Dynamic: every effect side by side

What it shows. The speed of the Compressor's gain reduction, in decibels per millisecond, in the moments after a 440 Hz tone jumps from −40 to −10 dBFS. One ridge per Attack setting: the fastest at the front (cyan), the slowest at the back (amber).

How to read it. Time after the jump runs left to right on a log scale; the height of a ridge above its own baseline is how fast the gain is falling at that instant (the white bar at the right is the height scale). A tall, narrow spike at the left is a compressor that snaps shut; a low, wide swell further right is one that eases in. Hover any ridge for the exact speed.

What it found.

• At Attack 0 the gain is already falling at 7.4 dB/ms at the first readable instant and 90% of the 20 dB reduction is done in 4 ms.
• At Attack 19 the peak speed is 0.21 dB/ms, 35 times slower, and it takes 139 ms.
• The ridge never changes shape, only its scale: the same detector slowed down, not a different attack curve per setting.
• The first 1.2 ms cannot be resolved (one cycle of the test tone).

What it shows. The same view for the recovery: how fast the Compressor's gain climbs back after the tone drops from −10 to −40 dBFS, one ridge per Release setting.

How to read it. As above, with speed now meaning gain returning. A ridge that starts low, swells and then stops abruptly is a release that hesitates, then recovers at a steady rate and arrives all at once.

What it found.

• Recovery speed peaks at 0.83 dB/ms at Release 0 (33 ms to 90%) and falls to 0.030 dB/ms at Release 14 (835 ms).
• At Release 15 the gain had not come 90% of the way back when the 1.3 s window ended.
• Every ridge starts near zero and swells later: after the level drops the gain waits before it moves, so a short gap between notes passes before the compressor has let go.
• The first 6 ms are not shown: the loud tone is still ringing out of the signal path there and swamps the reading.

What it shows. The recovery after a 30 dB drop, cut into five stages by how much of the gain has come back, and the time each stage takes compared with a release that recovers at a perfectly steady rate. Each outline is the median over all of an effect's Release settings.

How to read it. The dotted ring at 1× is a straight-line release. A spoke longer than the ring means the recovery lingers in that stage; shorter means it hurries. The dashed outline is the textbook exponential (opto-like) release, which hurries at first and lingers at the end.

What it found.

• Compressor waits before it moves (the first tenth takes 2.0× the straight-line time), then recovers a little faster than the line through the middle (0.74×); shape index −0.03.
• MultiBand Comp 1 waits before it moves (the first tenth takes 2.1× the straight-line time), then recovers a little faster than the line through the middle (0.91×); shape index −0.04.
• MultiBand Comp 2 (mid band) stays within 5% of the straight line after a short hesitation (1.26× on the first tenth); shape index −0.01.
• On the index, 0 is a straight line and +0.16 a one-pole exponential, so neither compressor has the fast-then-slow tail of an optical cell or an RC network: both release at a constant number of dB per second, the linear-in-dB recovery of a digital design, and the Compressor adds a hold before it starts.
• Cmp+Dist+Dly, Cmp+Odrv+Dly, Comp + Dist are read through a distortion stage that follows the compressor and flattens level changes, so their outlines describe what reaches the output, not the compressor alone: Cmp+Dist+Dly keeps a steady rate at first and lingers on the last stretch (1.7×); shape index +0.06; Cmp+Odrv+Dly keeps a steady rate at first and lingers on the last stretch (1.4×); shape index +0.04; Comp + Dist keeps a steady rate at first and lingers on the last stretch (1.4×); shape index +0.08.

What it shows. The Compressor's gain plotted against how fast that gain is moving, over one cycle of the test tone getting 30 dB louder and then quiet again. Time is not an axis: it runs around each loop.

How to read it. Start at the right-hand white dot (quiet, gain at rest). When the tone jumps, the trace dives (gain falling fast) and travels left to the other white dot, the fully clamped gain, where it comes to rest on the centre line. When the tone drops, it rises a little above the line and drifts back to the start. Each loop is open at the top of its dive: the first 1.2 ms after the jump cannot be resolved. The vertical scale is stretched near zero so the slow return is visible beside the fast dive. A bypassed effect would be a single dot.

What it found.

• All seven loops share nearly the same upper edge: the release hardly depends on Attack (its peak speed runs from 0.126 to 0.118 dB/ms across the whole range).
• Only the lower edge moves, from a dive of 7.4 dB/ms at Attack 0 to 0.21 dB/ms at Attack 19.
• Every loop is smooth and closes on itself: one gain value, one speed, no wobble or overshoot in the control signal.

