fabfilter Saturn 2 or alternative

[jens]

Destructor

Now we're talking! That one is amazing - and amazingly useful.

[Jac459]

Saturn is not doing a lot

not sure I would say that about a plugin that includes 28 different algos (including various amp-sims (b/w cabinet emus) , tubes, tapes, transformers and more), each and all available for each and any of up to six frequency bands, yadda yadda.

If Saturn 2 isn't doing a lot, then what?

My point was however that none of the actual algos themselves are really outstanding - or (there, I said it) even just competitive.

And I never woke up to the thought of "I should put a four-band saturator on the bass guitar".

One might of course be utterly bored and end up experimenting and subsequenctly coming up with something that - surprise surprise (would be for me at least, frankly put) doesn't sound absolutely hideous, but then again: who has really got the time for that?

But boy, do I love to fire it up now and then and just stare at the gorgeous GUI for a moment or two. (And then I do the reasonable thing and quickly remove it again.)

I think I stand with the answer of bmanic.

This is really a plug in I use and love.

That being said, I think it is ok to have different tastes on distortion algorithms. We don't have to agree

[vitocorleone123]

Saturn is not doing a lot

not sure I would say that about a plugin that includes 28 different algos (including various amp-sims (b/w cabinet emus) , tubes, tapes, transformers and more), each and all available for each and any of up to six frequency bands, yadda yadda.

If Saturn 2 isn't doing a lot, then what?

My point was however that none of the actual algos themselves are really outstanding - or (there, I said it) even just competitive.

And I never woke up to the thought of "I should put a four-band saturator on the bass guitar".

One might of course be utterly bored and end up experimenting and subsequenctly coming up with something that - surprise surprise (would be for me at least, frankly put) doesn't sound absolutely hideous, but then again: who has really got the time for that?

But boy, do I love to fire it up now and then and just stare at the gorgeous GUI for a moment or two. (And then I do the reasonable thing and quickly remove it again.)

The fabfilter creative plugins aren’t intended to be pedals. It’s ok to like pedals. Just don’t confuse the intent of different tools.

[bmanic]

That being said, I think it is ok to have different tastes on distortion algorithms. We don't have to agree

Absolutely! Saturation is about as subjective as you can get! Just think of all the different guitar amplifiers and pedals available on the market. There are those that absolutely love the Boss Metal Zone and those that really hate it with a passion. Same goes for the Ibanez Tube Screamer. Many people think it is impossible to not use it while others hate it.

Same goes for tape saturation. Ironically I know a lot of old timers who absolutely hate anything tape, no matter how much I try to convince them how good tape saturation is on various sources, especially drums.. whereas these people who have worked with it most of their life seem to really hate how much their meticulous miking and recording is destroyed by it! Then again these same people seem to really love pushing mixing desks into heavy saturation and get things under control that way.

Kind of makes sense. First they hear what they do through the desk, only to be disappointed by the end results coming off the tape, having to re-do a lot of things before hitting the tape to get it as close as they can to the results they want.

So yeah, if somebody puts FF Saturn on a track, expecting a certain flavor and then get the exact opposite, I can totally understand the dislike. Those saturation algorithms do indeed have a very heavy finger print and it's NOT possible to get rid of it, no matter how much one tries to tweak envelope followers or levels. It's there and you either like it or you don't.

One thing I myself dislike about Saturn is the quite heavy prevalence of a 3rd harmonic that you can not get rid of, no matter how hard you try. Even if you put the dry/wet mix knob of a band to zero, it's still there.. happening before or after (I'm not sure exactly when in the signal chain it happens!) all other processing and it's strength heavily varies between each algorithm. It's most present in all the tape algorithms. This reminds me that I have to send an email to FF and ask about it.. if it's perhaps a bug. Though I doubt they would change it this late in it's product run.

[Jac459]

That being said, I think it is ok to have different tastes on distortion algorithms. We don't have to agree

Absolutely! Saturation is about as subjective as you can get! Just think of all the different guitar amplifiers and pedals available on the market. There are those that absolutely love the Boss Metal Zone and those that really hate it with a passion. Same goes for the Ibanez Tube Screamer. Many people think it is impossible to not use it while others hate it.

Same goes for tape saturation. Ironically I know a lot of old timers who absolutely hate anything tape, no matter how much I try to convince them how good tape saturation is on various sources, especially drums.. whereas these people who have worked with it most of their life seem to really hate how much their meticulous miking and recording is destroyed by it! Then again these same people seem to really love pushing mixing desks into heavy saturation and get things under control that way.

Kind of makes sense. First they hear what they do through the desk, only to be disappointed by the end results coming off the tape, having to re-do a lot of things before hitting the tape to get it as close as they can to the results they want.

So yeah, if somebody puts FF Saturn on a track, expecting a certain flavor and then get the exact opposite, I can totally understand the dislike. Those saturation algorithms do indeed have a very heavy finger print and it's NOT possible to get rid of it, no matter how much one tries to tweak envelope followers or levels. It's there and you either like it or you don't.

One thing I myself dislike about Saturn is the quite heavy prevalence of a 2nd harmonic that you can not get rid of, no matter how hard you try. Even if you put the dry/wet mix knob of a band to zero, it's still there.. happening before or after (I'm not sure exactly when in the signal chain it happens!) all other processing and it's strength heavily varies between each algorithm. It's most present in all the tape algorithms. This reminds me that I have to send an email to FF and ask about it.. if it's perhaps a bug. Though I doubt they would change it this late in it's product run.

What do you mean by 2nd harmonic? Like a 660hz predominantly coming out of 440hz? Wouldn't just it be a coloration?

