mid/side utility plugins for plugins

[Mr No Name]

Instead of buying (I'm not buying any more plugins) a plugin which has a mid side utility, are there any good mid/side utility plugins people use to turn normal plugins to mid/side, inserting immediately after in the chain, like a hardware Fusion box with a mid/side insert?

thanks.

[mettelus]

There are quite a few EQs (and other plugins) with mid/side capabilities, but if looking at a higher level (for the entire track content), Voxengo's MSED has been a long-time freebie worth checking out.

Edited yesterday at 12:10 AM by mettelus

[Mr No Name]

no, I'm looking for a plugin that will turn any plugin into mid/side, 

[Mr No Name]

it's only function being to turn non mid /side plugins into mid/side ones.

[Amberwolf]

Do you mean:

--something that alters the way other plugins work (I doubt this is possible) so they accept and process as mid/side instead of L/R?

or

--something that changes the signal from L/R into mid/side before it goes into the plugin (but still as a L/R signal since that's all the plugin is "wired" to accept)?

or something else?

 

[Mr No Name]

I'm looking for a plugin that will convert any L/R  plugin into mid / side mode, even if (especially if, that's the point) it's not designed to do so.

a mid/ side converter if you will

whether it will go before or after I'm not sure ?

 

[Base 57]

Channel Tools last in the chain.

[Mr No Name]

20 minutes ago, Base 57 said:

Channel Tools last in the chain.

does work, but is very similar to voxengo msed

[Pragi]

I recommend 

Voxengo MSED ,it´s free

https://www.voxengo.com/product/msed/

[Mr No Name]

these are good suggestions, but they seem to be only affecting the mid/side properties of the audio, I want to be able to control the mid/side properties of the plug in. I'll keep looking. Must exist.

[Pragi]

You could, for instance, use the MSED as an encoder first, followed by an equalizer or other effect,

and then that Msed as a decoder if you want to change the mid-side characteristics of a track

. Boz's Directional EQ would be an additional piece of advice.

Edited Saturday at 10:01 PM by Pragi

[Pragi]

Sorry, it´s the DDMF Bidirectional EQ.

https://ddmf.eu/directionaleq-equalizer-plugin/

Edited Saturday at 09:58 PM by Pragi

[Mr No Name]

10 minutes ago, Pragi said:

Sorry, it´s the DDMF Bidirectional EQ.

https://ddmf.eu/directionaleq-equalizer-plugin/

thanks, I have that plugin since a few years, good plugin.

What prompted the idea about this was seeing developers releasing mid/side versions of plugins I already have, for example, Maag eq 4, they released a mid/side version, rather than buying a mid/side version there must be a utility to covert the original version, also with the black box HG 2, they released a mid/side version, I don't want to buy another version for mid/side,  needs a DIY solution, a workaround. ??

[Pragi]

 

42 minutes ago, Mr No Name said:

,  needs a DIY solution, a workaround. ??

Please check this out:

You could, for instance, use the MSED as an encoder first, followed by an equalizer or other effect,

and then that Msed as a decoder if you want to change the mid-side characteristics of a track.4

Try that on a bus  and mix it with the original track etc.

 

 

Check this out if you're unsure of what can be done with mid-side fx:

 

Edited Saturday at 10:53 PM by Pragi

[mettelus]

1 hour ago, Mr No Name said:

What prompted the idea about this was seeing developers releasing mid/side versions of plugins I already have, for example, Maag eq 4, they released a mid/side version, rather than buying a mid/side version there must be a utility to covert the original version

If this is your focus, you are not going to find it. Only the developer that made software is going to be able to patch it (at machine code level), and that is after they recompile the new version and compare it with the old one. The best you can do is split content with another plugin, then feed a follow-on FX chain.

Another example (of what you are asking), is many single-band Melda plugins are free, but the multi-band versions cost money. There is no utility to "convert all my single-band plugins to MB" either.

[Mr No Name]

I have good news all round on this subject,

10 hours ago, mettelus said:

If this is your focus, you are not going to find it. Only the developer that made software is going to be able to patch it (at machine code level), and that is after they recompile the new version and compare it with the old one. The best you can do is split content with another plugin, then feed a follow-on FX chain.

Another example (of what you are asking), is many single-band Melda plugins are free, but the multi-band versions cost money. There is no utility to "convert all my single-band plugins to MB" either.

there is a plugin from Klevgrand called Gaffel which I got a while back for this purpose, it has 4 bands and works well, I got it cheap in one of their promotions, currently $60 , no discount for black friday for some reason.

 

also there is one from bluecat audio MB-7, which has good reviews but quite expensive at around $129

https://www.bluecataudio.com/Products/Product_MB7Mixer/

 

but, the winner is a plugin I promote regularly to people for it's cpu saving qualities, Waves Studio Rack / Studio Verse, which is free,

you can insert 8 bands of multiband, it is designed to work with waves but will load a selected amount of 3rd party vsts from other developers,

 

It also does parallel processing, i'e mid/side on non mid/side plugins, sounds fantastic, tested it with a waves API 560, sounds exactly like you would expect a mid/side eq to sound, possibly better, I would rate the msed as a monitoring tool more than a processing one, sounds a bit un-natural to my ear, again will convert a selected number of 3rd party vsts, and as luck would have it, black box HG2 is on the list, not Maag eq4 unfortunately.

👍

 

https://www.waves.com/plugins/studiorack

 

 

edit ; rescanned plugins through the studiorack, have all the vst3 plugins at my disposal, including maag.

great success,

 

Edited 20 hours ago by Mr No Name

[Mr No Name]

 

[mettelus]

There is a clear distinction between using an FX (especially one that that is technically a host) as part of an FX chain versus "changing an existing plugin." FX chains are part of DSP, so it is easy to isolate and process to your heart's content (with the right tools), but you are still limited by what the tool is capable of on its own. The real reason a lot of plugins have mid/side internally (also preferred) is that they are self-aware of what processing they are doing (and to which components), then reassemble that into a stereo output that the next FX will understand. When using an FX to split something apart, the content of the output is something you would need to track from that point on. Some are fairly simple and generic, while others are definitely not.

Melda's MXXX is probably the most extreme example... it will host any other Melda plugin, so the processing capabilities are intense, but once you get too far in, the onus is on the user to track what it is doing. On paper MXXX sounds impressive, but in practical use, so many setups tend to be one-off scenarios, so it is very easy to lose track of things, especially after taking a break from what you did.

[Mr No Name]

32 minutes ago, mettelus said:

There is a clear distinction between using an FX (especially one that that is technically a host) as part of an FX chain versus "changing an existing plugin." FX chains are part of DSP, so it is easy to isolate and process to your heart's content (with the right tools), but you are still limited by what the tool is capable of on its own. The real reason a lot of plugins have mid/side internally (also preferred) is that they are self-aware of what processing they are doing (and to which components), then reassemble that into a stereo output that the next FX will understand. When using an FX to split something apart, the content of the output is something you would need to track from that point on. Some are fairly simple and generic, while others are definitely not.

Melda's MXXX is probably the most extreme example... it will host any other Melda plugin, so the processing capabilities are intense, but once you get too far in, the onus is on the user to track what it is doing. On paper MXXX sounds impressive, but in practical use, so many setups tend to be one-off scenarios, so it is very easy to lose track of things, especially after taking a break from what you did.

I respectfully disagree, Waves Studio rack is a thing of beauty, possibly a work of genius, having tested it I can find no fault with it, plugin companies can go f%"& themselves releasing mid/side versions of existing plugins, I'll use that instead for free.