I'd love to see a shootout. Would love to see FabFilter Saturn, Waves tape plugins, Wavesfactory tape, maybe the Slate Tape plugin (I stopped using it cause others seem to do a better job). And of course compare it with real tape and maybe even real equipment stream sites like mix:analog. Just realised that it's a lot of options to compare.
Satin is just one of those plugins that are just good enough you can use it on anything. Not sure if it's accurate in any way, but it makes any mix or even track sound better. But I totally agree, I would love to see this shootout, would be an interesting benchmark to see where we are at in this digital world.
They have a bypass, in minute 5:25. its on the "baby audio" label you click it and it bypass the effect. You passed the mouse to fast so you couldn't see it.
Agreed, but don't confuse it with the newly released Tascam-Tape-Emulations. Don't know how good they are yet. But the tape-collection are by far my favorite tape-emulations. Use them all the time.
YES! Please do a full comparison between tape plugins and add the hardware as well. If you can get a Anamod ATS-1 in it as well, that would be great! I'm sure a lot of people will be interested.
I am an old musician and studio owner who worked on real analog stuff in 80’s and first 90’s. And I remember that era mostly for the annoying side effects of analog equipment and tape machines. By the way, not mentioning the maintenance costs… So I can’t figure out why newest generations of musicians and audio people loves this defective stuff. Anyway, the virtual reels of TAIP spin the wrong way. They should spin anti-clockwise, so the left reel feeds the tape and the right one takes it up.
How can a supposedly experienced audio engineer not understand why people love this stuff? We live in a world where you can set up a hybrid system and use the analog gear to take advantage of the so called “defects” and the huge maintenance costs can be mostly avoided. Tape is pretty fricken expensive though.
@@domdraper3221 I suppose it’s a matter of taste and what your goals are in the recording/mixing process. I actually appreciate tape compression and that bit of fattiness in the sound, I used to record at high levels snare drums and kicks into tape to get tape compression. But how can you like noise or wow and flutter and high frequencies heavy distortion? Try to record let’s say an high hat on a 30 ips 24 trk 2 inch tape at a level higher than -15/-20 db. What you get in playback it’s not a cymbal anymore but something similar to a pot cover falling down the stairs. That said it’s obvious that sound must be somewhat “digested” in the record/mix process. Because on one side it has become part of the music production language, and on the other side you really need to smooth out peaks and frequencies buildups to get a good playback on most consumer systems. To obtain this I prefer use eq, compression, saturation with a very specific setting for each sound instead of put my tracks into a tape and slam up the levels. But, as I said, it’s matter of taste and maybe there’s some weird kind of generation gap that affects me.
@@GianlucaSibaldi Very interesting :) "To obtain this I prefer use eq, compression, saturation with a very specific setting for each sound instead of put my tracks into a tape and slam up the levels" It's also interesting that now that the loudness war is hopefully over, we need to regain responsibility and technique of working with more dynamic material. If before lots of peaks and buildups were eaten by all the compression/limiting/clipping now it's a different game I believe...
@Gianluca Sibaldi I agree with all you say I will only add that several styles of music deliberately destroy the sound as part of the effect. It’s supposed to sound like an old damaged tape.
because if you record everything with clean pres and mix everything with plugins it sounds completely flat and lifeless, and theres no opportunity to be creative with the defects because.. there aren’t any. that being said I would also never go back to the old days of resetting the console or waiting for a sampler to load or running out of cables/channels for things. I’m fine working on the computer and just bouncing things through the analog EQs/filters thanks :)
The mystery and sound of analog for me is in the spread and bleeding of frequencies across the tape. Every aspect of the process breaths in a way, from the music itself to the electrical conversion and the magnetic aspect of the medium as well as the rolling flux of the tape itself, it all breathes.
I bought it after trying the demo because I loved the sound it gave during my testing. Don’t really care how it compares to others because plug-ins that color sound quite a bit will all have their specialty. If you don’t like the sound of a plugin, simply skip it and go for the ones you personally enjoy. But always try the demo!
Its technically a compressor/expander in series, really really really cool to mess with on various things, and emphasis/deemphasis in general opens up a great world of possibilities
@@steverachmadofficial Sure, OK, but then Baby Audio didn't actually answer the question either. If the question is "How did you train your AI?" and the answer is "The AI couldn't handle the tape machine's randomness", that implies they did not train an AI. Obviously, they did. So the real answer would elaborate on the first with something like "We had to isolate specific features of tape audio and then train it to recognized each one individually." Overall, I found that portion of the video a disappointing let down. I wanted to hear more about 'how' but instead I got a non-answer.
