Hi all! Huge fan of @ chrisj and Airwindows here. Just sharing my finds (as inspired by AW doodlers like @ StoneyBCN ). I also love DDMF's plugins - I get a ton of mileage out of Metaplugin and PluginDoctor.

AW + MP Adventure #1: Multiband Transient Softening

To start off, I'm loving this multiband transient softening trick, using Airwindows' Point.




Notes:
• I used Fabfilter's Pro-MB for crossovers (3 bands, at ≈205H and 3300Hz respectively, 24dB/oct slopes), and soloed each band. But I suspect any MB plugin would work.
• BitShiftGain was just to get the cleanest input level for each band going into Point, in case Point responded to certain levels better than others. I defer to Chris on this.
• As you can see, we're clocking about 882 samples of latency (at 44.1kHz), so this AW + MP setup is massive.

But, all things considered, I TRANSPARENTLY shaved about 3dB of excess transient off the drums, plus some group delay benefits from separating into bands. The result is warmer and, I think, a bit closer to "that sheen" as one GS member posted about years ago. One member in that thread commented that analog gear imparts a sound where
And all of this is completely ITB. No hardware + $20 earbuds + 2019 Macbook Pro. The groove isn't the most musical thing since sliced bread, but the difference is audible. If PluginDoctor taught me anything, sounds moving with a speed anywhere between 0.0 and 0.1ms get through most plugins untreated. Gibb Effect + pristine slew rates + no group/phase delay = music that sits on your eardrums like humming with your ears plugged. No gentle soundstage behind a "plate of glass"; no "sheen" -- no matter how balanced or musical the ITB mix.

TL;DR I believe in Airwindows plugs to help save creators money!

(more adventures soon)

Audio examples below. No limiting, peak level attenuated -4.5dB:

Hey, only just saw this for some reason but thanks for the mention @ bbabb !

Have you had a look at Airwindows in VCV Rack 2 in the DAW?

@ StoneyBCN wow, hello! How cool to hear from you! I love all that you’ve contributed to this community ^_^

I haven’t tried any of the VCV Racks! I’ve (stubbornly) been focusing so much on mixing, I haven’t dared much into the world of synths yet. I even bought the Arturia synths, but haven’t brought myself to play around with them.

But regardless: leave it to Chris to make all his open source resources abundantly available in another open source project. I’m sure you’ve been having a blast

Aww shucks, thanks for the kind words

Your Metaplugin chain looks interesting - and totally cool - and it reminded me instantly of VCV. To be honest, I've not used it in the DAW much either, but I was a tiiiny little bit involved in the original 3rd-party Airwindows VCV modules (rackwindows) before VCV went DAW (and before I started to learn to code in C++).

The freeware/open-source/awesome Surge synth also has tons of built-in Airwindows, if synths do one day enter your wheelhouse

I took a long sabbatical from producing (and posting here) while I've been interning in a role in the web dev industry. Recently, things are settling quite nicely such that I'm thinking about setting up a new production suite at home to get back into producing things. I'm quite excited to have a bank of the more recent Airwindows reverbs as templated Aux channels during tracking and mixing; I've never quite been able to get away with the CPU hit of having several simultaneous reverb chains in a track without freezing tracks... until now :D