Help Understanding Compression in Pro Tools

[spidey01]

Hi Everyone.
I am trying to get a grasp on using the compressor, I am little confused on the following:
Fast Attack ;
which is considered a fast attack a low setting such as say 15ms or a higher setting say 300ms,
the same goes for the Release is a slow release would it be 15ms or higher setting of 300ms.
those numbers are just example, to recap
Attack
15ms slow or fast
300ms fast or slow
Release
15ms slow or fast
300ms fast or slow.
Thank you for your help

[Andrew814]

Well this is more of a general question about recording rather than just PT. But the ms stands for milliseconds, so the shorter the time, the faster the compressor attacks or releases visa versa. So 30 ms would be faster than 300 ms.

[spidey01]

Thank you very much for your reply

[Murt]

spidey01 or anyone who's interested, the sample videos here are a good overview on compression

http://www.groove3.com/str/daw-plug-ins-explained.html

[djmichael.london]

when you have the dial turn to the left on attack I believe its more of a quick attack. You allow the begining of the transient to come in then the compressor kicks in right after that. so if it like a RnB track the compressor is going to compress the end of the word so it best not to attack to early but okay for rap. when releasing you want a to release quickly when doing rap and late on Rnb so that harmonies etc arent compressed to bad. Same with drums when a snare hits you want a quick attack to let the hit of the transient in and the release quick as well or else the release if set late will compress the hit of the next transient. Hope you understand. I think someone will prob come in here and explain it better tahn me.