Re: Is Ozone 4 much better than Ozone 3
Posted: Sun Feb 21, 2010 10:37 pm
I don't know about the Ozone limiter in v4 but I was not personally too enamoured with the v3 limiter myself actually - it comes in soundforge 9 along with the mastering reverb, eq and multiband compressor. I say this as an advanced user.
To me, Precision Limiter in UAD and Elephant, Kjaerhus MPL-1 PRO and PSP Xenon were all superior to the Ozone v3 limiter. I know Tarekith doesn't like the Sonalksis Limiters, and they have some shortcomings, but I liked that better after spending some time with it, and when I blind tested it with 4 other limiters including Elephant, Ozone and Xenon, my friend whose project I was mastering preferred the Sonalksis result 3 out of 5 times, 2nd 1 time and 3rd 1 time with Elephant being picked the other 2 times as first and second on 2 tracks and last on another. The Ozone result was bottom choice 3 out of 5. This was on a rock and pop project. So while I agree the Sonalksis isn't the most transparent, like the Waves L2, it's colour added something as far as the client was concerned that sounded good. Transparency is key for very dynamic recordings such as classical/soundtrack/jazz or more subtle type music. If you make Belgian trance, limiter transparency is not usually too much of an issue, which is why the L2 is used so much.
The biggest problem with Ozone for beginners are they use the presets too much, such as moderate rock etc - there will be times when those settings aren't the best for the music even if you're making rock music. rock music encompasses everything from quiet ballads to in your face distortion, so one preset can never be the go to 100% of the time. As for Elephant - when you know what you're doing with limiting, having those options is brilliant and therefore with experience, you know how to apply the right settings and get a very desirable result. For newbies, all I can suggest is that you really try things out, use the gentlest settings first, with higher release times and keep taking it up a notch from there and don't look to push your RMS levels more than a couple of dBs until you're familiar with the process.
However, the metering in Ozone is excellent as are the timestretching, dithering and sample rate conversion algorithms. I HATE the mastering reverb with a passion though, although having m/s is useful.
To me, Precision Limiter in UAD and Elephant, Kjaerhus MPL-1 PRO and PSP Xenon were all superior to the Ozone v3 limiter. I know Tarekith doesn't like the Sonalksis Limiters, and they have some shortcomings, but I liked that better after spending some time with it, and when I blind tested it with 4 other limiters including Elephant, Ozone and Xenon, my friend whose project I was mastering preferred the Sonalksis result 3 out of 5 times, 2nd 1 time and 3rd 1 time with Elephant being picked the other 2 times as first and second on 2 tracks and last on another. The Ozone result was bottom choice 3 out of 5. This was on a rock and pop project. So while I agree the Sonalksis isn't the most transparent, like the Waves L2, it's colour added something as far as the client was concerned that sounded good. Transparency is key for very dynamic recordings such as classical/soundtrack/jazz or more subtle type music. If you make Belgian trance, limiter transparency is not usually too much of an issue, which is why the L2 is used so much.
The biggest problem with Ozone for beginners are they use the presets too much, such as moderate rock etc - there will be times when those settings aren't the best for the music even if you're making rock music. rock music encompasses everything from quiet ballads to in your face distortion, so one preset can never be the go to 100% of the time. As for Elephant - when you know what you're doing with limiting, having those options is brilliant and therefore with experience, you know how to apply the right settings and get a very desirable result. For newbies, all I can suggest is that you really try things out, use the gentlest settings first, with higher release times and keep taking it up a notch from there and don't look to push your RMS levels more than a couple of dBs until you're familiar with the process.
However, the metering in Ozone is excellent as are the timestretching, dithering and sample rate conversion algorithms. I HATE the mastering reverb with a passion though, although having m/s is useful.
