Hey SA (in a spanish accent)
I hear a lot of big noise about what Vintage Warmer can do for your track, but after having a go with it I’m left a little baffled. Where is it used? on mix busses, on master chains? or on individual tracks? Man the dials are a little complex too and so different to what I’m used to from a normal compressor…
…as it gets a lot of name drops from top producers maybe a tech tutorial on this bad boy would be a good idea? 
i just whack it on the master out
quoted from buddy of mine from gearslutz
first, i start with it on the 2buss with the low @ 100hz and the high @ 8k-10k and both those level knobs at 0. the drive i start at 0 and the knee around 30, the speed at 50, the release @ 1. the mix is always at 100%. the ceiling starts at zero and the backside [he’s referring to the plugin’s back panel] i start with the saturations all at 0 and the release for low x4, the mid at 1 and the high at .25.
the big things to consider when using it is the saturation on the back and the ceiling on the front work with each other. the release on the back and the release on the front go together (i kinda wished these were all on the front as little knobs below the associated knobs but they arent so i flip the thing over)… but its pretty odd when i move the ceiling too far off 0 for 2buss.
big two things that i mess with is the knee and the speed first after i get a rough mix built, and i always keep tweaking this plugin as the mix progresses. for a smoother sound, turn the knee to zero but for a punchier sound go clockwise… sound gets more hard going clockwise on that knob. the speed i generally use for attack and let the attack i want through before the limiter clamps down on the signal on the final output of it. it does work in relation to the speed knob (and the release knobs on the back) so if i get the attack i want but the release is too fast or slow, i change the speed knob of the front and then flip to the back and fine tune those release settings (kinda wish there was a solo for each band while working on it, but something to be said about not letting you solo and listening as a whole)
so now you are starting to get some compression and loudness to the mix, probably rivaling commercial releases in loudness by this time. the meters i leave always set to GR and flip between VU and PPM. but as the GR meters start moving more, that is when i start to back off the drive (or if im not getting enough compression/limiting, i add some)… now with the drive set, and i usually set this during hte loudest passages of the song because if you dont, you are setting yourself up for massive slamming when they do come. so set that drive to be working nicely during the loudest parts so they are nice and excited sounding but no pumping (which is also very easy to do)
now i listen to the balance between low/mids/highs and thats where the ceiling knob and the saturation knobs come in handy, and while back working on those set the releases right. i check the lows and see if they are getting through enough but not enough to set off the limiter overreacting to the low information. the saturation basically sets its ceiling in relation to the other two bands. a lot of times i will increase it a db or 2 but that spretty program dependant. same goes for the mids which i tend to open up a bit as well, the highs usually stay where they are.
if the bass gets that farty sound, i make the release multiplier by 4 on the low on the back and then move the release on the front until that distortion goes away, and then go back to deal with the mids/highs and usually shorten their time more. obviously the higher the freq, the faster release you can get away with, but you can also use them to your advantage the other way.
as for the crossover settings, i use 100hz because i like to focus the plugin on what is basically going to be feeding the sub and controlling that for some nice consistant level so when i bring it into my truck and the sub in there keeps pounding nicely along with the song and no odd suprises there.
the mids i generally take care of as a huge swipe from low mids to upper highs (5kish range and up) and leave the high xover point for the “air”… 10k sometimes. i adjust the levels feeding the compressor from there as to how much i want to feed it but this also reacts with the saturation settings. again, one of the reason i revisit this plugin over and over through a mix because how i alter the tracks within the mix invariably affects how the plugin is processing the result.
if you look at the block diagram, its the input feed the drive>multiband comps>limiter… so you want to make sure your comp levels on the bands are pretty balanced going into the limiter or that will wreck havoc upon the mix.
now while i change these settings through the mix, obviously its not gonna change EVERYTHING i want it to so by putting it on the 2buss to begin with you adjust your individual tracks to take out or add things you want happening in each of the sections you define iwth the crossover points.
does any of this make any sense?
END ALPHAJERK TUTORIAL.
*now my own personal recommendation is nebula3 pro.nothing else native touches it.actually it devastates liquid mix and renders a lot of uads plugins pointless.
Wow thanks man! Lot for me to chew on there … gonna take my iPhone to the ****ter for a super long crap so I got time to read it all