Most popular filter libraries?

[soundmodel]

There have been so many synth and fx releases lately that I've been wondering, how are they made so fast.
The oscillator and envelope stuff isn't' that complicated, but the filters are. That makes me assume that they're all using some libraries for their filters.

So what are the most popular filter libraries? Or perhaps they just implement RBJ Cookbook or something?

[BertKoor]

There have been so many synth and fx releases lately

Oh really? I don't keep track...

how are they made so fast.

That is an unverified assumption which imho comes out of nowhere. You have no way to tell how many hours a developer has put into his latest creation.

The oscillator and envelope stuff isn't' that complicated

Ahem... doing oscillators right is actually pretty hard. I'll dare you to code an oscillator which doesn't alias and can do smooth pitch modulations over some octaves.

but the filters are. That makes me assume that they're all

Assumption is the mother of all fuckups. All who exactly?

using some libraries for their filters.

Or even made with something like SynthMaker?

[vortico]

The oscillator and envelope stuff isn't' that complicated

lol

But to answer your question, most developers here write their own algorithms from scratch straight from textbooks, their own algorithms/designs/models, or from research papers/proceedings.

Libraries aren't really needed most the time. You can write a filter in one line of code if you want, but even that simple filter would likely need to be tweaked a bit if used in a different application, so it's pretty much impossible to make a library that is confortably suitable for everyone to use. So most people just roll their own.

With that said, there are a few like https://github.com/kfrlib/kfr/tree/mast ... de/kfr/dsp or https://github.com/hamiltonkibbe/FxDSP/ ... SP/include, but I have no experience with them.

[mystran]

The oscillator and envelope stuff isn't' that complicated, but the filters are. That makes me assume that they're all using some libraries for their filters.

Filters aren't really all that complicated (and I would argue oscillators can potentially be worse in some cases), but they can seem like magic if you try to approach them as a "programming problem" because what you really need to do is attack them as a "math problem" instead. The actual math required is not really all that bad (eg. basic undergraduate engineering math should handle it all pretty much; the stuff that even comp-sci students have to learn), but it's important to realise it's math you need here and no amount of "programming" will get you anywhere.

[davidguda]

Look at the topic "The Art of VA Filter Design 2.0.0alpha" and the linked pdf there.. There you have a great guide to building filters and a long thread of experts discussing it.

There is also https://github.com/vinniefalco/DSPFilters as a filters library but that is not really "synth filters" although still useable stuff for effects.