Using custom plugin names for a Favs folder

[guavadude]

 

I've created a Favs folder and use custom names with the type in the name itself. This has greatly sped up my workflow. I still have other folders if I want to dive into more choices or to remind me to try stuff.

 

[des99]

Whatever works for you!

Personally, I arrange mine so I don't have a huge list of plugins to wade through - if I need a delay, I want to see *just* my delays, not scroll through reverbs, EQs, compressors etc until I get to the delays.

So I break mine down by category  - Compressors, EQs, Reverbs etc, and then directly in those folders will be my faves *of that type*. I might further have subfolders containing more, but lesser used, plugins of that type (sometimes by class, eg 1176 type, SSL Bus type, LA2A type etc), that I can go into if I don't want to choose one of my regular favourites from the top level Compressor folder.

These things are all personal, but it's always interesting to see how other people choose to workflow...

[guavadude]

I used to do it the way you mentioned but I found that I spent a lot of time scrolling down to the correct folder and then looking for the plugins. With everything alphabetized by type in one folder _FAVS, that's always at the top, it's been faster for me. 

[des99]

Like I say, whatever works.

The thing I didn't like about prepending custom plugin names is how they appear in the mixer - I would end up with a bunch of things like "DEL Ap", "DEL MF" making it harder to see which plugin was actually being used in that insert slot - there's even less letters for the actual plugin identifier. In the end, the only ones I tend to rename is for things like the SSL Native plugins, which all start with "SSL Native " before they get to the actual plugin name, so all your inserts with them look like "SSL Native" or whatever - not that helpful!

I also rename things like "bx_console SSL 4000 E" to "bx SSL E" etc, again to be more readable and identifiable in a quick visual sweep around the mixer... and one or two others, like "DSP56300Emu" I've just called "Virus Emu" etc. Short of those, I'm not a big custom plugin name user.

Fingers crossed for plugin text search/instantiate by return key in Logic 10.8. Maybe even plugin thumbnails in the plugin manager would be spiffy, too..!