Darkglass Hyper Luminal Settings?

[GrooveWarrior]

I have a DGHL on the way. I currently have a Seymour Duncan Studio Bass Compressor, and wanted A/B something a little different. With the DG having so many more features and controls, what are some of your favorite settings, or settings I should try? I play a Warrior 4 and a US EBMM Sterling 4. Mostly play fingerstyle funk, and don't really slap at all. I prefer a mid-boost around 300-400Hz for my prominent EQ, just for reference.

Thoughts?

 

[gdro]

@GrooveWarrior I haven't had mine very long and I'm more of a studio guy than bass player, but so far I like the FET mode best, possibly because I love 1176s in the studio. And for me the pedal really shines when you tweak it in the Darkglass Suite app, even if all you do is raise the Sidechain High Pass Filter so your bottom end isn't being affected. I set mine at 224hz, for now, but use your ears and set it to your own instrument and sound preference. I leave the attack and release faders (in the app) at their default settings, then run the Time control full up for a slow attack and quick release. I also run the Blend control all the way up so you don't hear the direct sound - just my preference. I adjust Ratio and Compression controls depending on what I'm playing.
Hope that helps - it's a cool compressor!

 

[Le beau JP]

@GrooveWarrior I haven't had mine very long and I'm more of a studio guy than bass player, but so far I like the FET mode best, possibly because I love 1176s in the studio. And for me the pedal really shines when you tweak it in the Darkglass Suite app, even if all you do is raise the Sidechain High Pass Filter so your bottom end isn't being affected. I set mine at 224hz, for now, but use your ears and set it to your own instrument and sound preference. I leave the attack and release faders (in the app) at their default settings, then run the Time control full up for a slow attack and quick release. I also run the Blend control all the way up so you don't hear the direct sound - just my preference. I adjust Ratio and Compression controls depending on what I'm playing.
Hope that helps - it's a cool compressor!

FET mode with HPF set that way, to me makes it sound a little muddy and doesnt cut through the mix as much as id like to.

I cant wait lockdown to be over so I can test it again in a jam session. I figured out lately that it might sound better with the HpF left untouched , but with blend knob never past 12 o’clock.

I used to set HPF to 200hz and then into a TC Hyper Gravity to compress low end (200hz and lower) at a different level and that sounded great for recording.

there is so much going with this pedal im still learning the functions even after 2 years of ownership ahahaa

 

[crguti]

the hpf beyond 100hz is just mud.

 

[Le beau JP]

the hpf beyond 100hz is just mud.

Agreed. Thats why I think the HPF is meant to be used to do multiband compression with another compression pedal, or the Microtubes X series that have low comp customizable on them.
That is a clever idea from darkglass.

but if used as a main compression pedal, HL is better with HPf untouched and its better to work with blend knob IMO

 

[sunbeast]

the hpf beyond 100hz is just mud.

Agreed. Thats why I think the HPF is meant to be used to do multiband compression with another compression pedal, or the Microtubes X series that have low comp customizable on them.
That is a clever idea from darkglass.

but if used as a main compression pedal, HL is better with HPf untouched and its better to work with blend knob IMO

I’m not certain that you two understand the function of the HPF in the Hyper Luminal. It is only working on the sidechain, which is a separate copy of your input signal that is only used to trigger when the compressor engages (the Threshold control raises and lowers the gain of the sidechain without raising and lowering your output gain, the HPF cuts lows in the sidechain without cutting lows in your compressed signal)- so the HPF just prevents subharmonic frequencies peaks from triggering the compressor. Low subharmonics have a lot of energy even though they are barely audible, so little things like bumping strings could trigger the compressor even when you aren’t digging in and cause you to get an overly squishy response. The sidechain HPF helps clean up and tighten the compression response so that it only clamps down on intentional note attacks. The entire frequency range of the bass signal is still compressed when the threshold is passed- the HPF isn’t affecting the signal range actually being compressed at all (only affecting when the compression is triggered).

 

[Dope Staircase]

Thanks for the input. So where do you recommend setting the HPF?

 

[gdro]

@sunbeast Yes! Thank you for that excellent description of the HPF in the sidechain. I've used that technique on whole mixes (not with the DGHL) so the bottom end energy doesn't dominate what the mix bus compression is doing.
@Dope Staircase As for setting the HPF frequency - I think you need to adjust it depending on the bass you're using, how hard to play, etc. I like to set it so the compression is evening out the overall sound, but I don't hear it working much or at all on the low bass.

