Which VSTi plugins are the best?
There is indeed a very large selection of VSTi plugins, thousands or even tens of thousands you can buy or download for free. On my blog there are in the Free Download area very many good VST plugins for free (Freeware).
There is indeed a very large selection of VSTi plugins, thousands or even tens of thousands you can buy or download for free. On my blog there are in the Free Download area very many good VST plugins for free (Freeware).
Tone 2 Gladiator 2
Gladiator 2 is a seriously deep synth, but rather than hide everything behind heaps of menus or pages, Tone 2 manages to fit everything all on a single page. The layout takes a little getting used to, but once you have a feel for where everything is, it’s quite logical and easy to navigate. It is big, though. So big, in fact, that when I tried to use it on my 15” Macbook, it didn’t fit on the screen. Perhaps the addition of a scroll bar or something to the interface for people using smaller screens might be a nice addition. As it is now, there was no way for me to see or reach the parameters at the bottom inch or so. That said, let’s have a look at what’s on offer.
At the very top of the interface is the category and preset browser. These work about as you would expect and helpfully include an INIT button to initialize a new sound and a RANDOM button for generating random sounds as starting points to your own programs. The results from this are generally quite good, although occasionally they resulted in either no sound at all, or dangerously loud sounds (the manual recommends inserting a brick-wall limiter on the Gladiator 2 channel when you are using the RANDOM function). Next to this are settings for volume, quality (for setting the amount of oversampling to prevent aliasing), FX MIX, and Microtuning (which slightly detunes notes in a chord for a fatter and clearer sound). There is also a HELP button here, but all it does is bring up a window telling you where the manual is. This seems rather pointless to me. If you’re going to have a HELP button, it should bring up in-program help or at least automatically open the manual.
This is all you see when you first open Gladiator 2, so if you want to get into making your own sounds, you need to hit the EDIT button which opens the rest of the interface allowing you access to all the sound programming controls.
Gladiator 2’s architecture is based around 2 pairs of waveform oscillators and a 5th oscillator for various types of noise and attack transients (a very nice touch). The waveforms (or more accurately wavetables… Tone2 calls them ‘morphtables’) range from your standard basic synth waveforms to vocals, pianos, strings, guitars, percussion and all manner of other acoustic and synthetic sources. From here, you can apply any of dozens of ‘modifiers’ which alter the harmonic spectra of the morphtable. There are far too many modifiers for me to list here, but suffice it to say that these can do anything from slight variations on the original timbre to all out sonic mangling. Just this ability alone expands the timbral possibilities nearly infinitely. Still more variety is available via a number of different options for combining the oscillators within a pair. Of course you can simply mix them, as on a standard synth, but you can also have them combine only the odd harmonics of one wave with the even harmonics of another and a number of other less conventional methods. Cross-modulating with FM and AM is also available.
Next up are controls for the MORPHMODE, which effects how the MORPHTABLES play back and how much of the MORPHTABLE plays back. Everything from playing through one to all manner of looping back and forth are available here. You may also notice two buttons marked RESYNTHESIS and VOCODER. At the moment these do nothing, but apparently, they are to eventually become available as paid “expansions”. There’s been a lot of controversy about this online and I have to say I agree with the general consensus that one shouldn’t have to pay to add functionality to a synth they already paid for. Either include it as standard, or don’t.
Below the standard PITCH and MIX settings, you’ll find OSCILLATOR 5. As mentioned previously, this is a specialized oscillator for playing back various types of noise (everything from standard WHITE, PINK, and BROWN to human breath, applause, water, etc.) and attack transients (including acoustic sounds like guitar picks or piano hammers to synthetic laser blips for adding attack to synth basses). This oscillator is much more basic than the others and lacks the MODIFIERS, but they really aren’t needed here.
At the very top of the interface is the category and preset browser. These work about as you would expect and helpfully include an INIT button to initialize a new sound and a RANDOM button for generating random sounds as starting points to your own programs. The results from this are generally quite good, although occasionally they resulted in either no sound at all, or dangerously loud sounds (the manual recommends inserting a brick-wall limiter on the Gladiator 2 channel when you are using the RANDOM function). Next to this are settings for volume, quality (for setting the amount of oversampling to prevent aliasing), FX MIX, and Microtuning (which slightly detunes notes in a chord for a fatter and clearer sound). There is also a HELP button here, but all it does is bring up a window telling you where the manual is. This seems rather pointless to me. If you’re going to have a HELP button, it should bring up in-program help or at least automatically open the manual.
This is all you see when you first open Gladiator 2, so if you want to get into making your own sounds, you need to hit the EDIT button which opens the rest of the interface allowing you access to all the sound programming controls.