I think it sort of lead to that they didn't train an AI on any tape machine itself. So not like "this is a digital sine sweep" and "this is a sine sweep through a 1" studer with bias". So instead they prolly reverse engineered things that best showed the "tape effect". To train you need yes cases and no cases so then they have to give it really "tapey" songs and very modern digital songs. And probably some testing files like solo drums, sine sweeps, and so on. Train it to know the difference between the sounds and then take that difference, create a transfer curve, and apply it to a sound effect. That, instead of learning the machine itself or running a live simulation inside your machine. My best guess anyways.
@@steverachmadofficial it’s not random … to do this with AI one would need take a digital recording and then send it to tape … then train the Neural network on the differential …. It’s just a very very complicated equation and the end of the day
Wow! That's some impressive stuff! Baby Audio really nailed the feeling of Tape in the coffin! I'm going to try this myself, really interested in the input "Hot" button you didn't touch. Great video as usual Wytse!
Black Rooster Magnetite (which has oversampling btw), Chow Tape Model (amazing free stuff), Ferric TDS Mk2 (updated free plugin), Ozone 9 Vintage Tape vs Hardware. P.S. I hate that I can't stop those spinning reels!!)
Seconding this! Such an interning plugin because it can affect the signal so drastically but it’s not like wavesfactory cassette, it’s not my goto saturation 100% of the time of course but I love it to death
Glad to see baby audio working with intelligent producers such as yourself esp after smooth operator. They seem like a solid company and this plugin seems awesome!
It actually sounds pretty good, and I like the way it glues things together like tape does. It's interesting they said that it's difficult to deal with noise when training an AI (if you actually want it to reproduce noise), which is exactly right. Machine learning algorithms always want to generalize/optimize what it's trained on. And when it's trained on noise it just tends to average out all randomness, and you end up with nothing/silence. I've actually attempted to emulate tape using machine learning myself, and personally I couldn't get it all to quite work, so I'm quite impressed with what I'm hearing. I'm guessing the AI part of "tAIp" is purely related to the drive controls and such, but not the noisy controls like "wear" and "noise", but I could be wrong. As far as I got myself with randomness using machine learning is capturing pseudo random number generators (which just seems like noise but actually isn't).
I found it really useful, it does have a diffent feel compared to other 'satuation' or 'tap emulation' . The test for me is 'does it stand out as a price of useable software regardless of whether it is a good emulation' . And yes itsxa very useful tool. I ran multiple instances, on drums, vocals (surprisingly good de-esser), chorused guitar, strings and bass. Really changed the dynamics of my mix. Thumbs up from me
Could be an interesting idea to test "Chow Tape Model" plugin as well. Its GUI is not so sexy, it's not "AI" but there're far more control (gap, wear, speed, bias, spacing, etc...) How does it compete with this Taip? Oh, yes, Chow Tape Model is free.
I've tried a fair number of tape plugins and watched many more demos but this is the first one that actually gave me the FEELING you described. AI is an overused buzzword but when applied with care and purpose it really does work magic.
If you do a tape shootout video, you absolutely *need* to include IK Multimedia's Tape Machine Collection in there. As far as I can tell they're based on a very similar approach as Taip here, but give you considerably more control over the process and employ an even more detailed modelling.
This plugin really surprised me. I used it in my master chain with the "start here" default preset... And it really cleared and lifted the master up without distorting it. Nice one! And then I turned presence, hi-shape and lo-shape to 100 and I was like wtf 🤯 it was so clear, balanced and bassy that I doubted my skills because of the difference between with and without taip. Maybe it was the 3 bottles of champaign that confused me but... What the heck... I have to test that out when I'm back sober again... (probably the hights are going to kill me, but we'll see 😅). Check that for yourself... I'll be back for another review...
You missed trying the middle buttons and you also missed out where the bypass resides, which is surprising, not only that, not only do the knobs expand, they contract as well, so you can zero in on exactly the tone, texture and volume you want.
I think it’s amazing UX feedback. The bypass is absolutely hidden, and Taip should be updated to give better UX. The other things you mention are the same thing. It’s perfectly fine to miss things. It means the UX is bad.
