In Ears and Ambience (bone dry sounds unnatural)

I

imrecs

Inspired
Just started using in ear monitors and trying to find the best way to dial in some room sound since the bone dry amp sounds unnatural. Would rather not use reverb unless nevcesary so if Cliff or anyone can give recommended settings for room parameters in the can block or other methods to help with the feel of the Axe in IEMs, that would be great! Obviously the goal is to have it also sound great going direct to FOH or through an FRFR.
 
imrecs said:
Would rather not use reverb unless nevcesary so if Cliff or anyone can give recommended settings for room parameters in the can block or other methods to help with the feel of the Axe in IEMs, that would be great!
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Why would you not want to add a reverb? I'm really asking to understand what the apprehension would be for that? For myself I have heavy ambient reverbs for swells and such using IEMs with no problems.

Most of the time you can just add a reverb block after the CAB with the SMALL ROOM effect, mix level @ 20% and 2 sec/echo density 4 to add a tad of room reverb. You could even put a COMP block before so CAB > COMP > REV to squish down the effect it will have to your natural amp sounds. Hope that helps.
 
the common this is to set up a shotgun mic or condenser mic in the room and blend some into the iem feed. I got used to bone dry because I never found a good blend of ambiance from the room
 
never had good results with room mics either....it's too much of the room and not of what's happening around you on stage...which is what you are really missing.
 
I've read that setting the mic to NULL in your cab block, and adjusting the proximity, helps with this...
 
I don't use a cabinet on stage. Axe straight to FOH. Don't love the idea of an ambient mic. One extra thing to worry about...would like it to be self contained within the fractal. Don't want to use reverb if I don't have to as I wouldn't normally use reverb on a real amp...though I guess the room reverbs could work since they aren't typicL springs/plate/halls/more effect style verb. I think the cabinet parameters might be the best place to start; any suggestions on settings of room size, amount, proximity, proximity frequency?

I saw Metallica's tech said between 18-22% room but not sure where to set room size or how to best set the null/proximity setting to give me something optimal in my ears and at FOH. Will experiment but if Cliff could share some specific settings that would be cool.
 
Don´t have your iem too loud.
If so the "dry" sound takes over. Have them just barely over stage volume (or what you hear on stage from the FOH system)
If I have my guitar loud in my iem it also affects my playing in a bad way. Makes me play more "cowardly". Almost as I´m afraid of my own guitarsound.
I know it sounds weird but that´s how it works for me.
 
just because you wouldn't normally use reverb doesn't mean you shouldn't experiment with it now....especially if it would get you what you need.
 
I like a stereo feed for in ears with the Fractal.

Try a nice soft delay instead of reverb. Stereo Tape, Fdbk: 33%, Dly: 423ms.

The delay will create some space around the sound without a wash.

I get ear fatigue with a mono dry guitar and in ears.
 
I used two ambient miss (nothing expensive) mounted on lighting stands either side of stage front - most often above line of PA

These fed into our desk and into everyone's individual in-ear feed - perfect... especially with the main FOH feed being the 'mix' with a little individual bump perhaps
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It's useful to use low and high shelves on the ambient mics to cut everything except the mids where people's voices, applause and cheers are heard - no point adding any additional low-end woof or high end noise into the mix
 
Anders_J said:
If I have my guitar loud in my iem it also affects my playing in a bad way. Makes me play more "cowardly". Almost as I´m afraid of my own guitarsound.
I know it sounds weird but that´s how it works for me.
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I know what you mean. For me it's because I think my guitar is too loud, especially during quieter parts where it's maybe just guitar and synth.
 
if you don't want an ambient mic and want to keep it all in the axe you must use some sort of reverb, even if it is just "room" from the cab blk
 
imrecs said:
I don't use a cabinet on stage. Axe straight to FOH. Don't love the idea of an ambient mic. One extra thing to worry about...would like it to be self contained within the fractal. Don't want to use reverb if I don't have to as I wouldn't normally use reverb on a real amp...though I guess the room reverbs could work since they aren't typicL springs/plate/halls/more effect style verb. I think the cabinet parameters might be the best place to start; any suggestions on settings of room size, amount, proximity, proximity frequency?

I saw Metallica's tech said between 18-22% room but not sure where to set room size or how to best set the null/proximity setting to give me something optimal in my ears and at FOH. Will experiment but if Cliff could share some specific settings that would be cool.
Click to expand...
Sorry. Didn't realize you were playing stadiums.

I don't use cabs on stage either. An ambient mic on stage at my position though was the solution that worked for me.
 
Check out Sensaphonic Custom Ear Buds. They have an ambient mic built in, fully adjustable. Lot of big pros using them., their artist roster is crazy. No personal experience, but have met several very happy users. Saving for a set now. Not cheap, lol

http://www.sensaphonics.com/3d-aaro


Sent from my iPhone
 
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Use output 1 to FOH dry.
Use output 2 to your ears wet with a nice reverb. You will love.

After the last effect in your chain, shunt down to a new line, and put a reverb and then an FX loop block (routes to output 2). Make sure output 2 echo is set to none in the I/O:Audio menu.
 
I like the output 2 idea to in ears and output 1 to the house idea. I could also just use a plugin verb on a send for my in ears so might end up taking that route.

I spent some time today running the Axe into a JBL PRX speaker side by side with my real amp and it sounded great bone dry in the room...the medium room reverb which I used in my in ears didn't seem to mess up the sound through the JBL so I could probably get away with it no problem....I also tried can block settings room size to 5, 18-22%, proximity to 2.00 at 200hz with the null mic setting and going through "transformer" preamp with drive on 2.00. All of these settings seemed to subtlely help the sound in my IEMs, though the medium room verb definitelly helped a lot. Large hall just in my in ears was fun to play with as well, giving it a very lively sound. Though tht verb I wouldn't want to send to FOH unless it was for a specific part or effect.
 
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