[linux-audio-user] Where to put your plugins

[Sampo Savolainen]

Quoting Bill Allen <bwanab+lau at juraview.com>:

> Another question that might be generic, but I'm asking specifically in 
> the case of ardour. Why does one choose to put which plugins pre-fader 
> or post-fader. In other words, which plugins work best pre-fader and 
> which work best post-fader? Are there general rules that one can apply? 
> For example I would think that compression should be pre-fader since it 
> wouldn't seem to make sense to be compressing after you've set levels.

You put the plugins pre-fader which you don't want the gain setting of that
track/bus to have an affect on.

Say you create a really tight gate on a snare which perfectly lets all snare
hits pass but silence everything else. Then you mix the rest of the song and
suddenly feel that the snare is too loud, and turn the gain down. Suddenly
you are missing snare hits as the gate is fed a lower signal than originally.

If you have a send from a track to a rever bus. You will most probably want
the send post-fader, so that the amount of signal sent to the reverb is
relative to the gain on the track.

 Sampo