Beam by Lunacy Audio - Multi Effect plugin

[morphex]

Wouldn't a spectral effect add latency though? I like the fact I can use this in realtime

All of our BEAM plugins are zero latency effects

Thank you for replying to the thread. The current effect nodes may be zero latency, which is great by the way. But what is your opinion in regards to designing a new spectral effect node for BEAM?

Has Lunacy Audio ever considered adding spectral effects of some kind? For example, I think adding a spectral delay to BEAM, would be like putting the cherry on top of this already killer multi-effect.

Or, have you decided against using spectral effects altogether, due to their issues with latency? This is all just pure speculation and curiosity on my part.

A good q! We've committed to keeping the plugin zero latency, so that's a big reason we haven't explored certain effects. We also only add very specific effects which we feel will add a unique character to the ecosystem. Otherwise, spectral would certainly be cool

Thanks for answering my question, and I really think that you made the right decision at the end of the day. I absolutely love spectral effects, and it was NI’s discontinued Spektral Delay that first got me hooked.

But BEAM already offers so many incredible features, and it’s been very stable on my older system. Latency from fft processing would probably change that experience. So leaving it out makes perfect sense.

[enCiphered]

Well, Beam is definitely far from being a killer multi-effect. It is good and interesting enough to use creatively, but it is still buggy, mainly because of its graphical concept, which is also its strongest feature.
I have never managed to use it for very long because every second or third time I try to randomize the settings, the editor zooms uncontrollably beyond the window proportions. After that, I can no longer scroll properly or move anything.
It just stalls, no nodes are visible anymore and it becomes completely unusable. So, the effect that was generated while the editor was out of proportion might actually be great, but you cannot keep or properly use it because you cannot see or control it anymore.
The only way to get the editor back into a usable state is to randomize again, which means losing that effect completely.
This has been broken since day one and has never been fixed.

Honestly, we've never seen this before. Very sorry to hear you're experiencing this! We've tested BEAM on hundreds of computers without this issue, so it could be a weird graphics card incompatibility or a setting for the DAW's plugin performance. Could you reach out to our support team here? https://support.lunacy.audio

I’m happy to say that I seem to have resolved the graphics issue by downloading and installing the latest version of Beam, 2.2.0. I have been using version 2.1.2 all the time, so the issue may have been related to that older version.

Since updating, Beam has been working perfectly as expected. I’m not entirely sure what caused the issue, but I’m very pleased that the update solved it and that I can use Beam properly again.
Thanks @Slic and @LunacyAudio for your help

[Lunacy Audio]

Well, Beam is definitely far from being a killer multi-effect. It is good and interesting enough to use creatively, but it is still buggy, mainly because of its graphical concept, which is also its strongest feature.
I have never managed to use it for very long because every second or third time I try to randomize the settings, the editor zooms uncontrollably beyond the window proportions. After that, I can no longer scroll properly or move anything.
It just stalls, no nodes are visible anymore and it becomes completely unusable. So, the effect that was generated while the editor was out of proportion might actually be great, but you cannot keep or properly use it because you cannot see or control it anymore.
The only way to get the editor back into a usable state is to randomize again, which means losing that effect completely.
This has been broken since day one and has never been fixed.

Honestly, we've never seen this before. Very sorry to hear you're experiencing this! We've tested BEAM on hundreds of computers without this issue, so it could be a weird graphics card incompatibility or a setting for the DAW's plugin performance. Could you reach out to our support team here? https://support.lunacy.audio

I’m happy to say that I seem to have resolved the graphics issue by downloading and installing the latest version of Beam, 2.2.0. I have been using version 2.1.2 all the time, so the issue may have been related to that older version.

Since updating, Beam has been working perfectly as expected. I’m not entirely sure what caused the issue, but I’m very pleased that the update solved it and that I can use Beam properly again.
Thanks @Slic and @LunacyAudio for your help

Excellent news!!

