Incorporating bettermaker hw control plugjns

WaveLab
1

Hi there, happy new year!

I’m running into a workflow issue with my bettermaker mastering eq (and soon to be compounded with the mastering limiter I just purchased)

Basically my issue is that for workflow reasons it’s a major pain to put an instance of the bettermaker eq plugin on each clip. This is because random instances of the plugin within the montage will auto-connect to the hw and as such I need to jump around to find the connected instance, disconnect from the hardware via that plugin instance, and then start over hunting around until the correct instance decides to connect. Massively frustrating.

On gearspace some MEs recommended putting a single plugin instance on the DAW output section and automating which “snapshot” (aka temporary preset) is used per track. So I’ve started doing that but because WL doesn’t accept automation on the track or output level, I need to select the correct snapshot manually which leaves a bit too much room for error.

So I suppose I’m wondering if anyone here has found a better way (no pun!) to incorporate the bettermaker hardware/plugin workflow within WL. And/ or if there are plans to introduce track/output automation in an upcoming update?

Thanks!
Nick

2

I feel your pain. I believe it was an oversight with how the plugin/hardware interaction was designed.

Despite being named “Mastering EQ” etc it seems like they were designed from a mix engineer’s standpoint where you have one session for each song as opposed to mastering where you have some or many songs in one session.

I had a REAPER script made to get around this limitation but there is essentially a stalemate going on to get them working ideally in WaveLab or any other DAW with clip/item/object effects:

Snapshots, automation, and presets are too much of a hassle in my opinion. It should work like it does in the video I made without having to use scripts or any other workarounds.

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Amazing, thanks Justin for taking the time on New Year’s Day. I really appreciate it.

The video was super helpful, if nothing else than to let me know I’m not going crazy and this is a noted issue. Because as far as I could tell from my GS post, others weren’t aware of it.

I’m guessing your workflow remains unchanged since the video? Pre-capture work through reaper? And that this (or a similar script) won’t work in WL currently?

While your script sounds amazingly helpful, I’m not a reaper user and, with this issue aside, very much love keeping the entire project in WL. I also really like the sound of the bettermaker eq (and hopefully limiter 2 soon enough), so I may be stuck with my clunky current workflow. Hopefully either BM updates their plugins or WL will add other avenues for automation in the not so distant future.

I was in contact with someone at bettermaker and he seemed open to the idea of adding a master disconnect function to the plugin which would disconnect all instances. And then you’d be free to connect a specific instance manually. I also asked for the ability to copy mid to side or vise versa in the plugin while working in sum diff, which he also was looking into. Hopefully something may come from that also.

Anyways thanks again and happy new year!
Nick

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No problem. I too have had many back and forth messages with Bettermaker about it but I have come to the conclusion that they aren’t going to change anything. Maybe if more voices contact them they will, but I have basically given up hope.

WaveLab has a DYN (dynamic) mode that could potentially solve the issue but for whatever reason, DYN mode doesn’t take the Bettermaker plugins offline fully enough for the hardware to work correctly like REAPER’s “Offline” option for plugins.

Even if WaveLab added Track and/or Output automation, I’m still not sure I’d use it because of how good I have it in REAPER with the scripting method. It basically works like a digital plugin but it controls analog hardware without having to do any extra steps whatsoever, which would be hard to give up.

I keep hoping a real native solution is found for WaveLab and all DAWs but I’ve just been too busy mastering to push any farther than I already have.

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Hey Justin, thanks for the preview vid on WL12, seems like a few things there will really help my workflow.

Just wanted to bump this thread to see if you know if any of the WL12 improvements will solve the bettermaker workflow issues, either by way of deactivating unused plugins, new script features or full montage automation.

Thanks again
Nick

6

Not that I know of. WaveLab already has the “Dyn” option for plugins but that doesn’t seem to deactivate plugins enough to cease communication with hardware units.

Maybe PG knows of a way to make it work that way for a future WaveLab update but last time I tested WL12 for this, my Bettermaker EQ was still confused by having more than one plugin instance in a single audio montage, which I did using Clip Effects of course.

I think with the growing number of plug-in controlled hardware units like Bettermaker, Dutch Audio, etc. that it would be a good feature addition but for now, I haven’t been able to get Bettermaker or Steinberg to make a move for improvement here so for now, my REAPER script is the best way (in my opinion) to use the Bettermaker units in mastering session context.

Every other method (including automation, snapshots, presets) is a compromise.

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Seriously, at 3200eu, bettermaker would want to be doing a LOT ‘better’ than this, and indeed taking feedack seriously.

1 Like
8

Yeah, I felt that way about 4 or 5 years go when I first got the EQ but now I’m past the point of having hope for any change from Bettermaker. I’ve had the conversation with them more than one time and they just don’t get it.

From what I can tell, the main guy at Bettermaker does mix/mastering of mostly electronic/EDM type stuff and my theory is that he views mastering only as stereo processing and likely just has one Pro Tools (or other DAW) session per song.

This means that when he opens the DAW session for each song, the hardware changes to the correct setting and all is OK in his world.

He doesn’t seem to be familiar with actual mastering DAWs like WaveLab, Sequoia, Pyramix, etc. where we have clip/object/item based processing and can put plug-in instances directly on each song within the mastering session containing many songs, usually an EP or album.

I know there are snapshots, presets, and other automation related workarounds but in my opinion, the way I have scripted it to work in REAPER is the absolute best and fastest way because I don’t need to think about any snapshots, presets, or other automation related things.

With the script that I had made for REAPER, I just put the Bettermaker EQ on each song (known as an item in REAPER), and when the session plays, the correct plug-in instance is active, all other instances are “offline”, and the hardware changes to the correct settings for each song. It can’t get any simpler than that.

Again, I’ve kind of given up on making this work how it should and my only hope now is that WaveLab can improve the DYN mode for plug-ins (mostly invented for the UAD plug-in system) so that plug-ins that talk to hardware can go far enough “offline” to stop communicating with the hardware so that the hardware only sees one plug-in instance and knows what to do on a per-song basis.

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Just crashed into this wall. zoinc.

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Yes, I’ve been reporting this issue to Bettermaker for many years now. It seems they don’t care about this limitation. The plug-in/hardware integration was clearly designed by a mixing engineer that thinks “mastering” is just adding stereo processing to your Pro Tools / Logic / Cubase mixing session and he cannot understand what a real mastering session with Clip Effects in WaveLab/ Sequoia / Pyramix is like.

For me, saving presets, scenes, and incorporating automation is not a practical solution.

On the WaveLab side, I have long since requested a better dynamic mode that fully releases the plug-in communication to the hardware when the clip is not in use for playback or rendering, but that has also not happened.

This is why I still use REAPER for my analog play/capture process when mastering. Even though WaveLab can now do many more things related to the analog processing loop compared to when I first started using it, there are still too many small things and scripts I can do with REAPER that I’m not ready to give up yet and this is one of the bigger factors.

At this point, I don’t think it will ever be solved.

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