My Most EXPENSIVE Plugins: Are They WORTH IT?

i bought this one on sale for 20. and it's still not worth it to me i never found any use for this plugin top 10 most expensive plugins that i own are they worth it let's check it out hello everyone welcome back to make specifically hopefully i'm a great day before we start please check the info box down below for more mixing courses on pro mix academy free plugin special discounts and offers and of course if you want to support the channel but most important if you really want to learn how to mix and master professionally click the join button become a mixbus tv member access the already big and always growing library of full mixing courses on many different genres mastering courses special videos and a lot more you also get mixed consultations with me via skype or email and if you missed the biggest event of the year on the channel happening right now remix contest for my artist bella kelly's latest single heartbreak motel with over 30 000 dollars in prices and you get a free plug-in from waves just to enter the context links are going to be in the info box down below let's get to the video all right this wants to be a quick list so we'll hear some of the plugins in action and some other i will just mention my most expensive plugins which one are worth it and which one are not i'm basing my list on the retail price okay so full price many manufacturers have several sales during the year right now we are at the end of the year sale and we'll mention some of them we'll start with the first one sound theory gulfos eq the intelligent equalizer we all know this plug-in is very famous and we actually have two versions the master version and the original goofus eq this retails a 199 dollars we have a full review of this one on the channel it's an intelligent automatic advanced equalizer which is great to both enhance material whether it's complex material like a mix or single tracks based on how our brain perceives sound so it's not really equalization [Music] [Music] [Music] the master version has a smaller range so it allows you to do very very small and subtle adjustment is it worth it than 199 full retail price absolutely yes this plugin is great when sometimes i receive mixes that are not that great to master for example and using this as a first process even if used very subtly it gives me a much better starting point for them to process with either plugins or analog so this would be the first one good for cq next one soft chandelier curve bander and i included in this all the other analog eq emulation by software which all retail at 249 dollars are they worth it is this worth it 100 yes this is one of the best analog emulation plugin no matter what compressor saturator equalizer is absolutely great i love this plug-in in my dedicated video i named this the king of mid-range and i stand by that because it's really great to enhance or fix the money range the mid-range and that makes it suitable for all genres and the curvebender is by now a classic sounding unit because it's been around forever and has been used on so many records it's great for two boss and for mastering [Music] [Music] top and mid-range he's gonna have a perfect combination of vintage and modern sound and he also has great lows so in my opinion this is definitely a thumb up but at the time of this video there is the end of the year sale for all software products so you get this one at almost half the price next one shadow heels mastering compressor it looks cool and it retails a full price at 299 dollars i bought this one on sale for 20 dollars and it's still not worth it to me i never found any use for this plugin i'm not even mad because i paid 20 but it was pretty disappointing i did not find anything special about this plugin to be honest i was never a big fan of the real thing of the hardware either i think it's a bit overpriced the shadow hills is basically an ssl compressor with three different transformers and an opto compressor added on top of it now my problem with both the plug-in and the hardware to be honest is the vca section is always too grabby and too jumpy unless you do less than one db of gain reduction and i've never really found any use for the optical part at least on 2buss it can be good on vocals but nothing special really at that point i'm opening an optocompressor plug-in or i'm buying an optical unit without the vca attached or anything else the three transformers are very subtle barely audible for the most part on on most cases and if i want an ssl compressor plug-in there's better out there and like i said the optical is kind of okay but to be honest at 299 it would be a no-go for me absolutely like i said i paid 20 and i'm kind of i could have saved that because i never found a place where to use this thing next one ozone 9 advanced it retails if i'm not mistaken at 249 and for me this is not just a go but it's a hell yes because not only you get the main plugin when you can load all the different modules in one instance but what interests me and i use the most because i don't think i've ever used the actual main plugin is that you get all the different modules as a standalone plugin so you got dynamic eq you got multiband dynamics you got the exciter and the imager you know how much i love those low end focus is crazy and so master rebalance there's a whole bunch of individual plug-in that you get the vintage limiter the vintage tape there are absolutely great and to me are a steal for 249 dollars the maximizers is one of my most used to remastering among others so for me ozone 9 advanced is definitely a go totally worth it next one new entry and i'm absolutely in love with this plugin i mentioned it in one of the latest videos i don't remember which one is a p42 climax by pulsar modular stay tuned because i'm gonna do a full review of this plugin and there is a big update that you guys are gonna love it but this plugin retails at 240 dollars and for me it's totally worth it especially with the already existing new updates and features and some of them i actually asked for and you know they implemented them because since the first day that i had this plugin i started using it right away for mixes and masters and i was using in mastering and the filters didn't have an on off switch there wasn't a way to completely turn them on i asked them if they could do it and they did it so but