sidechain compression attack and release help!

[cmass333]

I know the basics of sidechain compression but i for some reason have never been able to make it sound right in my track. I have trouble setting the attack and release knobs right so that it creates that pumping feeling. Any tips of creating the pumping sound? How to know where to place my attack and release knobs? Where to set threshold, how to adjust gain. i have watched and read a few tutorials but none are too specific and generally all say the same stuff that i already know.

any tips are appreciated!

[virks]

It all depends of the audio what u proccessing
,it,like most of rules are useless because it all depends of audio material...
...so all yo have is your ears.
Trust them neo

[5kinAndBone5]

Try loading up a sustained pad or string noise and draw a long note for the duration of your loop.

Sidechain it to a kick.

Drop attack to Zero. Try setting your release to around 50 milliseconds. Drag threshold down to -20dB or -25dB somewhere. If you have a gain knob for the sidechain source on your compressor, you can turn that up a bit too.

This should provide that classic ducking sound where the string yields to the kick poking through. Solo the string noise and you should be able to clearly hear the space where the kick is essentially punching a hole in it.

Decrease threshold further for really drastic sidechain action. I find that the release time is key though...in house/dubstep etc/ just the right amount of time gives it a proper response where it kinda bounces back in waves.

Hope that helps!

[hifi]

you could put a short release, fast attack, and the ratio would be set to whatever the threshold is at or how much gain loss you want as in if you want your instrument to be hitting -5dB you would set that up for it and there you go. hopefully that information is correct I am not too big on compression i am more of a limiter type of guy.

[nowaysj]

Not gonna lie compression can be hard to hear. So for the retarded (like myself) start with extreme settings and back them down until they start to sound right.

Extreme = low threshold (tricky language here, does turning up the AC mean you're actually turning down the threshold of the thermostat? age old question, open to debate, so excuse my language here, also some comps are kind of upside with the way their handle their threshold, so just roll with me - set it so that the compressor starts compressing when any signal hits, I like comps where you can set the threshold in -db range, makes more sense, so like -40db or whatever the lowest [or highest!] you can set your threshold to)

Fast attack - make it kick in as quickly as possible.

Slow release - make it compress for as long as possible. Some comps have rediculous releases, like 10 seconds.

High ratio - like infinity:1 or whatever the max is, sometimes 10:1 20:1.

If you can't hear what your compressor is doing now, you're more retarded than me, or you have no ears whatsoever.

Now just start working that release back down until it is starting to release in time with how you want it, start dropping the ratio a little bit, 10, 6:1 where ever you like it, then raise the threshold. As you back all of these params back down (or up, jeez...) you might have to adjust others, like going back and slowing the release down a little bit more. Or whateves.

Another tricky thing the tricky tricky pros do is use muted sidechain tracks. Like maybe they want the kick to be ducking a pad. They'll duplicated their kick track, mute the new track and move it forward in time a few ms, or even more. Now depending how you have your attack set on your side chain comp, you can get a gnarly suck into your actual unmuted kick. All kinds of tricks you can play, and play it is. This is all just the surface. Enjoy.