Soundtoys Tone

[fese]

Here I was excited to read the thread about the new "Soundtoys Tone" plugin.
Boy was I wrong. Soundtoys are still great. I keep forgetting to try using Crystalizer more, I've been meaning to so if nothing else thanks for reminding me of that.

Yeah, I was rather disappointed reading the actual thread content…
I tend to forget about my soundtoys collection, too. Microshift is on practically every background vocals, though.

I think in plugin world there is a tendency to think that newer plugins are inherently better/innovative than old ones, which is of course what marketing wants us to believe with all the fancy terms like “component/spice modeling”,”AI” and such. Now I am no dsp expert, but I guess that a lot of the algorithms and math stuff behind the code were already known back in the days of expensive digital hardware effects like the much revered H3000, it’s just that nowadays we have so much more compute power available that a lot of algorithms are feasible to run in real time.
Funnily enough, I’ve never heard about someone complain about “quantization distortion “ in a H3000 or similar box.
But I guess it takes another 5-10 years before Soundtoys becomes “vintage digital”

I still like most of them, to me they have character. Yep, Decapitator aliases like hell. I wouldn’t use it on drum overheads.
They are in dire need of a GUI update, though.

[btfnk]

To my ears the Soundtoys boxtone is "smushy". Things get kind of rounded out and softened. It's clearly an attempt at sounding analog and it's not a terrible one. But it's also not the best by 2022 standards.

[dubguy99]

The Soundtoys plugins (except the dedicated saturation ones) have the same saturation algos built in (which you can turn off, but it's on by default) and by default some of them run pretty hot. Which means, you are getting the same kinda saturation on all their plugs. It also aliases.

Their FX coding also definitely has a certain character to it.

I'd say the "Soundtoys Tone" is pleasant but slightly cartoon-ish? There's a lot of engineers, producers etc. that have access to the most expensive hardware and still use Soundtoys all over. I think that says something. They don't sound like hardware, but people do seem to like what they do, regardless.

Also, the title made me think there's a new Soundtoys plugin lol!

Yeah I suppose their saturation algo is what I’m talking about. It’s in all their plug ins. And if I let’s say use a few of their different delays on a mix (Echoboy, Primal tap, Crystallizer), that tone/saturation algorithm starts to take over the sound. And you can’t get rid of that tone. And if you use more than one instance, then you kind of have to commit to that sound. It doesn’t blend all that well, it kind of starts to take over. So if you were to use say Decap for saturation, Filterfreak for filtering, and a few of their delay plug ins, then your track would be entirely overrun by the saturation algo. It’s like if you use more than one instance of any of their plug ins, that “tone”starts to take over.

You can turn the saturation off by selecting the "clean" saturation option.

[ramseysounds]

Soundtoys plugins are effects. The initial tone (sound) is generated by the source it is processing. Understand??

[statue]

I love the sound of SoundToys plug-ins, but hate the fact you have to run your sound very quietly in to them (always have to add a separate gain plug-in before them).
Just doesn’t fit in to my workflow very well.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

Pro-Tip: you can turn saturation off in many SoundToys plugins in the Tweaks section by selecting the Op-Amp mode. Works great for things like PanMan or Tremulator where you may not necessarily be looking to change the sound of your source material other than pan/trem effect.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

You can turn the saturation off by selecting the "clean" saturation option.

The Clean option isn't clean. It actually produces a lot of harmonics. Oddly, the Op-Amp option is the clean one. I say oddly because there was an op-amp Big Muff that produced it's fuzz by clipping op-amps. But don't take my word for it, open up Plugin Doctor and check for yourself.

Honestly, I'd swear that was a bug if it hasn't been like that for years.

[plexuss]

I agree with the OP - Soundtoys came out in a time when, to my ears, other companies were achieving similar sound quality. I know nothing about dev and DSP so I can't speak to the specific. It seems like maybe there were technqies and/or code that many were using creating the sound quality the OP described as "plastic". Since Soundtoys haven't done any major updates that sound quality persisits. Not that Soundtoys are bad in anyway - its just "the Soundtoys vibe". But yes, it's now, to me, an old sound. Still useful. But definitely limiting in terms of go-to use. A new generation of Soundtoys using modern DSP/code techniques and sound quality would be amazing.

[ramseysounds]

I love the sound of SoundToys plug-ins, but hate the fact you have to run your sound very quietly in to them (always have to add a separate gain plug-in before them).
Just doesn’t fit in to my workflow very well.

what are you talking about?

[kobal]

some soundtoys plugins sound digital in a good way imo and some sound kinda analog ( radiator is still a very good tube amp emu , it s still better than some recent tube amp emu that are praised)
these are about caractere , it doesen t necesarry mean analog, if you replace them you lost that caractere.. it s up to you.. it s not about better or worst.. it s about taste.. they made some of the eventide algoryhtms, many people still love them 30 years later..

[SirKen]

I don’t know if this is placebo but Soundtoys plug-ins sound much nicer to me at higher sample rates. Like, they sound noticeably different.

[plexuss]

I don’t know if this is placebo but Soundtoys plug-ins sound much nicer to me at higher sample rates. Like, they sound noticeably different.

I'm totally with you on this. I dont normally talk about it because the subject is so divisive. To my ears there can be a dramatic increase in audio quality rendering at 96k vs 44,1k. My workflow is to work at 44.1 and then try rendering at 96k. Sometimes it doesn't sound good, or can be messed up because the dev didnt ensure certain plugins work the same at all rates. I dont use audio track. I use software synths and effects. about 50% of the time I get a great sounding render at 96k.

[dark water]

^^ agreed.
I believe that the very top end of some software synths (eg, LUSH 101) really add an extra something for me at 96 versus lower sample rates.

I can't say that I've noticed any difference with Soundtoys plugins, mainly because I wasn't aware of this possible audio difference in sample rates for them, but I'll test them out now and see what gives

[statue]

I love the sound of SoundToys plug-ins, but hate the fact you have to run your sound very quietly in to them (always have to add a separate gain plug-in before them).
Just doesn’t fit in to my workflow very well.

what are you talking about?

Sorry if I was a bit unclear.
I meant that most (all?) of SoundToys plug-ins saturate quite heavily if you run your signal peaking at 0 dB into them. Good example of this is Sie-Q. That is why I need to add an gain plug-in before them (and after to bring the volume back up).
I use lots of other plug-ins that do not need this kind of gain staging, so it just slightly annoys me I when need to add these separate gain plugins to my effect chains.

[Pilonsky]

Soundtoys plugins are effects. The initial tone (sound) is generated by the source it is processing. Understand??

No that’s not true. The initial tone is generated by the source. But the effect plug in imparts its own quality on that sound. And if that quality is uniform across all their effects plug ins, then we can talk about them imparting that quality on the original source, an whether we like that uniform quality or not. By the way, Webster’s defines tone as: “musical sound of a specific quality.” So we can definitely talk about the Soundtoys tone.