What it shows. The 2nd to 7th harmonics that Cmp+Dist+Dly adds to a pure tone, at ten input levels from −60 to −6 dBFS, default settings.

How to read it. Input level runs left to right, the harmonic number upward; the upper block is a 1 kHz note, the lower a 100 Hz note. Brighter amber is a louder harmonic and the number in each cell is its level in dB below the note itself. Hatched cells are within 10 dB of the noise measured between harmonics: nothing measurable there.

What it found.

• Total harmonic distortion passes 1% at −54 dBFS. At −6 dBFS the 3rd harmonic is strongest at −10 dB and distortion totals 40% on the 1 kHz note and 41% on the 100 Hz note; only odd harmonics (3rd, 5th, 7th) clear the noise at that level, the signature of a symmetric clipper.
• The columns barely change from −54 dBFS to −6 dBFS: the compressor ahead of the clipper feeds it the same level whatever comes in, so the distortion does not clean up when you play softly.

What it shows. The 2nd to 7th harmonics that Cmp+Odrv+Dly adds to a pure tone, at ten input levels from −60 to −6 dBFS, default settings.

How to read it. Input level runs left to right, the harmonic number upward; the upper block is a 1 kHz note, the lower a 100 Hz note. Brighter amber is a louder harmonic and the number in each cell is its level in dB below the note itself. Hatched cells are within 10 dB of the noise measured between harmonics: nothing measurable there.

What it found.

• Total harmonic distortion passes 1% at −54 dBFS. At −6 dBFS the 3rd harmonic is strongest at −11 dB and distortion totals 29% on the 1 kHz note and 41% on the 100 Hz note; only odd harmonics (3rd, 5th, 7th) clear the noise at that level, the signature of a symmetric clipper.
• The columns barely change from −54 dBFS to −6 dBFS: the compressor ahead of the clipper feeds it the same level whatever comes in, so the distortion does not clean up when you play softly.

What it shows. The 2nd to 7th harmonics that Compressor adds to a pure tone, at ten input levels from −60 to −6 dBFS, default settings.

How to read it. Input level runs left to right, the harmonic number upward; the upper block is a 1 kHz note, the lower a 100 Hz note. Brighter amber is a louder harmonic and the number in each cell is its level in dB below the note itself. Hatched cells are within 10 dB of the noise measured between harmonics: nothing measurable there.

What it found.

• From −24 dBFS upward total harmonic distortion stays below 0.017% in both blocks: this effect changes level without adding harmonics.
• Any dim cells at low input levels are the noise floor, as on the bypass matrix.

What it shows. The 2nd to 7th harmonics that MultiBand Comp 1 adds to a pure tone, at ten input levels from −60 to −6 dBFS, default settings.

How to read it. Input level runs left to right, the harmonic number upward; the upper block is a 1 kHz note, the lower a 100 Hz note. Brighter amber is a louder harmonic and the number in each cell is its level in dB below the note itself. Hatched cells are within 10 dB of the noise measured between harmonics: nothing measurable there.

What it found.

• Total harmonic distortion passes 1% at None dBFS. At −6 dBFS the 3rd harmonic is strongest at −50 dB and distortion totals 0% on the 1 kHz note and 0% on the 100 Hz note; only odd harmonics (3rd, 5th, 7th) clear the noise at that level, the signature of a symmetric clipper.
• The columns barely change from None dBFS to −6 dBFS.

What it shows. The 2nd to 7th harmonics that MultiBand Comp 2 adds to a pure tone, at ten input levels from −60 to −6 dBFS, default settings.

How to read it. Input level runs left to right, the harmonic number upward; the upper block is a 1 kHz note, the lower a 100 Hz note. Brighter amber is a louder harmonic and the number in each cell is its level in dB below the note itself. Hatched cells are within 10 dB of the noise measured between harmonics: nothing measurable there.

What it found.

• Total harmonic distortion passes 1% at None dBFS. At −6 dBFS the 3rd harmonic is strongest at −59 dB and distortion totals 0% on the 1 kHz note and 0% on the 100 Hz note; only odd harmonics (3rd, 5th, 7th) clear the noise at that level, the signature of a symmetric clipper.
• The columns barely change from None dBFS to −6 dBFS.

