DMG Dualism

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Dualism (DMG)

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Krzysztof Oktalski wrote:You've got it, you can disable the second channel entirely though. In Cubase you'd need to set up a quad bus or use the VST3 and use the sidechain.
Are there any instructions on how to set this up? In Cubase, or any DAW for that matter?

Trying to understand how this works. :)
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4damind wrote:
Krzysztof Oktalski wrote:You've got it, you can disable the second channel entirely though. In Cubase you'd need to set up a quad bus or use the VST3 and use the sidechain.
Ok ;)
Another question (or a feature request)... there is only a HP filter to cut from the sides/mids.
Brainworx has this amazing "mono maker" in the bx_digital EQ (quoted from the manual):
"The Mono-Maker will cut off bass-frequencies of the Side-Signal
(S-channel) and will compensate this automatically in the
Mid-Section (M) of the stereo mix with a dedicated shelving EQ in the mono-sum."

Add such feature ;)
+1
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Hermetech Mastering wrote:It already has it, it's the HPF for the side channel. HPFing the side will mono the bass.
If understand this correctly, this is only a simple highpass filter.
The Brainworx mono-maker is compensating this with a dedicated shelving filter in the mono-sum so it's a bit more.

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I'd be tempted just to DIY it by ear in a mastering critical application. HPF the difference, then boost the bass in the sum by however much you like.

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billcarroll wrote:
Krzysztof Oktalski wrote: Are there any instructions on how to set this up? In Cubase, or any DAW for that matter?

Trying to understand how this works. :)
It's the same as any sidechain, in Cubase if you're using VST2 you need to create a 4 input Quadro channel :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KI1s6HnTccM

...but you should use the VST3 version, because it's so much quicker and you can do it in seconds once you're used to it : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZhHLcX4e-g

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4damind wrote:
Hermetech Mastering wrote:It already has it, it's the HPF for the side channel. HPFing the side will mono the bass.
If understand this correctly, this is only a simple highpass filter.
The Brainworx mono-maker is compensating this with a dedicated shelving filter in the mono-sum so it's a bit more.
That goes against the concept of Dualism - we designed it so nothing you do to one channel effects the other, so that you can keep your mid in place, deal with the sides, or keep the left in place, deal with the right. This is so you can use the monitoring section to identify when things are correct, then deal with the other channel. To this end we kept the side -> mid and mid->side seperate, so you can do these tricks, but without it automatically changing the other channel!

If you can show me a demonstration of it being used in a meaningful way then I'd like to check that out, otherwise it seems like the kind of thing we're trying to avoid - why would you want something that changes both channels at once when you could achieve the same thing with separate controls?

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Krzysztof Oktalski wrote:
billcarroll wrote:
Krzysztof Oktalski wrote: Are there any instructions on how to set this up? In Cubase, or any DAW for that matter?

Trying to understand how this works. :)
It's the same as any sidechain, in Cubase if you're using VST2 you need to create a 4 input Quadro channel

...but you should use the VST3 version, because it's so much quicker and you can do it in seconds once you're used to it
Thank you!

Not sure what I was thinking. I use the VST3 send method all the time. That should have been obvious. :dog:
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The manual says, "Your graphics card must support OpenGL2; this should include most cards, though performance with integrated Intel graphics may be poor." Note that this says "may be poor". It does not say "will be poor".

I'm using the Intel video controller (a HD Graphics 4600) on my motherboard because I need the PCIe slot for a different purpose. I've installed the Dualism demo, looking forward to enjoying my test drive and purchase decision. But it appears that casual testing isn't going to be enough to determine whether I should buy the plugin for this hardware. I'm going to have to design a stress test. I suppose that means putting instances with 3D spectographs on more and more tracks until the display starts to slow down, or fails altogether.

Does anyone here know how to structure a more-or-less formal stress test, or know what I should expect in terms of number of instances, early warning signs, etc.? Thanks in advance.

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rrichard63 wrote:Does anyone here know how to structure a more-or-less formal stress test, or know what I should expect in terms of number of instances, early warning signs, etc.? Thanks in advance.
The manual isn't as clear here as it needs to be.

The defining test is this: can you see the UI?

If you get a white page with splodges, then your card is incompatible.

To test performance, simply instance the 3D spectrograph, double click it to enlarge, and spin it around a little. If you're happy with how smooth it feels, then you're good to go!

