Airwindows

MineSpace

MineSpace is something a bit out of the ordinary: a game ambiance reverb for Let’s Plays.

It came about because I did some Minecraft Let’s Plays, and was interested in applying reverb in giant caves and such. However, normal reverbs tended to be far too strong, and stereo reverb didn’t match well with the twisting, turning nature of gameplay… and there was no way to tell a reverb plugin to pan according to what the video footage showed.

What I settled on was MineSpace. It runs dual mono, very very faintly. If you crank it way up you can just about hear it on speakers (on headphones, it’s easier) and on defaults it’s largely subliminal. Because it’s dual-mono, reverb trails sort of chase sound positioning, in an unrealistic way but one that I think distracts less than the presentation of a single fixed space.

You can’t turn it up, it’s strictly grab-and-go. Just a hint of deep ambience behind the game audio… but a nice touch in post-production, before rendering videos. I recommend it for all manner of podcasting and videomaking… and if you think it’s too quiet, trust me, I may be saving you from a rookie mistake :)

Date January 31, 2014
Author Chris
Comments 3 Comments

ToVinyl2

ToVinyl2Demo is a version of ToVinyl, before it had the Groove Wear control. This version was about developing better-sounding highpass filtering, and also about making the plugin work more simply. It’s got a single control which sets the general frequency where the bass gathers together to be centered.

There are two versions of the fully working plugin available: when it first came out, it actually gave you a noticeable boost around where the filter cuts off. I fixed it, but then some people wanted that back, so I gave them the ToVinyl2 Bass Bump version (which has the same ID as the regular one, so you have to pick which you want to install). Both are available to owners of the current ToVinyl, just buy the up-to-date version and then ask for a specific old version.

I recommend the current ToVinyl for a number of reasons, but this one’s also available to try.

Date December 12, 2013
Author Chris
Comments No Comments

ADClip4

ADClip4Demo is a universal binary Audio Unit plugin, bringing together everything learned in the original ADClip and 3DClip plus new functionality for the best possible final-clipping plugin.

It works by tracking what samples have clipped, and pulling back the onset and release samples that would have clipped, to transition between the two states more gracefully. ADClip also tracks what information is lost to clipping, and brings it back in two ways- as high frequency energy and bass fill. This is only present when clipping occurs (or briefly after it). Finally, it works to cancel some of the distortion subharmonics and combines this effect with the rearranged energy from the clipped-off bass.

ADClip also switches in and out its antialiasing in such a way that it puts a maximum limit on high frequency content, as if it was an analog circuit with finite slew rate. This, combined with its special clipping behavior, means that extremely loud treble information is never harsh. You can push loud percussive content and never lose the nice airy texture, and it makes crazy-loud stuff hit in a more appealing way.

ADClip4 goes farther than I’ve ever gone to maintain the purity of the unclipped portions of the signal. Big chunks of it literally turn off when not in use- it does not even do needless math operations unless it has to. Since even its bass fill operations are very quickly completed, that means ADClip is constantly reverting to the most simple, untouched floating-point digital passthrough, giving it an unusually transparent digital-domain sound. Since version 4, even the antialiasing turns off when the plugin isn’t actively working. It’s overkill, but it’s correct and is what’s needed for mastering. This is not normal procedure for plugins, it’s the start of the line of development that led to PurestDrive.

ADClip4 is $50.

Date November 14, 2013
Author Chris
Comments No Comments

Space

SpaceDemo is the latest Airwindows algorithmic reverb, set up to work like the first hardware digital reverbs, and giving more spatial depth than typical digital reverbs.

It decays in a special way, like acoustic space, and has bass and treble controls that help you fit it into the mix, and liveness can be cranked up until sounds just sustain forever (it’ll distort if it gets too carried away). The sample rate settings are for fitting its primary sound into different mix environments, but you can also set the sample rate wrong to get unusual reverb effects.

There’s a calibrated pre-delay built in which roughly corresponds to Haas effect, making the reverb blend with dry signal in such a way that you can send stuff way back without blurring it undesirably (for bigger predelay, add any simple digital delay to the aux). This scales to the sample rate as well.

Space is strictly a stereo plugin, generating stereo reverb. For mono reverb, dual mono or multichannel, try PocketVerbs which is more a special effect verb: Space is about being the primary mix reverb. It takes stereo input and shows some stereo effect with hard panning, but mostly fills up the space in stereo regardless of what channel the input’s on.

Space is $50.

Date November 4, 2013
Author Chris
Comments No Comments

Chris

MineSpace

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Space

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