Dialing in a tone (again and again...)

metallaholic said:
All great advice here. Saving a new revised version is always my goto then a few days later I'll go between the few variations. More often than not, I find myself going back to the first version I made. A lot of times I don't even change anything preset to preset except the IR, so I sometimes just have different Its on the different cab channels loaded to swap between.
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Yes! This is a smart approach. I use cablab for this. As I can test multiple cabs fairly easy. And when im done i export the result to a single file.
 
Boris said:
Thank you guys! I find it incredible how many people take the time to answer in this forum!
This helps a lot! I feel a little less "crazy"... :cool:
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same "crazy" mate over here, ive been through the same with my "Jimi" patches, it took some time but "Snapshot" and "reclaibrating" my ears helped ALOT... =)
 
I have a good friend who happens to dig the same kinds of tones I do, and I use his opinion on my tones when he drops by. I have presets I like one day, then the next day I might tweak something minor, and save it to a new slot. Generally I don't really get bogged down by this too much; I could honestly grab any one of them at any time, and be fine. But I'll let him hear them and pick which one he likes, just to give me someone else's opinion, since I know we like the same kinds of sounds. Maybe you could do something similar...?

One other thing I'd recommend (if this applies to your situation of course)... I just get my presets "close enough", and then I leave them alone. My thinking is, until (if ever) I get in a band context, anything else I think they might need, could very well end up not being right in a band mix, which in that case I'd have just been wasting my time.
 
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This isn’t a solution to the tone changing issue, but might help overcome it-

When you sit down to play and you hear the tone is ‘off’ from what you heard yesterday, before touching a single thing, ask yourself what your goal is for this playing session. Is it just noodling? Is it recording? Is it recording demo tracks that will be re-recorded into final takes later? And lastly, “Will this tone work for my goal right now?”

We can spend years tweaking because the tones we want ARE residing inside these units, but we can also waste years of creativity and advancement in our playing if we spend too much time tweaking.

So before I’d let the small tonal difference decide for me if I’m going to tweak or play, I’d focus on my goal and whether or not the 3db of extra bass I’m hearing is going to remove me from my goal or not.
 
i just assumed that my presets weren't really dialed in until they've gone back and forth 10 times and with dif guitars and dif moods and sometimes headphones and sometimes monitors and sometimes through a poweramp/speaker. the one time I don't allow myself to change my preset is if I'm playing a (split) humbucker through an amp that I know I want setup for singles (twin) or playing my tele through an engl (for some reason). Other than that... i figure over time it is going to avg itself out to good. Plus... if it isn't inspiring today... then it probably could use a change. For the most part it does seem like over time the changes I make are smaller and smaller on presets I know I've spent a lot of time on... and my reluctance to try a dif ir are greater and greater... but ymmv.
 
mistermikev said:
i just assumed that my presets weren't really dialed in until they've gone back and forth 10 times and with dif guitars and dif moods and sometimes headphones and sometimes monitors and sometimes through a poweramp/speaker. the one time I don't allow myself to change my preset is if I'm playing a (split) humbucker through an amp that I know I want setup for singles (twin) or playing my tele through an engl (for some reason). Other than that... i figure over time it is going to avg itself out to good. Plus... if it isn't inspiring today... then it probably could use a change. For the most part it does seem like over time the changes I make are smaller and smaller on presets I know I've spent a lot of time on... and my reluctance to try a dif ir are greater and greater... but ymmv.
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Agreed.

I mostly use my "Home" preset (as in, my musical home). It's on v25 now. Version 24 and 25 are insanely close...IIRC, it's just the cutoff frequency of the low-cut on the output. Versions 1 and 2 only had a few blocks in common, and those were set differently.
 
