Your Favorite Limiter/Maximizer and Equalizer Plugs

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miroslav

miroslav

Cosmic Cowboy
I notice as the year comes to an end and Xmas is just around the corner, quite a few software manufacturers are offering really huge discounts on their bundles and individual plugs.

I'm not in need of bundles, as I do most of my mix processing OTB...but once I bring the stereo mix back into the DAW, I like to do my own quasi-mastering just to add that final bit of polish...and the two things I mostly will end up adjusting is the overall loudness (just to keep my mixes in the competitive range, but nothing real crazy), and of course some final EQ touch-ups.

I've used the Waves L2 Ultramaximizer and their Linear Phase EQ in the past (though I currently don't have them)...so I was considering getting just those two plugs, as they are on 50% off sale right now ($125 each), but I'm wondering if there are other top-shelf Limiter and EQ plugs anyone wants to recommend.
I see a lot of the Oxford stuff is also on sale, plus a few other brands.
I'm not looking for just a bunch of "plugs" for mixing and whatnot.....mainly stuff to be used at the final "mastering" stage, which for me is the adjustment of level and overall EQ.

I'll probably need to make a decision soon, as I think all these great sales end either next week or at the end of the year.
Right now....I'm pretty set on getting the two Waves plugs...but I'm all ears.... :)
 
slate digital FXG

I use UAD....but you need the cards obviously, if not Id go with the FXG
 
Did you mean FG-X plugs from Slate Digital...?

The Virtual Mastering Processor looks real nice...but how much better/different would it be compared to the Waves L2 Ultramaximizer...?

$250 for the FG-X
$125 for the Waves
 
fg-x is a game changer ;)

if you are looking at loud, it will get you louder than any other limiter without crushing the life out of your track, for rock anyway...Ozone 5 has maybe a better shout at electronic/club music
 
I've just been reading some L2 vs. FG-X posts on another website. Seems like the FG-X does better if you need to really punch up a mix, preserving transients and keeping things clean (unless it's pushed and then it can go into distortion)....
...where the L2 seems to do good on bass-heavy mixes, but can eat up some of the transients.

I guess it's all about the type of music you are doing and how loud you want to get.

I'm not looking for "nuke" loud...just want to hit at least the lower end of commercially competitive loud...but I was also looking for some mastering "glue", just a touch-up step, nothing dramatic, as I'm trying to get to a point where I have most of my mix taken care of at the analog stereo mix. I already have some really nice outboard stereo-bus comps that I recently got (Overstayer), and truth be told, I may not really need to do much more in the way of compression or adding color adjustment with compression during "mastering", as I'm probably going to be getting all that sorted right at the mix with my Overstayers (based on initial trials), so mostly, I might need just some little bit of straight-up "level lift" at the mastering stage, so I'm still considering which limiter/maximizer plug would be best suited for that, but I'm liking what I'm reading about the FG-X.

On a poll at GS last year...the top 3 limiters were Fabfilter Pro-L , Sonnox and Voxengo Elephant...followed by the Waves L2/L3 as a close fourth....but honestly, I think most people just vote for what they have or have used. I doubt many have ALL those different limiters and are truly picking the best of the bunch.

AFA as EQ...that's another animal.
I have a couple of nice outboard analog stereo EQ boxes, but I still haven't quite dialed them in for mix-bus use the way I would like them to work....though I've been mainly focusing on the comp/limiter boxes and plan to spend more time on the EQ boxes over the holidays.

I was just thinking that it would be good to have at least a really decent set of comp/limiter and EQ plugins so that once the stereo mix is back ITB and I feel that I want to make yet one more adjustment...I have some tools that are aimed more at the mastering stage than tracking/mixing stage. I just happend to get an emial from Waves on their 50% off...so that's what got me started looking. :D
 
fabfilter L will be popular because its great value (same with elephant), Sonox's inflator is great, its limiter a bit more ordinary (50% off just now though)....Ozone 5 should be a consideration, at $199 it gives you a lot of tools...not saying you'll use them....but the new limiter is excellent and maybe worth the price alone


Im days away from pushing the button on that one
 
I was checking out the Ozone 5...and yeah, you get a lot for $199. I was looking for a phone number to call them as I had a few specific questions, but they only do email contact :facepalm:

Does anyone know if the Ozone 5 "Green Lantern" GUI is adjustable to other colors/skins...or is that it?
Looking at the screen shots, I find the excessive green glow on all their plugs very irritating and hard to look at. :(
 
I think thats it....maybe someone else can confirm, but as far as i know you cant change the colour

i wouldnt let the interface put you off if its a deal breaker....Im hearing great things about it
 
I have to admit, the FGX is pretty cool. If for no other reason that it's reasonably transparent *or* freakishly colorful if needed. I don't do a lot of digital limiting, but when I do, I tend to reach for the FG-X.

