Order Of Plugins Vst

The short answer is Yes!

That doesn’t mean that there is a right or wrong way to do it. I think it’s more important to understand that the order in which you route your plugins is going to determine the overall shape of your sound.

I remember when I was first getting into mixing, I would put plugins into inserts without even thinking about it. I also added plugins because I thought I needed to but that’s a completely different article.

It wasn’t until one engineer (who was more experienced) spilled the beans. He told me that the order of my plugins made an impact on the sound of my mixes. I honestly could not believe it. I thought that through some magical computer process, the sound came out the same, no matter how the plugins were inserted.

I can now admit that I was wrong.

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I’m going to give a short general idea of how (and why) I would order my plugins but it’s definitely not a rule. You can use this as a starting point if you choose to do so but If I were you I would experiment and use my advice as opinion and not fact.

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Cleaning Up

There is a theory in the mixing world to “cut before compression and boost after” and I would say I am probably on board with that for the most part but not completely.

Yes, I would most likely start with an EQ but not only to clean up the sound. I would look to potentially shape it into something a little bit more useable in the context of the entire song. That might include a little bit of cutting AND a little bit of boosting. The goal is really just to get the sound to a place that’s closer to a better starting point.

Tonal Shaping

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The next plugin would normally be a compressor if I needed it and I’m usually looking to do a few things:

1. Soften the sound

Some compressors like the R-Comp do a pretty good job of taking a rough sound and softening the transients in a pleasing way.

2. Smoothing out the sound

This could be confused with softening the sound but its different. I’m not really trying to change the overall tone that much; I’m just trying to take a sound that may be a bit dynamic (bouncy) and make it sit better between the speakers. Of course any added tone that’s pleasing is a bonus.

3. Tightening up

Other compressors have built in analog circuitry and really grabby attack/release parameters. These seem to help tighten things up when the sound is a bit loose. The 1176 emulations come to mind.

4. Taming peaks

Other times you have the sound in the right place but you need to control the odd peak. Limiters can work great here too.

Effects

There are times when I will put an effect directly on an insert like a reverb, delay or maybe a flanger. An effect could even be something like adding a plugin for colour.

I find myself doing this either before I even start or after the compression. I don’t have a really good reason except for that I either want it before it’s been tampered with or I want it after the general tone has been fixed. It’s really as simple as that.

More EQ

Yep, some more EQ (well sometimes).

After the compressor goes in and it does its job effectively it might not have taken the sound completely to 100% or it might have changed the tone a bit that I now have to correct. I’ll add in some top or bottom depending on what I’m looking for.

This could potentially be a time when some creative EQ might be needed. If the track is meant to live in the back or occupy an interesting space, I might do some EQ that’s completely bazaar just to help with that goal.

Knocking out those peaks

The limiter seems to come last in a chain if and when I use it but there are times when I will put the limiter before the previous step (more EQ). I think it just depends on how the EQ is affecting the peaks and if it’s exciting the limiter too much. It can actually make the limiter work a bit harder causing over compression (limiting) or pumping effects.

It might make more sense to put the limiter first so it can grab the peaks I don’t like. Once I have a smoother sound I can add an EQ to give me that extra something, something.

Break the Rules

So I made this order a bit more generic to fit as many possible situations as I could but of course don’t assume that you need all of these on every sound. Some sounds may require you to not touch any plugins, which is probably for the best.

So now that you have an idea of why I would make a decision to bring out a plugin, in a particular order, you can take that and apply it to your tastes. If you want to compress first, for a specific reason, than I say do it. There are logical reasons for EQing (cutting) before compressing but that doesn’t mean it’s right. Remember mixing is an art form just like painting or photography.

The less you stick to conventions but maintain good taste, the more desirable your sound will be.

You can manage your effects and VST instruments in the Plug-in Manager window.

  • To open the Plug-in Manager window, select Devices > Plug-in Manager.

The Plug-in Manager window shows the following:

VST Effects

This tab lists all VST effects that are loaded in Cubase. You can sort the list by name, vendor, category, etc. by clicking the corresponding column heading.

VST Instruments

This tab lists all VST instruments that are loaded in Cubase. You can sort the list by name, vendor, category, etc. by clicking the corresponding column heading.

Blacklist

This tab lists all VST effects and VST instruments that are installed on your system but not loaded in Cubase. These plug-ins might lead to stability problems or even cause the program to crash. As Cubase does not support 32-bit, all 32-bit plug-ins are shown in this list.

Note

You can reactivate a blacklisted 64-bit plug-in by selecting it and clicking Reactivate. This causes Cubase to rescan the plug-in and remove it from the blacklist. To move the plug-in back to the blacklist, you must rescan all plug-ins and restart Cubase.

Collection list

By default, the window section to the right shows the Default collection, which contains all effects or VST instruments loaded by the program. The Default collection cannot be changed.

You can compile your own collections of effects or VST instruments by clicking New Collection and dragging and dropping items from the list of all effects or VST instruments to the collection list.

Collections are shown in the selectors for effects/VST instruments, and all changes made to collections in the Plug-in Manager are immediately reflected in the selectors.

Search Field

Enter the name of a plug-in in the search field. The list of all effects or VST instruments is filtered to show only those plug-ins whose names contain the text that you entered.

Toggle list to show all/show only FX/VSTi not in current collection

Order Of Plugins Vst Plugin

Allows you to filter the lists of all effects or VST instruments to show either all loaded plug-ins, or only those that are not part of the current collection.

New Folder

Allows you to create a new folder in the current collection.

Delete

Allows you to delete the selected item in the current collection.

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Plugins
New Collection

Allows you to create a new collection.

To create a new, empty list, select Empty. To create a new collection based on the list of all effect, select Add All Plug-ins. To create a new collection based on the current collection, select Add Current Collection.

User Collections

Allows you to select a different collection, and to rename or delete the current collection.

To remove unavailable plug-ins from all collections, select Remove Unavailable Plug-ins from All Collections.

Show Plug-in Information

Opens a section at the bottom of the window in which more information about the selected item is shown. If you select several plug-ins, the information for the plug-in that you have selected first is shown. In this section, you can also deactivate selected plug-ins. Deactivated plug-ins are no longer available in collections. This is useful if you have plug-ins installed that you do not want to use in Cubase.

Plug-in Manager Settings

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Opens a section at the bottom of the window in which all current paths to VST 2 plug-ins are listed. You can add or remove folder locations by using the corresponding buttons. Click Rescan All to rescan your computer for plug-ins.