Thanks for you positive feedback! I have read all sorts of great papers on people modelling stomp boxes, tone stacks, and tubes, so I am amazed that there aren't some great plugins already out there covering distortion.HcDoom wrote:Using Drop all over my new album...its amazing. I can only say thanks to Andy and to his magnificent work. If he would make distortion plug-in (with various types of analog distortion...from subtle to total destruction), I believe that would be a dream come true. I would throw my money at it right away. I believe he is the only competent person to make it properly...out of all developers.
Since The Drop has to do with distortion hopefully it won't be too off topic for everyone: which plugins have you tried and how have you found them?
I have been looking at modelling a bunch of classic stomp boxes like the TS-808/909, Big Muff PI etc, so I visited here: http://www.igniteamps.com/en/audio-plug-ins and downloaded their free TS-999 tube screamer emulation and thought it was pretty good, it was just a fraction duller than the analog pedal I had, but I would have been happy using it in production. There must be better paid products as well, so I thought I should tackle other things instead, like a decent Boss IR-3109 based phaser.
However, in the cabinet simulation department I think they are all equally bad. Linear FIR impulse responses don't really cut it for decent tone. I feel to get that right there needs to be a full model of the coupled load of the power amp and the speaker coil + mass, with non-linearities of both modelled electro-accoustically and spatially. That is something I'm keen to investigate in the future, actually building a 3D model (lattice) of the speaker and cabinet, but I'm not sure computers are quite up for it just yet but they are getting more powerful.