It’s a common mantra when talking about audio processing and mixing decisions to say that it’s all about the sound, that nothing else matters. “If it sounds good, it is good”.

I’m not going to say that is wrong, but I am going to suggest that, like most things, it’s more complicated than that. All the listener cares about is how it sounds. They don’t care about how you got there, what you used or your inspired use of automation going into the chorus! Actually most people don’t really care about how it sounds, they are more concerned about how it makes them feel, which isn’t quite the same thing…

Hardware Control

The first thing which probably comes to mind when talking about the response of audio plugins is the difference between controlling parameters on a screen with a mouse and the tactile control of a hardware control surface. Whether you choose to use one or not this is a discussion you’ll have come across before and ultimately it comes down to whatever works for you.

That said, being able to control more than one parameter at a time makes an enormous difference, particularly to processes which interact with each other. The feel of the faders and encoders on a control surface make a difference too, not directly to the sound but definitely to the results. But there is also how the plugin itself responds. Not how it sounds but how it behaves while the controls are being set up.

The 1176 is an excellent example of a control set which doesn’t lend itself to being controlled with a mouse, one parameter at a time. Instead of having a variable threshold, the input level control is used to set the level relative to a fixed threshold and the output is turned down to offset the increase in level introduced by the input control. Anyone who has ever used the hardware will probably have set these controls simultaneously using a contrary rotation with both hands.

Changing your ‘handshake’ with the gear you’re using inevitably changes the ‘feel’ and this change in response can lead to different, usually faster and usually better decisions. After all a fast mix is often a good mix…

Beyond Hardware Control

Beyond the method you use to control the parameters presented, there is also the behaviour of the controls themselves. More subtle but quite possibly more significant in why we choose the plugins we do, particularly as in so many cases modern plugins are sonically so well matched.

Returning to the 1176, my preferred FET compressor is usually from the UAD 1176 Classic Limiter collection, though I have been a longtime fan of the Softube FET compressor too. They don’t sound identical, indeed the UAD is a collection of 1176s which all sound different, but the Softube FET, for all its great sound and added flexibility over the original 1176, usually gets passed over in favour of the UAD these days. After some investigation I think I know why…

When setting up the UAD 1176 I find I can get the results I’m after more quickly. I’ll usually flip the faders on my S1 so that instead of using the encoders to balance input vs output and get the required amount of compression I can pull one fader up and the other fader down - it works for me. After dialling in the kind of setting I’m after I might try different ratios. More often than not I’ll find myself back on 4:1 but I’ll often try the others.

An added benefit here is the trick you can do with the UAD 1176 Classic Limiter Collection where by holding Shift you can add as many ratios together as you like, not just the ‘All Buttons In’ offered by most 1176 plugins. Find out more about this trick here.

The FET compressor sounds different, but just as good, it offers fully variable ratios too, though I almost always just click the numbers to get the ‘proper’ 1176 ratios but when I change the ratio on the FET compressor I find I have to tweak the input and output more to get a comparable perceived amount of compression than I do when using the FET Compressor.

I ran both plugins through Plugin Doctor and my suspicions were confirmed. As you increase the ratio on the UAD 1176, the threshold rises, meaning that under typical circumstances the compression action is roughly comparable. The same tests on the FET compressor shows a more ‘correct’ response where the threshold doesn’t really change, apart from the 20:1 setting for some reason.

These differences aren’t about the range of the parameters, it’s about how they work while in use. Are there other examples of how a control’s behaviour while it is being used affects the results? I’d say the intimidatingly complicated sounding ‘Q/Gain Dependency’ of equalisers is another good example.

What is Q/Gain Dependency?

In an analogue equaliser there tends to be a change in the bandwidth of bell filters as different amounts of gain are applied. In vintage designs there often wasn't direct access to the Q of the filter and this interdependence was simply part of the character of the EQ. Some EQ designs are better regarded in some applications over others because of the way they respond in use and this is, at least in part, due to the Q/gain dependency of the equaliser's design. Not many EQs offer control over Q/Gain dependency but it is a key feature of the Sonnox Oxford EQ and one which differentiates it from the majority of the alternatives out there. By changing the EQ Mode in the Oxford EQ you can access different Q/Gain dependency characteristics. See the graphs below:

Looking at the EQ graphs you can see that, in an EQ where as long as a variable Q is available, any of these shapes can be achieved but the way Q changes (or doesn’t) with changes in gain gives an entirely different ‘feel’ to the equaliser while it is in use. It changes the response in use.

There are lots of examples of plugins which feel better to use than others. My preference for certain saturation plugins comes to mind, though I’m not sure how or even what you might measure to quantify that. Maybe to quantify the difference is to miss the point. Differences in response lead to difference in ‘feel’. Feel is rather elusive and hard to define. But then again so is ‘Good’ sound.

How does ‘feel’ influence your choices?