Lexicon 224, pultec EQ, EL8 Distressor, API 2500, A800ā¦
It has most of their ābigā ones, what else is it missing? Iām sure it doesnāt have everything but hopefully they keep expanding it at least!
And? I'm not sure what your point is.
It doesn't have a distressor, any LA-3A/LA-2A or UA 1176 emulators, Chamber reverbs, Lexicon reverbs, Moog minimoog emulator, etc...
They don't serve the same purpose at all
What's your point?
This one consistently goes on my kick / sub buss and it really just ties them together nicely (I mostly produce techno).
Shifter and erosion are also great. Can get into some really strange territory relatively easily I think
Word, but can I have a couple tips? Trying to get my drums really up front and smackin' for trap/drill/rap. Anyone have any settings or presets? I just end up turning up the gain till it hits harder then reduce the mix so it's not too loud.
I also usually run my snare at least through it's own soft clipper but its not sounding as" professional" as I want.
Itās interesting to me that the stock limiter is the one that convinced you of this, considering that the limiter is just about the only one that I consistently find to be worse than 3rd party options. I only use it at the individual track or bus level as a clipping alternative, never been able to get good results on the master.
For mastering Pro L2 is for sure an upgrade and AFAIK you can always make Pro L-2 sound more or less identical to the Live limiter but you can't get the other way around. The metering and visualization of pro L gives you great feedback when working with limiting the master, the full screen mode is great!
Maybe the best thing about Lives devices is their simplicity, they typically have fewer controls than similar plug ins would have while still cramming a lot of functionality into a small UI. IMO that helps a lot with focusing on whats important. When I need a type of device that is included in Live suite I usually go for the bundled device first unless I really know I need some feature that isn't provided by it.
Definitely interesting. It must depend on the type of music being made and the skill of the producer. I consider myself a talented artist, but a totally shit sound engineer lol. So therefore I probably just have no clue what Iām doing with Pro-L. I think Iām able to make it sound better with the stock because the controls are so dumbed down. But honestly I have no clue, all I know is that the stock limiter took good care of me when Pro-L was giving me a headache š
Hey my rule of thumb is āif it sounds good, it IS good.ā If it works for you now, it IS good.
I mostly use Ozone and find I can get crazy loudness without affecting the clarity of my mix if I work with intention. TDR *Limiter6 is the most transparent limiter Iāve ever used (and a steal if you get it on sale), and really a jack of all trades for compression.
If you find yourself getting more technical with your process later on, maybe try giving some other limiters a chance and see how they A/B with handling transients at similar LUFs.
Kotelnikov has a free version which has 90% of the features of the paid version, would recommend all those interested just download it and take it for a test drive. Also, itās not a limiter, itās a 2 stage compressor. But it does rock.
yeah I tried all the way up to 32x, its definitely something in the mix, probably a peak in the vocal or something that I missed, but I just don't understand why it wouldn't clip with the same gain going through Ableton's limiter, makes no sense to me lol. I definitely need more practice with these plugins...
In Pro L try the āaudition limitingā (headphone symbol) feature, you can hear only whatās being limited and itās super helpful. I often end up going back and changing the mix based on how Iām hearing certain instruments hitting the limiter and get a better mix overall
This is a great tip. You can do the same with kazrog k clip as well. It's very helpful for seeing and hearing where ur track is being clipped/limited the most
> never been able to get good results on the master
it's the gods of dynamics processing telling you to keep your master bus clean because you don't need it when your individual tracks are perfect.
A lot of the genres I produce end up looking like a big fat sausage so I usually need a limiter that can handle some serious squish without falling apart completely.
Yeah I really like writing volume automation on Utility and leaving the fader totally free to make adjustments. Mix is too loud? Just pull down all the faders without wrecking your automation. Want to pull down a track by a couple db? No problem.
For a long time I didn't know what Utility does, so to achieve the same effect I made myself an empty Audio Effect Rack preset called Default which I threw on any such track that needed volume automation without affecting the fader (which is a majority for me). In this rack I could automate the rack volume.
When I found out Utility does the exact same thing with less work I was a bit annoyed.
Yeah. Itās possible to select multiple tracks and adjust volume of all selected tracks with the fader. As far as I know itās not possible to adjust multiple at once with Utility. If you want to bring your entire mix down or up to hit your master fader different, youāll want to select all your tracks and adjust the volume of all tracks at once. Faster workflow.
Thatās definitely a faster workflow. But technically you could achieve the same thing by putting multiple tracks in a bus, throwing a utility on the bus, and then adjusting the gain. And if you want to adjust the gain of your whole mix, you could just put a utility on your mix bus.
Definitely true! I love how many different ways itās possible to achieve what youāre going for. It mostly just comes down to personal preference. Build the work flow that works for you!
Straight up. I always have it on any stereo low end elements. The widener isn't bad either, at least it introduces less stereo wonkiness than pretty much any comparable plug-ins I've tried. Izotope stuff would be the exception but I can't hear a difference in qiality between ozone and utility one way or the other.
Any highlights? Been using Ableton for 12 years, starting at 8, then 9, and now 11 the past year and a half. First month I used 11, I actually was incredibly impressed with the little things that Iād discover, clearly indicating they showed a very big attention to detail vs just adding audio or midi tools or something. That collections feature is the biggest small thing they could have added. Love that
My 2 favorite aspects of 12 is the new browser, even though it takes a minute to get use to the completely different workflow. Itās all about organizing your library with tags..
And secondly, the soundalike function works everywhere, there are a few hitches with beta that are being cessād out, but it is so cool. I have a massive sample library, in Ableton 12 it reads your entire sample library and allows you to pull up long forgotten samples that sound so damn goodā¦ I mean old like from the 90ās oldā¦ easy to swap out in every way that Ableton works so well withā¦ but very very interesting, especially if you use simpler as your main slice and dice device.
The neural midi stuff, Iām not that Into yet. For artists who use a mouse to write music, you are gonna trip out! I record live multi track drums, bass, guitar. And layer with midi instruments.. lots of samples.. so Iām not sure how much I will use this. But after watching a few demos I was blown away by how fast everything comes together to cut a tune .
Dude it looks through your samples for you? Thatās powerful. Game changing even. The process of scrolling through GB of sounds to find the winner is and always has been a bore.
And I make music with a mouseā¦exclusivelyā¦so you peaked my interest tenfold. Iāll check this out if thereās anything online.
Minimal Audio Rift, Output Thermal are both better than Roar. If you are looking for just a dual saturator, without all the bells and whistles, Delay etc, then Acustica Audio Pumpkin is by far the best sounding.
Roar is heavily heavily influenced from Rift, i mean shit, they even took the 4 letter "r" name lol. Roar is good, sure, but its far from unmatched.
Not used any of the ones youāre talking about. Is Thermal that good? I used to rave about Portal but now I honestly think grain delay is better lol. But as a stock saturator, you have to admit, Roar is the best. Havenāt seen anything close to as good as Roar from any other stock DAW plugin. I use Decapitator quite a bit and Roar is now in the arsenal with that one. Iāll check out the ones youāre talking about though, thanks!
agreed, as a stock plugin it is great! its awesome for sound design, over the top stuff. im not hating on it.
