Fabfilter Volcano 3 Out now

[gondii]

Also for the filter styles, I am barely able to distinguish these. In a blind test the most would sound pretty the same for me. Maybe I used wrong audio material (some synth tracks, not real life audio) to test it, but ATM the variance of the styles is pretty few for me.

They sound significantly different, but you have to push them a bit. Add drive and resonance. The more you do, the more difference / character you hear.

[Ploki]

Hm I demoed it and have to admit, that I am kind of dissapointed. I expected more. At the moment I can not yet see, how it brings additional value on my exisiting plugins (Shade, Mfilter). Normally I am slightly positively biased for FF, but I see not really a gamechanger there.

Also for the filter styles, I am barely able to distinguish these. In a blind test the most would sound pretty the same for me. Maybe I used wrong audio material (some synth tracks, not real life audio) to test it, but ATM the variance of the styles is pretty few for me.

If FF goes on BF sale, I think I would grab it with the additional discount, nevertheless. If not, I would wait on the next sale, if at all.

i have MFilter, and i demoed shade.
MFilter doesn't have colored filters at all, and shade has much less colored lpf/hpfs if i remember correctly.
So i don't see how they compare really?

edit:
also filter colors differ greatly imo.

[NinjaToon]

Also for the filter styles, I am barely able to distinguish these.

Crank the drive (you had to crank the input and adjust the output on 2 now you have a handy drive knob!) and the resonance, automate some slow sweeps and change the filter types. You will hear a difference.

EDIT: whoops I see you were already encouraged to this this.

[Biome_Digital]

Hm I demoed it and have to admit, that I am kind of dissapointed. I expected more. At the moment I can not yet see, how it brings additional value on my exisiting plugins (Shade, Mfilter). Normally I am slightly positively biased for FF, but I see not really a gamechanger there.

Also for the filter styles, I am barely able to distinguish these. In a blind test the most would sound pretty the same for me. Maybe I used wrong audio material (some synth tracks, not real life audio) to test it, but ATM the variance of the styles is pretty few for me.

If FF goes on BF sale, I think I would grab it with the additional discount, nevertheless. If not, I would wait on the next sale, if at all.

i have MFilter, and i demoed shade.
MFilter doesn't have colored filters at all, and shade has much less colored lpf/hpfs if i remember correctly.
So i don't see how they compare really?

edit:
also filter colors differ greatly imo.

I just hope UVI add the new Falcon MS20 filter to Shade soon. That's one of the best software filters I've heard on a synth. The Sallen Key is also great!

[Fleer]

FabFilter Volcano 3’s GUI is so workflow effective I’m smitten. Just like I was when Timeless 3 came out. Both are simply wonderful. And that sound! Delicious.

[vitocorleone123]

FabFilter Volcano 3’s GUI is so workflow effective I’m smitten. Just like I was when Timeless 3 came out. Both are simply wonderful. And that sound! Delicious.

I still can't get on with Timeless 3 - the reverb basics are just harder to use than Valhalla Delay, so I never use Timeless 3. But I'm falling for Volcano 3.

[e@rs]

Normally I am slightly positively biased for FF, but I see not really a gamechanger there.

It's a long time since I've seen a gamechanger from FabFilter.

PA on the other hand...

[Ploki]

lol

[NomadMonad]

Normally I am slightly positively biased for FF, but I see not really a gamechanger there.

It's a long time since I've seen a gamechanger from FabFilter.

PA on the other hand...

You could probably argue that it requires a slightly more advanced knowledge of audio engineering in order to make the most of it. If you expect to get instant wow results just by twisting one knob then yeah you could probably be a little disappointed.

[Ploki]

i think he was making funnies

[bmanic]

Don't sleep on the presets. There are a few hidden gems there, ready setup for your mixing tasks. Check the 'Basic' folder. You have a quick setup of BPF, HPF, LPF and Notch where I've already routed an Envelope Follower that you get instant control over and an LFO.

I would love if you could go into some detail about some of the presets. For example I noticed that you use several filters even in some of the most basic presets and I wonder what was your thinking behind that. Or for example how you picture someone using the other presets in the basics folder that aren't for typical filtering duties such as the Audio Enhancer or Phase Panning.

Sure.

The filter presets in the Basic category are a combination of many filters simply to make the overall response more unique and interesting. For instance, in some analogue synths, the various slopes are made by combining multiple stages of filters within a chip and if you carefully tune each individual stage you can get unique character of a filter. Thus I gave the factory presets 3 different variations on this theme, each with their own Cutoff, Resonance, EVF and LFO controls, all mapped for convenience sake. I covered all the basics, LPF, HPF, BPF and Notch.

The Audio Enhancer was just a preset that I made for a track that I mixed where I wanted it to dynamically and subtly boost the lows while at the same time cut around the corner frequency of that same low shelf and boost the rest. I think it was made for the drumbus on that particular track but I tested it on a bunch of other audio sources and it seems to work wonders on a lot of things. Same with the "Audio Mud Remover" preset in the same category.

Filter 1 is a Low Shelf, Filter 2 is a High Shelf and by having these two very close to each other and at 12dB/octave both have a slight dip before the boost, thus it becomes a double-dip at the corner frequency. Basically it creates a sort of Pultec type response.. but in this preset it's all tied into modulation by two opposite envelope followers where the first one is a slower normal EVF while the other is a transient based EVF. Thus it boosts the "sustain" of the overall signal. There is also a 3rd filter which is a High Shelf at around 15kHz that has the transient envelope tied to it, boosting it a very tiny amount. This provides some excitement and dynamic air/sparkle to any signal.

The two Panning utility presets are based on alternative audio panning concepts. Instead of just turning down one channel and turning up the other (basic volume panning), this instead boosts and cuts the frequencies around the center frequency that you can choose. This is a quite natural way of panning things as bass frequencies are much less localized than higher frequencies. The Phase pan utility does a similar thing but instead separating the phase response of each channel.

Both of these panning utility presets also contain a Delay pan slider which instead of changing the volume it separates the channels in time, taking advantage of the HAAS effect. Basically your brain will interpret a signal that arrives first as being the "louder/more prominent" signal, which in turn leads you to hear it either left or right. It becomes interesting when you combine frequency/phase panning with delay panning. If you set these in opposite directions you end up with a psychoacustic phenomenon where the signal will start sounding like it's going behind your head.

Note, as soon as you add some Delay panning, the signal is NOT mono compatible any more. There will be high frequency phase cancellation happening in mono.

[FapFilter]

demoed it for a bit now and while the features and workflow are quite nice (except for the by today's standards mediocre step LFO), i'm asking myself what they actually improved on the filter sound?
Never owned V1 or 2, but i was asking me the same when i was demoing Timeless 3 which supposedly also has it's filters improved for a more analog sound.
Didn't have T2 installed at that moment for 1:1 comparisons, but what i heard reminded me exactly of the meh sounding ones in T2.
Hard pass for me.
And i don't necessarily need truly “analog“ sounding filters as i quite like the ones in the ancient (but still extremely capable) Fruity Love Philter.
I'm just hoping for a miracle to happen that Image Line will release their plugins on Mac (especially M1 in my case).
That and The Drop for a more oldschool analog sound would keep me covered forever.

[sQeetz]

I'm just hoping for a miracle to happen that Image Line will release their plugins on Mac (especially M1 in my case).

I don't believe that is ever going to happen. They had VST versions of their plugins once but dropped them not too long ago

[FapFilter]

I know

[nirm123]

Fap(b)Filter ?