Virtual Capo - so awesome I am selling alt tuning guitars, but anyone else noticing some high freq tone loss?

Tiger1016

Inspired
So I first want to sing the praises of the Pitch block and Virtual Capo update that we got in 12.08, but I also want to see if anyone else is noticing some tone slight tone loss in the high frequencies.

The slight dilemma first
I feel like simply engaging the Virtual Capo results in a tone difference that seems to entail a slight loss of some of the high frequency detail, even when the pitch shift is set to 0.

For example, my basic test is to chug on a nice and crunchy open palm mute in Drop D then switch the Pitch Block with Virtual Capo mode with no alterations going on (no pitch shifting, high and low cuts at max levels to be irrelevant, etc.). When going back and forth with the Pitch Block engaged and disengaged, I notice a little of the high end frequencies that accentuate the crunchy part of the mute and the pick scrapes are not as present any more, and the low end could possibly be slightly more boomy too (it could be that it is just more present now). It is not a huge difference, but I still find it to be noticeable enough even with no pitch shifting. This observation seemsh to become more noticeable the more you drop the pitch (e.g. -4 to Drop A#).

When I play with the low cut in the Pitch Block, I feel like I can find those somewhat veiled high frequency details just fine but at the expense of the low end fullness. I think I could simply throw in an EQ block after the Pitch Block and experiment until I feel like I have sufficiently regained the original tone back, but part of me feels like this should not be needed. I am curious if this issue could possibly be addressed in a future update. I am super appreciative for what we have now and can happily live with this as is, so I don't want to come off the wrong way.

Is anyone else noticing the same thing? Any good solutions found yet? Or am I just crazy?

The great stuff now
The updated Virtual Capo is a game changer for me. Before the update, there was too much lag for this to be truly useful for me and the warbling was too noticeable on top of that. Now I don’t notice any lag at all, and as long as I am perfectly tuned and intonated, I am not noticing any detectable warbling when live playing (not saying a small amount might still be there is you listened back to super clean tone recordings).

I am already so happy this this now that I am in the process of getting rid of the extra guitars that I have kept around just for lower tunings (e.g. 2 6 strings were needed to cover Drop C# to A#). I am now preferring my Drop D guitar (PRS USA Custom 24 with 52-10 strings and HFS/VB), which I previously had setup for Drop C, with the Virtual Capo mode for all of these drop tunings rather than reaching for my dedicated Drop A# guitar (PRS SE277 baritone with 62-13 strings and BKP Black Dogs). Yeah the USA model should beat out the SE even though they are fairly comparable for their respective uses. But there is also something nice about the crisper tone and quicker responsiveness of the relatively lighter gauge strings and the playability of the normal scale is a hell of a lot easier too.

I am excited to be able to focus my collection on just standard/Drop D solutions and go for quality over quantity instead of having to have more guitars than I need just so I can cover all of the drop tunings that I do. I am also planning to try to switch over to Evertune bridges since I wont need to be changing tunings anymore, which will also help with the Pitch block’s sensitivity to tuning and intonation being off just slightly.
 
I want to clarify that I did notice that the high cut defaults to 10 KHz and made the adjustment to turn it fully clockwise to attempt to fully disengage it.

DLC86 made a comment in a different thread about the potential that the high cut might not be disengaging when turned fully clockwise, which could be a fitting theory. I am not sure how to test if that might be what is actually happening.
 
I know this is an old post, but for me I found the way to make metal riffing sound natural downtuned with the virtual capo: not only changing the low cut in the block, but also the high cut, and most importantly, raising the level of the pitch block output level knob.

I put the VC before the amp, and I create a preset just to dial it in where I set the bypass to a momentary control switch for quick comparison. I'm tuned standard E, so if I want to drop a whole step, I step on the control switch to engage the pitch block while palm muting a power chord on the second fret, so it's a low E power chord. I then lift my foot and compare that sound to the open low E power chord with no pitch shifting. I change the fine tuning of the shift in cents to match the pitch exactly by ear. I change the low cut, high cut, and increase the level until I've reached the point where they sound identical.

The loss of high frequency when downtuning on the VC seems to be from level loss. That was my big realization. I went extreme for a an octave harmony with palm muting and found that I had to raise the level all the way in the pitch block, 20 dB, to make it sound right, but that level, with very careful low and high cut in the VC, made it sound completely natural.

Now, for the low cut, you've got to play with it as you raise the level, because the more lows you let hit the amp, the less level you need. For the high cut, really hone in on your pick attack; if you play with low cut, high cut, and level together, you can get your pick attack perfectly indistinguishable.

I use the fast setting with tracking at zero, which helps keep vibrato natural for me.
 
One more important point: I've found that these settings are very contextual. If I'm matching a palm muted power chord, the low cut, high cut, and level will need to be very different than if I'm matching the shifted tone for a harmony a fifth below for a solo above the twelfth fret. Basically, adjusting those three parameters differently for each section of a song, for each shift amount, is paramount to get it to sound natural. I created different virtual capo channel settings for each part I was working on, and the settings were very different for each shift.

In a nutshell, I found that raising the level to get the pick attack in the ballpark, then setting low cut for just enough beef without flab, then high cut too finish matching your unshifted natural pick attack, is the path for me to get a perfectly natural down shift for metal.

Clean arpeggios I'm still working on, but Cliff has written that a warble may be unavoidable depending on the chords you play, so I may not be able to do as much there. Luckily single notes, power chords, and dyads are no problem!
 
I think @2112 got a eq block to correct that

You could definitely use one, but with two caveats:

To my ears, for metal at least, I don't think a separate block is necessary, because I was able to get it to match by ear just with the pitch low cut, high cut, and output level. Nothing wrong with fine tuning it if you need, but I think for harmonically simple stuff, single note, power chords, and dyads, I'm not seeing them give the pitch block that much trouble, at least with the settings of Fast and 0 for Tracking.

The second one is context. After my experimentation, I would only rely on my pitch block settings for a particular part of the neck, on specific strings. E.g., I was working with simply harmonies, octaves around the 4th to 7th frets on the middle strings, and fifths around the 14th - 17th frets of the G and B strings, and my settings had to be completely different.

And I would think each guitar would need a different level, low cut, and high cut alteration. I mean, each guitar can sound so different from the next, I just can't imagine a one size fits all approach to work well, but I could be wrong.
 
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