Reply To: Gear makes me feel stupid.

[face (chris) JantonParticipant]

I have been doing the software gear for going on 7 years. All I ever wanted was a U67 and an LA2A...when I was growing up and getting to hang out in the studio (with my teacher/mentor) all I ever saw was a "real" instrument and a microphone. They were very nice microphones. I never got a tour of all the lights and things in the control room.

Things started getting better for me after I decided to learn what an LA2A actually was and did. "Leveling Amplifier" makes a whole lot more sense than "compressor". Just like I think "Sta-Level" is such a fine name for gear.

I'm working on a small, portable system to take on the road. I don't have all the room in the world, so my ITB gear needs to shrink.

Turns out that Logic Pro X has pretty much "all the gears" or something close, but doesn't work outside of the Logic world...that's OK.

I did the IK Studio Bundle back in like 2011 during Black Friday sales, so got started easy...T-Racks, Amplitube, SampleTank. All the toys. I install T-Racks on all of my systems, thrilled by the 10 for 1 deal this month, have all the T-Racks I need...works so very well.

In the "modern" AI world of things the iZotope folks have my ears as well. Neutron 2, Ozone 8, RX 6 (soon 7), and Nectar just make things so simple it's almost not fair.

One week I do T-Racks. One week I do iZotope. Might actually give up the Slate bundle for practical reasons - hate the iLok...and the IK and iZotope tools are certainly at least similar in the skill set.

For my Logic buddies I try to stay in the pocket with the Apple tools.

For me knowing "what it does" and some of "how it does it" is far more helpful than the "it makes it 'better', but it is subtle" that I hear a lot.

I found my Rosetta Stone when I learned about the compressors in Logic. All the flavors are there. Not emulations, but "inspired by". This cheat sheet sums it up far better than I can

https://www.pro-tools-expert.com/logic-pro-expert/2018/9/18/ever-wanted-to-really-know-all-about-the-logic-compressor-well-now-you-can-expert-download

I am learning to love the T-Racks EQ-73 and EQ-81 for color (don't quite need VMR) and the de-esser from IK. The CSR hall/iverse/plate/room reverbs cover a wide swath.

I am finally learning how to translate the gear into the built-in effects I have in to my XR18 mixer (yes, all the classics) for me to use live.

It used to be simple - pick up the axe, play the axe, have a good time. Now I get to shape it a bit more.

Pardon me if I ramble.