Manual
The Stig Compressor
A clean, modern VCA compressor with real character stages — not an emulation of one classic box. Transparent when you want it; but the **pre-drive saturates *into* the detector (so drive changes how the compressor grabs, not just the tone), and the post-stage adds Drive / Bitcrush / Wavefolder** after it — from subtle harmonic thickening to full destruction.
The interface - every control mapped
1234567891011< > steps them.Quick start
- Put it after Analyser in the chain.
- In the suite, leave AUTO on — the Stig loads a starting setting for the track type (kick, vocal, bass…).
- Set Threshold for the gain reduction you want (watch the GR meter), then taste with Ratio, Attack, Release.
- Bring level back with Makeup, or pull Mix back for parallel compression.
Compressor core
Where compression starts. Lower = more. Watch the GR meter.
How hard, 1:1 (off) to 20:1 (limiting).
0 dB (hard, punchy) to 24 dB (soft, gentle).
0.1–100 ms. Slow lets transients through (keeps beater/pluck); fast grabs everything.
10–1000 ms, with optional Auto Release that adapts to the material (good on vocals and bus).
Adds back the level lost to compression.
Sidechain high-pass 20–500 Hz — stops low end driving the detector. Essential on bass and full mixes so they don’t pump on every low note.
Peak (follows transients — drums, percussion) or RMS (averages level — vocals and bus, so it rides the body of the sound, not the spikes).
Sum L+R / Max L+R / Dual Mono — how the two channels are detected. Keep stereo sources linked so the image doesn’t wander.
Character
Saturation into the compressor so drive and detection interact. Harmonics switch: *Odd* (symmetric tanh, aggressive), *Even* (asymmetric bias, warm tube-style, DC-blocked), *Both* (blend). Bias scales with drive, so all three are identical at zero drive.
Colour after the compressor: Drive (harmonic warmth→grit), Bitcrush (bit-depth + sample-rate reduction, lo-fi/digital), Wavefolder (fold distortion with symmetry, synth-like, extreme).
How much of the post-stage.
Output & suite integration
Wet/dry blend. 100% = straight compressor; pull back for parallel compression (smash hard, blend under the dry) with no second bus.
Signal invert and active/bypass.
When on, applies the factory preset matching the track type the moment it’s known, and adopts the master ANALYSE broadcast. Brain-controlled set: threshold, ratio, knee, attack, release, makeup (+ drive character per type). The first knob you touch turns AUTO off; press AUTO again to re-apply.
Categories Drums, Bass, Guitars, Keys, Vocals, Bus, Mastering, Character, browsable as sub-menus, steppable with < >. Remembered by name with the session.