Helix Patch advice

[drb1982]

When you guys are creating a patch with a new amp model, do you try to make every amp model be able to do a “clean” and “dirty” sound? Or do you just leave it at one setting that you think sounds best? For example, if you are using a model like the Uberschall, knowing that it’s a high gain amp, do you try to make it be able to have a clean channel and distortion channel by using snapshots? I ask because a lot of the models are made as if they are single channel amps when they are not, so it’s hard to get a clean sound out of them because you have to turn the gain way down or off and you lose so much volume. I struggle with this when making patches as I like my amps to be able to do both. Thoughts or suggestions? 

[silverhead]

1 hour ago, drb1982 said:

.... I ask because a lot of the models are made as if they are single channel amps when they are not, so it’s hard to get a clean sound out of them because you have to turn the gain way down or off and you lose so much volume. I struggle with this when making patches as I like my amps to be able to do both. Thoughts or suggestions? 

I’m not sure I really understand what you’re asking. Many of the Helix amp models actually model only one channel of the associated physical amp, as you can see in the model list:

https://helixhelp.com/models/guitar-amps.html#guitar
 

For instance, there are three different Helix amp models for the physical Marshall Super Lead 100 amp - normal, bright and jumped. On the physical amp you can get a wide range of tones from clean to heavy distortion. But using only the Helix Brit Plexi Jmp model you won’t be able to get the same clean tones that you might get on the physical amp. It’s a futile effort to try.

[MartinDorr]

This, but no matter how little Drive (and amp volume loss) you want to try,  a tone neutral gain block (or 2) after the amp can always get you to a reasonable signal level for further processing. A setting of 0.5 Drive is not a signal or volume level problem on Helix, though you may not like the tone ;-) ...

[j_hotch]

Personally, I like to stick to one amp to a patch, and use snaps to change gain/master volume/EQ for different purposes.  Saves some DSP over dual-amp patches, too.  Good luck!