Tip: Use "Bright" instead of "Bright." WHAAAA..?

B

Ben.Last

Experienced
So, I've noticed over time that I don't like some of the artifacts that seem to come into play when the Bright Switch is engaged. Luckily, the Bright knob on the Tone page seems to be able to get the same effect without those artifacts.

It seems to take about 3dB to get the knob to add approximately what the switch does. It's entirely possible that it boost slightly different frequencies than the switch, but it sounds good to me.

So, if you engage the Bright Switch on your patches, you may want to try the knob instead.
 
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Ben.Last said:
So, I've noticed over time that I don't like some of the artifacts that seem to come into play when the Bright Switch is engaged. Luckily, the Bright knob on the Tone page seems to be able to get the same effect without those artifacts.

It seems to take about 3dB to get the knob to add approximately what the switch does. It's entirely possible that it boost slightly different frequencies than the switch, but it sounds good to me.

So, if you engage the Bright Switch on your patches, you may want to try the knob instead.
Click to expand...

They use very different techniques to get the job done. They work in different ways.
The bright switch is an emulation of the bright cap found in the preamp section and is drive dependent. You can adjust the capacitors value with the bright cap parameter.
The bright knob is a simple filter between the preamp and poweramp.
 
dpavel said:
So is a filter , is not part of the preamp ?
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I don't understand the question?

Bright switch = bright cap - capacitor across drive pot
Bright Control = filter between preamp and power amp - can both darken or brighten the tone (it does the same thing as the presence on a triaxis)
 
javajunkie said:
I don't understand the question?

Bright switch = bright cap - capacitor across drive pot
Bright Control = filter between preamp and power amp - can both darken or brighten the tone (it does the same thing as the presence on a triaxis)
Click to expand...

To add to what Sean has said

The bright cap is across the drive pot making it a variable high pass filter, shifting the knee as the drive is altered. The lower the drive, the more bass is filtered out.

The bright control on the Triaxis (presence) was simply a low pass filter. At max it was out of the circuit, allowing all the treble through. Therefore it is the same as a Cut control but in a different place in the circuit (unless of course Cliff has changed how it functions in the Axe).
 
so if you aren't digging the character of the switch, just play with the cap values and you might find a nice middle ground....correct?

i usually prefer the bright switch on, no matter what...but depending on the amp and the guitar it can be a smidgen much every now and then. i'd still rather have it on than off, though.
 
javajunkie said:
They use very different techniques to get the job done. They work in different ways.
The bright switch is an emulation of the bright cap found in the preamp section and is drive dependent. You can adjust the capacitors value with the bright cap parameter.
The bright knob is a simple filter between the preamp and poweramp.
Click to expand...

All that matters to me is that I can use the Bright Knob to get it to sound indistinguishable from having the Bright Switch engaged except it doesn't have the weird background noise as the notes decay. The differing function of how the two are doing what they do doesn't really factor in.
 
jlynnb1 said:
so if you aren't digging the character of the switch, just play with the cap values and you might find a nice middle ground....correct?

i usually prefer the bright switch on, no matter what...but depending on the amp and the guitar it can be a smidgen much every now and then. i'd still rather have it on than off, though.
Click to expand...

It's not the character of the switch I don't like. I really like what it does to the tone on most of the amps I'm using. It just adds a weird fizz to the low level amp noise that's really audible as notes die out.

I should have mentioned in my initial post that I'm doing this on high gain patches.
 
Ben.Last said:
It's not the character of the switch I don't like. I really like what it does to the tone on most of the amps I'm using. It just adds a weird fizz to the low level amp noise that's really audible as notes die out.

I should have mentioned in my initial post that I'm doing this on high gain patches.
Click to expand...

With high gain patches things work a bit different compared to low gain. Settings that you do before the gain stages change the character of the distortion, they allow you to change how loud frequencies enter the circuit so they get distorted more or less depending on much you turned them up before the circuit. EQing corrects everything after the gain stages. So the bright knob as a preamp setting is less an EQing tool there and more like a colouring tool.
 
I've noticed that some amps default with the Bright switch on, even if said amp doesn't actually have a bright switch... is there a reason for this?
 
Genome said:
I've noticed that some amps default with the Bright switch on, even if said amp doesn't actually have a bright switch... is there a reason for this?
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Many amps have a bright cap, even if it's not switchable. It's a common mod to alter the value of the bright cap or even snip it out of circuit completely.

Having it switchable (and even the ability to change the value of the capacitor) is one of those nice little features in the axefx which allows you to 'modify' your circuit without getting the soldering iron out.
 
Okay, so amps that default with it on should be left as such if you want to keep things as authentic as possible? I had been turning it off as I figured if the amp didn't have one it shouldn't be on!
 
Genome said:
Okay, so amps that default with it on should be left as such if you want to keep things as authentic as possible? I had been turning it off as I figured if the amp didn't have one it shouldn't be on!
Click to expand...
yes. for authentic reasons. these would be amps that don't have a Bright switch exposed, but still have a Bright cap in the circuit.
 
Genome said:
Okay, so amps that default with it on should be left as such if you want to keep things as authentic as possible? I had been turning it off as I figured if the amp didn't have one it shouldn't be on!
Click to expand...
correct. Leave it alone to be authentic as possible. But don't be afraid to turn it off if it sounds better. Like all things, use your ears first.
 
Of course not, ears are the most important thing. I like to treat the Axe as if it were the real head that I'm using though, so for the most part I only tweak controls that are found on the actual amp and leave the rest be. Some might say I'm limiting myself but I've gotten better results that way than diving into more complicated settings.
 
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