De-essing is one of those tasks which is simple but that doesn’t mean it’s easy. Controlling the level of ‘ess’ sounds in a vocal performance isn’t about eliminating them, it’s about presenting them in a way in which they are audible but not distracting. The problem is that keeping esses sounding natural in something as unnatural as a heavily compressed, close miked modern vocal is something of a contradiction. The right. tools help. Here is our pick of the best tools out there to save your sanity from sibilant syllables spoiling singing sessions…
Fabfilter Pro DS
We’ll have to start with this one, beyond the mighty Pro-Q3, FabFilter have a knack of really nailing the balance between depth of features and simplicity of user interface in all their products. The ideal de-esser is one with which you can deal with the distracting esses and get out quickly because if you start to concentrate on them too much while chasing them with the de-esser, there’s a whole rabbit hole of mix prevarication waiting for you.
Pro-DS is a tool with which you can dial in something which works well fast. For the majority of tasks dialling in one of the handful of Single Vocal presets and tweaking the threshold is all that’s needed. The combination of visual feedback from the scrolling display and the delta button provide the necessary feedback. Deeper features are there but you’ll probably not need them. In and out quickly. Ideal.
Sonnox SurprEsser
The Sonnox SuprEsser is a fully featured tool, the IU doesn’t conceal this and it can look a little intimidating but it’s a very powerful plug-in which offers some interesting facilities. Built around the compressor section of the impeccable Sonnox Dynamics plugin, with linear phase filters from the Oxford EQ this De-esser offers some unusual features to really help for challenging tasks.
Three listen modes allow the user to listen to the processed signal, just the band being attenuated or everything apart from the band being attenuated, making precise filtering quick and accurate. An automatic level tracking feature allows the action of the de-esser to follow the energy level of the audio, reducing the need to automate the threshold. There’s much more so if you need precision, try this.
Accusonus ERA De Esser
With simplicity of operation being so important in de-essing, Accusonus’ De-ess plugin has to feature here. It is part of the ERA bundles aimed at videographers and podcasters - people who want a fast solution. That isn’t to say that these semi-automatic plugins aren’t suitable for use by audio specialists, they absolutely are, but the level of control is reduced and that is what makes them special. Effective single knob de-essing. Great.
SPL De-esser
This duo of de-essers are based on hardware and as such you might think they wouldn’t be as good as modern digital alternatives. However they are shockingly effective. Conventional de-essers work by filtering the side chain of a compressor, making the compressor only react to the filtered frequencies, if you filter out everything apart from the ‘ess’ sounds you have a de-esser. These SPL units took a different approach based on phase cancellation and this single band de-esser is amazingly effective.
Dual Band D Esser
For more challenging applications the dual band alternative is excellent. I’ve used it in the past for a difficult vocal in which a singer had a conventional ‘ess’ but occasionally had a 10KHz whistle on certain sounds. The Dual Band de-esser was perfect.
Oeksound Soothe 2
Soothe 2 has been a huge success for Oeksound, offering as it does a transparent way to address harshness and resonances in audio. It’s as useful on esses as it is on low end resonances or harshness in guitars. It offers semi-automatic process with as much control over the selectivity of its action as you need with rich visual feedback from the clean and responsive UI. It’s not called a de-esser but it does a great job of de-essing.
Revoice Pro
If you need the ultimate in selectivity and control over your de-essing, de-breathing and manipulation of “voiceless sounds” in a vocal, the solution has to be Revoice Pro. It identifies voiced and voiceless elements of a performance and treats them separately. This is an important part of making tuning processes as natural as possible as applying tuning processes to parts of the performance which aren’t pitched (like esses, breaths and many consonant sounds) has a negative impact on the sound of the tuning, but as the voiceless sounds are identified by Revoice pro they can be manipulated directly. Manually tweaking the level of esses is the ultimate solution for problematic audio.
Get A Free De-esser
If you are still using the basic de-esser which comes with your DAW why not try the excellent Techivation T-De-esser which we recently featured as one of our regular Free Plugins. Click the image above to get this free plugin.