Welcome to the world of warm tubes and bouncy dynamics! Introducing the TLs-2095 from TbT – not just a limiter, but a tool for giving your sound a unique character.
TLs-2095: More Than Just a Limiter
In the world of digital audio, where purity and transparency often become the goal, sometimes that special “fatness” and “glue” that analog devices give is missing. The TLs-2095 is designed for just that. It’s a limiting amplifier that doesn’t just limit peaks, but saturates the signal, adding noticeable “pumping” and saturation, the intensity of which depends on your “pressure” and “release” settings.
Forget about boring transparent limiters! The TLs-2095 is a tool for musicians and sound engineers looking for character. It can “glue” drums, add punch to bass, or saturate vocals, giving them density and presence.
Unique Character and Control
One of the interesting features of the TLs-2095 is its behavior when increasing the input signal. Initially, when increasing the Input knob, the volume may slowly decrease by approximately 6-8 dB. This is because the limiting stage uses about 7 dB of soft limiting to prevent output peaks, striving to achieve a “one knob action” effect. However, using less than 70% of the “pressure” value can lead to transient overshoots.
Minimum “pressure” values may require compensation on the Output knob, as the attack and ratio will pass most of the signal. But it is this interaction of parameters that gives you a wide range of possibilities for shaping dynamics and saturation.
Key Parameters
- Input: Increases the input signal level.
- Pressure: A unique parameter that mixes the attack and ratio functions, allowing you to control the intensity of limiting and “pumping”.
- Release1: The overall release time of the limiter, determines how quickly the plugin returns to normal after limiting.
- Release2: Controls the “overloaded” part of Release1. This parameter helps to suppress rapid changes in the envelope, making the release smoother.
- Output: Adjustable output level with a clipping indicator, required to compensate for volume changes caused by limiting.
Operating Modes
The TLs-2095 offers several additional modes that expand its functionality and allow you to adapt it to different tasks:
- Soft/Hard Mode: Mode switch button.
- ‘Soft’ mode: Smoothes the envelope curve to minimize artifacts that may be noticeable, for example, on vocals. This mode uses more processor resources.
- ‘Hard’ mode: More direct limiting, less resource-intensive.
- Low Punch Mode: Special mode activation button.
- This mode controls the operation of the allpass filter, centered around 200 Hz. It allows transients to pass earlier than the low-frequency part of the signal. This gives a feeling of greater “clickiness” or “punch” (if low frequencies are present in the signal).
- Stereo Link Mode: Channel link control button.
- ‘Normal’: Combines the left/right input signals and processes audio on only one channel. Preserves the stereo field, but may affect the balance. Uses less CPU.
- ‘HQ’: Processes both left/right channels independently and then combines the output envelope curves. Better preserves the stereo image, but uses more CPU.
The TLs-2095 from TbT is not just a plugin, it is a tool for creativity, allowing you to give your tracks that same analog character and bounce that is sometimes so lacking in the fully digital world. Experiment with “pressure” and “release”, explore different modes and discover new facets of dynamic processing!
Author: TbT
Format: VST
Compatibility: Windows
