Best plugins that you can’t live without

[V0RT3X]

None because if i had to id be perfectly happy with just Bitwig and hardware

[Kongru]

Scaler for me because my theory sucks.

[fceramic]

Permut8, Echobode and almost all the Goodhertz stuff would be very hard to replace with stock plugins.

[jancivil]

The Hybrid Reverb (IR early, algo late reflections) in the original VSL Vienna Suite is going to appear in everything I make from the DAW perspective.
Replika XT a very near certainty. VS Pro EQ and Exciter are go-tos.

Instruments, I couldn't do without Kontakt or VSL's VI Pro engine. Sometimes I don't do a kit drums part, but BFD3.

[dionenoid]

DMG Equilibrium, Klanghelm VUMT Deluxe, Fabfilter Pro-L2, Sir Standardclip. And a bunch of others

[Effectsworks]

Fabfilter, Twisted Tools and Sonimus for starters. I know there's more...

[HansP]

Beyond the obvious, that everyone tells..

Let me give you examples of free 32bit stuff that I never ever want to give up, it just works quickly, great sound with a unique character, and I created many presets. Only 1 or 2 may have got an upgrade.

TLs Saturated Driver (great for thin sounding drums and also vocals. super oomph but also attack)
Klanghelm IVGI2 (anywhere when the instrument or effect sounds too cold and "digital")
AriesVerb 4a (beta version) (modern algo rev in early state with "mathematical" UI but insane modulation, brings dumb programmed drums to life)
GlaceVerb (really trashy guitar room and stage-sound reverb, perfect for some punk and alternative tracks)
ReaGate (standalone) (somewhat trashy attack behavior, but has all parameters required for finest drum gating, including pre-open and hysteresis)
SFilter (it has a resonant hipass that is absolutely great to enhance the boof sound of kicks and snares)
c3-multibandcomp 1.2 (great to wire this before OrilRiver for lush vocal reverbs, it has a good filter color for this and won't sound dull but can squash the sibilants, I had set f to 1900Hz;5300Hz)
Density 1.0 (bootsy?) (M/S 4-Quadrant comp with "fat" and "trafo" buttons)
Density MK2 (side chain comp)
Thrillseeker LA (guitar and drum bus, great saturator section with selector for frequencies to dynamically enhance, can side-chain)
TAL-Dub 2 (versatile tape delay with legit full sound)
Thrillseeker XTC ("mojo" exciter in the form of a parallel EQ)
TinyQ (good transparent general EQ with very little CPU hit)


I do really use them because they deliver, and I would have to sift through a 1000 Waves plugins in all their details, to find something that does the job decently and fast enough.


Among the modern commercial plugins, there are
Phil's Cascade
Lindell 354
PA SSl 4000G (very pristine vintage sound for guitars and drums)
Little Plate (with an EQ after it, really becomes versatile)
TDR Nova GE (with its assistant to detect ringing frequencies and room modes)

[jyty]

Currently the list is as follows: Scaler 2, Cinematic Rooms reverb, also love the HZ Strings from spitfire, Jaeger (the vocals patch is superb!!), my all time favorite Superior Drums 3 with expansions (Hansa, Decades, Death&Darkness and the new one Legacy of Rock) + EZbass is superb as well!

[pppppppppp]

EndlessSmile by Dadalife.
There is nothing better than having a boring 4 bar loop and then throwing it onto the master bus. Doesn't bring you further much, but brings back a big smile in my face whilst dancing to my own loop

[acousticglue]

Audiority Dr. drive and Blue Face
Phil's Cascade
Exponential Audio R4 and Phoenixverb
bx ssl 4000E
Toneboosters Barricade and Compressor
TDR limiter and Kotelnykov
White Elephant Audio Carve
Ohmboyz
Modnetic delay
Cytomic the Drop
Soundtoys Phase Mistress
Eventide Micropitch and Undulator
Goodhertz Midside
Fabfilter ProQ2

[psynical]

yes, yes, what KVR desperately needs is yet another name your favorite plugin list!

[BONES]

I'm not a big user of effects but there are a few I value. First among them would be FireCobra. It sounds great in the master channel and it's so simple to use. It seems to do its best work on guitars and guitar-like sounds but it will improve just about anything you add it to.

I've also been using Arturia's Rev Plate-140 a bit lately, mostly on toms and snares but also on metal hits. Eventide's Shimmerverb is also very nice and I tend to reach for it over NI's Raum these days.

I'm not generally fussy about delays, they all do the same things. I've got Replika and it sounds fine but with some settings it uses more CPU than any two instruments. That's ridiculous so I don't bother with it. In fact I rarely add a delay to anything any more, I mostly rely on the effects built into my VST instruments and they all work well enough. Thinking about it, I've been using Studio One for around 3 months now and I've ported across around 40 songs but, so far, I've not needed a delay effect at all. I don't even know what's available in S1.

I have a lot of distortion plugins and amp-sims but none of them really stand out for me, except maybe Tantrum. Again, I tend to rely on an instrument's built-in effects for that kind of stuff, especially where you can add overdrive or distortion pre-filter. On vocals I like to use Soundspot's Halcyon, which allows you to band-limit the saturation. It's great for making your vocals stand out in a mix.

I'm also not big on compressors but I'd never put a kick into a song without Puncher on it. For most other things I'll use whatever I find first in the drop-down menu but, again, 40 songs ported across and the only other dynamics plugin I've used is a brickwall limiter on the master for every song (S1's native limiter).

[ztrauq]

I am confident that I can survive without any audio effect plugins whatsoever.

However, whether I would enjoy doing so is another matter entirely...

[imrae]

The market is competitive enough that pretty much everything has a competitor. If not, you can build what you want with basic blocks. So instead I'll reframe the question to plugins that, once I had them, made me think "yes, this is what I needed and did not have".

• Nova -
• SDRR - a good, fast and forgiving colouring box
• SlickEQ M - just perfect for gentle shaping of stereo and gain against frequency
• Waves Doubler - I was doing it with other stuff, but this is the right workflow
• Valhalla Plate - found it hard to manipulate this sort of sound with other plugins
• Spectre - I was using FX chains / custom reaktor to do this emphasis/de-emphasis stuff
• Battery - all the things I want to do with one-shots done faster
• Kontakt - obviously the libraries are good, but the loop-slicing is also important.
• Pultec - any EQP1 plugin. Sure you can dial in those curves with a parametric, but do you?

[Dirtgrain]

LFOTool -- for its comb filters
Uhbik-G - to dry/wet some texture
TDR Limiter 6 GE - on master
Audiothing Reels - to get heavy tape sounds, to mute things a bit

I've been a doofous with GAS. I just noticed/remembered I have NI Driver (part of Komplete) and Unfiltered Audio Zip. They are cool, and I have yet to use them. Just now I threw Driver on a frozen reverb pad thing, and holy crap it has some oomph. Also, I bought Initial Reverse on sale a month or so ago, not realizing I have Backmask which pretty much does the same thing.

I forget about or ignore some plugins I really like. For a bit I was digging on Runciter (must get back to it), but I bought UVI Shade and am having fun with it. When you get so many plugins that they don't come to mind, maybe you've gone too far.