FabFilter

Hi. Pro C2 compressor continues to be my most effective daily plug-in. No bugs, easy use, sounds excellent.
When the Prom concerts were on, I gave it a tough test: full scale orchestra plus solo piano.
In that context, the Hold feature really does work better than a slowed recovery.

However... with apologies for invoking Orban, what your Hold doesn't do is freeze the gain when there's not much there to amplify. Optimod (as configured by the BBC anyway) waits until the next passage comes along, then adjusts the makeup gain up or down. So if there's a long pause, you're spared a swelling of amplified noise. On a very long pause, the gain creeps back to a middle level so the next change, up or down, is less extreme. I once listened to an Optimod working hard on an AM broadcast of a Proms concert: there was almost nil dynamic range, as intended, but very few artefacts.

Your Hold surely could be taken that bit further? How about a Freeze preset for concerts - and also stage plays.
Current signal processing could easily distinguish between programme and irrelevant noise, couldn't it, to avoid false recovery?

I'm aware you probably won't wish to confirm if you do have such a feature in mind already. No problem. It would simply be great one day to hear the best go the extra half-mile!

With regards, Howard (UK)

Hi Howard,

Very interesting suggestion, we'll consider it for a future Pro-C update!

Cheers,

Hi Frederik. Nobody could implement it better than you! Thankyou for your interest. Howard.