Absolute must have plug ins and virtual instruments?

[KennyLusk]

For virtual instruments, IK's Miroslav Philharmonik has a really nice sound I feel comfortable using.

And Waves Kramer Mater Tape has added depth and dimension that wasn't there before in my final mixes. It's a depth and dimension I only experienced when I used to dump my mixes to 1/4" Ampex 456. "Glue" is an appropriate word to describe the effect.

Forgot to add that Sonnox Oxford Reverb blows me away with how smooth it is. Doesn't seem to be grainy at all. Beautiful tails.

[comfortstarr]

http://www.cambridge-mt.com/MixingSecrets.htm

I highly recommend this book before throwing a ton of money down a rabbit hole in an attempt to chase things that you may or may not know how to attain. It is an excellent resource and has really changed things for me in the past 2 years.


Jeff

Thanks for this heads up. Just ordered it. Looks really helpful.

As to the original subject--and from the perspective of a complete amateur/hobbyist--my sense is that if you have Logic or whatever, you should probably be able to make a hot damn record eh? People have made better from less.

[digitaldrummer]

Since it's on sale for much less than I bought it for, I'm going to toss this one into the ring:

Slate VBC - Virtual Buss Compressors

http://www.slatedigital.com/online-shop ... ompressors

cry all you want about iLoks and all that crap but if you put this on your mix you will probably wonder why you didn't get it long ago.

it's of course hard to describe, but what I hear is: clarity. space. it's done!

oh, and it's pure FM (yes I mean fucking magic). seriously. I have to do my own mastering for clients on a tiny budget. this has been on the last 2 projects I did and is going on another for sure and probably more. And how many of you have any of these comps that its modeled after? did you pay $100 for them?

I also like the Slate VCC with this.

[kobuk]

I'll be the contrarian a bit and say that there are most definitely plugins that most pros use. Waves (L1, Renvox, API series, CLA series ) , UAD, Soundtoys to name a few. From there (as my former bandmate Carl mentioned ) things tend to vary depending on the platform (protools, logic, cubase ) budget and musical goals. There are now some very good free VST plugins that are as good as any of the names mentioned above. Molot, SonEq, DC1A, Valhalla FreqEcho, TDR Feedback Compressor are a few that come to mind. Then you have some very cheap stuff like Stillwell and SkNote that are also excellent.

[Nick Sevilla]

What I'm getting at is, say if you had a person with limited mixing/mastering skills and you told them to use whatever, stock DAW plug ins they wanted (in this case Logic) to mix and or master a project; and then you also told that same person to do a comparison version using any third party plug ins out there that they wanted.

I would never do this.

Cheers

[No Wave Casio Kitsch]

We have Waves Mercury, almost every single UAD-2 plugin, the SoundToys bundle, and a handful of random other stuff. That being said, I could very happily mix an entire album with nothing but stock Avid or Logic plugs and the Soundtoys stuff.

[FNM]

We have Waves Mercury, almost every single UAD-2 plugin, the SoundToys bundle, and a handful of random other stuff. That being said, I could very happily mix an entire album with nothing but stock Avid or Logic plugs and the Soundtoys stuff.

Well the Soundtoys stuff is a big "AND"

I could mix an album with stock Studio One plugins, but I wouldn't be that happy. I hate when people ask, "which plugin" and get the ole, "get better with stock plugins" answer. There is so much stuff out that that will compliment stock plugins. You rarely hear the hardware guys say "get better at using your board."

Here's some must haves:

Free:

Tokyo Dawn Labs - Kotelnikov and SlickEQ
VladG - Limiter No.6

Complimentary to stock plugins:

LA2A type compressor (I use IK White2A, but there's a lot)

Pultec type EQ (IK for me again)

Parametric EQ - (Voxengo GlissEQ, could replace with DDMF, Fabfilter, etc.)

Transient Designer - (SPL, melda, Trans-X etc.)

Reverb - ValhallaVintageVerb

Any good drum replacement plugin - (Drumagog, drumXchanger)

All that and then I'd be happy. I think other compressor, limiter, delay, and EQ options are must haves too, but much more personal.

[neil wilkes]

Mike, I don't know what your background in mixing is, but I can't recommend highly enough that you first learn how to mix thoroughly with the stock plug-ins that come with Logic. Like most DAWs, the stock plug-ins are really high quality. Once you hit your limits with the stock plug-ins (that is, your outgrow them), then look into "industry standard" plug-ins, like Waves, McDSP, Sonnox and UAD.

Good luck!

Rob

Sound advice (pun unintentional) Rob.
The time to spend is when what you already have doesn't cut it quite right.

That said, I find the UAD system to be outstanding in terms of sheer quality, and coupled with Waves, Slate Digital & a couple of staples like AltiVerb, ReLab's LX480 & the Lexicon PCM Native Bundle tend to cover most of my needs.
Recent finds include the superb Imperial Delay (Boz Digital) which is one hell of a delay, and I still swear by the PSP Lexicon PSP42 unit.

[Mo-Tech]

Ditto here, been using Logic for over 8 years and Logic Pro X has 98-99% anyone would need for serious pro action. That 1-2% is where some need something else.

Space Designer is among the best software reverbs you can get IMO, the only downside is the relatively steep(ish) learning curve since it's not the easies UI to get by. Delay Designer is another Logic highlight, and you have all the necesseties from Linear Phase EQ till many distortion to stereo staging to test signalling. Really all you need plus tons more. I used to get all sorts of third-party plugins through out the years and ultimately found most aren't any improvement over the Logic's own stuff plus their different looking UIs, hardware-dongles etc that ultimately just complicate your workflow.

That being said I'm starting to love software-controlled external hardware DSP based plugins and lately, really loving the Metric Halo 2D plugin bundle working with the MH interfaces - Channel Strip (MIO Strip) sounds better than Logic's dynamic plugin kit to my ears and while almost unnoticable at first the MH's "Character" is my favourite plugin by far, especially when sending Logic tracks and mixing through 80bit MIO DSP engine - with multiple tracks it comes to life and makes noticably "jucier" mix than the Logic bounce IMHO.

Todays digital joys, but also interestingly "plugin-wise" I've also been more frequently switching back to outboard gear for certain sonic answers since the common digital "quality" doesn't often meet my expectations - in that sense my old cheapish and noisy Qadraverb can make it's own sonic wonders when used right. Not only final mixing, but tracking through the tape machine as well to get that sonic mojo very hard to impossible nail with the fully digital workflow even with the very best of plugins and skillset. Hence if you're looking for something that Logic can't do - a proper solid state- or tube- hardware is the answer. No matter what the salesmen and software sim(emu)ulators tell you - the software can't do what the hardware does or vice versa. It's best to use 'em both and know their strenghts.

All IMHO of course.