OpenGL2 is a very low requirement, comparatively, and any card from the last 8 years will almost certainly be fine.

So far, I'm aware that the original macpro1.1 stock card does not work, and I had one report of a very old laptop with integrated Intel graphics which didn't work.

These machines are sufficiently old that even if I work around this issue, the plugin won't be any fun to use, so I'm drawing a line with compatibility. If the UI shows up, it works and you'll have fun! If not, it's not going to work out for your machine. Dualism does a ton of analysis and really old machines aren't really up to it. Snappy and responsive is part of the design spec, so I'll keep things as they are.

Sorry for any confusion!

Dave.
[ DMGAudio ] | [ DMGAudio Blog ] | dave AT dmgaudio DOT com

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DaveGamble wrote:Sorry for any confusion
The confusion seems to have been mostly mine. Thanks for the detailed explanation. One 3D spectograph, full screen, is beautiful on my machine, which is a quite recent model. I'll try running five or six instances just to see what happens.

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rrichard63 wrote:
DaveGamble wrote:Sorry for any confusion
The confusion seems to have been mostly mine. Thanks for the detailed explanation. One 3D spectograph, full screen, is beautiful on my machine, which is a quite recent model. I'll try running five or six instances just to see what happens.
Just so you know, what SHOULD happen (this requires v1.01 btw) is that as load increases, the framerate for each starts to drop a little, to average out the load. That said, it should feel reasonably smooth as low as 20fps. You ought to be able to fill the screen with spectrographs with little consequence.

Dave.
[ DMGAudio ] | [ DMGAudio Blog ] | dave AT dmgaudio DOT com

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I just finished testing Dualism.

First impression:
great tool, ton of analysis tools right out of the box

Second impression:
I threw Dave a really long mail with a sh*tload of comments, crash reports and FRs. Not being a royal butt here, just seeing a lot of potential in this tool. And there are definitely improvements possible in terms of better readout capability, setup, usability - a larger GUI maybe even with custom placement, etc.

I see v1.01 as great start... I'm sure this will turn into something absolutely great by v1.5 or something. Just look at what Equality/EQuick has turned into (EQuilibrium!).


DaveGamble wrote:The defining test is this: can you see the UI?

If you get a white page with splodges, then your card is incompatible.

...

OpenGL2 is a very low requirement, comparatively, and any card from the last 8 years will almost certainly be fine.

So far, I'm aware that the original macpro1.1 stock card does not work, and I had one report of a very old laptop with integrated Intel graphics which didn't work.
I already wrote this to Dave to maybe post this as some sort of Knowledge Base entry... but the solution is actually fairly simple: update your GPU drivers. Or simply install them (if possible).

I am on a NVidia 9500GT. According to specs, my card is capable of OpenGL3.3 - yet I ran into the infamous "white page with splodges" (actually, blue arrows and red peak bars).

I refused to install the NVidia drivers due to long term testing for Steinberg (who insisted that my NVidia card causes issues I proved them otherwise over time) and never ran into any issues whatsoever. Until I got an update on a plugin I currently beta test for, and I also started taking a closer look at Dualism.

After installing just the drivers (fairly old ones even, 320.49 from late 2013), suddenly the GUI appeared. The 3D Spectrograph works like a charm, and the 1/N Oct Analyzer (with 12 divisions) is soothing as hell in full screen mode.

Last time I had that impression, i was visiting a studio that had Pinguin Ing. PG-AMM running in full screen. That was in early 2000s (so over 10 years ago!). Even old Inspector XL or Nugen's Visualizer didn't give me that feeling. So that is a huge compliment.



Else... I can definitely recommend this tool. Even at this state.

I hope however that we see a couple of improvements here and there. But for this price, already with a hint to see "more" in future updates (and maybe a slightly different GUI setup)... there just isn't any real competition on the market.

At least not if you don't want to pay annually or only want to live with a selective set of tools.
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Man, this was good.

Mid and Side filters? And including steepness adjustment? Real nice! Just wish I had an on/off button for each of them, instead of having to mute the whole plug. Muting the whole plug to compare before/after will include any stereo adjustment or pan settings the user has done too.

The whole thing looks very solid. You know it's a serious effort just by the looks of it.

