You kinda, sorta can use the DAW Reaper for free which would qualify as "...overall audio work....".

 

What about using Audacity? It's free and comes with many utilities which are way beyond just basic junk. A stand-alone audio editor might be easiest to learn first. And it also has Paul's Extreme Stretch in the default install.

 

IronOxide to simulate an old tape, kinda like neold warble, but it doesnt sound harsh, just oldschool and colorful
Busscolors to simulate some flavours of analog equipment on busses
Tape and ToTape6 (i prefer Tape)
Channel9 sounded WAY better than NLS to me (VCC was the winner to me), on individual channels
Verbity (easy to dial bricasti like reverb)
Doublelay (doubler with delay, this is siiiiiiiiiiiiiick)
Texturize (Noise shaping)
Sillhouette (Noise shaping)
Pockey2 (AKAI simulation)
Capacitor2(HPF and LPF with saturation)
Interstage
Desk4
Tubedesk, Transdesk, Desk (just drop in any channel or buss and feel the majik)

Many others, but these are on my daily work. And of course, my secret weapon which i will not tell...

 

If your on Mac, I think Logic Pro has one of the best native plugins. You can do a decent mix in Logic Pro without any third party plugins. Studio One is another one though they probably don't count as free. Whatever DAW your using, start with their plugins first before you start looking elsewhere.

 

I suggested a simple audio editor for "general audio" work because a lot of people think of that as doing things like minor crossfade edits, 1 channel strip of plugins, maybe some restoration stuff. DART pro. just kidding

Or Soundforge or Wavelab. But those are not free. If someone did have Logic available to them, and ask this; that is an entirely different challenge.

 

Last edited: Nov 26, 2022

Yes, some time ago I installed free Kiloheartz plugins and they really surprized me. Basic but really good. Have to add that using their "snap-ins" system is not needed (IMHO, Snap Heap is the worst part of their free offer), their plugins work as usual, without any "host" plugin, as simple VSTs.

 

Slate Digital Fresh Air and Valhalla Super Massive without a doubt. I also like Deelay by Sixth Sample and Frank 2 - Room041 by AO. Here is a nice list for those interested.

 

I´d suggest spending 1hr per week on plugins max, it is a waste of time going above that, most of the good ones surface the pond quickly and there´s nothing any deeper. If your goal is fiddling with the plugins like the most of us than you ofcorse can spend hous upon hours.

Plugins do not separate good engineers from bad, it is just fiddling with a mouse vs focusing on the end result.

 

BitShiftGain / PurestGain are the ones in question then. I won't be the one to defend the claims made behind these plugs, or how effective they are at what they claim, because I haven't spent any time investigating them.

But it is objectively true that- in digital audio- gain plugins, volume automations, or any function that causes drastic change in volume (while audio is playing) can cause aliasing.

 

This is almost always incorrect.

 

That's your assertion, that's fair. I am speaking more on a theoretical level rather than a practical level.

However, I do definitely hear it from time to time when collaborating with peoples' sessions where they've used heavy dynamic EQ or overused soothe2, etc. The fluctuation is creating aliasing that has a cumulative affect.

 

Changes in gain are linear across the entire spectrum. Read your post again. It's not theoretical or practically correct the way you typed it, in the form of some "rule" or even "rule of thumb". Wrong is wrong.

Google it: do changes in gain create aliasing?

No, changes in gain do not directly create aliasing. Aliasing is a phenomenon that occurs due to undersampling when a continuous signal is sampled at a rate less than twice its highest frequency. Gain changes, while they can affect the amplitude of a signal, don't alter its frequency components or the sampling rate.

Dynamic resonance surpression plugins are not amplifying anything if used correctly.

 

Last edited: Apr 23, 2025 at 11:31 PM

Unless there is severe monkey-coding going on with a particular plugin this should not be an issue. Especially if you're smart enough to be working your productions in a 32/64bit floating point mode. You really have to try hard (as in using some malformed piece of audio software) to muck something up in floating point mode.

 

This isn't a comment on you personally, but I don't understand how, in 2025, this sort of question is getting asked still.

Whatever DAW you're using (two of my best friends and I have been Logic since before it was called Logic, another two - drummers both - use ProTools, and the last of us musketeers uses Cubase), it comes with professional grade, if not world class plugins.

Believe me when I say, I have 707 items in my 20.38 GB Components folder (however many plugins and VSTis that is: 90+ UAD, Eventide, Lexicon, PSP, etc), and my default EQ, Verb, Chorus, etc plugins (the meat and potatoes on my busses) are all Logic stock plugins.

