1. Manuals
  2. Brands
  3. Antares Manuals
  4. Recording Equipment
  5. AMM-1
  6. Owner's manual

Antares AMM-1 Owner's Manual

Microphone modeler
Hide thumbs
Table of Contents

Advertisement

Quick Links

Advertisement

Table of Contents
loading
Need help?

Need help?

Do you have a question about the AMM-1 and is the answer not in the manual?

Questions and answers

Subscribe to Our Youtube Channel

Related Manuals for Antares AMM-1

Summary of Contents for Antares AMM-1

  • Page 2 ©2000 Antares Audio Technologies. All rights reserved. All trademarks are the property of their respective owners. All names of microphone manufacturers and microphone model designations appearing in this manual are used solely to identify the microphones analysed in the development of our digital models and do not in any way imply any association with or endorsement by any of the named manufacturers.

  • Page 3: Table Of Contents

    Contents Welcome Technical Support Introducing the AMM-1 Chapter 1 Overview About the Technology So What Exactly Does It Do? Setting Up Chapter 2 Panel Controls and Chapter 3 Connectors The Front Panel The Back Panel Operation Chapter 4 Live or Mixdown?
  • Page 4 The Microphone Models Chapter 5 Adding New Mic Models Realistic Expectations Chapter 6 Get Creative Chapter 7 Appendix Acknowledgments AMM-1 Specifications Index...

  • Page 5: Welcome

    AMM-1 Microphone Modeler. Before you proceed any farther, we’d like to strongly encourage you to fill out and return the AMM-1 registration card. To make it as easy as possible, we’ve included a sticker with your serial number already attached to the card.

  • Page 6: Technical Support

    2. Check our web page for tips, techniques, or any late-breaking information: www.antarestech.com 3. Call your local Antares dealer. 4. Call us at (831) 461-7814 Monday through Friday between 9am and 5pm USA Pacific Standard Time. 5. Email us at: techsupport@antarestech.com For options 3, 4 and 5, please be prepared to provide the serial number of your AMM-1.

  • Page 7: Introducing The Amm-1 Chapter

    It’s as simple as that. With the AMM-1, you can afford to record each track through a model of the specific mic that will best produce that ideal sound you’re looking for.

  • Page 8: About The Technology

    AMM-1 is really quite simple. Basically, audio originally recorded by a microphone is input to the AMM-1 where it is first processed by a “Source Model” which serves to neutralize the known characteristics of the input mic. The audio is then processed by a second “Modeled Mic”...

  • Page 9: Setting Up

    Setting Up the AMM-1 Setting up the AMM-1 is very straightforward. 1. Find a suitable location. The AMM-1 is designed to be mounted in a standard 19-inch equipment rack. 2. Confirm that the included power supply is correct for the elec- tricity in your part of the world.

  • Page 10: Panel Controls And

    The Front Panel 1 Power Switch As will be immediately obvious, pushing this button in turns on your AMM-1. It will be left as a exercise for the user to discover how to turn it off. 2 D-in LED This LED lights to indicate the presence of a valid digital input at the AES/EBU input connector 3 Input Level Adjusts the digital level of the audio.
  • Page 11 LCD. 14 System Button Press this button to set various parameters that affect the AMM-1’s overall functionality (input format, new model download, LCD contrast, etc.) The accompanying LED lights to remind you that you are in System Edit Mode. When the LED is lit, press the SYSTEM button again to exit the System Edit Mode.
  • Page 12 AMM-1 Front Panel 15 Bypass Button Press the Bypass button to pass audio through the AMM-1 without any processing. The AMM-1 can also be placed into Bypass Mode via a footswitch or by MIDI. The accom- panying LED lights to remind you that you are in Bypass Mode, whether the mode was initiated by the Bypass button, the foot switch, or MIDI.

  • Page 13: The Back Panel

    You should plug in your foot switch and then power on the AMM-1. The AMM-1 will detect which kind of foot switch you have and behave accordingly.

  • Page 14: Live Or Mixdown

    (singer, instrument, etc.). This information will be required to properly set the Source Mic controls during the mix. Signal Flow The AMM-1 is divided into a number of discreet functional blocks as follows (in the order of signal flow): Input...

  • Page 15: Controls

    Controls: Input Section Output For setting the output level of the processed audio. The use of each of the individual controls is covered below. Controls Input Section The Input Level knob adjusts the digital level of the audio. Turning the Input Level knob will temporarily display the Input Level value on the LCD: In most instances, you should start with the Input Level set to 0dB.