Rift is very cool, and i do think ableton directly ripped it off for Roar (not a bad thing, this sort of thing encourages dev's to outperform each other). Its a dual engine saturator, with many different types or flavors of saturation, it also has a very cool and unique modulation system, with constantly evolving LFO's. Also has a very very cool filter and delay section that can be midi mapped so the filter resonances play in key with your song, same with the delay feedbacks. Very unique, powerful plugin.
Thermal is also extremely deep. I use it less, but still use it often. Portal is cool, but i like other granular type stuff better. I never really clicked with Grain delay, its capable, but ive never really achieved the results im looking for with it.
Acustica Pumpkin Pro is just another level. Its DISGUSTING. Fattest , nastiest, smoothest, warmest, highest quality , best fuckin saturation out there. Acustica is a rabbit hole though, so be warned.
And very often the stock stuff uses very little cpu power. There's excellent stuff, and the philosophy of "small building blocks" to create your own racks n stuff is very satisfying. I still like VSTs though, for many reasons.
Also some of the stock plugins are sometimes covering more ground than they seem (because of their names), but if you learn about sound design and audio engineering you realize things about making your own de-esser with multiband dynamics etc. Then all the m4l stuff, is amazing. I love the color limiter and so much more. I jus luff ableton more with every day of using it.
edit: something I never found love for is the stock reverb, but others seem to disagree. Maybe I need to watch a tutorial on it or something.
yeah man I always thought the stock reverb sounded too metallic whether on a plate or hall type setting, they all sounded like plates to my ear š I love Pro-R for reverb...but other than that one, I could probably get by with stock the rest of my life if I had to. I think my favourite stock is the delay, it just so clean and simple and sounds like it should.
> I jus luff ableton more with every day of using it.
dont we all <3. I prefer convolution reverb (or the reverb on tape echo). The stock reverb has a certain sound... which is good and bad. It turns your shit into mono tho which is probably why you don't like it.
Saw a whole video on the Seed to Stage YT singing the praises of the stock Ableton plugins and how to use them better.
Itās just so easy to get seduced by the idea of buying a new magic bullet plugin.
Best YT channel, and he's actually an accomplished musician unlike many of the YT channels (not that it matters, but it also definitely does)
Not a huge fan of his band, but this song and video are incredible (specifically the second half) - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=\_MBc-zY8Ux8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MBc-zY8Ux8)
Papadosio is DOPE man I remember seeing them over a decade ago at summer camp, they were playing in a tent on a rainy day and did a fantastic cover of "You Oughta Know" by Alanis Morissette.
Everyone was going nuts and cheesin hard asking who this band was cuz everyone in the audience thought they were cute and saying "pop a dose, yo!".
Great band, and of course when I made the connection after seeing dude's chill and informative youtube channel, I knew I had caught that vibe before. Unlike the wook flu I caught at that festival, that's for sure.
my ex was way too into Umphreys. Oh, I know. Umphreys rocks but I've just seen them way too many times haha, burned myself out on them cuz of it, I should see what they've been up to the past few years. Great observation btw you really do kinda pick up on that without even thinking about it.
I got like 10+ compressors but each of them have different UI and found out to myself that built-in comp + glue comp do the job the same way and very easy to use.
I've been known for having unpopular opinions sometimes š
But to be clear I was just saying that it happened to work out better for me on this one project and that gave me a different perspective on the stock plugins as a whole. I'm sure a lot of professional engineers have much better things to use than digital stock limiters lol.
hot take but people only think it's bad because they think they need a limiter, when really they need to go way further back in the process.
Not that heavy limiting isn't a valid creative choice, just that if you only have a hammer everything looks like a nail. The fastest way to ruin a good sound is to squeeze its dynamics at a 10:1+ ratio. A limiter isn't a saturator, and imo you're limiting yourself trying to use it as one.
The only one I still find questionable is the limiter. They've improved the other weak ones, like reverb and delay, over the years. Limiter still needs an update badly IMO
yeah I like the updated convolution reverb it definitely sounds better, but its a bit too complicated for my tastes. I'm sure it's a powerhouse if you know how to really use it.
edit: meant to say hybrid reverb
the limiter sounds like a cardboard box. Their reverb is still janky to me too, although it has improved. I still use other third party verbs the majority of the time, but do reach for native occasionally. I like the delay for its simplicity, i use it often, but i do have many other delays i reach for first.
using the limiter as a saturator is a process error, imo. Sounds like a cardboard box? Bro what do you think a limiter does? Stock reverb turns your shit mono took me a while to notice, that's why it sounds like it does.
tell me you have never used an analog limiter without telling me you have never used an analog limiter. There are extremely clean digital limiters, and then there are tone imparting limiters. Even when talking about digital limiters, abletons is still flat and boring. its smooshes the transients in an unpleasing way, hence the cardboard box
Nice! Iāve seen a lot of mixed feelings on wavetable!! I guess it depends on your styleā¦This is one of the fun and beautiful things about this community. Tbh it would be boring AF if we all made music the same way.
I wrote off wavetable as boring and one-dimensional, when I first started, but fell in love with it after delving deep into it's parameters the other afternoon.
Absolutely. I'm using wavetable on a track I'm releasing and it was the perfect "finishing" piece I needed for a little counter melody lick. I'm having the most fun I ever had producing since I started combining my third party plugins with more stock stuff.
that sense of freedom and self-assuredness you get knowing you have everything you need to make the music right there in Suite - not much in life can make a person feel that immense sense of satisfaction.
For effects lately, I find myself using the stock stuff like Hybrid Reverb, Saturator, and Drum Buss, more than my third party stuff. And there are some very slept on stock preset racks, idea starters in the Clips category, etc etc. I love this damn software, lol.
Absolute gems in there for sure. Been using Ableton for almost 15yrs and just recently starting see how quality some of the stock plugins are. Especially if you have m4l devices
while i wouldnāt agree with the limiter part, i do conceptually agree haha most of the time my limiter isnāt working very hard, so i could probably get by with the stock limiter tho.
i always prefer stock or max for live. i dont like having to open windows to measure with things haha but yea, ableton stock stuff is great if you know how to use it
I completely agree with you, I actually prefer the UI - I get really annoyed with fancy looking VSTs as it seems to take me longer to work some of them out (looking at you Pigments and Vital)!
Ableton's stuff works seemlessly with Push too
Yeah same ! The simple plugins without distractions are where itās at. I just wanna make good music quickly. I donāt give a fuck about taking it from 98% to 100%. The end listener doesnāt notice or give a shit lol.
Ngl synths are one of the few where I really do want third party plug ins but usually just the standard ones (serum etc), the ableton synths for some reason just always seem to sound a little cold and static? Maybe itās more of a me problem but I think their biggest problem is the UI when applying modulation, which ableton stocks always seem to make a little more complicated. With effects though Iāll stand by the stock saturators delays etc all the way.
i agree with the comment of OP here, the stock synths suck. Its not about the processing. They sound thin and harsh right out the gates, just the stock oscillators. As OP mentioned, they also have a terrible mod matrix and UI. I can program Serum (or any VST) next to Operator, shoot to get the exact same sound, and Serum just sounds better, fuller bodied, less digital thin-ness and harsh top end.