I'm not alone in this: my two PT studio drummer/producer friends work exclusively with PT's stock plugins, because they exchange sessions with dozens of other producers and artists. Nothing worse than getting a session or project and having a bunch of plugins key to the mix missing (and having to buy them).

My point, sorry for the background, is that the stock plugins on most mature DAWs are nothing short of professional, if not stellar in their own right. Finneas said he produced his sister's Ocean Eyes entirely with and in Logic - the whole album actually - using stock plugins (though he might've snuck in a different bus compressor, but since I wasn't there, I won't say conclusively that he did, or did not).

Final answer: your stock plugins are "free" (actually, you paid for them - I know I did, many times over), why not start with those? I guarantee: until you actually turn pro and quit your day job, you won't regret it.

 

If you were not there, you cannot say conclusively that he is being truthful or not, about any of it. Someone could possibly use 100% stock stuff in Logic, and so it is easy enough to claim they did. Why bring up the contents of a /components folder full of warez plugins which anyone who is capable of math knows that a home studio producer would never buy? " I used all stock", and that even adds to the myth like Andrew Scheps "mixing everything on 99$ Sony MDR 7506 headphones". See how good I am? Yeah, ok.

There are many Logic tutorials from successful producers, and they often do everything using either stock or "free", such as NI Komplete Kontrol types of bundled plugins, etc. They do that because a) you could have used a stock option and more importantly b) they are not stupid enough to use warez in a filmed video demonstration. Or to even open the door to such a possibility, and have to go buy something for 3 minutes worth of footage. c) No product endorsements for free.

The stock plugins in Logic are an exception to the rule when talking about software-only effects processors. They are created by Apple, tested extensively by Apple, running inside a DAW created by Apple to run on only Apple's OS, and only on their hardware.

 

https://gearspace.com/board/music-c...caused-automation-even-volume-automation.html

Fabien (Tokyo Dawn Labs) chimes in and confirms it in the first reply if you feel you need an "authority" on the subject. Also note that I said -can- cause distortions, not all functions from different developers are created equal of course, and conditions for "linear" functions to do so usually have to be pretty extreme. Nonetheless, it can happen.

And yes I know Resonant Suppressor plugins are not "amplifying" (never used that word), but I would use the same word- fluctuation- to describe the conditions in which they can create aliasing/distortion: drastic changes happening quickly (though yes obviously different with an EQ or FFT band than with gain/volume)

 

Read first reply I wrote. I know it can. It has to be a very rapid increase in amplitude. Extreme is a better term. Secondly, distortion is not aliasing.

Again, read your post I commented was incorrect. "Sometimes" and "Extreme Examples" or "Badly coded Plugin" is not what you wrote.

It seems like you have an issue reading. I said "almost always" in my first post for a reason. When the probability of someone encountering that specific exception is almost zero; you might as well say "tomorrow I can win the lottery". In my second above reply, I even said; the issue is when you throw a statement like there out that as a "rule of thumb", it should not be referring to the tiniest possible exception to such a rule. Because it "is almost always incorrect".

 

Last edited: Apr 24, 2025 at 8:08 AM

Can someone recommend me any good free plugins for overall audio work, mix/master?

Many good suggestions so far. Personally I would stay away from Airwindows stuff since it has no GUI. Analog Obsession looks cool, but I'm not convinced soundwise.

Try not to install too many plugins, because it will cause choice paralysis, especially if you have too much redundancy.

Chances are that you DAWs stock plugins already offer everything you need. Most DAWs today have amazing built-in plugins, that can compete with some of the best third-party options. So why increase redundancy.

If you want to extend your toolset with a limited number of free third party plugins, Tokyo Dawn Labs, Variety Of Sound (Windows only), Toneboosters, Klanghelm and the Fuse Audio Labs freebies are the way to go. If your DAW doesn't come with a convolution reverb, you can also get Convology XT. That should be sufficient for any serious work, without overhoarding on additional plugins. I don't know anyone who has hundreds of plugins who is actually productive in his work. Pros typically have a few dedicated plugins that they use all the time. Some even just use a channelstrip emulation for all their basic mixing duties.

The fewer plugins you have, the higher the chance that you are actually focussing on the work and you also learn your plugins inside out, as opposed to constantly switching between countless plugins.

 

There is a note of suggestion to not do this with the All Airwindows download, but people commonly do that anyway. With other big bundles such as Waves, Plugin Alliance, Melda, etc. you do not frequently see where people have installed the entire thing?