Notes

Locomotion LM-18 - Desert Moon Audio plug-in
Tempo-synced auto-pan on drums and percussion: trigger mode, count to move and threshold
Why a free-running auto-pan smears a percussion part, and how bar-locked sync or a trigger that moves on every Nth hit keeps it in time. Read more...
TubeClip TC-19 - Desert Moon Audio plug-in
Parallel clipping on drums and vocals: GLOW, FAT and a time-aligned MIX
How parallel clipping adds density to drums and vocals, why the dry and clipped copies must stay time-aligned, and where GLOW and FAT fit in. Read more...
TubeClip – Tube Clipper plugin for Mac and PC
Clipper vs limiter: how a tube clipper makes a mix louder without aliasing
What a clipper does that a limiter cannot, why clipping usually aliases, and how a tube stage and a look-ahead guard hold a mix bus ceiling cleanly. Read more...
Locomotion – 3D Auto-Panner plugin for Mac and PC
3D auto-panner vs a pan knob: how distance, Doppler and ear cues make a sound travel
Why a pan knob only changes level, which cues tell your ears a sound is moving, and how a 3D auto-panner puts them on one DIMENSION knob. Read more...
Woody – DI Acoustic Guitar Enhancer plugin for Mac and PC
Why piezo, soundhole magnetic and internal mic pickups sound different
Why an under-saddle piezo sounds thin, a soundhole magnetic mid-heavy and an internal mic boxy, and how to even them out on a DI track. Read more...
Woody – DI Acoustic Guitar Enhancer plugin for Mac and PC
How to make a DI acoustic guitar sound like it was miked
Why a pickup misses the body of an acoustic guitar, and how a body voicing, SPACE and the DI blended back in put a miked sound on a DI track. Read more...
Rhyth-O-Matic – Analog Drum Machine plugin for Mac and PC
How to layer two drum machine rhythms at once
Why two preset rhythms on one bar clock make patterns no drummer plays, and how SWING, ACCENT and AUTO FILL turn the stack into a part. Read more...
Rhyth-O-Matic – Analog Drum Machine plugin for Mac and PC
How an analog drum machine makes its sounds without samples
Resonators, filtered noise and square-wave oscillators: how an analog drum machine builds each voice, and why TUNE and DECAY reshape it. Read more...
Trans-Box – Transient Smack / Girth Box plugin for Mac and PC
How to make a snare crack without making it louder
Transient shaping for snare: raise the attack, tuck the ring, add body on the drum's fundamental, and keep the peak under -1 dBTP. Read more...
Plate Daddy – Plate Reverberator plugin for Mac and PC
How to use a plate reverb on vocals
A plate reverb setup for vocals: choosing the plate, setting decay by ear, pre-delay to keep the voice in front, damping and ducking the tail. Read more...
Nebraska 144 – Cassette Four-Track plugin for Mac and PC
Cassette four-track sound in a DAW: what the machine really did to your mix
The five things a cassette four-track did to sound, from the head bump to the noise floor, and how to get them on one channel in a DAW Read more...
Optotron – Electro-Optical Leveling Amplifier plugin for Mac and PC
What an opto compressor actually does (and why vocals love it)
How an electro-optical leveling amplifier turns light into gain reduction, why its release depends on the material, and a two-knob way to set one on a vocal Read more...
Push Pull – Program Equalizer plugin for Mac and PC
Boost and cut the same bass: the passive program EQ trick
Why boosting and attenuating the same low frequency on a passive program equalizer does not cancel, and how to use the lift-and-dip on kick, bass and a mix Read more...
VU-02 – Analog Volume Unit Meter plugin for Mac and PC
How to read a VU meter (and why it ignores your peaks)
What a VU meter measures, why it lags and overshoots, where 0 VU should sit in a DAW, and how to line meters up across busses Read more...
Plate Daddy – Plate Reverberator plugin for Mac and PC
Plate reverb vs spring reverb: which one your mix wants
What actually separates a plate from a spring, why each chirps the way it does, and which sources each one suits Read more...