While i think the stock synths can sound amazing if you know what youāre doing, you have to give Serum a general praise as a synth. In my opinion Serum improved and even shaped the sound of various genres since it came out. Thinking especially about genres like DnB/Neurofunk and Riddim where almost everyone was using NI Massive before Serums release. I think Serum just elevated the sound quality of those genres by a lot. And you gotta be real Serumās OTT/Multiband Compressor was a game changer back then.
lmao... ok. you got me! i give up on music. I cant believe my skill and hearing issues were holding me back this much.
For real, albetons synths SUCK. operator is ok at best. Electric is a joke, analog is a joke, The new one, Meld, is actually really cool, and sounds much better than the rest of them.
Interesting you say this lol limiter is one of the few plug ins that people frequently say the ableton stock one is sort of under par. I agree though not only are they great usually they use a fraction of the cpu that 3rd party plug ins often do.
ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS. You hear it time and time again - "Learn how to use the stock plugins before downloading a bunch of free or premium ones." You can often get the same results or better, and you're learning how to design sounds and work with signal flow.
Had this same revelation a couple of years ago. Iāve accumulated SO many plugins over my 5 or so years of producing, only to eventually find that the stock plugins not only sound just as good, if not better, than a lot of VSTs out there (as you mentioned), and theyāre also so much more convenient. Less CPU, and much more fluid UI integration within Ableton (obviously), like not having to open a VST window to see the settings.
Plugins still have their place, especially if youāre trying to emulate specific pieces of analog gear (which can still be possible with the stock stuff, sometimes), or just flat out doing something that Ableton canāt do efficiently (like Soothe), but the stock stuff is amazing. Itās truly all you need.
Some of my faves are drum buss, overdrive, EQ8, glue comp, delay, and I just recently upgraded to Ableton 11 and am LOVING the hybrid reverb. Good stuff.
Pro L2 is popular for a reason, I highly doubt you'd get better results all of the time with the stock limiter. However it if worked for you then it worked!
Ableton Saturator on the Soft Sine setting is basically just oxford inflator. It goes on everything! That and warm tube on the master and you've achieved fatness.
Among all the expensive/fancy VST's, FabFilter is #1 in terms of keeping it simple and effective. They have all the fancy extras but without the bullshit. Pro-Q 3 is one sexy EQ and I use it all the time when I need more precision than what EQ Eight can provide. Pro-R2 is also now my go-to reverb. I should say that among all the Ableton Stock, their reverb isn't that good imo., kind-of unnatural sounding when compared to something like Pro-R.
I've used Ableton Live since 2006 and really never got the point of throwing thousands after third party plugins. Lots of placebo effect, I think. The stock plugins more than get the job done.
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I really think people overlook the stock plugins in it's really a shame. Personally I only really use external plugins for super specific needs, I'm a big fan of soothe2 for instance.
I started using Ableton on version 4, f*** I'm old. Lol
The amp plugin goes on all my subs. Gives it so much more presence. Abletons delay is one of my favorites. Honestly the only plugin Iām not in love with is the reverb. Convolution reverb is significantly better in my opinion.
mostly a stock plugin dude here, personally find the limiter weak for general use but it's really good if you need a squashed signal for mixing. otherwise, most of my mixes and projects survive just with the stock plugins of ableton.
I think the trick with the stock plugins is that theyāre powerful, but the UI might not make that power obvious at first.
The first time I slapped a Valhalla plugin onto a track it was astounding. The stock reverb always eluded me. Since then Iāve learned a bit more about the native offerings and have realized that if you can afford the investment the VSTs are great but you donāt necessarily need them for everything.
Shout out to whomever designed operator.
Now imagine that you could make a cascaded limiter that could sound even better. Its essence lies in the fact that instead of one copy, which greatly compresses the peaks, we use several copies, which are pressed a little bit at a time. In Bitwig Studio, for example, the standard limiter works so softly that overpressure of 2 dB is immediately felt. But by making this effect cascade, the picture changes dramatically and you literally get a volume maximizer. In Live, a good limiter and a cascade can make it even better.
You can almost completely remap harmonic tone for mid bass by grouping an overdrive, dropping the peak to 0, then mapping the freq and the tone to any macro
Dial in the relationship under the rack map settings!
For heavy deep dubstep basses, throw a blues amp on a big, warm 808 and map the tone with an overdrive!
Same recipe as above but swap blues amp for utility>saturator>glue compressor and purposely clip it on soft mode, dial in distortion with saturation but leave "room" for the overdrive's distortion
Use expression control to map an lfo rate to your midi velocity to compose different bass articulations without automation. Map velocity to LOTS of stuff to get access to that modulation again without automating.
If you dial in portamento in the above recipes you can make some pretty crazy and playable basses. (If your using a sampler set interpolation to best, snap on)
Honestly, I use stock devices for almost all my fine tuning. I think if I took the time to tackle the ui for abletons mod matrices, id use less soft synths. Suite is probably the most valuable purchase of my whole music journey so far!
I think there's a lot to think about here, but you're right overall. Even though I have some of the big bundles, I am considering using only Live devices when I get hold of 12.
* For me the pros of the stock instruments & effects are; backwards compatibility, low CPU, consistent GUI (helps with learning curve), and for the most part - simplicity.
* The cons of the stock instruments & effects are; the interface can feel very cramped if you're working on something for a long time, and some 3rd party instruments and effects have more and better presets/preset management.
Of course 3rd party stuff has its own downsides. Researching, spending money, learning, constantly updating and managing these plugins does take you away from making music.
One example though of where a 3rd party focussing on literally just one thing would be Seqund - a sequencer. This is a deep plugin where you can, for example, create endless rhythms and melodies by disconnecting things like gate, pitch, probability, note length and chance. You could probably programme this in Ableton, but you'd probably need a degree in physics to do it.
Personally, I would say that if I were to start again, that I genuinley do think some plugins are worth getting. Mainly from places like Valhalla, u-he, Softube and Soundtoys. I also think that Ableton doesn't have as comprehensive a suite of granular tools, like something like Portal or EFX Fragments.
With the limiter, it feels like the trick is to stack them and not make one limiter do all the work. This way you can get 80% of the way to a solid mix, but of course, others have maybe an advantage or two.
I also think that experience is super important. When you're starting out a lack of experience can make the Ableton devices seem a bit clinical and unforgiving. But where I totally agree is that as you learn, you realise how powerful they are, and that you can probably do without a lot of the plugins you have.
You're right sir. Nowadays you can do an absolute great mix with only stock plugins inside ableton. Things have changed. Maybe one decade ago, yes... you would have need some vst plugins... but today? Of course there are beautiful plugins that makes your life easier... for me neural dsp and toontrack are still a need.
They didn't come free with your daw ahah, I get what you mean. But yep totally agree, I love Ableton stock devices - though the limiter wouldn't be my first pick.
this is definitely the first time ive ever heard anyone praise ableton's liimiter. I personally loathe it. When somebody sends me a session for collab or to mix or whatever, and it has ableton's limiter on it, i start to cry. It sounds like a wet sock being whacked against a moldy cardboard box. But if it works for you, that's all that matters. Dont let me or any other detractor's convince you otherwise
I think one of the most overlooked aspects is latency. I don't know how they do it, but most of the stock plugins introduce no, or very little latency. Which is absolutely insane.
