Tape Simulator Plug

[the sinner]

Whats a good one? To get your 2007 gear to sound like it was recorded on 2 inch tape?

 

Free is better

[editbrain]

this might not be the answer you are looking for but here it goes.

 

 

if you are asking that question then maybe there is something missing from you mixing, not what your mixing on. maybe you could learn a little about using the wide arrangement of tools you already have at your disposal.

 

basics. it is all about basics. i am not saying you there is a definite in music mixing or creation when i say basics, but it helps to understand the fundamentals.

 

there are various ways to add distortion and other techniques to dirty/brown/warm up, down and around your mixes.

 

there is not a magic 2" tape plug. there are tape emulators thought, but i don't see a need personally.

[Z]

Though editbrain is absolutely right, I know a lot of people who love the PSP VintageWarmer for those reasons - it's not exactly like going to tape and it certainly colours your sound a bit....but it really does sound great

[marcel72]

Whats a good one? To get your 2007 gear to sound like it was recorded on 2 inch tape?

 

Free is better

 

Yeah, free is usually better...

 

If you really want it to sound 'like tape'...

 

Work on tape.

 

Otherwise, I would agree with editbrain.

[AllyMusicGirl]

Ahhh...

 

Right then, this one caught my eye.

 

My thought is I want easy peasy - yes there are a lot of tools, but for the beginner like myself I find that packaged plug-in's with familar interfaces give me more confidence that some of the GUI's within Logic.

 

Some of us were born to read manuals - some were born to twist knobs - and the lucky ones have the talent and time for both.

 

Personally I am musician first and a engineer second - I like simple interfaces and presets. I'd just rather be playing then tweaking!

 

...maybe I should just attend David's classes!

 

David does that include taking a lady out for a pint?

[David Nahmani]

...maybe I should just attend David's classes!

Here's an idea!

 

David does that include taking a lady out for a pint?

And here's an even better idea!

[AllyMusicGirl]

 

Right then, I'm staying on your couch!

[gsilbers]

airwindows free channel plugin is a console drive simulator. not tape but i think it will help u out. and on that website the gy sells tape plugin at a fair price. like 50 bucks.

[dven]

Back on topic

 

You can try Tritone Digital's ColorTone Free (requires Pluggo) or there are a few AUs here airwindows or a more complete list (some plugs aren't linked from the first url) here

 

--edit--- beaten to the airwindows link!

 

cheers,

dorian

[scrofani]

Analog Tape Sound? You're gonna love this. Download the IR's from this site http://noox.sitesled.com/

 

They are free. Among them are some IR's from a Studor tape machine. The Ir's themselves are several seconds long and so you can edit them like any other wave file to just keep the first part that you need. Throw one into space designer and put it on your track as an insert or on your main outs if you want. It really, really sounds like tape and to me sounds better than any emulation I've heard before.

[gsilbers]

Analog Tape Sound? You're gonna love this. Download the IR's from this site http://noox.sitesled.com/

 

They are free. Among them are some IR's from a Studor tape machine. The Ir's themselves are several seconds long and so you can edit them like any other wave file to just keep the first part that you need. Throw one into space designer and put it on your track as an insert or on your main outs if you want. It really, really sounds like tape and to me sounds better than any emulation I've heard before.

 

 

how do u load them in space designer?

 

i thought it only used logic IRs?

[marcel72]

It really, really sounds like tape

 

How?

 

Reduced HF response? Equalize.

 

Reduced dynamic range? Compress. Limit.

 

High noise floor? Add some noise, or even better, sum mixes on cheap unbalanced gear.

 

Slow, saturated transients? Use transformer based preamplifiers, or, again, compress or limit.

 

Harmonic distortion? Use quality converters, and you will be surprised at how much of this gets preserved from the source. Compressors and distortion plugs can do this, too.

 

That magic 'everything hangs together' feeling on mixes? Read editbrain's post above...

