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3. Maximising with Maximal 3 CM

1

Maximal 3 CM is flexible enough to be used as a ‘safety’ maximising limiter on the output or for more flavoursome tasks. Take a quick look at the presets and you’ll see a small but focused choice of options. We’re using the Gentle Mastering preset on our main output. 2

To get started, set the output Ceiling to taste; we’ve set ours to -0.1dB. Maximal 3 CM is a true peak design, so you can be pretty sure that when you set the ceiling, no intersample peaks will slip through. Keep an eye on the Max True Peak meter on the right hand side. 3

Next, to set the amount of limiting reduce the Threshold control. If your signal is quite quiet, you may also want to increase the In Gain parameter. Here we’ve increased In Gain to +3.0dB and set the Threshold to -4.0dB. Here Maximal 3 CM is beginning to catch the peaks.

4

Maximal 3 CM is a maximising design so make up gain is applied automatically. Try adjusting the Threshold. Even before you start to get any limiting, you’ll notice the processor is beginning to boost the signal back up to the ceiling.

5

The Lookahead feature is designed to help handle transients. With settings up to 5.0ms, higher settings can often reduce distortion, though the results may not be as loud. Try out different settings to see what you think. We’ve set ours to 2.0ms which is a good starting point.

6

The limiting action on Maximal 3 CM is designed to always act super fast and catch transients. You can then tailor the response, using the Attack and Release controls. The settings on the Gentle Master preset (6% Attack and 545ms Release) are designed to smooth out the release stage, even under heavier limiting.

7

Try changing the Attack and Release to see how Maximal 3 CM responds. Simply by reducing the Release time it’s easy to make the limiting more responsive and the outcome louder. That said, here we’ve set the Release to 1ms and the result is clearly more crunchy and distorted.

8

You can, of course, use Maximal 3 CM on individual sounds. Here we’ve loaded it on our bass sound. The original sound has a very obvious attack transient and with moderately aggressive Attack and Release settings we’ve added a bit more bite and distortion to the sound.

9

We’ve loaded up Maximal 3 CM on our drum loop and used the Pressurised preset to even out the peaks. The limiter is quick enough to grab the transients and by reducing the dynamic range it gives background noise more presence.