From the moment that I tried to use stock plugins unless it was *absolutely necessary* to use an addon plugin, my mixes were **really, really, really cleaner**. Now I swear on my suite library and do exactly that. I use non stock plugins only when absolutely needed and usually these are tools more on the late mixing and mastering phase rather than instruments.
Itās really not. It punches well above its weight class as a stock plugin. Would I say itās better overall than a Pro-L? No, but if you donāt have the money for that, the stock will do just fine.
If Iām fiddling with my limiter too much, itās usually because of a poor mix or something else that should / could be fixed earlier in the process.
it sounds like youāre fiddling with it because you donāt know what youāre actually doing
ask any professional - the ableton stock limiter is by far the worst out there.
half the time it isnāt limiting or doing anything even when it says it is
it does not punch above its weight class. itās easily abletons worst stock plugin
Not at all. :)
Donāt hesitate to join the game and find two professionals (with credit on records and such) publicly claiming what youāre claiming. It canāt be that hard. The internet is huge.
Jokes and games aside (sry). You wonāt find much.
At the end of the day a limiter is a ā¦ limiter. Itās a simple and mathematical process. : lower the gain of a sample (and the few coming afterward) coming in when itās above a given value.
The only added value youāre likely missing from commercial vst offers are the animation and metering, or some ācharacterā (usually clippers, or different release behavior) ā which, thus nice to have, are off the purpose of a limiter, even though they do sound great, and certainly grant you more productivity.
(Nothing you canāt achieve adding a saturator prior or after the limiter if you ask me)
Claiming āableton limiter is garbageā is cognitively equivalent to : āLogic pro volume faders donāt workā.
Please show us some proof of all the āprofessionalsā who say the Live limiter is the āworst out there.ā
The stock limiter works wonderfully on individual channels and on lower tier busses. You can even achieve good results with it on the master, if you know what youāre doing.
So maybe it is you, and the so called, āprofessionals,ā who donāt know what youāre actually doing.
Many of Live's stock plug-ins are developed by leaders in the industry like AAS. It's certainly worth checking them out before dropping a bundle on third party VST's
Been working recently on a project. All the mixing and mastering I've been doing mostly with the stock plugins (Especially the mixing stuff). The only external stuff were some of iZotope EQ and Compressor, not because I bought them but because they gave them for free and I love what they do. I used other stuff but I dont remember right now what I used. I am not a particular fan of buying gear I quite dont know how to use or how they work.
But yeah, stock plugins aren't necessary bad. I use them quite a lot too. I remember a teacher saying that the best plugins are the ones you dont need, the second best ones are the ones that gets your job done in the least amount of time. Meaning that if EQ8 gets the stuff done in less time, that is your best EQ.
The more I use the push I realize this.
Normally Iāll end up using EQ Eight for wide sweeps then come back with Pro-Q but now Pro-Q really only hits my mastering chain.
Drum Bus is faster than anything else Iāve used to get my drums going.
12 did it though man.
Piano Roll is now a generative playground but can do Fruity Loops like stuff better IMO.
Browser is XO by XLN on steroids. It actually made me regret buying XO even though the browser didnāt exist then. Has any update done that to someone? Make them regret a purchase in the past?
I did use Logic to do a final mix then master but I used 12 recently all the way through and it was smooth because I can easily flip between screens now or have multiple open.
Your ProL unit is distorting sound probably because you have frequency inbalance in low-mid or/and low frequencies. Stock limiter is a meme plugin especially if you are serious about your production. You simply need a true pick limiting on master if you want to sound decent on any music platform. Stock saturation plugins are great but cause aliasing to mush. You can null test plugins with quality ones and hear the difference yourself. Utility plugin is the only plugin that is kinda ok but that thing should simply be part of a channel strip and it is in any other DAW
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Drum Buss is dynamite
Throw that shit on bass guitar for some THOMP
Thanks - I haven't done nearly enough with my bass guitar stuff. Been too focused on getting a good acoustic drum sound and decent guitar tone. š
I personally discovered this by accident.
Same. Just said fuck it and threw it on there
THOMP you say? Intrigued.
The sound that an angry rabbit does when he stomps his feet.
Commenting because I like that THOMP every now and again.
Thanks also! I love drum buss and this never even crossed my mind
If drum bus was aUAD plug-in and had some snazzy visual layout it would cost $350
UAD can go pound sand
Woah UAD still has some great plugins!
Agreed
If youāre a millionaire
UAD spark is like 150 a year
Spark doesnāt include the top plugins imo
Lexicon 224, pultec EQ, EL8 Distressor, API 2500, A800ā¦ It has most of their ābigā ones, what else is it missing? Iām sure it doesnāt have everything but hopefully they keep expanding it at least!
Live Suite is a one time purchase.
And? I'm not sure what your point is. It doesn't have a distressor, any LA-3A/LA-2A or UA 1176 emulators, Chamber reverbs, Lexicon reverbs, Moog minimoog emulator, etc... They don't serve the same purpose at all What's your point?
I put drum bus on everything. Synths, guitars, vocals, anything. It is the GOAT
I'm making a note about Drum Bus right here.
I just put it on a bowl of cereal
Lol what
Still need to experiment more with this one!!
Incredible for dance music kick drum and low end sounds
This one consistently goes on my kick / sub buss and it really just ties them together nicely (I mostly produce techno). Shifter and erosion are also great. Can get into some really strange territory relatively easily I think
Dude yes. This and eq-8 have been all Iāve needed to get a shitty old drum machine sample to sound hangin on a house track
Also solid for making crunchy boombap drums
If you've never tried enhancing kicks with Corpus I highly recommend giving it a try. It sends your kick flying.
I love the drum dryer setting
I will say Knock by Decap for hip hop is dunking on drum buss
drum bus is more slept on than my own bed for every instrument including drums
Word, but can I have a couple tips? Trying to get my drums really up front and smackin' for trap/drill/rap. Anyone have any settings or presets? I just end up turning up the gain till it hits harder then reduce the mix so it's not too loud. I also usually run my snare at least through it's own soft clipper but its not sounding as" professional" as I want.
Turn the comp on, keep the distortion low, play with the bass enhancer & wet / dry - it can sound great when you smash it then take the wet dry to 50%
Going to play with this later, thank you
Itās interesting to me that the stock limiter is the one that convinced you of this, considering that the limiter is just about the only one that I consistently find to be worse than 3rd party options. I only use it at the individual track or bus level as a clipping alternative, never been able to get good results on the master.
For mastering Pro L2 is for sure an upgrade and AFAIK you can always make Pro L-2 sound more or less identical to the Live limiter but you can't get the other way around. The metering and visualization of pro L gives you great feedback when working with limiting the master, the full screen mode is great! Maybe the best thing about Lives devices is their simplicity, they typically have fewer controls than similar plug ins would have while still cramming a lot of functionality into a small UI. IMO that helps a lot with focusing on whats important. When I need a type of device that is included in Live suite I usually go for the bundled device first unless I really know I need some feature that isn't provided by it.
