New Plug-Ins October, 2008

Cool Music Plug-Ins: October 2008




UVI Workstation (Free)

Talk about getting a lot for FREE. UVI have released the UVI Workstation which could easily become your next sample playback "go too" plug-in. It supports all formats, has a very nice interface, Imports REX, Apple Loops, AIFF, WAV and more, has smart synchronization so all your loops are sync'd to your host, built in effects and even a built in convoluation reverb! All for free...

UVI SoundSource Home

This is worth checking out for the capabilities of the plug-in alone, that is for sure.

Audio Damage Automaton ($49.00/US)





I really dig the Audio Damage plug-ins. While being a newer company, they are bringing out tools that are not simply duplicates of plug-ins you have seen before. They are new and help create sounds and effects that were not possible until this was introduced. It's basically a step sequencer that you can program when a certain effect will happen and the effects are very cool (Stutter, Ring Modulator, Bit Crusher and an effect they call Replicate). It's easier if you just watch the 2 videos they created - the 2nd one is the better of the 2 videos if you're short on time.

Automaton Product Page

QuickQuak Effects

The totally cool interface to Crowd Chamber

It's almost impossible to single out a "must have" effect from the guys at QuickQuak. They are all unique and totally interesting in RealKuhl ways. Quick descriptions:

Fusion Field - a very unique sounding, very nice reverb.

Crowd Chamber - Coolest effect I've seen in a while !! Can duplicate up to 2,000,000 voices of whatever you feed thru it with separate stereo positioning and more. Totally amazing for sound design.

Pitchwheel - Real-Time Pitch Changing plug-in

Glass Viper - Weird name for a cool and very unique sounding synthesizer - very in your face.

RaySpace - a reverb and space designer. You HAVE to hear some of the rooms that are included. You can make your own or even walk around in the "room" by moving where you are in the room.

The prices are very reasonable and there is also a bundle for all plug-ins at once.

QuickQuak Home Page

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In the future, I plan to include video with these mini reviews so you can hear what I'm talking about instead of just reading...... I'm still working on the Plug-in Guru website. It's taking longer than expected but that was to be expected !!

Once Upon a Time....

Once upon a time (say around 1982), there was a guy that loved to make sounds for synthesizers. He didn't just like to make sounds, no, he truly LOVED to make sounds for synthesizers. Well, this guy has made literally thousands and thousands of sounds at this point in his career. Sound that have been used in commercials, albums and films, sounds that are found in over 25 synthesizers and even more sounds that are provided as support for those synthesizers.

Well, fast forward to 2008 and when you look at creating music, today there are some really amazing virtual synthesizers that are available for your personal computer. In fact, some of these virtual synthesizers (or "Virtual Instrument" as they are generally called in "the Industry") are more complex and capable of doing things that don't even exist on a hardware based synthesizer.

Well, back to the story. See, this sound making fellow has noticed that there is very minimal support for these virtual synthesizers..... they are capable of doing so much, but do most people that use these synthesizers know all the cool things that they can do ? NO. Most people call up a factory preset, and use it to write a song without ever diving deeper than the browser window or the default patches....

Well John "Skippy" Lehmkuhl wants to change all that.... soon there will be a web site where you can go and download free video tutorial on how a certain plug-in works. Skippy will personally show you some of the cool abilities and explain how to use them - and it will be easy to learn because you will see and hear the review/tutorial instead of just reading text that makes your eyes glaze over. Watching someone do something is the best way of learning new things and there are lot of new things in all of the Virtual Instruments to lear. So these tutorials will be FREE to view and even download so anybody can also learn and start using the amazing abilities of these cool virtual instruments.

On top of this, Skippy will provide you with a link to download 10 free kick-butt patches for each of the plug-ins that he reviews. If you like those, there will be a link below the free one to purchase 50 more patches for $30 US dollars. The goal is to keep the price down so that nobody feels they need to give these away. Everybody can afford to have their own copy of these sounds and will hopefully tell all their friends to get their own legal download of the sounds. If enough people do this, then Skippy can keep creating reviews and sounds for other cool plug-ins and the world will hopefully be a slightly better place than it was before.......

First up is Native Instruments amazing FM8 - this plug-in has taken one of Skippy' favorite forms of synthesis (FM Synthesis) to new worlds and the 60 patches that have been created will help make this seem like a totally new synth. After this is a ton of new support for Spectrasonic's Stylus RMX including new drum kits, New Multi and MIDI files that re-invent tons of the included grooves and a ton of new Drum Loops in Recycle or native Stylus RMX format !! On top of this the "LIVE" Multi that has Tons of synth parameters, Chaos parameter and even Effect Parameters that change via controllers will also be made available .

Stay tuned !!