it just sounds great and it became one of those secret weapons to increase the apparent loudness and the richness of the material let me just give it a quick go on a mix on this way to touch [Music] [Applause] [Music] i'm exaggerating but did you hear how this thing sounds so 240 dollars thumb up for me next one soft device mastering bundle kind of breaking the rules and it's not one plugin but it's a bundle simply because it's much much cheaper if you buy the bundle instead of single plugins which retails at 840 more or less at the time of this video there's again the end of the year sale and you get it for something like 30 to 40 percent less so it's a great deal is this bundle worth it i got this question actually non-related to this video of course many times before and not just yes but heck yes if you have any of my mastering courses or if you've seen any of my mastering videos since this bundle came out one to two or three of the plugins included are always in use and specifically the ds1 mk3 we we did a full course on that actually the eqp1 the equalizer the de-esser and we have in the bundle also the compressor and the limiter these are 100 industry standard tools that people dreamed of having for years until they became more affordable with the plugins the software made otherwise each unit goes between 10 and 15 grand and you see many of the legendary mastering suite having these tools and there is a reason are they replaceable you can ballpark it but they are not these they don't sound like these you won't get the same polished result that you get with these tools there's a reason because they were so popular so for me the prize is totally worth it and like i said you want to see them in action i have plenty of videos public and for members only on how to use these tools because that's the other thing they are amazing but they also have a learning curve so you need to know how to use them definitely worth the price the little mag eq4 now this one retails at 299 dollars full price now you know i have the hardware sitting here next to me now i did my comparisons but i was using the plugin before having the hardware is it a good plug-in yeah it is a good plug-in is it worth 299 no it's not fortunately the company has deals every other day so you can definitely get this one on sale i think it retails probably around forty dollars i wouldn't pay more than that that's a price you can pay for this plugin it's a good plugin does it sound like a hardware no it doesn't we can give it a spin really quick [Music] [Applause] as i never did before i hold you on the floor okay always level match with something like this because it's easy to be fooled when you add a little bit of bottom and a little bit of top to smiley curve to think that everything sounds better but when you actually level match if you have a good mix on your hands that first excitement that can go away pretty quickly this worth the sale price do not pay the full price next one empirical lab arouse or it retails at 199 dollars in full price i think there's a sale going on right now so definitely grab it why because 199 is well worth the price of this plugin in my opinion you know i have plenty of empirical lab analog units i have two fatsos two distressors i'm more than familiar with uh their stuff i've been using it for over a decade right now and this is basically in short the plugin that i use if i have a mix that i have maybe to make a video out of and i don't feel like turning on the actual unit for the video and i have to replace my stressor that's the plugin that i use so it's definitely a close replacement of the hardware and that's a big achievement and if you think about how much the hardware cost the arouser at 1.99 it's not that bad at all but the great thing about the arouser is you have variable saturation that the unit doesn't have you have an attack modification which is amazing on transient material which the hardware doesn't have does it sound like the hardware no it doesn't but it is an absolutely great plugin with a bunch of added feature that makes it even more versatile you know so you will do different things and you will use it in a different way than you do with the hardware is of course less forgiving the saturation is different but is it totally worth the price tag [Music] it definitely has the empirical lab smack let's get to the next one kind of breaking the rules here again to condense and make the video not too long all my oxford plugins i talked about these plugins especially the inflator we have a video and the oxford limiter is in my top 10 mastering clipper limiter video and drumgate we have a video on that too these are on the pricey side but there's again a sale end of the year sale with big discounts and are they worth it absolutely yes i've been using them forever and the inflator is no secret how much i love that plugin the oxford limiter is still one of the dirty little secret there's a specific way to use it for super loud masters and also has a sound that was very popular in the early 2000s when things sounded really loud but especially certain genres rock and metal they had a specific tone that is still considered the best to date and the oxford limiter was part of it at least and if you mix a lot of recorded real drums drum gate is absolutely amazing how easy it is to use and the results that you get on real acoustic drums when you have to gate it and isolate things or remove unwanted sounds coming in the microphone that's hands down my absolute favorite out of the three i'm going to give a quick spin to the oxford limiter screaming daddy put me back in i ain't got no time now you want to [Music] [Music] and other things totally worth the price oxford limiter inflator and drum gate suit 2 by ox sound this one retails full price at 220 dollars not just worth it but super worth it this plugin is irreplaceable nothing else sound and does what suit 2 does it saved my behind several times when i received like harsh mixes or even harsh recordings to mix it's great and can be used in mastering but this is an extremely useful tool for single tracks as well we all know the plugin it's just magic is probably the best the harsher out there along with spiff the other plug-in from uh oix sound there's really not much to add to suit two that hasn't been said we have a dedicated review video on the channel um it's still one of the