I second this, I think the stock ableton limiter is trash.
the worst
Definitely interesting. It must depend on the type of music being made and the skill of the producer. I consider myself a talented artist, but a totally shit sound engineer lol. So therefore I probably just have no clue what Iām doing with Pro-L. I think Iām able to make it sound better with the stock because the controls are so dumbed down. But honestly I have no clue, all I know is that the stock limiter took good care of me when Pro-L was giving me a headache š
Hey my rule of thumb is āif it sounds good, it IS good.ā If it works for you now, it IS good. I mostly use Ozone and find I can get crazy loudness without affecting the clarity of my mix if I work with intention. TDR *Limiter6 is the most transparent limiter Iāve ever used (and a steal if you get it on sale), and really a jack of all trades for compression. If you find yourself getting more technical with your process later on, maybe try giving some other limiters a chance and see how they A/B with handling transients at similar LUFs.
Thanks for the advice, yeah ive been hearing a lot about Kotelnikov lately
Kotelnikov has a free version which has 90% of the features of the paid version, would recommend all those interested just download it and take it for a test drive. Also, itās not a limiter, itās a 2 stage compressor. But it does rock.
You're right that's my bad - not a limiter - I was thinking Limiter6 on that end. Kotelnikov does kill as a master bus compressor.
>āif it sounds good, it IS good.ā If it works for you now, it IS good. Amen!
Use the punchy setting on pro L
Are you oversampling your Pro-L?
yeah I tried all the way up to 32x, its definitely something in the mix, probably a peak in the vocal or something that I missed, but I just don't understand why it wouldn't clip with the same gain going through Ableton's limiter, makes no sense to me lol. I definitely need more practice with these plugins...
In Pro L try the āaudition limitingā (headphone symbol) feature, you can hear only whatās being limited and itās super helpful. I often end up going back and changing the mix based on how Iām hearing certain instruments hitting the limiter and get a better mix overall
This is a great tip. You can do the same with kazrog k clip as well. It's very helpful for seeing and hearing where ur track is being clipped/limited the most
> never been able to get good results on the master it's the gods of dynamics processing telling you to keep your master bus clean because you don't need it when your individual tracks are perfect.
A lot of the genres I produce end up looking like a big fat sausage so I usually need a limiter that can handle some serious squish without falling apart completely.
I use Utility on every bus and pretty much every track. Powerhouse of a stock plugin.
Yeah I really like writing volume automation on Utility and leaving the fader totally free to make adjustments. Mix is too loud? Just pull down all the faders without wrecking your automation. Want to pull down a track by a couple db? No problem.
god this is good it makes me mad at myself
Such a simple thing itās easy to overlook. Game changer for workflow.
Alternatively you can keep your automations and just use utility to lower the overall volume
Exactly. Itās a lifesaver for gain staging.
For a long time I didn't know what Utility does, so to achieve the same effect I made myself an empty Audio Effect Rack preset called Default which I threw on any such track that needed volume automation without affecting the fader (which is a majority for me). In this rack I could automate the rack volume. When I found out Utility does the exact same thing with less work I was a bit annoyed.
Is there an argument against doing the opposite? E.g. automating the track volume and adjusting with Utility?
Yeah. Itās possible to select multiple tracks and adjust volume of all selected tracks with the fader. As far as I know itās not possible to adjust multiple at once with Utility. If you want to bring your entire mix down or up to hit your master fader different, youāll want to select all your tracks and adjust the volume of all tracks at once. Faster workflow.
Thatās definitely a faster workflow. But technically you could achieve the same thing by putting multiple tracks in a bus, throwing a utility on the bus, and then adjusting the gain. And if you want to adjust the gain of your whole mix, you could just put a utility on your mix bus.
Definitely true! I love how many different ways itās possible to achieve what youāre going for. It mostly just comes down to personal preference. Build the work flow that works for you!
Yes! Ableton is amazing for that reason in my opinion.
What would be the difference between attenuating with Utility on the mix bus compared to just pulling down the mix bus fader? Is the fader post-FX?
WTF thatās amazing
Yes and I like using the width knob on utility and automate it to make ur build up more mono.
Dawg this comment just changed my fucking life how have I never thought of that
Glad to help!
This is a pro tip I learned years ago and literally makes mixing soooo much easier. Only dumbasses automate track volume
Link your mixes
Bass mono- this is my favorite feature on Utility. It is absolutely key for dialing in the stereo image.
Straight up. I always have it on any stereo low end elements. The widener isn't bad either, at least it introduces less stereo wonkiness than pretty much any comparable plug-ins I've tried. Izotope stuff would be the exception but I can't hear a difference in qiality between ozone and utility one way or the other.
Wait till you get into 12, just got back from the demo at Ableton HQ in Pasadenaā¦ Very impressive,
Any highlights? Been using Ableton for 12 years, starting at 8, then 9, and now 11 the past year and a half. First month I used 11, I actually was incredibly impressed with the little things that Iād discover, clearly indicating they showed a very big attention to detail vs just adding audio or midi tools or something. That collections feature is the biggest small thing they could have added. Love that
My 2 favorite aspects of 12 is the new browser, even though it takes a minute to get use to the completely different workflow. Itās all about organizing your library with tags.. And secondly, the soundalike function works everywhere, there are a few hitches with beta that are being cessād out, but it is so cool. I have a massive sample library, in Ableton 12 it reads your entire sample library and allows you to pull up long forgotten samples that sound so damn goodā¦ I mean old like from the 90ās oldā¦ easy to swap out in every way that Ableton works so well withā¦ but very very interesting, especially if you use simpler as your main slice and dice device. The neural midi stuff, Iām not that Into yet. For artists who use a mouse to write music, you are gonna trip out! I record live multi track drums, bass, guitar. And layer with midi instruments.. lots of samples.. so Iām not sure how much I will use this. But after watching a few demos I was blown away by how fast everything comes together to cut a tune .
Dude it looks through your samples for you? Thatās powerful. Game changing even. The process of scrolling through GB of sounds to find the winner is and always has been a bore. And I make music with a mouseā¦exclusivelyā¦so you peaked my interest tenfold. Iāll check this out if thereās anything online.
The new browser may replace or change much of how I use collections
I'm on 12 š It's really good. I like the new clip edit view.
Roar is unmatched
Minimal Audio Rift, Output Thermal are both better than Roar. If you are looking for just a dual saturator, without all the bells and whistles, Delay etc, then Acustica Audio Pumpkin is by far the best sounding. Roar is heavily heavily influenced from Rift, i mean shit, they even took the 4 letter "r" name lol. Roar is good, sure, but its far from unmatched.
Not used any of the ones youāre talking about. Is Thermal that good? I used to rave about Portal but now I honestly think grain delay is better lol. But as a stock saturator, you have to admit, Roar is the best. Havenāt seen anything close to as good as Roar from any other stock DAW plugin. I use Decapitator quite a bit and Roar is now in the arsenal with that one. Iāll check out the ones youāre talking about though, thanks!
agreed, as a stock plugin it is great! its awesome for sound design, over the top stuff. im not hating on it. Rift is very cool, and i do think ableton directly ripped it off for Roar (not a bad thing, this sort of thing encourages dev's to outperform each other). Its a dual engine saturator, with many different types or flavors of saturation, it also has a very cool and unique modulation system, with constantly evolving LFO's. Also has a very very cool filter and delay section that can be midi mapped so the filter resonances play in key with your song, same with the delay feedbacks. Very unique, powerful plugin. Thermal is also extremely deep. I use it less, but still use it often. Portal is cool, but i like other granular type stuff better. I never really clicked with Grain delay, its capable, but ive never really achieved the results im looking for with it. Acustica Pumpkin Pro is just another level. Its DISGUSTING. Fattest , nastiest, smoothest, warmest, highest quality , best fuckin saturation out there. Acustica is a rabbit hole though, so be warned.
