Free Fridays! Top Freeware Picks — Circuit Bending, Mid-Side and More
SonicScoopers, welcome to Free Fridays part four! This segment brings us a slew of updated, new and old experimental plugins from a few names you may or may not have heard of. Get your trigger-happy download finger ready because you will be playing with this set of FF freeware units for weeks to come! Now go ahead. Make my day…
Connect with the Bend Box.
First on the list we have “Bend Box,” a VST format plug-in for Windows only. Circuit-Bending gets its roots from your average Joe taking circuits from children’s toys and various inexpensive electronic instruments and altering the guts in a DIY fashion to produce highly randomized results. This one should be fun. ToneBytes sez:
“Bend Box is a software synthesizer that emulates a circuit-bending device. Can be useful for making experiments and for creating various noise FX. All knobs can be tweaked manually or thru easily assignable MIDI controllers. MIDI Automation is also available.
With Bend Box you can get wide range of noises: from the soft gurgling to ringing grinding, or even strange melodical timbres.”
Soundiron – Phonautograms Sample Library
“Phonautograms” library works like an “instrument” with all plugin formats of Kontakt – only as a .nki instrument program presets (available only by the full retail version of Kontakt) for Windows and Mac OS. The sample instrument is very unique and bizarre for experimental purposes or ambience effect for the background of your next haunting melody. As they explain:
“The 1860 recording we chose for this library features a D major scale being sung by a single voice, presumably that of the inventor. The original capture left the pitch one octave too high, giving the resulting timbre a female vocal quality. The newer version was translated at the proper original pitch, revealing the singer to have been a man. We used both audio files to give us a full two octave range of notes to work with.
You’ll notice that the distortion of pitch, tone and general lack of preserved acoustic information yields a smeared and warbling quality, somewhere between a voice and some sort of woodwind and possessing a frail and innocent affect. I like it, because it really reminds me of the humble beginnings that our modern audio-visual media has grown from and the power to share and explore music and sound that our technology has given us.”
Kong Audio – ChineeGuzheng Classic
New to the freeware universe is the “ChineseGuzheng Classic” sampleset from Kong Audio for Windows users only (first flagged by SonicScoop on its release earlier this month). For those of you who don’t know, a guzheng is a traditional and ancient Chinese instrument with 18-21 strings and a movable bridge. The guzheng is performed in a plucking or strumming manner – you may have actually heard or seen it in some of your favorite movies. Now you can go ahead and put it into your productions. For free! According to Kong:
“Rippling and Dreamy
ChineeGuZheng Classic has an extensive sampleset which contains various types of tremolo, slide, glissando, and strumming. It is the predecessor of the brand new ChineeGuZheng II.
ChineeGuZheng Classic is now freeware. It’s the complete version with all the samplesets from the previously commercial version.
One unique feature that sets ChineeGuZheng Classic apart from other GuZheng libraries out there, is that it was performed using GuQin‘s techniques. This subtle yet distinctive difference makes ChineeGuZheng Classic a collector’s item to any GuZheng/GuQin lovers!”
Audioteknikk – Equilibre, MidSideMangler, GreenEugene and RedAmption
Color your sound with Redamption.
Lastly we have group of four free dynamics plugins from Audioteknikk. These plugins come to us with good graces in the request for an optional donation which can be done at their product page. The set includes an 8-band, fully-parametric graphic EQ, a mid/side processor, a saturation plugin, and a compressor. Each can be downloaded individually and are for Windows OS only. As Audioteknikk describes:
“Equilibre uses double precision and oversampling in the critical parts of the filter structure. This is a very good sounding equalizer with minimal digital artifacts, firm bass and analog shaped curves for that airy nice high frequencies. It has a practical and intuitive GUI. Well suited for mixing and mastering.
MidSideMangler is a Mid/Side processor that is capable of traditional LR panning, MS balance, and more interesting Mid panning and Side panning. You can do small adjustments to the stereo image or rearrange it completely. This is a great tool for stereo effects and it can give you a hand in the mastering of a problematic mix.
GreenEugene is a saturation filter and distortion plug-in. When used gently without the drive function it can be useful on a full track to achieve some added color and dynamic changes to the mix.
RedAmption is a versatile and powerful compressor suited for many different tasks. It is designed to respond as a analog compressor would do. It also has four saturation/ distortion modes.”