smear: the ultimate spectral plugin transcript

Hi everyone and welcome back to the Magago channel. Today I'm going to showcase a very unique plug-in just recently released by Le Audio. It's called Smear and it processes the audio in the frequency domain enabling a wide range of spectral manipulation. I'm not going to walk you through the plug-in step by step. If you want a deeper tutorial, you can go and check out the videos on LZ Audio's channel. Instead, I will show it in action within a small track that I put together just for the occasion.

If you're interested by the end, you can use the link in the description and the code you see to purchase MI at 30% off. With that said, let's dive right in. >> So, not yet fully aware of what I wanted to make, I started with the simplest sound element, a sine wave. I routed it to the mixer and without wasting time, I opened up Smear and began browsing the presets. In short, Smear can be seen as a multi effects spectral processor that combines several effects modules, 12 to be exact, to create really unique combinations.

The cool part is that everything can be automated via the modulation system that you see down here. So I come across this preset called digital nautical. Let's try to understand what's going on. The first module is called warp. By modulating a few parameters on the right like the operating center and the amount, I get a constant shifting of my sound spectral content. And this is the result. >> [music] >> Next is an interpolation module which smooth the sound reducing its dynamics and making it more flat much like a compressor.

And we have a delay module that also operates spectrally applying a different delay for each frequency region. Finally, there's our pitch shifter module. Using the very handy factor bands graph, you can essentially select the frequencies the shifting will act on and then blend the process signal with the dry one. So here is what I end up with. Okay, I got this particular soundsscape and needed to make it even more dimensional.

So I applied from another plug-in by laser audio, a spatial simulator that lets you spread the sound across a vast environment. So it kind of surrounds the listener. To finish, a light touch of Iari reverb to glue everything together. All right. Now, I needed a touch of melody. I was looking for something more impactful that would contrast with the lush soundscape that I just created. So I opened this contact library called Frozen Glock and drew in a few notes on the piano roll knowing that I would then let's say overprocess the sound.

So I thought that just a few scattered notes would already do the job. Okay, so I opened another instance of Smeir and this time I made my own preset to fit the task. We got pitch shifter as the first module. I'm blending the original signal with a copy pitched up one octave. But that copy is constantly morphing because it [music] follows the mix automation. As you can see from the graph, [music] something similar happens in the next module, a resonance module.

So the generated resonances alternate creating this uh distinctive morphing effect. As the last module, we bring interpolate back in where I quickly modulate the factor bands creating this uh spectral oscillations that at times resemble a kind of echo. [music] After that comes another instance of fram and halftime at 75% a light OTT and a final filter freak where I randomly modulate the low pass filter to give the sound even more movement. >> [music] [music] >> Moving on, we got another sine wave.

I once again drew just a few notes spaced far apart. The goal was to create a pad that wraps around everything we made so far. on it. I'm using another smear preset called Goss Echo, which combines resonate, interpolation, and pitch shifter modules. [music] After that, I used Recurse, another plug-in by Lea Audio, a degradationbased plugin that makes my sound more alive and introduces artifacts. [music] Hikari reverb once again to stretch the sound into a long atmospheric pad.

Then I sent this signal to another mixer channel where I applied half time set at 1.5 essentially giving me a copy of the signal pitched down five semmitones. And here is how it sounds. [music] [music] >> [music] >> As the last element of the track, I wanted to introduce this field recording that I found on freesound.org. On it, I once again applied the preset that I created before, but this time I replaced the first delay module with a gate module.

The spectral approach to gating is very [music] interesting in my opinion because it's not the whole sound getting muted like [music] it happens in traditional gates, but only certain frequency bands. Determined once again by the factor band you see [music] moving in the graph. >> This kind of underwater effect is then amplified by a delay >> and by a final interpolation module. Once again, if you are interested in purchasing Smeir, I invite you to visit the link in the description and use this code for 30% of the plugin.

With that said, I will see you in the next one. Hey, two. [music] >> [music] [music] >> Heat. Heat. >> [music]