Why use Fabfilter plugins?

In this article I’m going to talk about Fabfilter plugins in answer to a question asked by a musician.

The question is this:

“Francis what do you think about Fabfilter plugins and which ones would you recommend, knowing that I compose electro music with only virtual synthesizers?”

Emmanuel C.

Discover Fabfilter

The founders of Fabfilter are Floris Klinkert and Frederik Slijkerman, the company is based in the Netherlands, in the city of Amsterdam. To make it very simple, they make us nice audio plugins with very nice interfaces, and excellent algorithms…

I invite you, if you understand English, to read this description of the company.

Now let’s talk about plugins.

There are three families of plugins:

(You can click directly on the name of the plugin to access its description)

• the basics:
  • One basic synthesizer with a single oscillator
  • Simplon a filter composed of two high quality multi-mode filters
  • Micro a filter including the modulation of the envelope follower.
• Creative effects and synthesizers:
  • Saturn 2  a 3 in one because it integrates:
    • a multiband distortion,
    • saturation
    • amp modeling
  • Timeless 3 an ultra-flexible band delay with time stretching.
  • Volcano 2 a versatile filter effect with modulations.
  • Twin 2 a synthesizer with drag and drop modulation.
• Professional tools for mixing and mastering:Pro-Q 3 an incredible quality equalization, in my opinion one of the best EQ at the moment.
  • Pro-R a high-end reverb.
  • Pro-L 2 a peak limiter with many features, including a sound level and intensity measurement system, the famous loudness.
  • Pro-C 2 a professional compressor with versatile routing options.
  • Pro-MB a multiband compressor/expander.
  • Pro-DS a transparent de-esser, perfect for processing vocal tracks.
  • Pro-G a very flexible gate/expander.

Did we just go around the store?

Yes and no because on the store, you can buy the plugins either individually or as a bundle. This is where it gets interesting because as you can imagine, having all of them might be tempting but it might not be affordable for everyone.

There are 7 bundles depending on the tools you want to use.

Of course you have the Total bundle which includes all the plugins of the brand.

Let’s talk about the other 6 bundles

• FX bundle
• Pro bundle
• Mixing bundle
• Mastering bundle
• Essential bundle
• Creative bundle

Let’s get back to our question!

From my point of view, and to answer the question that was asked, I can honestly say that these plugins are of exceptional quality with a clean, simple and intuitive graphical interface. It is really pleasant to work with such tools.

If I have a bundle to recommend, a little bit all-purpose and which can be reasonable in terms of price, I would opt for “Essential bundle“.

That said, you can always wait for sales periods, promotional offers or Black Friday or even ask Santa Claus…

This article is not sponsored in any way, I’m telling you about it as a user.

My favorite: the Pro Q 3!

Over time you will discover that it is very difficult to do without the Pro Q 3 because it is so incredibly powerful and versatile. You can do almost everything with this EQ. Frankly I can’t find any fault with it, it’s a must have in your studio plugins panel. Moreover it is not for nothing that it appears in most of the bundles.

Personally as a musician you know that when you compose a piece of music, to really find the frequency of a tone, of a note can in some cases be difficult. In the Pro Q 3, having the note displayed via a keyboard according to the frequency is for me something extremely useful.

So I don’t need to explain to you the mixing part and also the mastering part. It’s really a very powerful tool. I confess, I haven’t found better.

So if you add to that the analysis tools, the equalization match (users of Logic Pro X will understand since in Logic’s EQ we have an equalization plug-in called Match EQ.) and a tool that I love, the EQ capture, well frankly nothing to complain about.

Oh yes, I forgot, we have a dynamic processor…

What?

A dynamic band processor that is incredibly interesting and easy to use, which I really like.

Comme si ça ne suffisait pas toujours par bande, on peut choisir si on est en mono, stéréo, mid/side ou surround ! 

Isn’t life beautiful?

Compressions with Pro C 2!

I think the Pro C 2 is the right choice for you, especially if you compose electro music or music in this style. Although those who make hip-hop music will quickly feel at ease with this type of compressor. The reason is very simple: terribly efficient presets on some instrumentations as well as for EDM drum kits and vocals, frankly you can go with your eyes closed. However, you will always have to work on the sound in relation to what your ears hear.

Space with Pro R!

I don’t know what to say, you really have to work on it to understand the level of quality that this reverb can give you. It’s beautiful, it’s clean and in the right hands (mine) I assure you that it’s an extremely qualitative tool.

Ah I think I already said extremely qualitative, well it’s a leitmotif of the brand’s plugins.

I must confess that for Epic music, I started to create my own presets, something I rarely do in plugins.

The last word on this Fabfilter article

First of all, to try it is to adopt it, then I hope to have answered the question.

If this is not the case, I propose to do your mixing and or mastering, just to hear it by yourself.

I think with time to write more articles about the plugins of this builder but for the moment I don’t have the whole collection of their fabulous plugins, fabulous filter… Fabfilter 😉

Musically Francis