This is another one of Sreejesh Nair's posts on this excellent blog which he has given us permission to repost here. In this post Sreejesh has written about some things that he doesn't see or use usually in Pro Tools and some alternate ways of using plugins. Check these out, over to you Sreejesh....

1. Clip Back Or Forward

This is one thing that had skipped my mind for a long time until I realised this feature existed. So basically how it works is you can have a clip nudge or move under or over a clip. The default behaviour is over the clip. This can be changed under the Clip Menu with the Send to Back or Send to front option. The video below will help explain that.

2. Pro Compressor for Performance Reverbs

This is one trick I do with the Avid Pro Compressor. It works using the listen button on the compressor. This plays back just the gain reduced signal. So, how I use this is to have a send from a track to a reverb aux. Before the reverb plugin, I insert the Pro Compressor and also engage the listen. I adjust the threshold to a point where the gain reduction happens only on higher levels of the voice or snare. This means whenever the singer throws his voice, it will be reverbed. (Or you can add any process you like). This is really cool and saves a lot of time compared to riding a fader for the same effect. You can also side chain and have some cool effects with that.

3. Pro Multiband Compression Split

Ok, this is not little known but not that famous either! Like the Pro Multiband Splitter, the Pro Multiband Compression plugin is also one that allows for something called AOS or Auxiliary Output Stems. This plugin allows the different bands to be split to different auxes with each aux having a certain part of the band. You can then add for example a reverb in just the low mids after compression, bring up the attack on the highs and add a bit of delay or a Devil Loc for crush etc.

4. FabFilter MB internal Sidechain

On the Fabfilter dynamic EQ, there is a mode on the expert section to trigger the reduction of the frequency using another range on the same signal as the key. We all know multiband compression or EQ with external sidechain. This is the same concept but using the frequencies of the same signal to do so. This is very useful if say you want to control the extended bass or the tail of the bass guitar but triggered by the attack. Or if you want to duck the cymbals when the snare hits. Or even reduce the low freqs in a dialogue as the pitch rises. It’s anything! You can read more about this function here.

So there you go, some excellent little known tricks there from Sreejesh and he is promising more in future posts. Thanks again Sreejesh for allowing us to repost this from your blog.