15 Band Graphic EQ: LA Bands

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

This is a simple 15 band equalizer that sounds smooth like the Vibe EQ from Stillwell. It has 15 bands though and a bit less colour.

It's functionality is similar to EQ18 and EQ10 and it is extremely efficient. Though it says 2% when You load it, after 21 uses, the CPU usage is at around 18%. You do the math, it's a bit more efficient then it says; And I'm glad of that.

I added a bit of de-essing so that it is more predictable; And it has a very simple layout:



It should also say Sri to be acknowledged, Hrm; I was in a rush admittedly, but nonetheless Sri, Thank You for Your fantastic DC clipper. I used it to avoid essing.

la bands v0023.fsm

CC: Pall, Sri, Le Attol

(109.82 KiB) Downloaded 1565 times

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

Here's some stuff made with it (all commercial):

Symphonical: Fisher King (click to view on YouTube)


RAP: Cause We have Love (click to view on Youtube)


Used a Sennheiser Mic and a Roland Boss CD bouncer with FL 10 to master. Uses Navigator from My betas as well:

http://dsprobotics.com/support/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=14696

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

Ok, so LA Bands is now available on flowstoners.com !

flowstonersl.jpg (35.06 KiB) Viewed 28488 times

Get the VST HERE

Thanks again to Spogg, who made the hosting available. I'll try to make sure that all of My final plugs are available for download in My Signature. They'll all be hosted on flowstoners.com of course.

[Spogg]

It’s a nice, useful and straightforward tool and, as always with your stuff, it looks really good in my opinion.

It takes me some time to test, prepare and upload stuff, and I don’t mind at all just as long as the plugin’s development is finished (apart from any bugs that might show up at some point).
You share a lot of betas so I’ve been reluctant to upload them to date, for no other reason than they might change the next day!

Keep up the good work!

Cheers

Spogg

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

Thanks Spogg. Yes, in regards to Beta's, it really comes down to My utilization of math.

Like in the new "navigator"; I'm trying to embrace using as much as I can and I have found the result very pleasing. But it is like going back to high school lol.

Peace to all and I hope this plugin does it for You. I've found it better than most commercial EQ's, even waves ones. However the Q10 has a perceptibility factor IMO.

It’s a nice, useful and straightforward tool and, as always with your stuff, it looks really good in my opinion.

It takes me some time to test, prepare and upload stuff, and I don’t mind at all just as long as the plugin’s development is finished (apart from any bugs that might show up at some point).
You share a lot of betas so I’ve been reluctant to upload them to date, for no other reason than they might change the next day!

Keep up the good work!

Cheers

Spogg

[martinvicanek]

Le Attol, I had a closer look at your 15 band eq, let me share some observations and suggestions.

Clear layout and good usability. I liked that right clicking on a slider will zero it. You should add a preset manager, though, so the unit remembers its last config.

This time you got the filter topology right: peaking filters in series. Most of the Q values are too big: if you look at the frequency response it is a bunch of isolated sharp resonances. I think they should be more like bands with a small overlap, unless you want to use it as an effect (you mentioned color?). For a more general purpose EQ, use Q=1 for octave bands.

When you set all sliders to neutral position, the overall frequency response is not flat but that of a highpass with a corner frequency around 100Hz. I would not have expected that.

Your filters are unoptimized direct form 1 - that's quite wasteful. You could improve CPU load by an order of magnitude with optimized TDF2 filters, say.

I hope I wasn't too harsh on you. We all started at some point and learn from there. However, we usually don't praise our own work like you do ("extremely efficient" - nope.).

[MichaelBenjamin]

...

[martinvicanek]

wlangfor has a certain idea about use of certain math and opcodes for the signalpath, so i guess that could be intentional for a better/different sound regardless of cpu?

Not sure, the DF1 is the first thing you would grab without giving it too much thought. There are certainly cheaper and better filter structures in terms of quantization noise etc.

Not everything in digital music has to be cheap in cpu. Sometimes the cycles need to burn like new eve fires.

I agree! Sometimes we get carried away with optimizing stuff. It should not be the main design aspect.

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

Your filters are unoptimized direct form 1 - that's quite wasteful. You could improve CPU load by an order of magnitude with optimized TDF2 filters, say.

wlangfor has a certain idea about use of certain math and opcodes for the signalpath, so i guess that could be intentional for a better/different sound regardless of cpu? Not everything in digital music has to be cheap in cpu. Sometimes the cycles need to burn like new eve fires.

Hmm, yes to be honest I like the unique sound of these filters. It really did not come down to optimization. However, I still want to attempt serialization. That is to change the five co-efficients to a linear min/max change based upon sample rate. My rationale is that I love the sound of these filters.

I like the TDF2, they're good but the sound is also quite unique. To be honest I find they have a very professional sound that is also a bit dry like as it is solid state. So, in regards to the resonance / q ratio being too wide it is due to My extensive testing of this EQ mixing vocals and drums, classical violins and plucks.

Though One could argue that it is less technical I felt this was a happy medium between some technical prowess and usability. Thanks Martin, and it must have been annoying seeing a parallel filter being made extremely slowly.

wlangfor has a certain idea about use of certain math and opcodes for the signalpath, so i guess that could be intentional for a better/different sound regardless of cpu?

Not sure, the DF1 is the first thing you would grab without giving it too much thought. There are certainly cheaper and better filter structures in terms of quantization noise etc.

Not everything in digital music has to be cheap in cpu. Sometimes the cycles need to burn like new eve fires.

I agree! Sometimes we get carried away with optimizing stuff. It should not be the main design aspect.

Well, ultimately I was going to add some special two channel crossfaders so that if the band is at zero and not being used I can ensure that the co-efficient is turned off.

Look in the My beta EQ's post; It's within the shelf EQ. It allows You to switch between two signals. The Boolean would be driven by !==0.

I'll optimize a bit more, I was pressed for time. Thanks to both of You for Your input and I can see the reason for scrutiny too. All in all, I hate to blame commercial EQ's; If I'd had LA Bands in the past I wouldn't have sounded so Noob like some of My earlier tracks sound.

That's why there is some wide Q constraints so that there is less chance of distortion and clipping. It came down to extensive testing.

EDIT: And yeah, I will add some presets with a manager.

[wlangfor@uoguelph.ca]

here's a look at the newest version:
(being made)