 

I think there's something dangerous here. I think the things that a lot of people love that they assume to be the products of tape recording (in part based on manufacturers' sales strategies) are actually the products of the same things that make great digital recording: Great material, great performances, good, solid, creative engineering, a little bit of personal or collective inspiration...

 

Not really a plugin for that.

[scrofani]

Certainly convolution doesn't capture the dynamic characteristics of a space or a medium like tape. For that you could set a compressor after the convolution plug with appropriate settings to mimic tape compression (I don't know what these are by the way). Or if someone made a dynamically stepped IR convolution plug, like a native version of the Liquid Mix then we might get that. What the IR convolution will give you now is the reduced HF and the smearing of transients. Try it and see. The sound will be very familiar to you. Convolution is hard to beat for capturing the sound of a space or a piece of gear. IR convolution has been around for a long time as the major technique for the DSP in digital eq units and now plugs. It was around long before convolution reverb.

 

Anyway, to get impulses in Space Designer you just need to have them saved as standard wav files. Click the Load IR button in Space Designer and select the IR you want to load. That's it.

[the sinner]

Well its not quite so easy as editbrain's answer, for two reasons.

 

1) I am working primarly with samples so recording them a specific way is not possible.

 

2) There is something "gritty" about tape, listen to Mancini, Moriccone recordings its not just the EQ etc..

[Ashermusic]

Well its not quite so easy as editbrain's answer, for two reasons.

 

1) I am working primarly with samples so recording them a specific way is not possible.

 

2) There is something "gritty" about tape, listen to Mancini, Moriccone recordings its not just the EQ etc..

 

IMHO 95% of the reason Mancini ansd Morricone recordings sound the way they do is great composing, orchestrating, engineering and performances by the players. Duplicate these conditions and record into a DAW it will still sound great.

 

It's the guys, not the gear.

[the sinner]

I just asked for a simple plug in, assume that I am doing all the necassary studying and writing. I want something that I can turn on to make these modern sounding samples sound crunchy and old. Thanks for all those who actually offered plug in suggestions.

 

Well its not quite so easy as editbrain's answer, for two reasons.

 

1) I am working primarly with samples so recording them a specific way is not possible.

 

2) There is something "gritty" about tape, listen to Mancini, Moriccone recordings its not just the EQ etc..

 

IMHO 95% of the reason Mancini ansd Morricone recordings sound the way they do is great composing, orchestrating, engineering and performances by the players. Duplicate these conditions and record into a DAW it will still sound great.

 

It's the guys, not the gear.

[editbrain]

i gave you plug-in examples and a work flow.

 

it is cool if you did not accept my answer, but as your last post suggests. it seems that my initial post was correct. there is something wrong with you mixing, and not what your mixing.

maybe that is harsh. i will rephrase.

 

there is a flaw in you theory, and your acceptance to create the sound you need, and a reliance on being handed what you want.

whoa! that sounded just as bad.

[peeb]

Hey Sinner,

 

This will sound radical. but i saw a TV Documentary thing the other day about Beck, and he had a crappy old Ghetto Blaster cassette in the studio they were using. Not sure i'd be brave enough to do it to a full mix, but i'd certainly happily record to cassette and resample some of my tracks if i were looking for that sound. No doubt it would mess up your sync and you'd have to fiddle with the spotting, but as a creative choice, absolutely. On a similar note, i know for a fact that when Eric Persing was creating the original Stylus library, he burnt his loops to vinyl and resampled them. To his ears, nothing sounds like vinyl except vinyl. So if you feel nothing sounds like tape but tape, you're in good company

[velvet]

With respect to all what was written, there are some plugins in AU format , that are tape (tape machine) simulations and the question was about that. Again-respect to all who wrote their suggestions up here... Personally I started recording to tape quite long time ago (before Logic was born - no I am not THAT old, I was just lucky and started when I was really young ) I still prefer mix to 2track tape and I love to have not only basic EQ and compressor tools, but also some "Tape" simulator present in the DAW I work with. Although I agree that similar (same ) result one might achieve with compression and EQ, it is faster to use a good "dedicated " plugin - at least for me.