I always have many questions with AI-powered plugins. Over the last few years, I have been developing and researching several AI-powered tools in the game industry and big leaps are being made by working to getter and sharing ideas often in the form of research papers. In audio/DSP development that uses AI, this seems to be happening much less often and thus very hard to verify what they are adding. What neural network configuration are you running, what part of the audio pipeline is AI, which inference engine are you using etc. It's the training and data that adds value to your work not so much the network itself so why are these companies so secretive about their "AI"...
To be fair to this plugin though this can be a genuine use for AI and is much less questionable than the "helps generate rhythm or melody AI" plugins that I personally see often in ads. but some openness and clarity will not only be nice for consumers but also amazing for developers who are pushing this relatively new tech forwards.
Agreed - And while it sure sounds as if they are using a GAN to do this, it's just not clear. I really hope they publish some research or at least a process summary and if I ever find one, I'll probably come back here and link it wherever it applies.
_'AI is an overused - and often misused - term._ They figured if they preemptively state that we'd be less inclined to think that TAIP is part and contributor to that very problem.
What I've learned recently (by way of my fave tech podcast, Trashfuture) is that a lot of AI in general is usually neither A nor I. It's more often still people behind the tech, duck taping things together to make it function. AI is more of a buzz word that's good for PR. It's like when in the 1950s a, tech company claimed they built an intelligent robot ls to showcase at the world's fair, and it turned out to just be a guy in a suit.
In most cases AI is just a cleverly written algorithm, not machine learning. And in a *lot* of cases, can fit the use case much better and more consistently than the ML option. They do imply quite heavily on their website that they're using a neural net(ML), but they don't say that's what they're doing, they use the wording 'we can' multiple times rather than 'we did' so I'm inclined to believe that they aren't using ML and are only trying to get people to think they did. If it sounds good and you think the value is there, go ahead and use it, but this sounds like it's walking very close to the line of what's considered false advertising.
I tried a lot of tape emulations in the last few years and I have to say that for my ears this is the first plugin that adds some real vibe... perhaps too much vibe for things like mastering and adding subtle saturation in a mix (I'd still use Saturn 2 and Softube's Tape for these use-cases). I genuinely enjoy this a lot. As a borderline-millennial home recorder/producer I never even saw a realt tape machine in my entire life so I don't really know how it relates to the real thing... but I totally see myself using this as a sound design and tone shaping tool for the years to come.
Definite +1 for doing a tape comparison video - I'd vote TAIP (which I've been pronouncing "tape"), RC-20 (which does many other things also but is such a go-to for many people that its tape aspect should really be zoomed in on), and Cassette by Wavesfactory (because Wavesfactory makes incredible things). I don't have Satin so can't say there. Maybe by narrowing down the features you could compare several. What TAIP is doing is really unique and a clever approach, I think: they used the AI (likely a Generative Adversarial Network / GAN) to compare the difference between dry and tape-recorded specimens, and to recreate the difference space. I do appreciate the relative *simplicity* of its controls compared to others mentioned. Tape is magic! Let's do some deep dives to discover just why!
I suggest make the video again :) more detailed. This plug in in my opinion it’s a game changer in the way it works and the sound is really good. Baby Audio deserves
For the Tape Emulation Shootout we DEFINITELY need the Fabfilter Saturn². It is my main Saturation Plugin and i would really like to see if it holds up against competition in a fair comparison video. (Also Cpu-Load would be kinda interesting to see in that test as well) Thanks 🤘
Lets be honest... Been in the business for 35 years... Worked with 24 tracks/Dolby SR for many years... Our goal then was to record and playback as " transparently and accurately " as possible. We did as much as we could to keep the dynamics natural and opened and the freq spectrum as wide as possible... And remember that what we did ended up on vinyl... The MOST restrictive medium in all the analog chain... Analog is a world of " limitations"... Today's digital high end converters and DAWs are way more transparent and accurate than any analog gear you can get. its paradoxical... Therefore to get the analog feel and sound, didital recording must subtract elements from its full data. Tape saturation is a good example. It is in fact a reduced dynamic response in the mostly audible range in the highest part of the freq spectrum. Same principle goes for limiters and compressors in a wider spectrum. But why do we still want to sound like 50 years ago ? Its all " cultural". Its part of a long history in the pop culture when vinyl records and radio dictated the technical restrictions to suit their limitations... And we got used to it . Just listen to the best recent digital classical recordings VS the vinyls and you get the idea... To bad we got stuck in this " compressed limited saturated distorted low pass cut high pass cut restrictive " way of producing non classical music...