most expensive plugins that i own so he had to make the list but we all know this and by the way this is one of the prizes for the remix contest for bella kelly hardback motel remix contest you can win a suit and a spiff license now this one is the tcv ss4 hd is the algorithm directly taken from their system 6000 mastering suite which is a thousand tens of thousand dollars and it retails at 249 dollars this is considered the master of reverbs pun intended because many master engineers the rare times that they need a reverb for a mastering job the vs4 hd is the first choice now there's no doubt that this plugin is of the highest quality out there it's princetine sounding has extensive control and it's very realistic with the spaces but it's definitely different and i mean completely different from any other reverb that i usually use for mixing and i'm including from the same brand the tc8210 that i have here and i absolutely love it or the valhalla all day reverbs which by the way will be in the cheapest or free plug-in list that i already released or will release after this video it's different from the inputs responses it's just a whole different beast and you might not feel it as you feel the cheaper or the lo-fi reverbs that we very often use i mean d-verb is still one of the most used reverbs on plenty of records the stock pro tools it's classy super refined and sometimes it might not work but let's give it a spin really quick all i ever wanted was to stand my ground big words to confuse and spin your mind around but every little stab just takes me further down i felt my soul just waiting in the lost and found baby it's nothing you did so stop talking stupid we gave it a taste now it's done i'm out for self-healing you ain't got that feeling i am the one that i love all i ever wanted was to stand my ground big words to confuse and spin your mind around but every little stab just takes me further down i found my soul just waiting in the lost and found baby it's nothing you did so stop talking stupid we gave it a taste now it's done i'm out for self-healing you ain't got that feeling i am the one that i love all right you hear it it it it sounds beautiful especially when you solo it but i found that in use it it's always a hit or miss in a mix if i'm gonna end up using this or something that is like low-fi and cheap of course that depends on style but is it worth the 250 dollars in my opinion yes it is because when it works and when you need that kind of sound there's no other reverb that can do it other than the vss 4 hd let's get to the next one we reviewed this as well this is the unisom mastering compressor from tone project it retails full price of 1.99 and for what this compressor is i think it's not just worth it it might be even cheap let's not tell them though this is probably the most advanced mastering compressor out there and i mean mastering in the close meaning of the word so extreme fine detail those fine detail that unfortunately many out there think oh it doesn't matter well it does matter and this compressor is definitely one of the peak of where our technology is at right now they actually released they actually release accelerator based on the ig uh button here on the unizoom i didn't try it i'll probably try some sometime soon and i'm pretty sure it's great because the control that you have with this compressor is second to none even not opening the edit style window which is almost over my head and you know i spent quite some time doing this it's it's a great sounding compressor as in it's for the most part transparent and its compression is organic and the saturation is very subtle but but long story short this is a list not a review is it worth the money well if you are serious about mastering then you probably want to have this for the average guy and i mean no disrespect but if you don't have very well trained ears it's probably going to be hard for you to use it because the changes for the most part unless you you do something like extreme are very very subtle and they require both very well-trained ears and a good monitoring system but for those people that can hear the nuances this is where he's at right now the video is getting long so last one is the psp old-timer multi-band it retails at 199 full price is one of my favorite compressors in the box the old old timer was one of my favorite this one the multiband they really did something special in my opinion it is totally worth the price it has a great color and a great saturation a great action despite being a multi-band so with all the so to speak artifacts that a multiband could bring to the table this is one of the most musical compressors out there i think it's irreplaceable when you need something that is mellow and yet it gives you control and it's detailed enough it's for the most part a broad stroke compressor but it reminds me a slightly more colored version of the tubetech multiband compressor that for example al schmidt resting piece used to use on the 2buss okay light use or heavy use this compressor is really great i think the price it's totally worth it and we can give this one a spin [Music] you gave me [Music] look with questions [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] nice dense and warm this is definitely the character of this compressor i think this is it for this video these were my most expensive plugins that i own which one were worth it which one were not all the links are gonna be in the info box down below like i said some of them are on sale right now for the end of the year sale so take advantage of it if you saw something interesting i hope you liked this video and if you did please don't forget to leave a like comment down below let me see what you want to see on the channel for 2022 check all the links in the info box down below stay safe subscribe if you haven't already see you next time [Music] [Applause] is [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: MixbusTv

Views: 7,248

Keywords: mastering, audiomixing, producer, mixbustv best youtube channel mix mastering, david gnozzi best mix engineer producer, david gnozzi best vocal producer, david bella mixbustv, david bella kelly relationship, bella kelly, bella kelly official, bella kelly david gnozzi, how to record vocals, how to mix vocals, loudness master

Id: H2gSgNXYE8M

Length: 23min 49sec (1429 seconds)

Published: Sun Dec 19 2021