Sometimes I am working with source material that goes through 2 or 3 stages of processing in which, it would be a dream to freeze the first stage, while not losing the ability to add more plugins.
For example, sometimes:
I’m doing hours of corrective/restorative/doctoring work on a problematic source material which might require 9 plugins (some are the same plugin attacking different areas of the material because of separated parameter limitations in specific plugins).
I’ve maybe fixed things enough, If I could only freeze the track up to those first 9 plugins, save system resources, and then focus on re-balancing the sound and seeing where I can take it after problem removal/reduction… maybe high frequencies can be broad boosted to compensate for harshness reduction for example.
Or maybe now I’m going to apply FX and craft the creative direction with the previous corrective plugins frozen… And then maybe I’m happy with the FX I’ve added.. So I unfreeze, move the Freeze Divider Line up a few slots, and the re-freeze both the corrective and FX inserts together - and now focus on final mix integration/balancing… And perhaps, I will never freeze these ones and leave them open to adjustment throughout the mixing process.
It would sort of allow users to incrementally bounce their work, save system resources, and save them from always having to freeze/unfreeze to make adjustments.
This would be useful for many users in many different contexts:
- Heavy restoration/fixing/doctoring
- Heavy sound-design
- Working with plugins that oversample
- Users with less powerful computers
It would work much like how the Post-Fader insert divider line would work but with a few different protocols.
In preferences, there would be an option for automatic freeze once the user drags the arrow down. If the user drags the arrow down twice, ie there track already has some inserts frozen and the user wants to freeze the next set of inserts - there is no need to unfreeze and refreeze, the user just drags the arrow down and the previously frozen insert stage simply has the next set of processing applied.
Also, It would be great GUI wise, is Frozen Inserts instead of looking the same as disabled inserts, were coloured muted red or something.