Gladiator 2’s architecture is based around 2 pairs of waveform oscillators and a 5th oscillator for various types of noise and attack transients (a very nice touch). The waveforms (or more accurately wavetables… Tone2 calls them ‘morphtables’) range from your standard basic synth waveforms to vocals, pianos, strings, guitars, percussion and all manner of other acoustic and synthetic sources. From here, you can apply any of dozens of ‘modifiers’ which alter the harmonic spectra of the morphtable. There are far too many modifiers for me to list here, but suffice it to say that these can do anything from slight variations on the original timbre to all out sonic mangling. Just this ability alone expands the timbral possibilities nearly infinitely. Still more variety is available via a number of different options for combining the oscillators within a pair. Of course you can simply mix them, as on a standard synth, but you can also have them combine only the odd harmonics of one wave with the even harmonics of another and a number of other less conventional methods. Cross-modulating with FM and AM is also available.
Next up are controls for the MORPHMODE, which effects how the MORPHTABLES play back and how much of the MORPHTABLE plays back. Everything from playing through one to all manner of looping back and forth are available here. You may also notice two buttons marked RESYNTHESIS and VOCODER. At the moment these do nothing, but apparently, they are to eventually become available as paid “expansions”. There’s been a lot of controversy about this online and I have to say I agree with the general consensus that one shouldn’t have to pay to add functionality to a synth they already paid for. Either include it as standard, or don’t.
Below the standard PITCH and MIX settings, you’ll find OSCILLATOR 5. As mentioned previously, this is a specialized oscillator for playing back various types of noise (everything from standard WHITE, PINK, and BROWN to human breath, applause, water, etc.) and attack transients (including acoustic sounds like guitar picks or piano hammers to synthetic laser blips for adding attack to synth basses). This oscillator is much more basic than the others and lacks the MODIFIERS, but they really aren’t needed here.
ReFX Nexus 2 Pack VSTi, Expansions, Presets and Skins
NEXUS 2 is a next generation ROM synthesizer of the highest quality that can turn your musical dreams into a stunning reality. Forget about stereotypical, boring, stale, old sounding ROM synths and embrace the power of NEXUS2 to evolve your productions to a new level of greatness. You can find here a lot of expansions and presets for NEXUS.
NEXUS2 explores new sonic territory delivering complex, ultra-fat, contemporary soundstorms that sound as good as the most expensive and best hardware available today. A powerful and flexible architecture is the foundation that supports the immediately useful and spontaneously engaging design of the instrument. Every aspect of NEXUS2 was built to produce music of the highest quality, quickly, with the least amount of fuss.
NEXUS 2 features a world-class 32 step arpegiator with note-transposition, an agile and simple 32 step trance gate, industry leading reverb licensed from Arts Acoustic, and a sophisticated modulation-matrix that will help you sculpt the sound.
NEXUS2 explores new sonic territory delivering complex, ultra-fat, contemporary soundstorms that sound as good as the most expensive and best hardware available today. A powerful and flexible architecture is the foundation that supports the immediately useful and spontaneously engaging design of the instrument. Every aspect of NEXUS2 was built to produce music of the highest quality, quickly, with the least amount of fuss.
NEXUS 2 features a world-class 32 step arpegiator with note-transposition, an agile and simple 32 step trance gate, industry leading reverb licensed from Arts Acoustic, and a sophisticated modulation-matrix that will help you sculpt the sound.
First of all:
. Native Instruments
I recommend all VST plug-ins from Native Instruments. Free download you can not do this here, unfortunately, because as already mentioned it is paid software.
I use the VST plugin Massive very often. This is especially suitable for Electro, Trance, Electro House, Dubstep, Hardstyle, Complextro, etc.
. Native Instruments
I recommend all VST plug-ins from Native Instruments. Free download you can not do this here, unfortunately, because as already mentioned it is paid software.
I use the VST plugin Massive very often. This is especially suitable for Electro, Trance, Electro House, Dubstep, Hardstyle, Complextro, etc.
In addition, I use FM8 Native Instruments also very often.
Synth This is particularly suitable for Electro, Minimal Techno and Detroit.
Synth This is particularly suitable for Electro, Minimal Techno and Detroit.
Native Instruments FM8
Another very cool plugin is the Edirol Orchestral VST plugin.
As the name says you can not play sämliche instruments of the orchestra
(among other things: Violin, Flute, Violin, Strings / Strings, bells, Conerto piano, trumpet, xylophone, Spicatto , etc.).
As the name says you can not play sämliche instruments of the orchestra
(among other things: Violin, Flute, Violin, Strings / Strings, bells, Conerto piano, trumpet, xylophone, Spicatto , etc.).
The plugin TruePianos is the first cream to play a piano. It has many piano presets to choose from and the VST brings a very high quality audio with it.
TruePianos VST Plugin
The Sylenth1 is one of my often-used synth with a very good sound.
Especially good for Electro, House, Dubstep, etc.
Especially good for Electro, House, Dubstep, etc.
Sylenth1 VST Plugin