What are some of your favourite "gems", be they hidden or not-so-hidden?

[emef]

I find this distortion to be very unique, it`s from KVRDC2014 and 32bit, so pretty old, but very cool: EpiCentre

i hadn't heard of EpiCentre so downloaded it and used jbridger on it so it works in 64bit and it's a really great distortion, cheers for mentioning it

[tlkmx]

Nice post.
I love reaktor generally.
A Prism is insanely good with prism FX for sound designing weird sounds
Tons of creative reaktor ensemble but would be long to list.
Many people mentionned plugs i really love.
I'll make a proper list later to share thoo

[Choikdoi]

Cleaning up some old downloads and I came across Cymatics DejaVu again. I hadn't really used it much after installing it, but it definitely survives this latest purge and should be getting some use from now on. Free too.

[cptgone]

Plugin Boutique Radio.

[Fleer]

Adaptiverb by Zynaptiq.
Simply incredible.

[harryupbabble]

i only use freeware

synth1 is a gem to me
so many free presets available to download (twenty thousand or more)
and i can make my own randomized presets by using reaper scripts

sforzando by plogue is also a gem
i use the standalone version a lot to audition tons of free soundfonts
and i'll be using the vst version in reaper for my socalled "songs"
it can load sf2 and sfz files
plus it can convert sf2 to sfz

a lot of built in reaper plugins are gems
i use the "realimit" one a lot
change "a lot" to always

xoxos plugins are pretty useful

surge
dexed
amplesound plugins
4front plugins

so many other freeware vst plugins are gems
lotsa gems from the kvr audio developer challenges

kbrown synths are great
(doesn't have presets though but that's okay)

u-he freeware are great

too many freeware gems
can't remember all of them right now

oh oh i just remembered the most current one that is a potential gem:
hyperstonik by midi mobiles

wonderful wonderful free stuff everywhere

[dmbaer]

...Anything from Nomad Factory...

I got the bundle which includes most everything for a steal, great stuff

Same here. The best bang for the buck (100 or so) I ever spent on plug-ins. Even better, as NF is releasing upgrades (albeit way more slowly than they thought they would) the new versions are free to existing bundle owners. Great stuff entirely.

[swilow11]

Fircomp2- great compressor, got some really nice features and seems relatively transparent and low CPU. Great price too.

[swilow11]

i only use freeware

synth1 is a gem to me
so many free presets available to download (twenty thousand or more)
and i can make my own randomized presets by using reaper scripts

sforzando by plogue is also a gem
i use the standalone version a lot to audition tons of free soundfonts
and i'll be using the vst version in reaper for my socalled "songs"
it can load sf2 and sfz files
plus it can convert sf2 to sfz

a lot of built in reaper plugins are gems
i use the "realimit" one a lot
change "a lot" to always

xoxos plugins are pretty useful

surge
dexed
amplesound plugins
4front plugins

so many other freeware vst plugins are gems
lotsa gems from the kvr audio developer challenges

kbrown synths are great
(doesn't have presets though but that's okay)

u-he freeware are great

too many freeware gems
can't remember all of them right now

oh oh i just remembered the most current one that is a potential gem:
hyperstonik by midi mobiles

wonderful wonderful free stuff everywhere

Throw Vital into that list. It's easily one of the best VSTs out there- perfect blend of features and usability. I felt obliged to pay for it in the possibly vain hope that it would see continued development as its not without some minor bugs... But even with the bugs, I think I prefer it to Serum/Pigments etc. Only drawback is its relatively high CPU usage when using multiple instances and going for 8x oversampling almost starts fires, but I generally render to audio pretty quickly so can deal with it. Wonderful synth that I really hope doesn't die.

[ahuman]

i only use freeware

Have you always been doing this? And also a free DAW?

[replicant X]

deleted

[Big DAW Audio]

TDR Kotelnikov is a really great compressor for the master bus.

Calm Before to add the final touches before any drop or chorus.

Low End Focus and Bassroom to help get the low end on point.