I’ve been happy with my tones only to find that I’ll make a few tweaks here and there.. mainly on the low or high end.. usually subtle changes.
Then there’s the difference of recorded tone vs live tone.. because they’re two different things.
Different guitars on the same preset will sound.. different.
I’ve made lots of presets, but not because I have 12 guitars.. but because I play numerous styles, and / or there’s slight tone variations.
Years ago we didn’t have the options we have today, and many who have units like the Fractal spend tons of time tweaking and running themselves in circles.
I try to avoid that rabbit hole.
Dial in some tones that get you in the zone you’re after.. check your tones either live or recorded, then if needed make adjustments, and give your ears a break and don’t over do it because ‘it’s never good enough’.
Yes, with the Fractal you can get option paralysis, but for me personally I try and keep it as simple and organic as I can.
 
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Greg Ferguson said:
Definitely loud, 90 dB-ish. If against several different reference sources/sounds our preset still sounds good then I think we're pretty much assured to be dialed in.
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An important component of this is to use an SPL dB meter when measuring listening levels.

Using a timer and being disciplined enough to take an ear rest break is the other key component for avoiding listening fatigue.

Guessing at listening levels is the biggest thing that messes up the people I have worked with.

Guessing at exposure time is the second pitfall that messes people up.

Matching the listening levels between your recorded reference tone goal versus your live playing is another pitfall. Humans suck at judging this in an uncalibrated manner, as we sometimes believe the louder thing we listen to is "better".

We all want to believe that we are expert enough to judge these things on our own, but human guesstimate of loudness and time are no match for calibrated instruments for those tasks.
 
dr bonkers said:
An important component of this is to use an SPL dB meter when measuring listening levels.

Using a timer and being disciplined enough to take an ear rest break is the other key component for avoiding listening fatigue.

Guessing at listening levels is the biggest thing that messes up the people I have worked with.

Guessing at exposure time is the second pitfall that messes people up.

Matching the listening levels between your recorded reference tone goal versus your live playing is another pitfall. Humans suck at judging this in an uncalibrated manner, as we sometimes believe the louder thing we listen to is "better".

We all want to believe that we are expert enough to judge these things on our own, but human guesstimate of loudness and time are no match for calibrated instruments for those tasks.
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So what do level should we shoot for?
 
FusionFanatic said:
Dial in some tones that get you in the zone you’re after.. check your tones either live or recorded, then if needed make adjustments, and give your ears a break and don’t over do it because ‘it’s never good enough’
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It’s never good enough. You nailed it.
 
Make small incremental changes to a single parameter and then give them a few days to see how they sound. This will help with ear fatigue.
 
Make a version of the preset for S_M_T_W_T_F_S and play the appropriate one on each day of the week. If that doesn't work do 1-2-3-4 on to 30/31/28? and if that doesn't stay consistent the next step involves a year. Just don't change volume, room position, monitoring solution, guitars, strings, temperature, humidity or your underwear... eat and drink the same thing every day, meditate, don't upgrade anything, stay in the same mood, think the same thoughts... Then you lose your favorite pick!!!!!
 
I think it's easy to just tweak to all hell for no reason. If it's fun, then it's fun. If you're worried about it or it's causing stress...it's time to stop and pretend your rig is set in stone for a while. IMHO.

If something sounds different, the worst thing that'll happen is that it'll push you to a slightly different musical place. That's not necessarily a bad thing.
 
Our hearing isn't consistent from day to day. That said, it might help to create versions of presets so you don't end up chasing your tail, so to speak.

Some days my "Master of Puppets V1" preset sounds like it needs a little more gain and high end, and on those days I use a V2 version. If I find myself favoring one version over another for a couple months I'll just delete the old preset and continue to iterate on whatever one is working for me.
 
Here's an interesting experiment I've performed several times. Take your best preset and noodle for a while, making any tweaks you like to the amp, cab, eq, and fx. Save it when you feel its as good as it's going to get that day.

Now repeat this for several days or weeks, always using the latest save as a starting point. Once you have a few saves over several days or weeks, compare the early ones with the most recent. Sometimes I'll find that nothing much changed over time, but sometimes the early and last saves are very different. Sometimes I find the later versions are better, which indicates I've been doing something right, but sometimes I find I've been slowly going off the rails and over tweaking.
 
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