Velocity Filter vs RingsFX

WHAT IS VELOCITY FILTER? Velocity Filter is the fastest way to make all your synthesizer patches respond to MIDI velocity in a natural and musical way. Just add it to your audio unit effects on the synth track and you are done! WHAT DOES IT DO? It converts non-velocity-sensitive synths sounds into velocity-sensitive ones. Velocity Filter can be configured as either a MIDI-controlled filter or a MIDI-operated volume control. In filter mode, it adds or removes high frequency energy according to the velocity of each MIDI note, so that lower velocity notes sound softer and have less high harmonic content. You can control the amount of boost or cut and the frequency range. In volume control mode, it adjusts the volume according to incoming MIDI velocity. WHAT ELSE DOES IT DO? In addition to MIDI velocity, you can also control the filter using MIDI-CC or aftertouch controls. So you can control it in a variety of ways. HOW IS THIS BETTER THAN EDITING MY SYNTH PATCHES TO MODULATE THE FILTER CUTOFF BY MIDI VELOCITY? Most synthesizers respond to velocity either by modulating the cutoff frequency of a lowpass filter or by modulating the gain. Doing velocity response that way distorts the tone of the patch in an un-musical way, especially if it uses a resonant lowpass filter. Instead of modulating the gain of a lowpass filter, Velocity Filter modulates the gain of a high-shelf filter. The sound is very different, and can be applied on top of the existing filters in the synth patch without destroying the tone of the patch. Also, if you are browsing through a collection of 1000 patches, it's much easier to apply this filter to the output than to modify each and every patch to modulate the filter cutoff with MIDI velocity. However, it's not necessarily "better"; it's just very different. Read the limitations section below for why it's not always better. WHAT LIMITATIONS DOES IT HAVE? All notes go through one filter, so if you play two notes at the same time, with different velocities, it will set the filter for the loudest of the two notes. Also, the filter takes about 1 millisecond to change from loud to soft, so if you quickly switch from loud to soft, you'll hear the filter clamping down AFTER the initial attack. This is problematic for synth patches that have near zero attack time. Velocity Filter does not support GarageBand because GarageBand does not support sending MIDI messages to audio effects. Velocity filter is an audio unit plugin ONLY. It runs inside of host apps such as AUM, Audiobus, Cubasis, Auria, and Beatmaker 3.

RingsFX is an AUv3 plugin based on the famous Mutable Instruments Rings, one of the most dedicated and fully-featured Physical Modeling Eurorack modules ever created. At its core is a resonator that needs to be 'excited' or 'strummed' by MIDI input, noise, or external audio excitation. RingsFX emulates vibrations of structures simulated by 3 different synthesis techniques that can be plucked or process external signals: Modal Synthesis, Sympathetic Strings, and Inharmonic Strings. Traditionally, Rings was only monophonic but used a unique approach to polyphony that allowed the previous note to 'ring' out and decay while a new note was played. Rings FX provides these same modes (Mono, Duo, and Quad), but expands it with a true Polyphonic mode. RingsFX also expands the capabilities of the original engine by adding support for velocity sensitivity and MIDI MPE mode. The new polyphonic mode allows RingsFX to play up to 12 notes of true polyphony, depending on the settings. Doing so requires RingsFX to use multiple Rings resonators, but the more true polyphony you use, the more processing power it requires. Running in the traditional Monophonic, Duophonic, or Quadrophonic modes may be preferred in order to keep CPU usage under control. RingsFX has 7 modes in total, by combining the 3 basic modes with additional properties such as chords or specially tuned reverbs. The original hardware also had a secret 'Easter Egg' mode, which in RingsFX is simply calling 'Synthesizer' mode, rumoured to be based on one of the early Korg synthesis methods. This mode supported a number of mutable effects which now work on in all resonator modes. RingsFX also has a Mod-Matrix which allows you to combine the built-in LFOs and FEGs to great effect by manipulating parameters and mutable effects in realtime. Finally, RingsFX can be loaded as an AUv3 effect plugin. Set the Exciter Source to 'INPUT', and you can pass any audio through RingsFX and use this audio as an external exciter. For example, it can be used to great affect on a drum beat to create some crazy rhythms. Use the Output Mix to combine the original audio with the synthesised resonator output to create some stunning effects. Features ○ 7 unique synthesis modes. ○ Supports Mono, Duo, Quad and true polyphony. ○ Supports 2 fluid LFO's per note. ○ Up to 4 FEG's per note. ○ External Exciter modes. ○ White noise Pulse Sequencer. ○ Supports 6 mod-able effects and 6 global effects. ○ Mod Matrix ○ Input and white noise filters. ○ Program Manager with drag and drop. ○ Preset Search and Favourites. ○ Easy export and import of banks and presets. ○ Extensive help manual. ○ Web Transfer for backing up to PC/Mac. ○ MPE Support.