[joradn]

Honestly, we've never seen this before. Very sorry to hear you're experiencing this! We've tested BEAM on hundreds of computers without this issue, so it could be a weird graphics card incompatibility or a setting for the DAW's plugin performance. Could you reach out to our support team here? https://support.lunacy.audio

I attempted to report this bug many times, never hearing back, since the release of Beam 2.0 and it was only just fixed in a recent update. It seems odd that you have never seen it. I think your support system needs work. No disrespect though, Beam is a great plugin.

[Sampleconstruct]

As I couldn't find anything about this in the manual: is there a way to export preset expansions including custom impulse responses? If not, are the sample paths stored within the presets absolute or relative?

[adl]

As I couldn't find anything about this in the manual: is there a way to export preset expansions including custom impulse responses? If not, are the sample paths stored within the presets absolute or relative?

It does not automatically safe those custom impulse responses as it seams, here's what AI says about your question:
https://share.google/aimode/qNd0SCXTI3lp3ONtu

[Sampleconstruct]

As I couldn't find anything about this in the manual: is there a way to export preset expansions including custom impulse responses? If not, are the sample paths stored within the presets absolute or relative?

It does not automatically safe those custom impulse responses as it seams, here's what AI says about your question:
https://share.google/aimode/qNd0SCXTI3lp3ONtu

Thanks, I feared that.

[aMUSEd]

You can create a custom folder though in the User IR Location ('/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses') but whether that would work on systems with different paths might need some testing (although the User folder seems like it might be common to all installs)

[Sampleconstruct]

You can create a custom folder though in the User IR Location ('/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses') but whether that would work on systems with different paths might need some testing (although the User folder seems like it might be common to all installs)

Yes but Beam transforms imported wavs into its own format and then saves them in a folder named "Imported" so it's not clear what to save where.

[aMUSEd]

You can create a custom folder though in the User IR Location ('/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses') but whether that would work on systems with different paths might need some testing (although the User folder seems like it might be common to all installs)

Yes but Beam transforms imported wavs into its own format and then saves them in a folder named "Imported" so it's not clear what to save where.

Does it? I tried moving one of the IRs I'd saved with a patch I made and it gave me a lost file error message so that doesn't sound like it had imported it then saved a converted version somewhere else because it would not need the original as a reference if that was the case

[Sampleconstruct]

You can create a custom folder though in the User IR Location ('/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses') but whether that would work on systems with different paths might need some testing (although the User folder seems like it might be common to all installs)

Yes but Beam transforms imported wavs into its own format and then saves them in a folder named "Imported" so it's not clear what to save where.

Does it? I tried moving one of the IRs I'd saved with a patch I made and it gave me a lost file error message so that doesn't sound like it had imported it then saved a converted version somewhere else because it would not need the original as a reference if that was the case

Here (pic below) I have two folders with converted Beam IRs made from my own imported wavs, located in User(me)/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses/User

Bildschirmfoto 2026-05-28 um 11.47.43.png

[Sampleconstruct]

I find it strange that root note/pattern in Bismuth can be automated in my DAW but can not be assigned to the Macro, so it's a feature request.

[aMUSEd]

You can create a custom folder though in the User IR Location ('/Users/username/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses') but whether that would work on systems with different paths might need some testing (although the User folder seems like it might be common to all installs)

Yes but Beam transforms imported wavs into its own format and then saves them in a folder named "Imported" so it's not clear what to save where.

Does it? I tried moving one of the IRs I'd saved with a patch I made and it gave me a lost file error message so that doesn't sound like it had imported it then saved a converted version somewhere else because it would not need the original as a reference if that was the case

Here (pic below) I have two folders with converted Beam IRs made from my own imported wavs, located in User(me)/Library/Application Support/Lunacy Audio/BEAM/Impulse Responses/User

Bildschirmfoto 2026-05-28 um 11.47.43.png

I see but it looks like those are references to the original wav, not converted IRs. File size is too small and they open in a JSON editor (although with unspecified errors) so are text readable

[aMUSEd]

The Lunacy IRs looks like proper audio files though so the 'impulse' format seems to be able to be both a converted audio file for factory content and a reference for imported ones - so maybe some sort of wrapper?

[Sampleconstruct]

Well the ones in the image I posted are up to 4.9 MB in size so they must contain audio data.