DarkVelar

DarkVelar — VCA Compressor

A modern transformerless bus compressor  VU lineage — fast, surgical, and clean. Where DarkNova goes for the soft, feedback “glue” sound, DarkVelar delivers the punchier feedforward response with continuous controls and serious flexibility.

Topology:

• THAT2181 VCA per channel with class-A op-amp input/output stages
• THAT2252-style log-domain RMS detector
• Feedforward sidechain (detector sees input, not output)
• Selectable sidechain mode: London (summed mono) or New York (left only)
• Sidechain HPF: Off / 60 / 90 / 120 Hz
• ~0.012% THD at 0 dBu (IGS spec), gentle 2nd-order rise to ~0.15% at +20 dBu
• Fully transformerless audio path — optional output transformer added separately

Controls:

• 7-stop Ratio ladder: 2:1, 2.5:1, 4:1, 6:1, 8:1, 10:1, 20:1
• Continuous Attack: 0.1–30 ms (centered at 3 ms)
• Continuous Release: 0.05–1.5 s with optional Auto-Release dual-time-constant mode
• Threshold, Makeup, Mix (parallel compression)
• Saturation drive into the class-A op-amp stage

Optional output transformer section with 8 modeled transformers — Carnhill, Sowter, Cinemag, Marinair, Haufe V72, Triad HS-30, Reichenbach, EA Edcor — for adding character on top of the clean compressor.

Extras:

• Built-in sidechain parametric EQ (Bell / LShelf / HShelf / LCut / HCut)
• x2 / x4 / x8 oversampling
• Phase-aligned dry buffer for parallel compression
• Host bypass with sample-aligned PDC compensation