FabFilter User Forum
Achieving Maximum Bass
Apparently, the secret to a widely compatible bass is boosting the upper harmonics.
Problem is, not every recorded bass instrument has much in the way of usable upper harmonics to boost. So you have to make them, somehow.
I went about tackling this with a duplicate of the original signal, adding distortion for 'harmonic excitement' with Saturn, HPF, and some compression, then mixing it back in with the original. Problem is, every mode I've tried in Saturn tends to add a bit of fuzz.
Is there some not-immediately-obvious clean waveshaper mode I haven't tried with Saturn? Or does anyone have a better, tried-and-true approach to this kind of procedure they'd like to share?
I'm tempted to just buy the thing from Waves that does all this, but I don't like subscribing to "magic", if you know what I mean.
I've done this with some success using a much less sophisticated distortion plugin than Saturn (Studio One's RedlightDist). What works for me is band-pass filtering the duplicate track both before and after the distortion. The before part would be easy to do in Saturn: just select the appropriate frequency band to distort, but for the after part, although you have some control with the graphic eq thingy, you would need an eq plugin to band-pass it properly.
For bass, I've found that what works best is HP-filtering it at around 250-350 Hz and LP-filtering it just below any fret noise, hiss, etc. (i.e. any "non-musical" stuff). Then distort and then band-pass filter the distorted signal again, as I said, to place those harmonics just where you want them. If you're just HP-filtering it maybe you're letting through too much harmonic content too high up in frequency and that's where your fuzz is comming from.
Try the preset "The Tube bM" (it's in Best Of)and just increase the drive till you're happy! Or the presets "808 Designer O" (it's under drums) and play with the mix control and the levels/drives of the different bands (particularly the middle one).
Thanks! I'll give all these a try!