Kemper Liquid Profiling First Look

[Boudoir Guitar]

Not really in the market, but it the concept is cool. I’ll wait until someone else does a video though to check it out, as I will not click on this douche canoe’s videos.

And I asked myself "Boudoir, do you really wanna hear the voice of a televangelist talk to you about Kemper profiles? Are you really prepared for twenty minutes of feeling like you're stuck on a church bus headed to some retreat camp listening to what sounds like a youth minister trying to convince the bus load of kids to wait until marriage while two high school sophomores are finger banging in the backseat? Even more, are you willing to support his YouTube channel by viewing the video?!?!?" And I said "No, Boudoir." No, I am not.

 

[GTR37]

Two big name capture creators pitching a sale?

Except one has credibility and is more enjoyable to listen to

 

[BenIfin]

It aint gonna do anything for preamp distortion accuracy, so I'm not interested really.

Curious as to why you think this ?

In my mind .... I've got no doubt that the KPA engineers can component-model as good as anyone else - and they have component modeled the initial 40+ Amps .... the unique full Gain Stacks and EQ Stacks of each.

Apart from combining modeling and profiling, which is a first [as far as I know] ... their Liquid Profiling approach is also unique in that compared to QC / Tonex / NAM ... it is the only Capturing process which knows during the Profiling Process what it is looking for.

If it works as promoted by C.K ..... and as I wrote above ..... it would be a brave person that bets against him .... you can grab a Kemper ... buy [or make], say 6 Single Separate Profiles of your favorite 6 Amps ... and then you have the full range of Gain / EQ in each Profile responding at all settings as would the real Amp.

I'm a simple man ... :) ... but no-one is even talking about this approach ... except for Fractal / Cliff who "had" planned to do this also .... but who knows where that now stands in terms of patents / legalities etc... he did *not* sound happy *at all* when they "released" this, so he too must have thought it was a very good approach to take (?)

Once released, and ground up Liquid Profiles are made, I suspect there will be numerous Y/T Video's comparing Amp X at [say] 10 or 15 wildly different Amp settings compared to 1 x Liquid Profile using the same 10 or 15 wildly differnet settings ... I think it will be apparent very quickly if it "cuts the mustard" :)

Ben
PS:- I've tried to keep the formatting to a minimum !

 

[mbenigni]

Doesn't make me want to go back to Kemper or anything, but I think it's a really cool implementation. All things being equal, who wouldn't rather have one or two good profiles of an amp with familiar controls to dial in whatever that amp is capable of - as opposed to 25 profiles at various canned settings?

Ultimately, though, it's a hybrid - and a compromise - between profiling and modeled factory content. It's only go to work if Kemper has provided the control stack you're after, and only to the extent that that control stack is accurate and complements your profile.

 

[Jarick]

I have yet to see or hear any claim that it models preamp gain.

 

[BenIfin]

I have yet to see or hear any claim that it models preamp gain.

The i/view C.K did with T.J when it was pre-announced made it very clear that the whole gain and eq stack is component modeled.

I just automatically took that as being [at least] the entire Pre-amp and Eq stages ... the 2 videos in this threads OP back that up ... to my eyes at least :)

Ben

 

[Orvillain]

I have yet to see or hear any claim that it models preamp gain.

Exactly this.

From what I have seen, it just selects between 40+ modelled tone-stacks. Since they sit outside of the preamp distortion stages in your typical amp (and in a passive manner) I see no evidence that we are going to see any actual profiling improvements here.

The knobs mapping closer to the real amp is just a case of baking in some offsets to the underlying parameter mappings. Again, it doesn't sound like it will actually improve the underlying profiling algorithms.

 

[Orvillain]

The i/view C.K did with T.J when it was pre-announced made it very clear that the whole gain and eq stack is component modeled.

I watched those videos, and I did not come away with that impression. It was a while ago now, so happy to be proven wrong.

 

[EOengineer]

I wonder how this works with something like a Mesa Mark series lead channel where you have a pre gain tonestack and post EQ. Is there a separate post EQ that can be employed in the Kemper?

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

Haven't Kemper profiles always been built from a selected component model? This seems to take the number of component models from 8 to 40, allows the profiler to select the underlying component model rather than relying on auto-selection by the Kemper itself.

 

[BenIfin]

I watched those videos, and I did not come away with that impression. It was a while ago now, so happy to be proven wrong.