 

[sunbeast]

@sunbeast Yes! Thank you for that excellent description of the HPF in the sidechain. I've used that technique on whole mixes (not with the DGHL) so the bottom end energy doesn't dominate what the mix bus compression is doing.
@Dope Staircase As for setting the HPF frequency - I think you need to adjust it depending on the bass you're using, how hard to play, etc. I like to set it so the compression is evening out the overall sound, but I don't hear it working much or at all on the low bass.

Yeah it works great for tightening up really modern-sounding active basses or aggressive players in particular, because the low-end from 5 or 6 string/ downtuned basses combined with preamp bass-boost can cause more basic comps to just clamp down all the time in the lower register and totally squash the natural dynamics even when playing relatively lightly (not to mention it can exacerbate making the higher strings sound particularly thin relative to the low strings). If you raise the sidechain HPF up significantly then you can make the compressor only respond to actual attack dynamics. My first non-DAW compression with an HPF sidechain was the Cali76-CB and it was the first time I ever really felt like it made sense to use a pedal compressor. I think the HL is even better in most aspects (there was a cool aggressive tonal mojo in the Cali, but it was also impossible to dial out), and far more versatile with the 3 separate engines

 

[Dope Staircase]

Ok. I'm dumb but trying to be smarter about this. If I have a 4-string passive P bass what would be a good starting point for the HPF in a pop-to-hard rock situation?

 

[sunbeast]

Ok. I'm dumb but trying to be smarter about this. If I have a 4-string passive P bass what would be a good starting point for the HPF in a pop-to-hard rock situation?

I set mine around 150-200hZ or so IIRC. The effect will be pretty subtle until you’re able to really feel/hear it working. You will also likely need to raise the Threshold and possibly adjust the Attack/Decay a bit as you turn it up. Play around with the Frequency and listen to how it affects the response of the compressor (particularly when playing low notes), including turning it all the way down so that it is disengaged just so you can hear what it is doing.

 

[Real Soon]

Pretty early on, a lot of users found joy setting the HPF sidechain to 120Hz, so it still "hears" most of what the bass is doing even if that bass is a P w/ flats and rolled-off tone. Higher settings, IMHO, will suit players who generally deliver more mid and upper-end content and want that to be what the HL listens to, but the differences are also going to be fairly subtle for most scenarios.

For a lot of purposes, BUS is a very musical comp, and I'm now learning how much I love setting it to engage a bit, but then dial back the mix so it's giving a studio-type parallel compression. The Symmetry is ideal, for me, for that P with flats sound when I want to, say, enhance its thump via slower attack, and let its naturally darker sound work in my tonal favor. And FET is fun for all-purpose aggression over here... colorful squish, flattening out slap or pick attacks, or going SUPER GIRTH via the All-In mode (whatever it's called with all the ratio buttons light up).

In dialing it in, typically I think how generally hard I want the comp to work and set the ratio accordingly. Then decide how I want it to shape my attack, and adjust the time setting. Then, Compression for the intensity of the effect, and finally output to compensate and mix how I like. Mix-wise, I'll go from barely breathing to 100% wet; every part of the range has its value.

 

[Le beau JP]

I’m not certain that you two understand the function of the HPF in the Hyper Luminal. It is only working on the sidechain, which is a separate copy of your input signal that is only used to trigger when the compressor engages (the Threshold control raises and lowers the gain of the sidechain without raising and lowering your output gain, the HPF cuts lows in the sidechain without cutting lows in your compressed signal)- so the HPF just prevents subharmonic frequencies peaks from triggering the compressor. Low subharmonics have a lot of energy even though they are barely audible, so little things like bumping strings could trigger the compressor even when you aren’t digging in and cause you to get an overly squishy response. The sidechain HPF helps clean up and tighten the compression response so that it only clamps down on intentional note attacks. The entire frequency range of the bass signal is still compressed when the threshold is passed- the HPF isn’t affecting the signal range actually being compressed at all (only affecting when the compression is triggered).