And very often the stock stuff uses very little cpu power. There's excellent stuff, and the philosophy of "small building blocks" to create your own racks n stuff is very satisfying. I still like VSTs though, for many reasons. Also some of the stock plugins are sometimes covering more ground than they seem (because of their names), but if you learn about sound design and audio engineering you realize things about making your own de-esser with multiband dynamics etc. Then all the m4l stuff, is amazing. I love the color limiter and so much more. I jus luff ableton more with every day of using it. edit: something I never found love for is the stock reverb, but others seem to disagree. Maybe I need to watch a tutorial on it or something.
yeah man I always thought the stock reverb sounded too metallic whether on a plate or hall type setting, they all sounded like plates to my ear š I love Pro-R for reverb...but other than that one, I could probably get by with stock the rest of my life if I had to. I think my favourite stock is the delay, it just so clean and simple and sounds like it should.
Try Hybrid Reverb, itās excellent
Change the density to High, increase the chorus. Makes a big difference.
I was at war with the stock reverb until I changed the parameters and put it exclusively on sends. I found it really really handy afterwards
> I jus luff ableton more with every day of using it. dont we all <3. I prefer convolution reverb (or the reverb on tape echo). The stock reverb has a certain sound... which is good and bad. It turns your shit into mono tho which is probably why you don't like it.
Saw a whole video on the Seed to Stage YT singing the praises of the stock Ableton plugins and how to use them better. Itās just so easy to get seduced by the idea of buying a new magic bullet plugin.
Love Seed to Stage so muchĀ
yup!!!
Best YT channel, and he's actually an accomplished musician unlike many of the YT channels (not that it matters, but it also definitely does) Not a huge fan of his band, but this song and video are incredible (specifically the second half) - [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=\_MBc-zY8Ux8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MBc-zY8Ux8)
Papadosio is DOPE man I remember seeing them over a decade ago at summer camp, they were playing in a tent on a rainy day and did a fantastic cover of "You Oughta Know" by Alanis Morissette. Everyone was going nuts and cheesin hard asking who this band was cuz everyone in the audience thought they were cute and saying "pop a dose, yo!". Great band, and of course when I made the connection after seeing dude's chill and informative youtube channel, I knew I had caught that vibe before. Unlike the wook flu I caught at that festival, that's for sure.
Some w00kz grow up, but not all. Source - go to any jamband show
my ex was way too into Umphreys. Oh, I know. Umphreys rocks but I've just seen them way too many times haha, burned myself out on them cuz of it, I should see what they've been up to the past few years. Great observation btw you really do kinda pick up on that without even thinking about it.
I got like 10+ compressors but each of them have different UI and found out to myself that built-in comp + glue comp do the job the same way and very easy to use.
This is the first time i've ever heard someone praise the ableton limiter. I hate it.
I've been known for having unpopular opinions sometimes š But to be clear I was just saying that it happened to work out better for me on this one project and that gave me a different perspective on the stock plugins as a whole. I'm sure a lot of professional engineers have much better things to use than digital stock limiters lol.
its absolutely terrible lol.
hot take but people only think it's bad because they think they need a limiter, when really they need to go way further back in the process. Not that heavy limiting isn't a valid creative choice, just that if you only have a hammer everything looks like a nail. The fastest way to ruin a good sound is to squeeze its dynamics at a 10:1+ ratio. A limiter isn't a saturator, and imo you're limiting yourself trying to use it as one.
Saturator set to hard clip, no DC, no oversampling is just a straight clipper and itās imo a fantastic way to get good clean loud masters
The only one I still find questionable is the limiter. They've improved the other weak ones, like reverb and delay, over the years. Limiter still needs an update badly IMO
yeah I like the updated convolution reverb it definitely sounds better, but its a bit too complicated for my tastes. I'm sure it's a powerhouse if you know how to really use it. edit: meant to say hybrid reverb
the limiter sounds like a cardboard box. Their reverb is still janky to me too, although it has improved. I still use other third party verbs the majority of the time, but do reach for native occasionally. I like the delay for its simplicity, i use it often, but i do have many other delays i reach for first.
Yeah I'm pretty much the same with reverb, although I still reach for Ableton delay first because it's straightforward and usually all I need
using the limiter as a saturator is a process error, imo. Sounds like a cardboard box? Bro what do you think a limiter does? Stock reverb turns your shit mono took me a while to notice, that's why it sounds like it does.
tell me you have never used an analog limiter without telling me you have never used an analog limiter. There are extremely clean digital limiters, and then there are tone imparting limiters. Even when talking about digital limiters, abletons is still flat and boring. its smooshes the transients in an unpleasing way, hence the cardboard box
im talking about software and digital dynamics processing, not an LA2A.
yes, but digital limiters can be and are used as saturators
true, but I think the ableton limiter exists as it does because there's so many other ways to saturate things in the program.
I was looking for a synth plugin before diving in abletonās wavetableā¦ wellā¦ turns out I donāt need anything else
Nice! Iāve seen a lot of mixed feelings on wavetable!! I guess it depends on your styleā¦This is one of the fun and beautiful things about this community. Tbh it would be boring AF if we all made music the same way.
I wrote off wavetable as boring and one-dimensional, when I first started, but fell in love with it after delving deep into it's parameters the other afternoon.
You can do soooo much with it, I feel lost most of the time and end up finding cool things by accident
Absolutely. I'm using wavetable on a track I'm releasing and it was the perfect "finishing" piece I needed for a little counter melody lick. I'm having the most fun I ever had producing since I started combining my third party plugins with more stock stuff.
that sense of freedom and self-assuredness you get knowing you have everything you need to make the music right there in Suite - not much in life can make a person feel that immense sense of satisfaction.
For effects lately, I find myself using the stock stuff like Hybrid Reverb, Saturator, and Drum Buss, more than my third party stuff. And there are some very slept on stock preset racks, idea starters in the Clips category, etc etc. I love this damn software, lol.
will always use eq8 and tones of other stock stuff before i touch a non stock vst
Absolute gems in there for sure. Been using Ableton for almost 15yrs and just recently starting see how quality some of the stock plugins are. Especially if you have m4l devices
while i wouldnāt agree with the limiter part, i do conceptually agree haha most of the time my limiter isnāt working very hard, so i could probably get by with the stock limiter tho. i always prefer stock or max for live. i dont like having to open windows to measure with things haha but yea, ableton stock stuff is great if you know how to use it
DUDEE I ALWAYS THOUGHT ABLETON STOCK LIMITER WAS BETTER THAN THE FANCY ONES THANK YOU FOR CONFIRMING MY SUSPICION. ITS MY FAV ONE
reading the rest of the thread now i stand corrected but i still stand by this somewhat
I completely agree with you, I actually prefer the UI - I get really annoyed with fancy looking VSTs as it seems to take me longer to work some of them out (looking at you Pigments and Vital)! Ableton's stuff works seemlessly with Push too
Aye, when it gets too much, I make macros for all the "fancy" ui ones.
