTube.

There’s always room for more community contributions. And IF there’s some “competition”, it’s only healthy. Leon’s and others’ pace and quality is hard to keep up with, but it’s nice to have different perspectives and styles.

I’m working towards updating my amp models guide. Got lots of material. But that will probably be well into 2020.

EDIT: I just "quick-watched" the video, and I love the research and additional information you come up with. I've always wondered about the Boutique 2's background too. Nice job.
 
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Nice idea James but for me it's too much trivial talking in there. Don't need the double window screen with the original amp and Yek's marvellous amp-guide pages. I'm missing new infos in depth (if available - otherwise Yek's guide hit bull's eye for me). Reading is way faster than videoing.. Probably I would like this video if I would be a newbie ... Anyway - thanks for your work.
 
Very nice and informative video! I share the other guys' opinions: maybe starting with sounds, and then some talking to expand the concepts and conclude the video.

One thing I noticed is I can hear the pick noise through the voice mic (pretty obvious from around 33:00 onward). Don't know if you intentionally left the voice mic open, but that can cause phase issues other than picking up the pick noise on the strings.
 
Well you’re obviously not going to do your personal intro every video..
I think it’s perfect the way ya did it. I think we’ve all seen enough people playing and enough vids of the AxeFx sounding exactly like its real life counterpart and it’s/people’s ability to cop our guitar hero’s tones spot on, so I’m not sure there is any real value in re-litigating that again imo. But the history lesson is great, and then hearing examples of what the amp is capable of within its useable range to get a good fundamental idea of what the amp is not only capable of but generally sounds like is good. The only potential issue I can think of is, is that I suppose it could be possible your “take” on what the amp should sound like is erroneous and/or presented in only one context or missing another context.
For example, while I thoroughly enjoyed the video, I didn’t care for any of the tones I heard out of the Chieftain the video, so it’d heavily influence me to never fire it up. On the flip side, the next vid may be an amp I never really thought much of that maybe something absolutely fantastic.
Anyway, I think it was great & thank you for your contribution & hope you continue along with these.
 
As @yek said, different perspectives and styles are only going to be better for the community. My advice would be to make the sort of videos you'd want to watch - once I started approaching YT like that I found my groove pretty quickly, and it seems like you've already figured that out. This video is about 1000 times better than the first videos I made so I look forward to more.

Also, the original music you've got on your channel is excellent and I love your singing voice. More please!
 
Some good feedback guys. Thanks.

-More playing and sound examples needed
-Pick noise in the BG was indeed a thing, and I feel stupid for not muting it.
 
Decent first effort, James, thanks for doing it. as someone who has the video editing skills of a sea slug, I have no place to give criticism, but perhaps consider how you approach text-based material on videos where many of us are viewing on a tiny screen,and I’m sure you will come up with better ways to utilize split screen, but the content was pretty solid:)
 
This is really great! I love longer format, information dense videos. I really hope you continue with this series.
I would watch a video like this on every amp in the AxeFx. I'd even be interested in the history of some cabs/speakers.

With that being said, I think basically all the criticism in this thread is pretty spot on.
Definitely start the video off with some playing, or some samples to show what the amp is capable of.

I don't know if you already do this or not, but perhaps make an outline for yourself of things you know you're going to talk about, and know what you want to say before recording. It seems like you were just saying things as it came to you, and you kinda jumped from one thing to the other.

For example: the part were you were talking about the 1 input vs. the 2 input amp model. You went on the Matchless Instagram and scrolled through it for a few minutes trying to find the pictures you wanted to show. You should have those pictures/text ready to go, and edit them into the video rather than watch you scroll through Instagram waiting for you to land on the picture you wanted. Stuff like that would cut back on the length of the video without sacrificing information. Your casual conversation approach is cool, but it does make the video much longer than it needs to be.

Again, thanks for making these videos, I look forward to more.
 
@james...
I liked the video and didn't mind the length. Using the time stamp index is great for those looking for specifics. Your history with FAS provided us with insight newer folks like me might never find in an ocean of forum posts. I appreciate your insight. You never know what you don't know until you see/hear someone else's perspective. It's always a treat to find music you like that you never knew existed. The famous users section is a great starting point to search for examples.
I think you did a great job, and I look forward to watching many more.
 
I loved the video! Keep them coming!

Minor issues I had: I had to listen to it on 1.5x speed, I wish the guitar was tuned.

Otherwise very well done!!
 
Thanks James! Good job! I like it! The explanations and history as well. I would agree with some of the comments for more examples up front and during as well as condensing it a bit more. ( a bit long) but as someone mentioned some of it probably wouldn’t be included in every video.
Excellent!
 
RDH said:
Thanks James! Good job! I like it! The explanations and history as well. I would agree with some of the comments for more examples up front and during as well as condensing it a bit more. ( a bit long) but as someone mentioned some of it probably wouldn’t be included in every video.
Excellent!
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Yeah, there's 5 mins of just explaining the format in there.
I think adding more clips throughout and a more condensed format are great ideas. Obviously, this kind of thing is never going to be 5 minutes long. I do need to talk faster.

CipherHost said:
@james...
I liked the video and didn't mind the length. Using the time stamp index is great for those looking for specifics. Your history with FAS provided us with insight newer folks like me might never find in an ocean of forum posts. I appreciate your insight. You never know what you don't know until you see/hear someone else's perspective. It's always a treat to find music you like that you never knew existed. The famous users section is a great starting point to search for examples.
I think you did a great job, and I look forward to watching many more.
Click to expand...
And that's sort of the whole point. There are MOUNTAINS of info on all these sims, but most of it is scattered across this forum and deep in other forums too. My goal with these is to gather all of that info and present it in a 20 minute format.
 
I watched it and mostly enjoyed it.

My brain has a knack for trivia (mostly useless, but sometimes not) and this feeds that nicely.

I agree with the comments from Brad about the text stuff - on my iPad that was useless to me.

My biggest suggestion for improvement: have some specific material to demo the various parts where you are playing. I felt like a lot of times you were just banging away on some kind of random chords...

Look forward to the next one!
 
Much too long in my opinion, I kept jumping ahead and was kind of bored as it felt like someone just going on and on talking off the cuff and I kept looking for more music/playing. Obviously its nice to easily be able to jump ahead at any point, but at the same time, you ideally want content that one finds engaging and watches from start to finish.

I'd say start out with a few clips of some of the famous tones from the amp, talk a few minutes about how the design came about, what its based off, who designed it etc, then maybe some unique features etc, followed by like maybe 10 minutes of how to dial in some of those classic tones. Long enough to cover the bases, short enough to be interesting.... (like a proper woman's skirt length the old saying goes lol)

Some amps will have a bit more interesting story, history etc, like Slash’s #34 for example. Others are a little more cut and dried, and I think length will greatly depend on the amp model.

All and all great first attempt and more good than bad, but I think it could be really great with some refinements
 
Good attempt on this one. I'd prefer a shorter length with more sound bites and maybe a bit more time devoted to tweaking the amp.

Personally, I didn't quite like the sound you were getting out of the chieftain. Never really used this amp so can't comment on whether it could be dialed in differently.
 
toneseeker911 said:
Good attempt on this one. I'd prefer a shorter length with more sound bites and maybe a bit more time devoted to tweaking the amp.

Personally, I didn't quite like the sound you were getting out of the chieftain. Never really used this amp so can't comment on whether it could be dialed in differently.
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There are situations where that tone would sit pretty.
 
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