What it shows. The 2nd to 7th harmonics that the bypassed signal path adds to a pure tone, at ten input levels from −60 to −6 dBFS, default settings.

How to read it. Input level runs left to right, the harmonic number upward; the upper block is a 1 kHz note, the lower a 100 Hz note. Brighter amber is a louder harmonic and the number in each cell is its level in dB below the note itself. Hatched cells are within 10 dB of the noise measured between harmonics: nothing measurable there.

What it found.

• From −24 dBFS upward total harmonic distortion stays below 0.005% in both blocks: the capture chain itself adds nothing measurable, so every bright cell on the other matrices belongs to the effect.
• The few dim cells at low levels are the noise floor showing through a quiet note.

What it shows. Two notes, 220 Hz and 697 Hz, played together through Cmp+Dist+Dly at ten levels. Each dot is a tone the effect added that was not played: amber for sums and differences of the two notes (intermodulation), cyan for harmonics of one note alone. 54 possible products up to the 7th order are checked at every level.

How to read it. Frequency runs left to right, input level upward; a bigger, brighter dot is a louder product (hover for its level and the arithmetic that produces its frequency). The white diamonds are the two notes. Drag the slider to change Drive. Products within 6 dB of the noise beside them are left out.

What it found.

• At Drive 0 the effect adds 11 measurable products at most, the first handful appearing at −60 dBFS; at Drive 127 there are 50 at −6 dBFS and already 42 at −60 dBFS. The amber dots between and below the notes are what makes a distorted chord sound muddy where a single distorted note sounds merely bright: they are not harmonically related to either note.

What it shows. Two notes, 220 Hz and 697 Hz, played together through Cmp+Odrv+Dly at ten levels. Each dot is a tone the effect added that was not played: amber for sums and differences of the two notes (intermodulation), cyan for harmonics of one note alone. 54 possible products up to the 7th order are checked at every level.

How to read it. Frequency runs left to right, input level upward; a bigger, brighter dot is a louder product (hover for its level and the arithmetic that produces its frequency). The white diamonds are the two notes. Drag the slider to change Drive. Products within 6 dB of the noise beside them are left out.

What it found.

• At Drive 0 the effect adds 17 measurable products at most, the first handful appearing at −60 dBFS; at Drive 127 there are 48 at −6 dBFS and already 38 at −60 dBFS. The amber dots between and below the notes are what makes a distorted chord sound muddy where a single distorted note sounds merely bright: they are not harmonically related to either note.

What it shows. All 319 timing captures of the dynamics family (each a different effect or control setting) as one line apiece, crossing eight measurements that a level curve cannot show: how long the gain takes to clamp and how fast it moves at its quickest, how much of a sudden hit gets through in the first millisecond, how long and in what shape the gain recovers, how far the gain moves for a 30 dB jump, and the distortion (at −10 dBFS) and idle noise that come with it.

How to read it. Each vertical rule is one measurement with its own scale (lowest value at the bottom, highest at the top, both printed). Follow a line left to right to read one capture; lines that travel together are settings that behave alike. Click a name in the legend to hide or isolate an effect; hover a point for the setting and the value. A line that breaks has no reading on that axis, usually because a distortion stage after the compressor pins the output level and hides the attack.

What it found.

• Two populations separate cleanly on the right-hand axes.
• Compressor, MultiBand Comp 1, MultiBand Comp 2 sit below 0.46% distortion with idle noise from −99 to −89 dBFS; Cmp+Dist+Dly, Cmp+Odrv+Dly, Comp + Dist sit at 39–41% with noise −73 to −65 dBFS, 24 dB noisier on average, and remove almost the whole 30 dB step because their clipper, not their compressor, sets the output level.
• On the left, the Compressor fans out along attack time and clamp speed in step (slower attack, lower speed), while most MultiBand Comp 2 lines lie on top of each other: its low and high band controls do not touch a 440 Hz tone.

What it shows. A map of all 319 timing captures. Each capture's two gain curves (clamping down, then letting go; 280 points) are compared with every other capture's, and the two directions along which the curves differ most become the map's axes (principal component analysis). No effect names or settings go into the calculation.

How to read it. One dot per capture, coloured by effect, larger for higher settings of the control being stepped; a thin line joins the settings of one control in order, so each control draws a path. Distance is difference in behaviour: dots on top of each other responded identically. The axes are in dB of curve difference and have no other meaning.

What it found.

