sansamp , avalon 737

[cheesypita]

I am currently recording bass on a track that, in the end will be a bit driven and distorted. I generally always record DI (or a channel is atleast included,, and as such am always looking for the 'best' signal, or cleanest reproduction of my bass guitar. well..I know many ppl will disagree or find this surprising, but nothing seems to beat going straight into my Avalon 737.


however, as I mentioned before the end result is to be driven/distorted. And after a bit of playing around with different effects & amp simulators (svx and mark studio), I actually found best results using my sansamp BDDI hardware. Furthermore, I even thought the sansamp routed into the Avalon was the best 'overall' result...meaning that no additional processing besides maybe a little eq would be needed.


my current plan is to use this signal path to record:


Bass -- Sansamp = Avalon 737


However, the sp737 is a single channel and I do not have 2 of them. so, the decision at this pt is to run the unaffected dry signal out the parallel output of the 737, and the pre'd signal bypassing the 737 straight into the mixer. I'd love to run the dirty signal through the Avalon as well, but the producer I am working with would very much like to have a highest quality dry bass track at his disposal..and since the 737 is a fairly synonymous with clarity, I feel the dry channel will get the most benefit out of the avalon. IME, it seems the Avalon always comes in most handy when I don't have a coloring book with me so to speak.


MAIN QUESTION: Do you think it's a bad idea putting the sansamp in front of the 737? as opposed to an external effects insert, etc? running 2 DI's may be redundant, especially because 1 is of higher quality? I'd love to hear from those who have used a sansamp in conjunction with an Avalon in for recording purposes.
your comments are appreciated,

 

[pglaser01]

If I'm following you correctly...hopefully I am...You want the overdriven sound to the board from the BDDI and the clean to the board from the Avalon? If so, then either order is sufficient. You can run bass to the BDDI, use the output or DI to the mixer for the driven tone, and run the unaffected parallel out to the Avalon for the clean. Or send Avalon first then out from there to the BDDI.

Either should work fine, basically it's not a bad idea if it sounds better to you just make sure you and the SE are on the same page about it really.

 

[Frenchy-Lefty]

My suggestion is one clean track through the Avalon and a slightly overdriven one through the BDDI only (since high definition does not really matter on an overdriven track) then mix the two tracks.
I own a Summit audio preamp and a BDDI but lately I have mixed the Summit track with a mic'ed track.

 

[Real Soon]

I think you're setting it up the best way. Getting your totally maxed-out-quality clean signal down gives your producer an ideal master source recording, and from there, he'll be able to mix it with the pleasantly dirted BDDI track to taste, or have fun with re-tracking thru the BDDI via insert, or whatever else.

And, of course, you could always do a separate set of takes with the BDDI thru the Avalon. The more material he has available to work with, the better.

 

[bassadicct]

You could re-amp it through the sans-amp.