  • Page 16: Source Mic Section

    Press the Edit Select button until the Source LED is lit. This puts the AMM-1 in Source Mic Edit Mode and allows you to specify the mic and the settings that were (or will be) used to capture the input sound.
  • Page 17 4 Select Bypass from the menu It must be stressed that selecting option 2, 3 or, especially, 4, will compromise the AMM-1’s ability to accurately reproduce the sound of the desired modeled mic. That’s not to say that you won’t be able to get something that sounds great, just that it’s unlikely to be an...
  • Page 18 A/B Comparison/Proximity Note: If we don’t have a model of your mic and you really, really want to use it as a source mic, you might consider giving us a call and seeing if we’re interested in modeling it. If so, you’d have to be willing to send it to us and have it out of your possession for about 5 working days.
  • Page 19 Also note that the effect of the Proximity control is unique for each model of microphone. The AMM-1 does not use a generalized approximation of proximity effect. Each model reflects the specific physical properties that create the proximity effect for that indi- vidual mic.
  • Page 20 The purpose of all the controls in the Source Mic section is to neutralize the effects of the source mic. So, when you select a low-cut filter, you’re telling the AMM-1 that the source mic recorded the audio with that much bass attenuation and, therefore, the model must now boost the bass an equal amount to remove the source mic’s sonic coloration.

  • Page 21: Modeled Mic Section

    Modeled Mic Section Here’s where the fun really starts. Press the Edit Select button until the Model LED is lit. This puts the AMM-1 in Modeled Mic Edit Mode and allows you to select the mic (and its settings) whose characteris- tics you to want to apply to your audio.
  • Page 22 • If Bypass is selected in the Source Mic list and Bypass is selected in the Modeled Mic list, the final output of the AMM-1 will be identical to the original input signal (with the exception of any added tube saturation).
  • Page 23 “room tone” increases (assuming that you are not in an anechoic chamber). The AMM-1 does not model this effect. However, judicious use of the Proxim-...
  • Page 24 In some cases, the label is the cut-off frequency of the low-cut filter as specified by the mic’s manufac- turer. However, the AMM-1 does not simply apply a generic low- cut filter at the stated frequency, but instead models the actual filter performance of each modeled mic.

  • Page 25: Preserve Source

    (i.e., from the front of the microphone). Since the AMM-1 has no way of knowing the actual placement of the signal source, it does not attempt to simulate off-axis performance.

  • Page 26: Tube Saturation

    1) Preserve Source: Treble O Bass O With neither button pressed, frequency splitting does not take place and the AMM-1 operates in its normal manner according to the settings in the Source and Modeled Mic sections. 2) Preserve Source: Treble O Bass With the Bass button pressed, the source mic’s bass characteristics...

  • Page 27: Bypass

    Bypass. Bypass Pressing the Bypass button passes audio through the AMM-1 with- out any processing. The AMM-1 can also be placed into Bypass Mode via the Bypass Footswitch or by MIDI. The MIDI SysEx message to engage Bypass is: F0 00 01 26 11 02 F7...

  • Page 28: Output Level

    System Edit Pressing the SYSTEM button at any time will place the AMM-1 in System Edit mode. The System Edit pages allow you to set param- eters which affect the AMM-1 globally, as well as to access the FLASH Model Management functions.
  • Page 29 System Edit: Input/Output Page Input/Output Page This page is used to set the format and sample rate of the AMM-1’s input. Use the Cursor button to move between the Input and Sample Rate fields. In the Input field, represents one of the...
  • Page 30 This page is of primary use to those who have more than one AMM-1 in their system, as it allows you to specify exactly which units will receive any particular download. The more cautious among you might also want to keep this set to “No” so that there is no chance of any inadvertent downloads.
  • Page 31 FLASH memory (see the Compress FLASH Page below for more details). A bit of explanation: When you first take your AMM-1 out of the box, it contains models of approximately 100 mics perma- nently stored in EPROM (more accurately, 200 models, in that each mic model includes both a source version and a model version).
  • Page 32 System Edit When you select a model that has previously been marked as de- leted, the top line of the display will read: Pressing the Enter button at this point will restore the model to active status. It will once again appear in the appropriate mic selection list and will not be subject to erasure during the FLASH compression process.

