Spectral Gating

Parameters

Threshold — Per-band level (in dB) on the gate signal (input A) that controls when each band of the main signal (input B) opens or closes. Bands of the main signal are passed only where the gate signal exceeds threshold in that band. This is cross-spectral gating — the gate signal isn’t the main audio.

Attack — How fast each band of the main signal opens once the gate signal exceeds threshold in that band, in ms. Fast attack keeps the gate snappy; slow attack softens the per-band edge.

Release — How fast each band of the main signal closes after the gate signal drops below threshold in that band, in ms. Slow release produces a gentle per-band fade; fast release for tighter rhythmic gating.

Range — Maximum per-band attenuation in dB applied to the main signal when its band is closed, −96 to 0. Sets how much the main signal gets pushed down where the gate signal is below threshold. At −80+ effectively silences the band; lower values produce a partial, more transparent effect.

Mix — Wet/dry blend, 0–100%. 100% is fully gated output; lower values blend the original main signal back in for a more transparent effect. Useful for parallel-style gating where you want the gated material as a layer underneath the unfiltered main signal.

Output Gain — Output makeup gain in dB, −24 to +24. Cross-spectral gating often pushes overall level down (since some bands are silenced); this brings the output level back up.

Additional controls

Mode — Normal — main signal passes where gate signal is above threshold. Inverse — main signal passes where gate signal is below threshold (i.e. the gate signal blocks rather than enables). Inverse mode is useful for “ducking the parts of B where A is loud” — closer to spectral side-chain ducking. Normal mode is the standard cross-spectral gate.

Detection Mode — How the gate signal’s level is measured per band. Peak for instantaneous per-bin detection; RMS for smoother, averaged response.

Smoothing — Time-smoothing of the per-band gate decisions, 0–1. Higher values smear gate decisions across adjacent frames, reducing artifacts when the gate signal is rhythmic or transient-heavy. Low values give crisp per-frame gating; higher values produce a more “ambient” gating feel.

Lookahead — Frames of lookahead (0–8) on the gate signal. Lets the main signal start opening before the gate signal triggers, catching the leading edges of attacks. Useful for percussion-driven gating where you want the main signal’s attacks aligned with the gate’s hits.

About Spectral Gating

Cross-spectral gating uses one signal’s spectrum to control another’s. Plug in a drum loop as the gate (input A) and a pad as the main (input B), and the pad will play only in the frequencies and moments where the drum loop has energy — producing a “drum-shaped pad,” with the rhythm of the drums and the timbre of the pad combined. This is the K2K-flavored spiritual cousin of vocoding, with no carrier-modulator distinction and full per-band control. Use it for rhythmic transformation, spectral masking experiments, and linking otherwise unrelated signals into a coherent texture.

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