Finding new VSTs, weeding out ones that don't work or don't sound good, organizing; it's a never ending battle. Surely there's a better way to evaluate and recommend great free VSTs instead of falling into the black hole of searching KVR and the usual suspects all day. I don't have much extra time these days and neither should you! There's just shitloads of sorting, downloading, evaluating, failures: let's cut out all that wasted time.
I did this at a studio with many AM users and we just traded folders every so often and ransacked them. I suggest within here we list different subjects i.e. "dynamics", "reverb", "eq", "synth" or "instrument" etc. Then people post their fave compressors, EQ etc. Maybe let's first figure what categories people's VST folders fall into? Mine is organized by type. These are standard for everyone no?
DLY
DISTORTION
DYNAMICS
EQ
FILTER
FSU
MODULATION
MULTI
PAN/SPATIAL
PITCH
REVERB
I have others but I'd also be interested to hear about other organizational idea re: the VST folder.
It's a great idea. If we as a user community agree on a VST folder structure and keep all of our free VSTs synced up, we'll be able to share patches the way the Reaktor community shares ensembles....
flavio lemelle
Bump...thanks Flavio!
I'm with you on this one guys. Where do we post this stuff? In this Thread or where?
Best Regards,
I'm fairly certain I could host a directory for now. I guess we just establish basic processing categories like ^^^. Maybe this goes beyond AM? I mean we could get more people involved that way and just start a VST exchange forum with a dedicated server. But for now since the need for VST organization, evaluation, and renewal is closer to AM users' heads I'll suggest we wait till the thread has more interested users who get it and have big folders. The whole point is to keep only good plug-ins that perform well in the AM environment. I also see the need because good VST's can disappear and the only way it seems to get them is by sharing i.e. the Modern/Antrees UAD clones (PC). This AM-only headspace may be a better filter than just pro audio across the board. Plus everyone probably uses AM differently so it'll be better once those users are repped within the thread. Once we have a handful of each platform we should all be able to stay on top of stuff and just refining the set-up with ease. Who knows it may only take a handful of people to cover everything for a year...and then no need till next year. Just brainstorming.
Or just post links in the thread like:
http://www.yoursite.com/myvstfolder/mydynamics
Then people could just keep up with the thread but I want stuff in return! The idea is to collectively sort through what's out there so it's not you vs. the Internet. Hmm is this redundant with all the CM collection discs and the like? Maybe just links from our sites to select folders is OK here.
I'd Suggest we start with the links and describe what the VST does, and what we used it for. I think that's a good start to at least gather some ideas (and some VST's too).
Personally I'm desperate for this to start. Cos I've downloaded about 200 VST's and used maybe 10.
Best Regards,
Who is using PC and/or Mac? I'm PC only.
I'm PC.
Regards,
Let me clean out my folder too. Tell me if there's anything specific and I'll organize my end.