What's in your toolkit?

[Text_Edifice]

So, a bunch of things have changed. But my plugin folder / mic locker hasn't really.

I'm still basically running

- sound toys
- fabfilter
- trigger
- some oddities (psp springbox, a cassette sim from sketchup, other weirdness)

Plus outboard.

What are you using / loving plugin or gear wise?

[Chinagraf]

I 'm all about Fabfilter. I'm doing mainly post nowdays but still use all of them on the rare music thng I do.
The update to Pro Q to add dynamic eq was a Godsend. Pro L limiter is great, De-esser is too, but I find myself doing more de-essing with the dynamic eq now.

[Barney Loveland]

Similar here, these are my most used.

Fabfilter L2, C2, PROQ 3

Sonnox - Limiter and Suppresor, Dynamic EQ (i seem to prefer it over ProQ3 but they are both great)

Tokyo Dawn Labs (all plugs) - M Slick EQ Mastering, Limiter 6 GE (has pushed Fabfilter L2 out of the most used spot). GE EQ. Koteltnikov GE Comp - lots to learn but amazing. The 'Inverse Fletcher Munson' curve preset you can find online is a great starting point for some work.

Massey - all plugs but you need PT and i'm starting to use Reaper more to teach myself out P tools one day...

Brainworx - bx_digital V3, HG 2 (that saved a very expensive purchase ha ha )

[Text_Edifice]

Fabfilter stuff is so useful.

I'm interested to know if there's some cool stuff I've missed in the last few years since I properly looked at plugins.

I feel like I might be missing out with the uad stuff as haven't played with them for ages now.

[The Tasmanian]

I'm pretty much mostly DMG - have been for a while.
Limitless / Equlibrium /EQuality / Expurgate- and EQuick.
A bit of Tokyo Dawn Labs
Compression duties with Klanghelm.

One thing is, I have really moved away from Avid. Although still run a PT10 - 48 I/O rig for client mixing.
Reaper is my go to.
My recent installation project I have running has 218 audio outs - over 750 tracks of audio running simultaneously - 24 hrs a day. Has never crashed since opening in June 2019. 50% CPU. < all on a $60 program.

[Text_Edifice]

Thanks Chris - that DMG stuff looks interesting!

I keep to-ing and fro-ing on reaper. It works great - phenomenal for a $60 bit of kit really. And it's been a great macgyver style problem solver for a couple of things recently. I watched someone mix on a cubase rig recently and it actually made reaper make a bit more sense and got me thinking about how slow some pt moves are in comparison (they never touched the mixer and had some pretty nifty routing and grouping setup in seconds / modified on the fly). It made me want to look at cubase again as I've gone to the dark side (PC audio) and abandoned logic.

[tony]

Pluggins wise, Soundtoys, UAD stuff and Valhalla are the things I miss when I am working on other rigs around the traps. Particular the Valhalla stuff, I actually have a few different licences for it now as I have installed it on a few machine around the country just to get things done with that particular sound in a set time frame.

That said when I am in other space the Fabfilter stuff gets a fair work out as well.... maybe I should make the leap and get a copy.

The other game changer for me was moving from Protools to Bitwig as my primary DAW of choice. Completely different experience I describe it as the difference between using a tape machine (protools) and an instrument(instrument). I find Bitwig to be a inspiringly creative platform, where as Protools, even after 20 years with it, still just feels like a archiving device (and an expensive one). I still use Protools when I go into other studios if I am tracking ensembles or the like. However for creating and mixing back in my little studio I found with Bitwig and Reaper I have most of my bases covered.

[Text_Edifice]

Tell me some more about Bitwig.

I can drive ableton but haven't ever really clicked with it. Bitwig looks pretty interesting.

[tony]

I moved to Bitwig in response to a brief for a show where I needed to create EDM remix versions of baroque songs. So I dived in to finding a platform that made sense for that. I had been using Protools but midi is just crap inside it (or I was crap at using it). I had used Reason for a while rewired inside Protools, but when I tested the stand alone I didn’t love it. Fruity loops gave me flashbacks to high school. So it basically came down to the obvious choice Ableton and this new competitor Bitwig. I tried both for a couple weeks but I just kept finding the work flow in Bitwig more intuitive than Ableton. Not sure if that was because I had come from Tools, and that the Ableton screen looked backwards to me, or if there was more complex mechanics behind it (probably both), but I used Bitwig for the project and mostly loved it. Next project was more traditional editing SFX, atmos and music stuff but going back to Tools I missed some the ‘creative’ elements of the work flow so I have slowly moved most of my gigs over to it now.

I think the biggest thing I like is that i find it very simple to start a project, but there is a huge amount of scope for things to get really crazy. My work moves pretty fluidly between creating music, sfx, atmospheres, editing voice and recording all sorts of random instruments and objects. Having one space where I can do all that while jumping back and forth between Audio and Midi with out really having to think about them that differently was a game changer. That and automation, it is incredibly easy to get rolling. Then you throw in the stock VI’s and it’s way of using modulation and it just turn into something else. I could list cool things for hours. A lot of those features might also be available in other DAWs, but there is something about the layout and the workflow that I found to be really intuitive.

That said there are a number of things Bitwig isn’t great at or doesn’t do at all. The biggest is It doesn’t do video natively, this really sucks. If I am editing to video I have to run third party pluggin, which can be really hit and mis.
Secondly it doesn’t really do surround. It does sort of have workarounds, and if you dive into the modular environment you probably build something which I might do in the future, but it certainly isn’t fast or intuitive like the most it the process.
Thirdly the editing still feels a little sloppy compared to Tools, not terrible, but I do miss certain things. Those three things are why I use it in conjunction with Reaper.

If I was recording bands or ensembles everyday in a commercial space then I would probably still use Tools, but for ‘making’ works this just fits better.

[The Tasmanian]

Hey Dave,
I heard a large yellow tail cockatoo yell to me you had moved to NZ?
Is this true?
Whats happening?

[Text_Edifice]

Tony, I hear you on midi and tools. Bitwig sounds like it's worth another look - I think I found ableton similarly annoying coming from tools. The first proper gig I had to do with it was setup a multi-speaker surround installation thingo and, while it worked, it took a bit of head scratching around why bussing didn't work the way i wanted it to.

Chris - I've been in Wellington for about a year. The portal opened (we both got job offers at the same time, in the same place) so we made the leap.

It's been great. We live by the ocean and I run trails every other day.

I miss a bunch of folk from Tas but generally happier and healthier over here.

[The Tasmanian]

Good to hear Dave - you will make the most of it I'm sure !

[Drumstruck]

I don't like to say it, but I'm using Audacity a lot now - mostly because I have to output 8K u-Law audio for IVR and it's efficient for tidying up voiceovers and spitting out compressed and loud voice messages.

On the other end of the scale the SSL plugs are really nice and subtle for classical mixes.

The Eventide Harmoniser plug is interesting 'cause I'll never get a h/w unit.

And to end it all DSP Quattro is well written code for a bargain price.