Thank you for reminding me how much I don't miss tape or analog for that matter. I maintained tape machines of all kinds tape machines in recording studios and broadcast. I've spent most of my professional career trying to record the source more accurately. I think the question really is, does it really sound better or does just sound more familiar?
Yeah I definitely need a comparison with different plugins, so we can hear if AI really makes the difference or not. My recommendations: Slate Tape, IK Track-S Tape 99, etc.
Yes, we need that shout-out. Some suggestions: Softube Tape, U_HE Satin, TAIP, TAIPEI STUDIO (London Acoustics), Tonebooster Reelbus and IK Multimedia Tape Rack!
Hey. Melda Productions did machine learning years ago already. This technique has its limits. For a Shootout video I recommend Satin from U-he and P42 Climax (Tape Studer preset) from Pulsar Modular. Satin was the king for many many years but the P42 plays in another league and took over the crown effortless. Unbelievable audio quality and legit vividness with non linearity and little things happening with randomness. When you do such a shootout, have in mind a tape emulation (also the good and interesting TAIP) only can show its real power when put on all channels and compare their cumulative effect. Every instance of P42 for example will act a tiny bit different. Like real hardware. Thank you. Enjoy. Cheers
@@levondarratt787 if you aren't into distorted gimmicks, you'll sure love P42 Climax. Awesome saturation with a soft very natural break-up behavoir, completely different from what I heard so far ITB.
@@levondarratt787 hey cool :) I am curious how you like it. "nichttuntun" is from ZEN and roughly translated would be "to do not-doing" what means being focused in here and now. diffucult to translate ;)
It sounds like it's just a bundled set of compressors, modulation, eq, noise generator, and some distortion. But made with a specific set of parameters to create that emulation. It's something that can be done even with Reaper's stock plugins, though it's a lot of work. But this one in one single VST, does make the workflow more convenient.
Yes. Please do a shootout video. When I started out in music we only had 2 inch 24 track. I still remember the long, long nights (and HORROR) manually "editing" some song by literally cutting and splicing the actual tape. ONE bad edit and it was back to the drawing board. At that time in my life my apartment mate's father use to work as a producer in one of our major local TV news centers and would sell me their used, soon to be decommissioned Ampex 2 inch tapes for $125 USD when brand new were well over $250 from Sam Ash music stores and started at $500 if purchased directly from the recording studio. Ahhh, those were the days. FYI....I was in my late teens/early twenty's back then...so 30+ years ago? Where does the time go????
Yes, on the shootout idea. I'd like to see the Waves J37 emulator. It's better than you might expect. This thing looks cool, but it doesn't really remind me that much of tape. It's more like an AI box that magically makes things sound better. Which is both fascinating, and depressing. Is it really going to be that hard to train a AI to just mix and master the whole damn song? You and I are probably already relics of the past, my friend.
I mentioned before that I really like the tAIp plugin, but not as an actual tape emulation. In truth it´s not meant to be used as an true emulation of a real tape machine, there are other plugins that does that. I mainly use tAIp as a saturation and sound shaping effect which it does very good. The only gripe I have with this plugin is it´s aliasing it´s making, they should add at least 8x oversampling in a future update.
I think that this plugin is unreachable in the impact that provides. It's fantastic - sounds like a real tape and even better! Wowwww - I hope they gonna make it even better with future updates with oversampling and more stuff but eventhough if you put it in anything it makes dramatic impact and brings to life everything!! I can't believe this plugin
Just bought it - I love a bit of tape around but honestly can't be bothered with the real thing. I haven't used any "real" hardware for at least 10 years now and it has been a real freedom! I'm not really bothered about authenticity - the difference between the plugin and the hardware is similar to the difference between two examples of a piece of vintage hardware anyway.
Would love to see a shootout between your machine and software including Taip and perhaps Acustica Taupe, Black Rooster Magnetite and Fabfilter Saturn in the line up.
Please try to include the Black Rooster Audio tape plugin (Magnetite) in your shootout. It's frequently on sale for $29 and I personally think it sounds awesome. I reach for it often.