 

DUY DaD Tape is available in AU format for a while, it is a bit pricey IMHO , but probably the best you can get in AU world

many choices of different Tape Machines, speeds, noise reductions, etc...

 

Nomad Factory has a Tape sim kind of a plugin with less possibilities AND it is only a part of a bundle It was not bad but not worth paying other plugins I did not want to buy....

 

Wintage Warmer really has some settings (presets) named like Tape medium, slow or similar. To me it never worked - I did not like it. Or should I say I might like what those preset settings do, but they are not that close to what I wanted to hear ... Might work for someone

 

Tritone Digital has a Colortone Pro plugin which is a kind of convolution based plugin - you can load your impulses too. And this plug has already some 15 ips and 30 ips tape presets. Nice, but it is just coloration, not that kind of tape compression - that nice rounding of peaks etc...

 

Airwindows - never tried their Tape sim plugin, as it is not available as a demo. But their Airwindows channel isn't bad at all!

 

 

If you are on ProTools you might want to try MacDSP Analog Channel, Cranesong Phoenix or Massey Tape Head.

 

there is a Voxengo Tape simulator plugin for PCs as a VST plugin

There are some hardware Tape simulators (getting better and better!) like rupert Neve Portico, and the one from Anamodaudio.

 

I like the DaD Tape most also because it is in AU format and can be used in Logic

 

For me - no plugin beats original Ampex 456 (also because I do love the wheels roling and tape moving) but I still find tape simul. plugs usefull.

[/b]

[semtek]

DUY DaD Tape is available in AU format for a while, it is a bit pricey IMHO , but probably the best you can get in AU world

many choices of different Tape Machines, speeds, noise reductions, etc...

 

 

I tried this one and was dissapointed - I remember recording onto a cassette machine when I was making dance music like 10 years ago. At the time we were just hijacking my teacher's music room, and cassette was the only way of getting the music out of there. The sound on the tape was always amazing, tho very distorted, and we could never figure out why. When I tried the DUY tape emu it just sounded so subtle, and though I know lots of people like that, it's not even 10% the fun of what saturating that old machine was. I've never worked on reel to reel, but I imagine that it also sounds nothing like anything you can achieve in the digital domain.

 

My strategy is make the music first, and know that when you receive that $100,000 advance you'll have plenty of cash to burn on hiring vintage gear to your heart's content. Either that, or experiment with cheaper tae machines as suggested above...

[velvet]

The sound on the tape was always amazing, tho very distorted, and we could never figure out why. When I tried the DUY tape emu it just sounded so subtle, and though I know lots of people like that, it's not even 10% the fun of what saturating that old machine was. I've never worked on reel to reel, but I imagine that it also sounds nothing like anything you can achieve in the digital domain.

 

Be aware that in the "old" days when working with reel to reels and mostly analog hardware one of the most important things was to AVOID distortion and noise

We actually did not really think about "adding a tape saturation" to a clean and "cold" digital signal, because - as everything was recorded to tape , everything was already "saturated" - or how you name it... But not distorted (unless it was desirable effect).

So yes-the DUY DaD Tape's effect probably is quite subtle to the effect you get from overdriven "cassete machine"...

But you can always insert some kind of distortion (Logic has for example a perfect "Bright Funky Crunch preset on one of his distortion plugins"-and if you insert that, set it not too wet (like 10-20%) and than add a DUY's Tape with some no Noisereduction setting @ 15ips to add some lows which might get lost due to the distortion plugin process - I guess here comes your old cassete-machine sound

btw I still own old 8 track cassete recorder somewhere - I remember it's a fun to work with, I should find it and give it a try for some "lo-fi" analog damage

[stlpck]

I do not understand why anyone would ever record on tape again after all the advancement in technology. To get rid of the tape hiss you use noise reduction ,which changes your natural tone, therefore tape isn't giving you the true sound. The digital realm is giving you a more accurate sound than before. I would recommend using some tube mic pre's which warms up the sound, has no hiss, and saturates to the fullest.

