Studio mode works like a typical tape emulation plugin with dedicated knobs for speed ips and pre-emphasis on the left and a compander part on the right with five types noise reduction encoders and decoders modeled upon some authentic vintage hardware units.īelow the main panel, there is a service panel that allows you advanced editing, and, luckily, the Satub manual will cover most of the info for you. Satin is a tape emulation machine designed to work in three specific modes - Studio (default), Delay, and Flange. It also sounds a bit different than the rest of the tape emulation products, so, because of the affordable price, you may extend your tape emulation collection. From our impression, Type A will work great for trap music. It may work great on drums and it will bring to life any synthetic element. Tape models are also chosen carefully so they cover a really broad sound palette. But, in overall, Softube Tape has a really pleasing tone throughout the complete range.
It’s how controlled these heavy changes sound and not just being a typical harmonic distortion that caught our attention. While being basic with just two knobs dedicated to the Tape Amount and Speed, Remote Control allows you to go more in-depth and adjust Speed Stability, Tape up, High-Frequency Trim, Crosstalk, and Noise activation parameters. Type B brings Ampex ATR102, a transformer machine that adds extra color to the low range while Type C brings a vintage vibe, similar to British EMI tape machines. Type A provides you with precision and linearity based on a Studer tape machine. This plugin is made from three tape models. While you will definitely like the warmth you’re getting from these plugins, hiss might be an issue that may lower the overall loudness of your track, so don’t be surprised if you devote some time balancing between clarity digital sound provides you and the warmth you’re getting from tape machines. Hiss is a regular part of the tape machine processing. And it’s much more forgiving than clipping from a digital realm. Unlike the digital clipping, analog clipping results in creating pleasing harmonic overtones which may be used as a constructive tool for creating a sonic character that may become a trademark for a specific instrument.
SOFTUBE TAPE TYPES PROFESSIONAL
Pushing tape machines over the top is a technique often found at professional producers. The warmth you’re getting from it is hard to recreate using other effects and some producers go even further and insist on using the original vintage hardware to get this specific effect. There is something almost magical found in the sound of the vintage tape machines that still work even in modern ages. Tape emulation is all about trading off things, so let’s see what you can get from it and at what price: Pros and Cons of a Tape Emulation VST Plugins So if you want to go fully professional with your mixes, it’s definitely worth the time investment.
It’s all about subtle changes and the result it will generate for you can’t be achieved in other ways. So, in general, it requires a lot of training and the differences you’re about to hear won’t be drastic. But it all depends on your knowledge and on what equipment where you’re listening to the reference track. Sometimes you won’t even be sure if you’re hearing any difference at all. We have to be really honest with you about this effect. Are Tape Emulation Plugins Hard to Learn? It brings the certain analog warmth to your digital recording which is most often registered as pleasant to the listener’s ears because many iconic albums were recorded using this specific method, so resembling that type of sound will trigger positive feedback from the audience instantly without even knowing what’s really going on. Also, applying a tape emulation allows your vocals to sit a bit better in the mix compared to what you would get with the EQ.
Tape emulation provides a smooth effect and glues individual tracks together into a dense mix. That’s how the saturation effect was discovered and very soon tape machines were used not just for recording master track but became a regular part of the mixing process.Īlso, the inevitable part of any tape emulation is the background noise called the tape hiss and luckily, using plugins instead of real hardware had for the result that the plugin version could completely remove this unwanted part of the saturation or at least control it as an individual parameter that can be applied to the desired amount. However, engineers of that time discovered that if you push the sound over the maximum, you’re getting a pleasant crunch effect that could be used on vocals and other instruments, especially on the drums.