Looking for free Spectral Shaper plugin to soften and control harsh frequencies and harmonics

VST & Plugins
1

Hi Everyone ,
I been using and just learning to use retro synth in Logic Pro X 10.4.6

But when I was playing a simple C chord
I notice that the high end of the sound was very harsh and after some time was wearing out my hearing abit

I did a search on this
I came up with a new word this weekšŸ˜œ

Spectral Shaper
I believe I understand this right
I have come understand that this kind of plugin deals with and controls and soften high frequencies and higher harmonics
Can Logic Pro X do this ?
or is there a free plugin that can do this is all possible

2

Hi @bcraig,

Check out ā€žNovaā€œ by Tokyo Dawn Records. A dynamic Equalizer. You could try using a multiband compressor as well which logic has. But often you need just to adjust the EQ.

Kind regards,
Alexey (JLX)
@jlx_music

1 Like
3

Well, Ozone comes with one of those (seems to behave kind of like a dynamic EQ with transient shaping) - but unless weā€™re talking really nasty problems, or sound design, the first step is usually the EQ.

Synths can easily be extremely harsh, and some instrument/mic combos arenā€™t particularly pleasant sounding out of the box either, but in many cases, itā€™s just that timbre, resonances, mic coloring etc adds up, and itā€™s often enough to just correct it with an EQ.

If that doesnā€™t cut it (pun intended); if the sound goes dull and muffled before you get that harshness out, the next thing to try would be a dynamic EQ, multiband compressor, or de-esser. They all do basically the same thing: Compress or expand specific frequency ranges. The difference is mostly what kind of problems theyā€™re optimized for.

For example, if you have a synth thatā€™s constantly harsh sounding, but attenuating the problematic frequencies just makes it sound muffled, you might try making that band dynamic instead, expanding the dynamic range a bit, so that the offending harshness is reduced a lot, but the EQ opens up and lets a bit of ā€œbiteā€ through in the attacks.

Of course, the best solution is usually to make sure the source sounds nice in the first place. ā€œRealā€ synthesis is so much nicer than samples in that way; you can tweak literally everything, and that means more control and less artifacts. But, with the nice dynamic EQs, MB compressors, and indeed, spectral shapers and whatnot we have these days, sometimes itā€™s quicker and easier to just shape things up there instead, or at least do the final tweaks there, after fixing the big issues at the source.

Now, speaking of spectral shaping and harshness, hereā€™s a use case for kiloHearts Multipass:

  • Set up one band to cover the problematic frequency range.
  • On that band, add:
    • Compressor
    • Transient Shaper
    • Frequency Shifter or Pitch Shifter (which one works best depends on the input)

With this, you can change the level and dynamics of the problem area, and also shift it to a different frequency range, and make it ā€œpunchierā€ or ā€œsnappier.ā€

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4

Nova ( free version works fine) as said is excellent for controlling unwanted frequencies- itā€™s an excellent dynamic eq.

Good eq with a multiband compressor should do the trick. Try as well with a normal eq a narrowband cut (small Q) at high gain and sweeping it to find unwanted frequencies.

Get the general idea here

Another option is to use a de esser - this is basically a very narrow band compressor

If you want a quick solution then try oeksound soothe - itā€™s on my wish list as it really works but itā€™s not cheap

Think thereā€™s still a 30 day free trial so you can try it out.

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5

ReaFir by Cockos (Reaper plugin, but there is a VST version), free spectral shaping plugin. Itā€™s an FFT based EQ-Compressor-Gateā€¦ I donā€™t use it, but it looks like it has the good potentialā€¦

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