This is a link to the video at the point where C.K talks about the Gain and EQ ... let it play for 20 secs or so

Gain and EQ Stage - Video with C.K and T.J

Ben

 

[BenIfin]

Haven't Kemper profiles always been built from a selected component model? This seems to take the number of component models from 8 to 40, allows the profiler to select the underlying component model rather than relying on auto-selection by the Kemper itself.

No. Nothing about the existing "legacy" Profiling Process is component based. Liquid Profiling is a totally "new" way combining, embedding and matching actual component modeled "real" amps [ Gain and EQ Stacks ] into the actual profiling process from the ground up.

Ben

 

[Orvillain]

This is a link to the video at the point where C.K talks about the Gain and EQ ... let it play for 20 secs or so

Gain and EQ Stage - Video with C.K and T.J

Ben

Right. So... this is all what I'm extrapolating....

He says:

- Where you put the gain
- Where you put the eq

This does not imply that they've modelled various gain stages across all the different amps. All it implies is that the Kemper can now know where your analog controls were set to. As far as I can tell, he's talking purely about knob positioning. Not changes to the underlying algorithms within the Kemper.

IE: when you're selecting your "amp model" on the Kemper it isn't changing the nature of the Kemper's distortion. It's just switching the EQ block over to a modelled EQ.

In addition to this, you can tell the Kemper "I had my original knob values at these positions" and that will then apply the correct offset so that the values match up against your original amp.

 

[Orvillain]

I wonder how this works with something like a Mesa Mark series lead channel where you have a pre gain tonestack and post EQ. Is there a separate post EQ that can be employed in the Kemper?

You could always set the EQ on the Kemper to be pre or post, iirc. So I expect you'd select the Mark EQ model (whatever it is called) and then set it to the pre position ???

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

No. Nothing about the existing "legacy" Profiling Process is component based.

Ben

I'm too lazy to go find all the old Cliff/Christoph bickering posts from ages ago, but I'm near certain the only thing they bickered about was how many base models were used to build the profiles, not whether or not they were built from base models.

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

You could always set the EQ on the Kemper to be pre or post, iirc. So I expect you'd select the Mark EQ model (whatever it is called) and then set it to the pre position ???

(And could always use an eq block either pre, post, or both).

 

[BenIfin]

Right. So... this is all what I'm extrapolating....

He says:

- Where you put the gain
- Where you put the eq

This does not imply that they've modelled various gain stages across all the different amps. All it implies is that the Kemper can now know where your analog controls were set to. As far as I can tell, he's talking purely about knob positioning. Not changes to the underlying algorithms within the Kemper.

IE: when you're selecting your "amp model" on the Kemper it isn't changing the nature of the Kemper's distortion. It's just switching the EQ block over to a modelled EQ.

In addition to this, you can tell the Kemper "I had my original knob values at these positions" and that will then apply the correct offset so that the values match up against your original amp.

Time will [very soon] tell. My extrapolation was / is that they *have* component modeled the actual full Gain and EQ stages.

Ben

 

[Boudoir Guitar]

No. Nothing about the existing "legacy" Profiling Process is component based. Liquid Profiling is a totally "new" way combining, embedding and matching actual component modeled "real" amps [ Gain and EQ Stacks ] into the actual profiling process from the ground up.

Ben

Okay, that took less energy than my bowel movement, so here we go:

Post in thread '1500 bucks, you say, Line6?' https://forum.fractalaudio.com/threads/1500-bucks-you-say-line6.100939/post-1226612

 

[Orvillain]

Time will [very soon] tell. My extrapolation was / is that they *have* component modeled the actual full Gain and EQ stages.

Ben

I'm highly skeptical of that interpretation. Because if true, it is basically tacit admission that the profiling techniques they have been using aren't good enough to faithfully capture the amps in question.

All in all, I expressed my viewpoints on the Kemper in my long-winded dialogue here:


Beating a dead horse at this point. I think the Kemper sounds good, but not particularly accurate. Nothing has changed there for me, and I doubt liquid profiling will change that.

 

[BenIfin]

I'm highly skeptical of that interpretation. Because if true, it is basically tacit admission that the profiling techniques they have been using aren't good enough to faithfully capture the amps in question.

All in all, I expressed my viewpoints on the Kemper in my long-winded dialogue here:


Beating a dead horse at this point. I think the Kemper sounds good, but not particularly accurate. Nothing has changed there for me, and I doubt liquid profiling will change that.

All good .... in the 2nd video in the OP, Mbritt said "it might even be out before this video" so I suspect it will be released very soon ..... so we will know one way or the other very soon :)

Ben