• The first two components carry 99% of all the variation, so the flat map loses little.
• Three islands form: the Compressor, MultiBand Comp 2, and the three distortion chains together, which the map cannot tell apart because their clipper pins the output whatever the compressor ahead of it does.
• Within an island each control draws its own arm: the Compressor's Attack and Release paths leave the same point (the default) in different directions, 118 and 104 dB long.
• The tight clump in MultiBand Comp 2 is every low-band and high-band setting landing on the same spot.

What it shows. The Compressor's eight Ratio settings again, but with the output expressed as loudness in sones instead of decibels. Make-up gain is removed (every curve is matched to bypass at the quietest step) so the curves show squashing alone. Loudness needs a playback level, which a recording does not have: these charts assume monitors set so a −20 dBFS tone plays at 83 dB SPL (the film and broadcast reference). Phon values use the ISO 226:2003 equal-loudness contours for pure tones; sones double for every 10 phon.

How to read it. Input level left to right; loudness upward on a doubling scale, so one gridline up sounds twice as loud. The dotted line is the untouched signal. The lower a curve ends, the less loud the loud notes are allowed to get.

What it found.

• Bypassed, the loudest step sounds 42 times as loud as the quietest.
• At Ratio 7 (21:1) it sounds only 3.9 times as loud: the 54 dB between the softest and loudest note has become a loudness difference a listener would call roughly 4-fold. Ratio 1 (1.5:1) leaves 18×. Ratio 3 (3.0:1) leaves 8×. Ratio 5 (7.0:1) leaves 5×.

What it shows. The loudness range between a soft note (−42 dBFS) and a loud one (−6 dBFS) at three pitches, bypassed and through each compressor at its default settings, in phon (10 phon is a doubling of loudness).

How to read it. Taller bars mean more of the difference between soft and loud survives. Compare each coloured bar with the grey bypass bar of the same pitch.

What it found.

• The same 36 dB step is not the same size to the ear at every pitch: bypassed it spans 51 phon at 100 Hz but 36 at 1 kHz and 35 at 6 kHz, because loudness grows faster with level in the bass (a quiet bass note falls toward inaudibility sooner than a quiet mid note).
• The Compressor leaves 17, 12 and 12 phon in the three bands, so it removes 34 phon of bass range against 24 at 1 kHz: the same ratio is heard as a stronger squeeze on low notes.
• The multiband compressors remove different amounts per band by design.

What it shows. What a listener hears after a loud note stops and a quiet one continues: the quiet note's loudness, as a percentage of what it would be with no compressor action, against time, for six Release settings.

How to read it. Time after the loud note runs left to right (log scale). A curve low on the chart means the quiet note is still being held down; where it crosses the dotted line the note is back to half its normal loudness.

What it found.

• Immediately after the loud note the quiet one is at 24% of its normal loudness (the compressor is still holding 20 dB of gain reduction).
• At Release 0 it is half as loud again after 20 ms; at Release 15 that takes 1241 ms.
• Because loudness follows level on a compressed scale, the last few dB of recovery are barely audible: the ear hears the release as finished well before the meter does.

What it shows. How long the Compressor takes to clamp down when a tone jumps up by 6, 12, 18, 24, 30 and 34 dB from the same quiet level, at its fastest, default and slowest Attack.

How to read it. The size of the jump runs left to right, the time upward. A flat line would be an attack that takes the same time however hard it is hit.

What it found.

• The attack is not a fixed time: at the default setting it takes 14 ms for a 6 dB jump and 34 ms for a 34 dB one.
• A harder hit takes longer to bring under control, which is what a detector with a fixed time constant does when it has further to travel.
• Times here are to within 1 dB of the settled level, read from a 7 ms level window.

What it shows. The same six jumps on the way back down: how long the gain takes to recover after each.

How to read it. As above. A straight rising line means the recovery time is proportional to how far the gain was turned down.

What it found.

• Recovery takes 84 ms after the smallest jump and 259 ms after the largest at the default setting, rising in step with the amount of gain reduction (6 to 25 dB): a wait of about 37 ms, then about 109 dB of recovery per second whatever the depth.
• That is the hold followed by a constant-rate release found from the single 30 dB step above, now confirmed across six depths. Attack shifts the whole line up by the time the slower attack adds.

What it shows. MultiBand Comp 2's Attack for each of its three bands, timed on a tone that sits inside that band (100 Hz, 440 Hz, 6 kHz) jumping 30 dB.