  • Page 33: Adding New Mic Models

    Adding New Mic Models To add new models to your AMM-1 you will need a Mac or PC computer equipped with the following: • An internet connection (to download the model files from our web site) •...
  • Page 34 Note: Many MIDI sequencers provide the capability to edit Standard MIDI Files. In the case of AMM-1, you should resist any temptation you may have to use this ability to fool around with the contents of the mic model files. Corruption of the FLASH...
  • Page 35 Adding New Mic Models If FLASH memory becomes full in the middle of a download, the following message is displayed: Press the Bypass button to return to normal operation. If necessary, use the Delete/Restore FLASH Models Page and the Compress FLASH Page to erase enough mics from FLASH to make room for the new models.
  • Page 36 Chapter 6: Realistic Expectations (or, AMM-1 Meets the Space-Time Continuum) Although the AMM-1 seems in many ways to be almost magic, it is, in fact, simply very clever science. And as such, it remains subject to those pesky laws of physics.
  • Page 37 If your audio is not well-recorded in the first place, the AMM-1 can to do very little to improve it. If you start with a poorly recorded track, all the AMM-1 will do is make it sound like a track that was poorly recorded with a great mic.
  • Page 38 2. Process this file through the AMM-1 with the Source Mic set to Bypass (so the spike is passed through the Source section un- changed) and the Modeled Mic set to the ATM31.
  • Page 39 4. Now take that processed file (which is now a model of the spike as it would have been recorded by the ATM31) and send it through the AMM-1 again, this time with the Source Mic set to the ATM31, and the Modeled Mic section set to Bypass. If that Source Mic model is doing its job, it should actually remove the characteristics of the ATM31, including that smeared transient.
  • Page 40 Chapter 7: Get Creative Up to this point, all of the instructions in this manual have focused on how to use the AMM-1 for its primary purpose: making one mic sound as accurately as possible like another. But don’t let that limit you.

  • Page 41: Appendix

    Appendix Listed below are all of the mics models that are shipped with the AMM-1. (Be sure to check the Antares web site frequently for additional models.) Please Note: All trademarks appearing below are the property of their respective owners. The following manufacturer names and...
  • Page 42 Solid Tube Large Diaphragm Condenser Vocals, strings, general purpose Alesis AM61 Large Diaphragm Condenser w/tube circuitry A rich warm sound ideal for vocals and instruments Audio Engineering Associates R44C Large Diaphragm Boundary - Ribbon Replica of the classic RCA 44 ribbon mic Audio-Technica ATM11 Dynamic Drums ATM31 Small...
  • Page 43 Audix CX111 Large Diaphragm Condenser General purpose SCX1 Small Diaphragm Condenser Piano, drum overheads B & K 4007 Large Diaphragm Prepolarized Condenser Close-micing drums, percussion, brass Behringer ECM8000 Measurement mic Ultravoice XM8500 Handheld vocal mic beyerdynamic M-500 Limited Edition Classic (Silver) Large Diaphragm Condenser Vocal, instruments MC-834...
  • Page 44 Earthworks TC30K Omni Condenser Drums, guitar, bass ElectroVoice PL20 Mid Diaphragm Dynamic Early predecessor to the RE20 - Bass, drums, vocals, electric guitar N/D357 Mid Diaphragm Dynamic Frequency expressly contoured for female vocals Groove Tubes MD-1 Large Diaphragm Tube Condenser Studio vocal, general purpose Lawson L47MP...
  • Page 45 Oktava MC-012 Small Diaphragm Condenser General purpose instruments and live performance MK-219 Large Diaphragm Condenser General purpose MK-319 Large Diaphragm Condenser Vocal, general purpose BK5A Uniaxial Ribbon Vocal, general purpose 77dx Classic Ribbon Try it on everything Rode Large Diaphragm Condenser Vocals, instruments Large Diaphragm Condenser Vocals, acoustic guitar, winds, piano...
  • Page 46 Shure Beta 98D/S Mini Condenser Toms, snares, percussion SM7A Dynamic Vocals, bass amp SM57 Large Diaphragm Dynamic Guitar, guitar amp, drums SM58 Large Diaphragm Dynamic Vocals, general purpose SM81 Large Diaphragm Condenser Guitar, cymbals, strings, vocals, piano SM98A Large Diaphragm Condenser Drums, brass, winds KSM32 Large Diaphragm Condenser...

  • Page 47: Acknowledgments

    Acknowledgments As you might imagine, sourcing and modeling all of those mics was (and remains) an interesting logistical challenge. Luckily for us, we have had assistance from a variety of interested dealers, manufac- turers, studios and individuals who were all willing to let us subject their precious microphones to our arcane modeling ritual.

  • Page 48: Amm-1 Specifications

    AMM-1 Specifications Data format 20-bit linear 56-bit internal processing Sample rates 44.1 kHz, 48 kHz Frequency response 10Hz–20kHz, +0.06dB/-0.23dB Distortion + Noise Less than 0.005% (@1kHz) 20 bit 103 dB Dynamic Range (A weighted) 97 dB S/(N+D) 24 bit 105 dB Dynamic Range (A weighted)

  • Page 49: Index

    Index Symbols * 16 grounding 9 Realistic Expectations 36 -w 17, 21 choice of input mic 36 excessive frequency boost Input Level 10 A/B Comparison 18 Input Level meter 10 mic technique 37 about the technology 8 mic variations 36 acknowledgements 47 off-axis response 37 LCD 10...
  • Page 50 URL 6 website address 6 Welcome 5 what the AMM-1 does 8...

Table of Contents