A couple of eyebrow raisers from my side:

I love and use spectragrams lots, lots. But why on earth would you just do a 1 channel spectragram? Can't show a sum of L/R? Nope! Gotta choose, either L, R, Mid or Side. :dog:. Still feel that the Elemental Audio/Roger Nichols InspectorXL is the spectragram to beat, overall the meter suite to beat actually. But this is second best on the spectragram part. Dualism's spectragram is pretty blurry, even with the best of settings I can set. Still, better than Izotope and almost all others on this point.

What about the level meters? When I set them to VU ballistics (love VU, best meters for reading musical flow to me) they don't react like no VU I've experienced (?) They're several times slower, and it doesn't look to be because of the steep exponential curve of the meter either. VU to me means ballistics of 300ms up and down. The VU setting here surely doesn't give me that. I can't even see what characteristics the different presets are set to. More detailed (and manual) settings to adjust the ballistics and other details of the meters would be real good. Can't see if the meters are set according to AES17 or not either.

No "Sum to mono" button? It should have, I think. Also pan law settings to set the plugin to the same pan law as the DAW. Otherwise what you see and hear may not match.

Plus, the different analyzer views can't be tilted to the standard +4,5dB. Only 4 or 5 but not 4,5. No decimals allowed.

Overall damn good work, DMG. Needs soo little, to be soo much better. I don't think people will buy this with the attitude that it's a stereo control plugin. I think people will by this as a monitoring and metering suite. I approached it like that here^.

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se729 wrote:I love and use spectragrams lots, lots. But why on earth would you just do a 1 channel spectragram? Can't show a sum of L/R? Nope! Gotta choose, either L, R, Mid or Side. :dog:. Still feel that the Elemental Audio/Roger Nichols InspectorXL is the spectragram to beat, overall the meter suite to beat actually. But this is second best on the spectragram part. This is a bit blurry though, even with the best of settings I can set. Still, better than Izotope and almost all others on this point.
I filed a similar FR. I'm sure it'll be expanded upon in a future update.
Though other tools clearly outbeat old InspectorXL (now Inspektor by AXIS Plugins). Doesn't mean that Dualism might not get there at some point.


se729 wrote:What about the level meters? When I set them to VU ballistics (love VU, best meters for reading musical flow to me) they don't react like no VU I've experienced (?) They're several times slower, and it doesn't look to be because of the steep exponential curve of the meter either. VU to me means ballistics of 300ms up and down. The VU setting here surely doesn't give me that. I can't even see what characteristics the different presets are set to. More detailed (and manual) settings to adjust the ballistics and other details of the meters would be real good. Can't see if the meters are set according to AES17 or not either.
The bendy meter is definitely hard to read, and I wrote Dave how to improve on that end. as well. Else, you can not set reference levels yet, but else you can switch the ballistics and the "presets" of the Bendy Meter.

se729 wrote:No "Sum to mono" button? It should have, I think.
Good FR.
se729 wrote:Also pan law settings to set the plugin to the same pan law as the DAW. Otherwise what you see and hear may not match.
I remember it having PAN LAW settings in the Preferences.

se729 wrote:Plus, the different analyzer views can't be tilted to the standard +4,5dB. Only 4 or 5 but not 4,5. No decimals allowed.
Isn't the standard tilt 3dB?
But yes, I agree - decimal values are not possible - but if you mouse drag and then double click on a value to enter numeric values... it does show decimals.

se729 wrote:Overall damn good work, DMG. Needs soo little, to be soo much better. I don't think people will buy this with the attitude that it's a stereo control plugin. I think people will by this as a monitoring and metering suite.
I can definitely agree on that end.
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se729 wrote: A couple of eyebrow raisers from my side:

I love and use spectragrams lots, lots. But why on earth would you just do a 1 channel spectragram? Can't show a sum of L/R? Nope! Gotta choose, either L, R, Mid or Side. :dog:.
Sum of L/R +*IS*+ Mid. By definition. Side is L-R too. By definition, so you can always select sum or difference of LR.
Default is Mid to give you L+R, because that's the obvious choice.
No "Sum to mono" button? It should have, I think.
Width=0%.
Also pan law settings to set the plugin to the same pan law as the DAW. Otherwise what you see and hear may not match.
Setup->GUI->Misc->Pan Law.
Plus, the different analyzer views can't be tilted to the standard +4,5dB. Only 4 or 5 but not 4,5. No decimals allowed.
Text entry supported for this very reason.

Hth,

Dave.
[ DMGAudio ] | [ DMGAudio Blog ] | dave AT dmgaudio DOT com

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