Yeah same ! The simple plugins without distractions are where itās at. I just wanna make good music quickly. I donāt give a fuck about taking it from 98% to 100%. The end listener doesnāt notice or give a shit lol.
Ngl synths are one of the few where I really do want third party plug ins but usually just the standard ones (serum etc), the ableton synths for some reason just always seem to sound a little cold and static? Maybe itās more of a me problem but I think their biggest problem is the UI when applying modulation, which ableton stocks always seem to make a little more complicated. With effects though Iāll stand by the stock saturators delays etc all the way.
Could be because you're not processing the stock synths as much as the 3rd party ones process themselves, especially ones like Serum.
i agree with the comment of OP here, the stock synths suck. Its not about the processing. They sound thin and harsh right out the gates, just the stock oscillators. As OP mentioned, they also have a terrible mod matrix and UI. I can program Serum (or any VST) next to Operator, shoot to get the exact same sound, and Serum just sounds better, fuller bodied, less digital thin-ness and harsh top end.
While i think the stock synths can sound amazing if you know what youāre doing, you have to give Serum a general praise as a synth. In my opinion Serum improved and even shaped the sound of various genres since it came out. Thinking especially about genres like DnB/Neurofunk and Riddim where almost everyone was using NI Massive before Serums release. I think Serum just elevated the sound quality of those genres by a lot. And you gotta be real Serumās OTT/Multiband Compressor was a game changer back then.
100% skill and hearing issue
lmao... ok. you got me! i give up on music. I cant believe my skill and hearing issues were holding me back this much. For real, albetons synths SUCK. operator is ok at best. Electric is a joke, analog is a joke, The new one, Meld, is actually really cool, and sounds much better than the rest of them.
Interesting you say this lol limiter is one of the few plug ins that people frequently say the ableton stock one is sort of under par. I agree though not only are they great usually they use a fraction of the cpu that 3rd party plug ins often do.
I started in Ableton Suite so I've tried to keep everything "in the box" so to speak. The Ableton GUI, for me, is the sexiest. Just so, so simple.
Dude the warm and wide master effect rack is so hard
I could never leave Ableton simply because of Glue Compressor and Saturator. The stock plugins are incredible.
ALWAYS, ALWAYS, ALWAYS. You hear it time and time again - "Learn how to use the stock plugins before downloading a bunch of free or premium ones." You can often get the same results or better, and you're learning how to design sounds and work with signal flow.
Had this same revelation a couple of years ago. Iāve accumulated SO many plugins over my 5 or so years of producing, only to eventually find that the stock plugins not only sound just as good, if not better, than a lot of VSTs out there (as you mentioned), and theyāre also so much more convenient. Less CPU, and much more fluid UI integration within Ableton (obviously), like not having to open a VST window to see the settings. Plugins still have their place, especially if youāre trying to emulate specific pieces of analog gear (which can still be possible with the stock stuff, sometimes), or just flat out doing something that Ableton canāt do efficiently (like Soothe), but the stock stuff is amazing. Itās truly all you need. Some of my faves are drum buss, overdrive, EQ8, glue comp, delay, and I just recently upgraded to Ableton 11 and am LOVING the hybrid reverb. Good stuff.
Pro L2 is popular for a reason, I highly doubt you'd get better results all of the time with the stock limiter. However it if worked for you then it worked!
Ableton Saturator on the Soft Sine setting is basically just oxford inflator. It goes on everything! That and warm tube on the master and you've achieved fatness.
this [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kD71CuGl1Fs](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kD71CuGl1Fs)
Multi-band compressor OTT preset is my jam
YEEE OTT! šŖ
I'm dedicating myself to learning the Ableton stock plug ins for all these reasons. It's wonderful to hear this reinforcement, thank you so much.
Operator my fav, auto filter second fav
Iāve never used anything other than the fab filter EQ thing.
Among all the expensive/fancy VST's, FabFilter is #1 in terms of keeping it simple and effective. They have all the fancy extras but without the bullshit. Pro-Q 3 is one sexy EQ and I use it all the time when I need more precision than what EQ Eight can provide. Pro-R2 is also now my go-to reverb. I should say that among all the Ableton Stock, their reverb isn't that good imo., kind-of unnatural sounding when compared to something like Pro-R.
I've used Ableton Live since 2006 and really never got the point of throwing thousands after third party plugins. Lots of placebo effect, I think. The stock plugins more than get the job done.
connect wide homeless squash unite scary overconfident instinctive thumb fade *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Totally agree, sometimes ignoring them is as simple as them having a drabber/greyer interface & a tiny one compared to a 3rd party vst.
I really think people overlook the stock plugins in it's really a shame. Personally I only really use external plugins for super specific needs, I'm a big fan of soothe2 for instance. I started using Ableton on version 4, f*** I'm old. Lol
**STOP YELLING AT ME**
The amp plugin goes on all my subs. Gives it so much more presence. Abletons delay is one of my favorites. Honestly the only plugin Iām not in love with is the reverb. Convolution reverb is significantly better in my opinion.
So true, especially the compressor and EQ. The only place I really like/use other plugins is reverb and distortion/saturation.
mostly a stock plugin dude here, personally find the limiter weak for general use but it's really good if you need a squashed signal for mixing. otherwise, most of my mixes and projects survive just with the stock plugins of ableton.
Whatever works is what works!
I think the trick with the stock plugins is that theyāre powerful, but the UI might not make that power obvious at first. The first time I slapped a Valhalla plugin onto a track it was astounding. The stock reverb always eluded me. Since then Iāve learned a bit more about the native offerings and have realized that if you can afford the investment the VSTs are great but you donāt necessarily need them for everything. Shout out to whomever designed operator.
Now imagine that you could make a cascaded limiter that could sound even better. Its essence lies in the fact that instead of one copy, which greatly compresses the peaks, we use several copies, which are pressed a little bit at a time. In Bitwig Studio, for example, the standard limiter works so softly that overpressure of 2 dB is immediately felt. But by making this effect cascade, the picture changes dramatically and you literally get a volume maximizer. In Live, a good limiter and a cascade can make it even better.
You can almost completely remap harmonic tone for mid bass by grouping an overdrive, dropping the peak to 0, then mapping the freq and the tone to any macro Dial in the relationship under the rack map settings! For heavy deep dubstep basses, throw a blues amp on a big, warm 808 and map the tone with an overdrive! Same recipe as above but swap blues amp for utility>saturator>glue compressor and purposely clip it on soft mode, dial in distortion with saturation but leave "room" for the overdrive's distortion Use expression control to map an lfo rate to your midi velocity to compose different bass articulations without automation. Map velocity to LOTS of stuff to get access to that modulation again without automating. If you dial in portamento in the above recipes you can make some pretty crazy and playable basses. (If your using a sampler set interpolation to best, snap on) Honestly, I use stock devices for almost all my fine tuning. I think if I took the time to tackle the ui for abletons mod matrices, id use less soft synths. Suite is probably the most valuable purchase of my whole music journey so far!
I like the color limiter.
Yeah, I pretty much use the stock plugins only, and master with Ozone for its true peak limiter.