I think a meme is called for...

35ildq.webp

If you want a straight-up freakishly wonderful limiter, G-Clip. (A) Awesome. (B) Free. It's like the SpitFish of limiters.

EQ's... The "Baxter" (can't remember who for some reason) is a Baxandall "emulator" of sorts -- Works in mid-side -- Another freakish freebie. FabFilter's Pro-Q is very nice (also works MS if you need it).
 
kcearl said:
I think thats it....maybe someone else can confirm, but as far as i know you cant change the colour

i wouldnt let the interface put you off if its a deal breaker....Im hearing great things about it
Click to expand...

I could work with it...I just find it rather extreme the green glow because the GUI is not huge, so looking at the icons and text is a bit hard on my eyes with the dark black and glowing green color scheme...but like I said, I could work with it if needed, and I do admit, they are giving you a lot of stuff for $199 (not sure if the other items they include are on par with the limiter quality)...so yeah, it might not be a bad purchase decision.



Massive Master said:
I have to admit, the FGX is pretty cool. If for no other reason that it's reasonably transparent *or* freakishly colorful if needed. I don't do a lot of digital limiting, but when I do, I tend to reach for the FG-X.

If you want a straight-up freakishly wonderful limiter, G-Clip. (A) Awesome. (B) Free. It's like the SpitFish of limiters.

EQ's... The "Baxter" (can't remember who for some reason) is a Baxandall "emulator" of sorts -- Works in mid-side -- Another freakish freebie. FabFilter's Pro-Q is very nice (also works MS if you need it).
Click to expand...

I was hoping you would chime in John...I wanted to also hear some opinions from guys who actually do mastering full-time.

As I said, I'm not looking for a suite of digital mastering tools...moslty one plug that will let me "bump up" my levels a few notches without too much butchering, and if there's a little extra available in the way of coloring and punch options/flavors, that would be cool too. I can get a lot of my level pushed up at the mixing stage before I bring it back to digital, so I don't need something too extreme or loaded with crazy options that I wouldn't use/need.

I will most certainly check out the freebies you mentioned... :) ...and put down one more vote for the FG-X.

When you say you don't do much digital limiting...may I ask, what is your go-to set of tools (most of the time) when you just want to bump up the level on an otherwise decent mix...and it's in a digital format?
Do you bring it back out to analog...or is it a collection of tools/steps...or....?

Not trying to steal your secrets or take work away from you... :D ...just trying to find at least one good signal chain that is relatively fool-proof at doing good things to final mixes AFA level bumps...and then yeah, final EQ touch-ups....
...without dropping the extreme cash on actual mastering-grade hardware comps and EQs (which I would love to do, but just can't warrant the expense at this time).

"Stay thirsty my friends"
 
Most of the "over the top" volume is most definitely in the analog chain. The DA/AD I use for mastering is calibrated wholly differently than the ones I use for tracking (the former is 1.23VRMS @ -10dBRMS, the latter @-20 and it'd be at -24 if I had it my way because I'm a whore for headroom). So line level at "war volume" in digital isn't even breaking a sweat on the analog side.

But no doubt (A) that amount of clean gain doesn't come easy and (B) even at that very nominal voltage, the signal isn't doing the AD any favors -- There are only a handful I've used that can handle the "abuse" without completely falling apart.
 
When I see someone like Massive recommend a free plug I am compelled to try it and I have to say, Gclip is a wonderful little freebie for sure (as is most of GVST's stuff I've tried before. I overlooked this little plug mostly because the name made me think of distortion). I also believe the OP is right about people voting for what they use. I would vote for Waves because that's all I've ever had access to and I can't recommend anything else. That's probably why I don't recommend anything. :)
 
I also believe the OP is right about people voting for what they use.
Click to expand...
This is sadly true much of the time (and the reason that so much of what would typically be considered "garbage" has scores of 9.7/10 on some merchant's sites).

I shouldn't say "sadly true..." But there's no doubt that there are some who might tout a particular product as "awesome" just because they never really tried the others.

(For the record, I overlooked it for the same reason until another engineer - Robin Schmidt if I recall, recommended it to me)
 
in the digital world, my masterchain is normally quite long (up to ~20 plugins/instances) where every plugin isn't doing much. these are some of my favorites for stereo mastering:

- voxengo glissEQ
- voxengo elephant limiter
- abbey road TG12413
- flux alchemist multiband
- softube tube-tech CL1B Compressor, PE 1C EQ, ME 1B EQ
- ferric TDS saturation (freeware)

the new brainworx vertigo is also really nice.
 
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