[the sinner]

I think the reason we want somethings to sound like "period" pieces are for my clients who sometimes want that "sound" to compliment their film or episode. Cool, I am checking out the Vintage Warmer demo.

[AllyMusicGirl]

Oh deary - seems some hostility took place over holiday!

 

I'm getting the distinct feeling we have two camps here at Logic Pro Help.

 

Those of us who like an "easy button", because we prefer not to be buggered down with techincal aspects, and then there are those of us who vent a degree of snobbery due to the fact that they have "mastered" Logic and all of it's finer points and shan't be bothered with the plebs.

 

(sigh)

 

The while the one-upmanship is humorus it's a little dishearting.

 

Smart folks, help the daft.

 

Daft folks read the manual.

 

We are all learning, even the certifed...(kiss) David!

 

 

Look at me, I'm bloody Mary Poppins with the life lesson! LOL

 

We can't have them gallivanting up there like kangaroos, can we?

[Ashermusic]

Oh deary - seems some hostility took place over holiday!

 

I'm getting the distinct feeling we have two camps here at Logic Pro Help.

 

Those of us who like an "easy button", because we prefer not to be buggered down with techincal aspects, and then there are those of us who vent a degree of snobbery due to the fact that they have "mastered" Logic and all of it's finer points and shan't be bothered with the plebs.

 

(sigh)

 

The while the one-upmanship is humorus it's a little dishearting.

 

Smart folks, help the daft.

 

Daft folks read the manual.

 

We are all learning, even the certifed...(kiss) David!

 

 

Look at me, I'm bloody Mary Poppins with the life lesson! LOL

 

We can't have them gallivanting up there like kangaroos, can we?

 

Ally, first of all as one of those who knows this program very well I will only say that if we did not want to help the plebs we would not be here. After all, away from the forum I get paid to help people with Logic.

 

Logic, or any modern full-featured DAW, does not have an easy button. That is what Garageband is for.

 

Personally I will help anyone who I believe has made at least an effort to learn what they are asking about by reading the manual. Because if they are not willing to do that to me it is if they are saying "your time is less valuable than mine."

 

So it isn't about snobbery, it is about comittment to learning which btw, you have amply demonstrated IMHO.

 

Daivd, who is a really fine fellow btw, will help those who are not willing to read the manual.

[marcel72]

I'm getting the distinct feeling we have two camps here at Logic Pro Help.

 

Those of us who like an "easy button", because we prefer not to be buggered down with techincal aspects, and then there are those of us who vent a degree of snobbery due to the fact that they have "mastered" Logic and all of it's finer points and shan't be bothered with the plebs.

 

I don't really think that's the case. I think there are lots of very knowledgeable people on this forum who are happy to help others with their issues. In this particular case, though, I think that the best answer is that there is no substitute for great recording.

 

Think of all the things that are involved in a recorded performance... Material... Players... Instruments... Recording environment... Microphone choice and placement... Preamplifiers... Dynamics... Equalizers... Recording medium (including recording device - tape deck or A/D/A converters)... Mixing format... FX... Monitors... Recording medium again... Etc.

 

Expecting a 'magic button' to make up for major differences in all of these variables is pretty unrealistic. Compensating for even one of these factors where something performed poorly or bad decisions were made can be a monumental task. Believe me, explaining this on this forum is a lot easier and more pleasant than trying to tell a client why the demos you did of their band can not be magically made to sound like Fleetwood Mac 'Rumors'...

 

To the original poster: If you are working with samples, is it possible to enrich your sample banks with stuff that has the vibe you're looking for at the source? IMHO, you may have a lot better luck doing things this way. One of the really great things about digital recording is that it is able, if properly used, to capture a lot of the subtleties of anything you put in front of it.

[AllyMusicGirl]

Bob's your uncle!

[Ashermusic]

Bob's your uncle!

 

A British expression I take it? What does that mean?

[AllyMusicGirl]

Basic translation:

 

...and there you have it!

 

[AllyMusicGirl]

Here's one for you -

 

I'm off to busk!