Let’s Talk About VST3
What Is It? Steinberg is the creator of the audio application software format – VST. VST stands for Virtual Studio Technology, and it is the world’s most widely supported standard for plug-ins and virtual instruments Released in 1996, VST was a major step in the evolution of the recording studio. Virtual instruments were now possible to emulate, recreate and even replace their hardware companions. VST3 is the most recent version of the software, and the best version yet. Improvements have been made to increase stability and efficiency. What’s the Big Deal? Open Standard VST offers so much to modern music productions. With it, we can seamlessly integrate virtual effects processing and virtual instruments into our DAWs. Thanks to the developers who make our favorite plugins, we can use them neatly packaged in a standardized format. The biggest plugin developers have contributed to the growth of the VST format. Companies like, …
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Accusonus Beat-Making: Beatformer and Regroover Pro
Accusonus Beat-Making: Beatformer and Regroover Pro Today we are going to go over two awesome plugins from Accusonus, Beatformer and Regroover Pro. Both plugins are designed to interact with your drums – Beatformer as an all-in-one drum processor and Regroover Pro as a complex sampler. Continue below as we go over the workflows with each and what makes them unique. Beatformer Beatformer is Accusonus’ all-in-one solution for your drum buss. It boasts “a dozen different processors under the hood” and allows control over them with a simple user interface and the ability to dial in a combination of tones. This can be seen as a pro or a con here, the terms are likely ones you’ve heard before but don’t accurately describe what happens when using them (except for Boom). Otherwise, Accusonus knocked it out of the park here for users by making the controls so simple yet powerful. Each knob has a finite amount of …
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How To Get The Perfect Amount Of Bass When Mastering Audio
How To Get The Perfect Amount Of Bass When Mastering Audio We’re happy to announce a new partnership with MasteringtheMix, a website with amazing audio plugins. When Tom reached out to us we were excited to see what his plugins could offer. Levels, Animate, Reference, and Expose all have proved to be super helpful in the mixing and mastering process. We’re featuring an article written by Tom guiding you in how to achieve an awesome bass balance while mastering. He uses a few of his own plugins as tools and we would highly suggest trying them out. Read below! This is where so many potentially awesome tracks fail. Too much bass and your track will sound bloated and lack clarity. Not enough bass and your track will sound weak. I have a process that helps me set the perfect amount of bass for my clients every time. Since …
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Top 5 Free VST Plugins: October 2018
Top 5 Free VST Plugins: October 2018 We’ve been posting about free downloads for a while now, and now we have a compilation of the latest free plugins from this month. Read below for descriptions of this month’s most awesome plugins. They are each available to download for free! 1. SimpleSide SimpleSide is a volume automation plugin developed by Armando Montanez. This plugin is very useful for simulating sidechain compression or other LFO tempo-synced effects. With this plugin, you can add an unlimited amount of curves. Amazing. Adjust the rate to change the synced up trigger, and use the blend knob to adjust the amount of dry signal heard relative to the effected signal. Add an envelope follower following this plugin and you have a seriously powerful plugin that is totally free. Download here. 2. Nightlife Nightlife is an awesome virtual synthesizer by Acoustica. It features …
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Captain Chords 2.0 – Composition Simplified
Captain Chords 2.0 – Composition Simplified Mixed In Key recently launched the most recent update to their Captain Chords plugin, Captain Chords 2.0. We’ve had our eyes on the whole Captain suite of plugins for a while now and with the update thought it’d be a perfect time to finally try it out and give it a proper review. Captain Chords 2.0 is just one of many in the Captain suite of plugins, so we’ll touch on the other plugins that come with the bundle later on in the review! Captain Chords 2.0 has a clean interface that can be navigated easily and quickly, the very first screen you’ll see when opening the plugin is where you decide which key you’ll be composing your chords in (you have an option to not see this screen at the bottom). There are a number of different scales to choose from ranging from …
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Regrader – FREE Lo-Fi Delay from Igorski
Regrader – FREE Lo-Fi Delay from Igorski Igorski has released Regrader, a Lo-Fi Delay plugin, for free in VST format. We’ve covered Igorski’s tech before with an article on the VSTSID plugin he released a bit back and we’re excited to see what he has done this time! Regrader comes with a user interface reminiscent of an old Windows system that it has 5 sections – Echoes, Gravel, Horror, Warble, and Filter. The Echo section is the main control section for aspects of the delay like time, feedback, and mix. Gravel, Horror, and Warble all contribute to the effect’s more unique elements that will warrant crazy sounding results. Here’s what Igorski had to say about it, Regrader provides a delay effect in which the repeats degrade in various ways to provide a malevolent twist on the ears. Echoes disintegrate, are decimated, piercingly oscillate and are finally mangled into a sound reminiscent of a …
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Diabolique – FREE Vintage Tape Emulation (Windows Only)
Diabolique – FREE Vintage Tape Emulation (Windows Only) In order to celebrate their 20 year anniversary, Ourafilms recently released Diabolique, a FREE to download Reel-to-Reel Tape emulation VST plugin. The plugin was built to emulate 2 vintage tube reel to reel tape machines, the Revox F36 (theirs from 1962) and the Tandberg Model 3 (1958), represented in circuity 1 and 2 respectively. The developers had this to say about the plugin, Apart from their differences, here the question is maintenance: while the Revox has been kept in immaculate condition (but retaining all good vintage components), the Tandberg has never seen any maintenance having all its original components (including a tube set of Telefunkens that are all testing as new). This plugin can be used to warm up your sounds, to simulate tape multi-tracking and/or to dirty up your sounds, it depends on the way it is used. The original template simulates …
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DC1A 3 Compressor – FREE Compressor Plugin from Klanghelm
DC1A 3 Compressor – FREE Compressor Plugin from Klanghelm Get excited everyone! Today we get to share with you the most recent updated version of their killer freeware plugin DC1A Compressor. This compressor is one of the best sounding compressors available FOR FREE. This is the 3rd incarnation of the beast and this time around we see the addition of a mix control which allows for parallel compression. Additionally, there is the option to switch the VU Meter from gain reduction to output gain so you can visualize either aspect. What has remained the same is the kickass compression algorithm. You can count on it to crunch out some clean sounds while you focus on the two big knobs. Mess around with the various settings and you’ve got a powerful compressor that puts out lots of different options. Here’s what the developer had to say, I’ve always wanted to do a compressor with …
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