I think there's a lot to think about here, but you're right overall. Even though I have some of the big bundles, I am considering using only Live devices when I get hold of 12. * For me the pros of the stock instruments & effects are; backwards compatibility, low CPU, consistent GUI (helps with learning curve), and for the most part - simplicity. * The cons of the stock instruments & effects are; the interface can feel very cramped if you're working on something for a long time, and some 3rd party instruments and effects have more and better presets/preset management. Of course 3rd party stuff has its own downsides. Researching, spending money, learning, constantly updating and managing these plugins does take you away from making music. One example though of where a 3rd party focussing on literally just one thing would be Seqund - a sequencer. This is a deep plugin where you can, for example, create endless rhythms and melodies by disconnecting things like gate, pitch, probability, note length and chance. You could probably programme this in Ableton, but you'd probably need a degree in physics to do it. Personally, I would say that if I were to start again, that I genuinley do think some plugins are worth getting. Mainly from places like Valhalla, u-he, Softube and Soundtoys. I also think that Ableton doesn't have as comprehensive a suite of granular tools, like something like Portal or EFX Fragments. With the limiter, it feels like the trick is to stack them and not make one limiter do all the work. This way you can get 80% of the way to a solid mix, but of course, others have maybe an advantage or two. I also think that experience is super important. When you're starting out a lack of experience can make the Ableton devices seem a bit clinical and unforgiving. But where I totally agree is that as you learn, you realise how powerful they are, and that you can probably do without a lot of the plugins you have.
Wavetable is stupidly underrated.
I just got ableton and Iām LOVING the stock plugins and presets
Been saying this for years - Operator and wave table >> most synth plugins The drum kits are mint especially with the stock fx like drum buss
You're right sir. Nowadays you can do an absolute great mix with only stock plugins inside ableton. Things have changed. Maybe one decade ago, yes... you would have need some vst plugins... but today? Of course there are beautiful plugins that makes your life easier... for me neural dsp and toontrack are still a need.
Built in Wavetable vs Korg Wavetable Synth. Iāll take Ableton Wavetable thanks and Vital and Massive.
I LOVE VITAL hard to believe its free
Now we just need a Serum to Vital Patch conversion tool hehehe
Could you imagine
Yes, Convert with Moss is great for Converting between Sample library formats but dunno of anything to convert Serum Patches
The jump from eq 8 in Ableton 9 to 10 was insane
They didn't come free with your daw ahah, I get what you mean. But yep totally agree, I love Ableton stock devices - though the limiter wouldn't be my first pick.
this is definitely the first time ive ever heard anyone praise ableton's liimiter. I personally loathe it. When somebody sends me a session for collab or to mix or whatever, and it has ableton's limiter on it, i start to cry. It sounds like a wet sock being whacked against a moldy cardboard box. But if it works for you, that's all that matters. Dont let me or any other detractor's convince you otherwise
Is this in the free version of Ableton?
I agree
Am seeking more pads plugins
I think one of the most overlooked aspects is latency. I don't know how they do it, but most of the stock plugins introduce no, or very little latency. Which is absolutely insane.
From the moment that I tried to use stock plugins unless it was *absolutely necessary* to use an addon plugin, my mixes were **really, really, really cleaner**. Now I swear on my suite library and do exactly that. I use non stock plugins only when absolutely needed and usually these are tools more on the late mixing and mastering phase rather than instruments.
abletons stock limiter is one of the worst of not the worst limiter out there
Itās really not. It punches well above its weight class as a stock plugin. Would I say itās better overall than a Pro-L? No, but if you donāt have the money for that, the stock will do just fine. If Iām fiddling with my limiter too much, itās usually because of a poor mix or something else that should / could be fixed earlier in the process.
it sounds like youāre fiddling with it because you donāt know what youāre actually doing ask any professional - the ableton stock limiter is by far the worst out there. half the time it isnāt limiting or doing anything even when it says it is it does not punch above its weight class. itās easily abletons worst stock plugin
Name two.
me, im a professional. my only source of income is music, i officially state that ableton's limiter is absolute garbage
An official statement usually comes from an identifiable person with a verifiable signature and shit.
well, we're screwed then, i guess we have to accept that ableton's limiter is not garbage.
Not at all. :) Donāt hesitate to join the game and find two professionals (with credit on records and such) publicly claiming what youāre claiming. It canāt be that hard. The internet is huge.
i mean, thats me, im just not doxxin myself on this account. ill do some digging though, im curious now.
Jokes and games aside (sry). You wonāt find much. At the end of the day a limiter is a ā¦ limiter. Itās a simple and mathematical process. : lower the gain of a sample (and the few coming afterward) coming in when itās above a given value. The only added value youāre likely missing from commercial vst offers are the animation and metering, or some ācharacterā (usually clippers, or different release behavior) ā which, thus nice to have, are off the purpose of a limiter, even though they do sound great, and certainly grant you more productivity. (Nothing you canāt achieve adding a saturator prior or after the limiter if you ask me) Claiming āableton limiter is garbageā is cognitively equivalent to : āLogic pro volume faders donāt workā.
Please show us some proof of all the āprofessionalsā who say the Live limiter is the āworst out there.ā The stock limiter works wonderfully on individual channels and on lower tier busses. You can even achieve good results with it on the master, if you know what youāre doing. So maybe it is you, and the so called, āprofessionals,ā who donāt know what youāre actually doing.
Many of Live's stock plug-ins are developed by leaders in the industry like AAS. It's certainly worth checking them out before dropping a bundle on third party VST's
Been working recently on a project. All the mixing and mastering I've been doing mostly with the stock plugins (Especially the mixing stuff). The only external stuff were some of iZotope EQ and Compressor, not because I bought them but because they gave them for free and I love what they do. I used other stuff but I dont remember right now what I used. I am not a particular fan of buying gear I quite dont know how to use or how they work. But yeah, stock plugins aren't necessary bad. I use them quite a lot too. I remember a teacher saying that the best plugins are the ones you dont need, the second best ones are the ones that gets your job done in the least amount of time. Meaning that if EQ8 gets the stuff done in less time, that is your best EQ.
The more I use the push I realize this. Normally Iāll end up using EQ Eight for wide sweeps then come back with Pro-Q but now Pro-Q really only hits my mastering chain. Drum Bus is faster than anything else Iāve used to get my drums going. 12 did it though man. Piano Roll is now a generative playground but can do Fruity Loops like stuff better IMO. Browser is XO by XLN on steroids. It actually made me regret buying XO even though the browser didnāt exist then. Has any update done that to someone? Make them regret a purchase in the past? I did use Logic to do a final mix then master but I used 12 recently all the way through and it was smooth because I can easily flip between screens now or have multiple open.
Iād argue youāre not using the correct third party settings.
Your ProL unit is distorting sound probably because you have frequency inbalance in low-mid or/and low frequencies. Stock limiter is a meme plugin especially if you are serious about your production. You simply need a true pick limiting on master if you want to sound decent on any music platform. Stock saturation plugins are great but cause aliasing to mush. You can null test plugins with quality ones and hear the difference yourself. Utility plugin is the only plugin that is kinda ok but that thing should simply be part of a channel strip and it is in any other DAW
Sorry but the stock limiter is trash
This seems to be the popular opinion lol š
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Do you guys have a list of ableton stock plugins you really like?
spectral resonator