For me Saturn is just perfect to brighten a sound while keeping warmth thanks to a very subtle saturation. I don't like to push it hard. The control you easily have on the dynamic is also perfect on the same plugin. At the end I use it more like I thought I would use pro Q3, for subtle control over the mixing but Saturn is just actually too good at it.

[bmanic]

Sorry, I meant a 3rd harmonic (corrected my post above). So 1kHz tone would have a harmonic at 3kHz that is quite prevalent, no matter what you do and it's tied to the algorithm you choose. This means that Saturn 2 can never be truly "subtle" as there will always be a quite loud 3rd harmonic happening, no matter what.

[jens]

Saturn is not doing a lot

not sure I would say that about a plugin that includes 28 different algos (including various amp-sims (b/w cabinet emus) , tubes, tapes, transformers and more), each and all available for each and any of up to six frequency bands, yadda yadda.

If Saturn 2 isn't doing a lot, then what?

My point was however that none of the actual algos themselves are really outstanding - or (there, I said it) even just competitive.

And I never woke up to the thought of "I should put a four-band saturator on the bass guitar".

One might of course be utterly bored and end up experimenting and subsequenctly coming up with something that - surprise surprise (would be for me at least, frankly put) doesn't sound absolutely hideous, but then again: who has really got the time for that?

But boy, do I love to fire it up now and then and just stare at the gorgeous GUI for a moment or two. (And then I do the reasonable thing and quickly remove it again.)

The fabfilter creative plugins aren’t intended to be pedals. It’s ok to like pedals. Just don’t confuse the intent of different tools.

Huh? Are you perhaps quoting the wrong post?

[Jac459]

Sorry, I meant a 3rd harmonic (corrected my post above). So 1kHz tone would have a harmonic at 3kHz that is quite prevalent, no matter what you do and it's tied to the algorithm you choose. This means that Saturn 2 can never be truly "subtle" as there will always be a quite loud 3rd harmonic happening, no matter what.

Actually I just tested. It is very clear for the Tape saturations but if you go for tube for example, it is actually subtle (at least in my referential .

[kraster]

Saturn is not doing a lot

not sure I would say that about a plugin that includes 28 different algos (including various amp-sims (b/w cabinet emus) , tubes, tapes, transformers and more), each and all available for each and any of up to six frequency bands, yadda yadda.

If Saturn 2 isn't doing a lot, then what?

My point was however that none of the actual algos themselves are really outstanding - or (there, I said it) even just competitive.

And I never woke up to the thought of "I should put a four-band saturator on the bass guitar".

One might of course be utterly bored and end up experimenting and subsequenctly coming up with something that - surprise surprise (would be for me at least, frankly put) doesn't sound absolutely hideous, but then again: who has really got the time for that?

But boy, do I love to fire it up now and then and just stare at the gorgeous GUI for a moment or two. (And then I do the reasonable thing and quickly remove it again.)

Ironically I use Saturn all the time on Bass Guitar.

Bass is difficult to distort with most broadband distortions. There's usually some kind of compromise like the arse falling out of the sound, bottom end getting too flabby or the high end getting too fizzy.

You usually have to come up with some kind of messy parallel setup.

Saturn just allows you to hone in on the areas that you want to drive/saturate/distort from subtle to extreme.

One thing I love about Saturn is that each band has its own EQ so if the distortion is getting too aggressive or too fuzzy you can adjust it with the eq controls. The option are always sensible without being overwhelming.

It's easily my favourite bass processing plugin.

[bmanic]

Sorry, I meant a 3rd harmonic (corrected my post above). So 1kHz tone would have a harmonic at 3kHz that is quite prevalent, no matter what you do and it's tied to the algorithm you choose. This means that Saturn 2 can never be truly "subtle" as there will always be a quite loud 3rd harmonic happening, no matter what.

Actually I just tested. It is very clear for the Tape saturations but if you go for tube for example, it is actually subtle (at least in my referential .

Only if you use the Subtle Tube algorithm. All others have it rather high. You can see the isolated 3rd harmonic if you set the individual bands dry/wet slider to zero (aka fully dry). It's rather loud no matter what you do. I really don't understand where this 3rd harmonic comes from or what makes it happen even if you have all bands set to 100% dry.

[Jac459]

Sorry, I meant a 3rd harmonic (corrected my post above). So 1kHz tone would have a harmonic at 3kHz that is quite prevalent, no matter what you do and it's tied to the algorithm you choose. This means that Saturn 2 can never be truly "subtle" as there will always be a quite loud 3rd harmonic happening, no matter what.

Actually I just tested. It is very clear for the Tape saturations but if you go for tube for example, it is actually subtle (at least in my referential .

Only if you use the Subtle Tube algorithm. All others have it rather high. You can see the isolated 3rd harmonic if you set the individual bands dry/wet slider to zero (aka fully dry). It's rather loud no matter what you do. I really don't understand where this 3rd harmonic comes from or what makes it happen even if you have all bands set to 100% dry.

Yes indeed, I tried with a clean sine and it is pretty obvious.

[dikrek]

Louder than Liftoff Silver Bullet MK2 plugin. Try it. Still $30 on their site I believe, which is crazy value.

[concealed identity]

One I forgot to mention is Unfiltered Audio's Tryad.

It's a multiband multi-fx plugin, but has the distortion/saturation algorithms from their other plugins, which imo are quite good.

[vitocorleone123]

Louder than Liftoff Silver Bullet MK2 plugin. Try it. Still $30 on their site I believe, which is crazy value.

I like it but it’s too cpu heavy on my old computer (9900k).

[Igro]

One I forgot to mention is Unfiltered Audio's Tryad.

It's a multiband multi-fx plugin, but has the distortion/saturation algorithms from their other plugins, which imo are quite good.

The quality of distortion in a dedicated Unfiltered Audio plugins is higher though than in Byome/Triad.