How to read it. The setting runs left to right, the time to clamp down upward; one line per band.

What it found.

• With a tone of its own each band answers its control: the high band runs from 18 to 379 ms and the low band from 36 to 283 ms.
• On the single 440 Hz tone used before, the low and high controls did nothing, because that tone only reaches the mid band.
• The 100 Hz reading uses a 20 ms level window (two cycles), so low-band times under about 20 ms cannot be told apart.

What it shows. The same for Release: time for each band's gain to recover after its tone drops 30 dB.

How to read it. As above. A gap in a line is a setting where the recovery was too fast or too small to time.

What it found.

• The high band recovers in 16 to 903 ms across its range.
• The low band reads 82 to 185 ms, with far less spread than the other two.
• Where a line turns back down at the longest settings, the gain had not finished recovering when the 1.5 s segment ended, so those points understate the time.

What it shows. The compressor stage of the three distortion chains, timed on a 30 dB level step with Drive turned to its minimum, at each Attack setting. The dotted line is the stand-alone Compressor.

How to read it. The setting runs left to right, the time upward. With the drive at its default the clipper pins the output level and none of this is visible; at minimum drive the compressor's own action comes through.

What it found.

• Cmp+Dist+Dly 14 to 143 ms; Cmp+Odrv+Dly 14 to 143 ms; Comp + Dist 16 to 167 ms.
• At minimum drive the chains still remove about 20 dB of the 30 dB step.
• These takes were recorded 1.8 dB hotter than the stand-alone Compressor's, which shifts where the threshold is crossed slightly but not the timing.

What it shows. The compressor stage of the three distortion chains, timed on a 30 dB level step with Drive turned to its minimum, at each Release setting. The dotted line is the stand-alone Compressor.

How to read it. The setting runs left to right, the time upward. With the drive at its default the clipper pins the output level and none of this is visible; at minimum drive the compressor's own action comes through.

What it found.

• Cmp+Dist+Dly 29 to 795 ms; Cmp+Odrv+Dly 29 to 794 ms; Comp + Dist 46 to 918 ms.
• The chains' compressors follow the same law as the stand-alone Compressor, setting for setting, so it is the same stage placed ahead of a clipper.
• These takes were recorded 1.8 dB hotter than the stand-alone Compressor's, which shifts where the threshold is crossed slightly but not the timing.

What it shows. How long the Noise Gate's output takes to come up once it starts to open, when a tone jumps from −60 to −20 dBFS, at each Attack setting. Threshold is at its highest (raw 97) so the quiet tone is below it.

How to read it. The setting runs left to right, the opening time upward (from 20 dB below the open level to 1 dB below it).

What it found.

• Opening takes 5.5 ms at Attack 0 and 83 ms at Attack 19.
• The delay before it starts to open cannot be read: the recording has no time reference (test T2).
• The shortest readable time is about 4 ms, the width of the level window.

What it shows. What the gate does after the tone drops back to −60 dBFS, at each Release setting: how long it stays open before it starts to close, and how long the closing takes.

How to read it. The setting runs left to right, milliseconds upward. The amber line is the wait, the cyan line the closing itself (from 10% to 90% of the way down).

What it found.

• Release mostly sets a wait, not a fade: the gate stays open for 20 ms at Release 0 and 611 ms at Release 14, then shuts in 12 to 58 ms.
• Shut, it turns the tone down by at least 31 dB; the true figure may be larger, because the closed level is at the recording's noise floor.
• At Release 15 and above it had not started to close 1.3 s after the tone dropped.

What it shows. Every pair of controls that was recorded at all four corners, each control at its low and its high test setting, for the Dynamic effects. For each pair: what the second control does to the tone with the first one low, what it does with the first one high, and how far apart those two are as a share of the larger.

How to read it. One dot is one pair; hover for which. At the left edge the second control does the same thing wherever the first one is, so the two simply add. At the right edge it does something at one end of the first control and nothing, or the opposite, at the other. The same pairs are drawn as curves on each effect's sheet above, under two controls together.

What it found.

• Of 26 pairs in which the second control changes the tone, 16 are ones where the first control changes what the second does.
• The pair furthest apart is Mid Gain with High Gain on MultiBand Comp 2.
• Tone only is compared, smoothed over about two thirds of an octave, so a change in timing alone does not show here.
• On an effect that moves by itself part of any gap is the movement caught at a different moment.