Not sure I understand 100% of all that ahaha
How about the blend knob? From what I understand, the HPF makes the blend knob almost useless?

my ears tell me that the HPF set at 200hz makes my sound more bassy and less defined in a band context (jam or live) but when I leave it stock (5hz) I barely hear any bass in band context. Thats with the blend knob at 3 oclock.

if I leave the HPF at 200hz and set the blend knob below 12 oclock, am I right to think ill just blow speakers and negate any nice effect the HL might have?

the HL not being a multiband compressir makes it harder to set right or understand than some other!

and when you talk about Threshold, i guess you talk about the Compression knob? Raising the Threshold is turning that knob counterclockwise. Just to make sure im on the same page

thanks

 

[sunbeast]

Not sure I understand 100% of all that ahaha
How about the blend knob? From what I understand, the HPF makes the blend knob almost useless?

my ears tell me that the HPF set at 200hz makes my sound more bassy and less defined in a band context (jam or live) but when I leave it stock (5hz) I barely hear any bass in band context. Thats with the blend knob at 3 oclock.

if I leave the HPF at 200hz and set the blend knob below 12 oclock, am I right to think ill just blow speakers and negate any nice effect the HL might have?

the HL not being a multiband compressir makes it harder to set right or understand than some other!

and when you talk about Threshold, i guess you talk about the Compression knob? Raising the Threshold is turning that knob counterclockwise. Just to make sure im on the same page

thanks

The HPF definitely doesn’t make the Blend knob useless. As I said before, when the compressor engages it is still compressing the entire frequency range of the signal (not “letting lows through uncompressed” if that’s what you are imagining), the HPF just helps fine-tune when your compressor engages to best fit your bass/playing-style/etc. You may find it most useful to set the Compression knob (“threshold”) by paying particular attention to how much it is compressing low register notes on your E string (and B if you have it) compared to your other strings, then adjusting the HPF from there

With the HPF at the stock setting (essentially “off”), the compressor is likely clamping down on the low strings almost all the time once you set the Compression (yes this is what I referred to as “Threshold!) knob to get a mild amount of compression. Oftentimes those sub transients are so plentiful that even lighter playing may trigger them if you aren’t playing super cleanly. The compressor doesn’t “hear” the bass the way our ears do- the low frequencies tend to have the most energy, while our ears hear mostly midrange. If you are squashing those low transients all the time, you can lose all definition in your low notes and just kinda flatten them out (hence being almost “missing” in a mix)- this would be a good use for additional Clean Blend, in order to return some of the detail of those notes.

Compressors without the benefit of sidechain HPF are particularly dependent on clean blend much of the time in order to do their magic. Many/most(?) compressors are using built-in hard-wired sidechain filtering already to shape the response of the compression- its a big part of what makes different compressors (even among the same compression types) sound/function so differently. They just don’t often allow you to tweak this filtering at all the way the HL does. For me, even with the HL I pretty much always have my Clean Blend at 1 o’clock or below to retain definition.

If your tone seems undefined at any compression/HPF setting, the Blend control is useful to help bring balance/clarity back. 3 o’clock Blend setting is generally going to be almost no clean blend on the HL, as the compressed signal has some automatic make-up gain added that raises its level up quite a bit higher than the Clean signal. You can test this by dialing in a particularly squashed compression tone and rolling in Clean til you can actually start hearing definition return (likely below noon).
Still, if you feel you are letting too many bass spikes through with the the HPF at 200hz, then experiment with dropping it some. There is no magic number, it’s all taste and different instruments/rigs/players/tastes

 

[Le beau JP]

The HPF definitely doesn’t make the Blend knob useless. As I said before, when the compressor engages it is still compressing the entire frequency range of the signal (not “letting lows through uncompressed” if that’s what you are imagining), the HPF just helps fine-tune when your compressor engages to best fit your bass/playing-style/etc. You may find it most useful to set the Compression knob (“threshold”) by paying particular attention to how much it is compressing low register notes on your E string (and B if you have it) compared to your other strings, then adjusting the HPF from there

With the HPF at the stock setting (essentially “off”), the compressor is likely clamping down on the low strings almost all the time once you set the Compression (yes this is what I referred to as “Threshold!) knob to get a mild amount of compression. Oftentimes those sub transients are so plentiful that even lighter playing may trigger them if you aren’t playing super cleanly. The compressor doesn’t “hear” the bass the way our ears do- the low frequencies tend to have the most energy, while our ears hear mostly midrange. If you are squashing those low transients all the time, you can lose all definition in your low notes and just kinda flatten them out (hence being almost “missing” in a mix)- this would be a good use for additional Clean Blend, in order to return some of the detail of those notes.

