Do the drums in sample packs already have compression?

[mr meh]

?

 

[ARTFX]

Depends on what sample pack your talking about, some do some don't.
But who cares, as long as it sounds good.

 

[druu]

Yeah most do but no harm in compressing a few layers slightly on a bus to gel the sound.

 

[mr meh]

thanks for the replies.

the reason i asked is because i was using some different drums from sample packs and im always hearing about using compression on drums (im fairly new to music production btw)
so everytime i add some compression they sound worse than the original sample?

 

[motion audio]

If your compressing something, the best way to look at it, is that you need to know why your doing it. To many people compress things because they've heard its a good thing to do, or someones told them it will help. Its easy to over do it with compression, and you can end up ruining something that was fine in the first place.

A lot of sample packs will have processed hits, and chances are they've been done with good kit. As was said a bit further up, a bit of bus compression can still help, but as for processing each hit, unless theres an obvious need for it, Its probably more hassle than its worth.

 

[Innovine]

if you can't tell if they are compressed or not, then you don't need to worry about adding compression

 

[Phat_Sam]

if you can't tell if they are compressed or not, then you don't need to worry about adding compression

THIS^^

If you cant tell it's compressed then that's a good thing. The idea of compression (especially on drums and unless you're going for a specific effect) is that it's meant to be transparent. Compression is normally used to help mix the sound not effect it. That make sense? It's prolly gonna take you a LONG while before you fully understand it. I've been properly producing for a good year or so and I'm still only scratching the tip of the ice berg with compression!

 

[luciduk]

thanks for the replies.

the reason i asked is because i was using some different drums from sample packs and im always hearing about using compression on drums (im fairly new to music production btw)
so everytime i add some compression they sound worse than the original sample?

easy mate, compression is a 2 way thing you can make sounds moar punchy or you can squash the life out of them very easily. so you need to get used to fiddling around with da threshold and ratio until it sounds better and not worse

 

[motion audio]

Last few posts are spot on. Remember that different compressors will have different sounds to them aswel, some might work really well one one thing, and not so well on another.