Telephone
Narrow-band line, earpiece resonance, µ-law grit, and dying-call dropouts.
A narrow band, a tinny earpiece resonance, and µ-law companding grit: the sound of a call you can barely hold onto. The core is mono (stereo inputs are collapsed), with a subtle decorrelated hiss keeping the sides alive. Reach for it when a vocal should feel small, distant, or overheard.
- Amount
- Squeezes the band from both ends (roughly 250 Hz to 3.8 kHz, narrowing to 450 Hz to 2.6 kHz), sharpens the 1 to 1.5 kHz earpiece peak, and deepens the µ-law grit from 8-bit toward 4.5-bit.
- Tone
- Scales the top cutoff by ×0.8 to ×1.4, from muffled handset to crispy line.
- Noise
- Line hum, crackle clicks, and a soft comfort hiss.
- Dropouts
- Line clicks and hard cuts: the classic dying-call chop.
Answering machine
- Amount
- 65%
- Tone
- 40%
- Noise
- 25%
- Dropouts
- 10%
- Mix
- 100%
A verse-opening vocal. Automate Mix to 0% at the drop and the arrangement opens up with it.
Long distance
- Amount
- 85%
- Tone
- 55%
- Noise
- 45%
- Dropouts
- 30%
- Mix
- 100%
A line that is failing on purpose. For bridges, outros and spoken-word interludes.
Presence grit
- Amount
- 70%
- Tone
- 60%
- Noise
- 0%
- Dropouts
- 0%
- Mix
- 35%
Parallel edge that pushes a vocal through a dense mix without obvious lo-fi.
Still stuck? Write to zhi@nonoaudio.com.