Compressors without the benefit of sidechain HPF are particularly dependent on clean blend much of the time in order to do their magic. Many/most(?) compressors are using built-in hard-wired sidechain filtering already to shape the response of the compression- its a big part of what makes different compressors (even among the same compression types) sound/function so differently. They just don’t often allow you to tweak this filtering at all the way the HL does. For me, even with the HL I pretty much always have my Clean Blend at 1 o’clock or below to retain definition.

If your tone seems undefined at any compression/HPF setting, the Blend control is useful to help bring balance/clarity back. 3 o’clock Blend setting is generally going to be almost no clean blend on the HL, as the compressed signal has some automatic make-up gain added that raises its level up quite a bit higher than the Clean signal. You can test this by dialing in a particularly squashed compression tone and rolling in Clean til you can actually start hearing definition return (likely below noon).
Still, if you feel you are letting too many bass spikes through with the the HPF at 200hz, then experiment with dropping it some. There is no magic number, it’s all taste and different instruments/rigs/players/tastes

thank you Sir, you just made my life better today. It feels like I just gain Yoda level of wisdom. I thought I knew how a comp works. Now I see the light. Lol

 

[GrooveWarrior]

Lots of great info here. The Seymour Duncan won the A/B comparison and I’ve already sold the Darkglass.

 

[Le beau JP]

Lots of great info here. The Seymour Duncan won the A/B comparison and I’ve already sold the Darkglass.

How does it compare? I was really interested in this one too before I learned how my HL works lol
More or less noisy? Is it transparent or does it color the tone?

 

[GrooveWarrior]

How does it compare? I was really interested in this one too before I learned how my HL works lol
More or less noisy? Is it transparent or does it color the tone?

The Seymour Duncan Studio Bass Compressor does add a bit of color to your tone. It has an EQ switch, and I think the tone it adds is great. The Darkglass has a ton of options and sounds really great. I preferred the Bus setting. One of the things I didn’t care for with the DGHL is that you could really feel the “pumping” of the compressor, where I don’t get that with the SDSBC. I play a Warrior and a US EBMM Sterling, and with those Basses, I preferred the SDSBC. I listened through my amp, through headphones, recorded, any way I could, and I continued to prefer the Duncan.

 

[sunbeast]

The Seymour Duncan Studio Bass Compressor does add a bit of color to your tone. It has an EQ switch, and I think the tone it adds is great. The Darkglass has a ton of options and sounds really great. I preferred the Bus setting. One of the things I didn’t care for with the DGHL is that you could really feel the “pumping” of the compressor, where I don’t get that with the SDSBC. I play a Warrior and a US EBMM Sterling, and with those Basses, I preferred the SDSBC. I listened through my amp, through headphones, recorded, any way I could, and I continued to prefer the Duncan.

The EQ Switch of the Seymour Duncan is an EQ filter for the clean/dry blend (so “Low” mode is only blending in clean/dry lows with the Blend control and “Mid” mode only clean midrange)- it’s a super cool idea that I wish were available in other comps (I don’t know another comp that really has any EQ filtering on the Dry signal).
I’m curious if you experimented much with the Attack/Decay settings in the Hyper Luminal? The SD comp has a fixed fast release and fairly fast adjustable Attack, something that would require adjustment of settings in the DG Suite to emulate (ideally by finding a similar release time to fix internally and set the Attack control to only control attack in the software). Also adjustment of the HPF may be useful to a degree. Not sure how close it may be capable of getting, but at least a good way to mitigate “pumping”

 

[GrooveWarrior]

The EQ Switch of the Seymour Duncan is an EQ filter for the clean/dry blend (so “Low” mode is only blending in clean/dry lows with the Blend control and “Mid” mode only clean midrange)- it’s a super cool idea that I wish were available in other comps (I don’t know another comp that really has any EQ filtering on the Dry signal).
I’m curious if you experimented much with the Attack/Decay settings in the Hyper Luminal? The SD comp has a fixed fast release and fairly fast adjustable Attack, something that would require adjustment of settings in the DG Suite to emulate (ideally by finding a similar release time to fix internally and set the Attack control to only control attack in the software). Also adjustment of the HPF may be useful to a degree. Not sure how close it may be capable of getting, but at least a good way to mitigate “pumping”

I did not get into the software at all. Part of what made me keep the Duncan is there was just too much going on with the DGHL. I really didn’t want that many options in the end.