1) Slate's tape pluguin 2) Waves j27 if i'm not wrong 3) Softtube Tape 4) Airwindows has a tape pluguin 5) And the best free tape - Chow DSP ChowTape At least some of them should be compared...
I like your Barry White voice :) With the size of your channel, you shouldn't have much issue finding a Dev willing to give an interview and demystify the 'magic' of hw emulation plugins, that would be awesome.
This could well be one of the best plugins in terms of simulating wow, flutter and the real tape feeling if only the input stage wouldn‘t alias like crazy, no matter what you do. There is no oversampling option and the plugin runs at 48kHz internally. So external oversampling or higher sample rates in the DAW don‘t help. Hope they‘re gonna fix this….
Developer here: AI-based audio algorithms are often limited to the samplerate of the training data. Basically if what you're saying is true, they most likely used 48kHz training data to create the model. There are a lot of memory constraints and limitations you have to factor in with real-time AI-based audio algorithms, let alone CPU usage.
LOL @ "You can just route things pretty easily to your tape machine." Yes, while feeding your pet giraffe.
I'd love to see a shootout. Would love to see FabFilter Saturn, Waves tape plugins, Wavesfactory tape, maybe the Slate Tape plugin (I stopped using it cause others seem to do a better job). And of course compare it with real tape and maybe even real equipment stream sites like mix:analog. Just realised that it's a lot of options to compare.
I'd add Softube TAPE as well
@@HumanAfterAll101 I'd add the three UAD versions as well. I own them, but really like the WF one.
Also Goodhertz Wow Ctrl!
@@HumanAfterAll101 Yes!
don't forget IK Multimedia Tape-Collection. Clearly prefer it above the others.
TAIP, Satin, and hardware tape. That’s the shootout we need.
Satin is just one of those plugins that are just good enough you can use it on anything. Not sure if it's accurate in any way, but it makes any mix or even track sound better. But I totally agree, I would love to see this shootout, would be an interesting benchmark to see where we are at in this digital world.
and what about fabfilter's saturn?
I should've read comments before I commented, cause I had the same thought lol
CHOWTAPEMODEL
@@lorenmorgan1931 actually, i prefer the Softube Tape.
yeahh, you should totally make a comparison video! I really like softube's "tape"
fuse audio flywheel also nice
They have a bypass, in minute 5:25. its on the "baby audio" label you click it and it bypass the effect. You passed the mouse to fast so you couldn't see it.
That is so stupid to do tho, why they didn't just put a "bypass" button
@@honeywellparts7541 True
I'd like to see IK Multimedia's tape emulation plugin(s) included in a future shootout. :)
Agreed, but don't confuse it with the newly released Tascam-Tape-Emulations. Don't know how good they are yet. But the tape-collection are by far my favorite tape-emulations. Use them all the time.
I really really likes this plug-in. There are interesting presets and it really adds a lot life to my tracks.
you can bypass by clicking where is says" baby audio" under "start here" top center. I think should be more obvious though
yeah but he never reads the manual 🤓🤷🏼♂️🕺
YES! Please do a full comparison between tape plugins and add the hardware as well.
If you can get a Anamod ATS-1 in it as well, that would be great!
I'm sure a lot of people will be interested.
I am an old musician and studio owner who worked on real analog stuff in 80’s and first 90’s. And I remember that era mostly for the annoying side effects of analog equipment and tape machines. By the way, not mentioning the maintenance costs… So I can’t figure out why newest generations of musicians and audio people loves this defective stuff.
Anyway, the virtual reels of TAIP spin the wrong way. They should spin anti-clockwise, so the left reel feeds the tape and the right one takes it up.
How can a supposedly experienced audio engineer not understand why people love this stuff? We live in a world where you can set up a hybrid system and use the analog gear to take advantage of the so called “defects” and the huge maintenance costs can be mostly avoided. Tape is pretty fricken expensive though.
@@domdraper3221 I suppose it’s a matter of taste and what your goals are in the recording/mixing process. I actually appreciate tape compression and that bit of fattiness in the sound, I used to record at high levels snare drums and kicks into tape to get tape compression. But how can you like noise or wow and flutter and high frequencies heavy distortion? Try to record let’s say an high hat on a 30 ips 24 trk 2 inch tape at a level higher than -15/-20 db. What you get in playback it’s not a cymbal anymore but something similar to a pot cover falling down the stairs. That said it’s obvious that sound must be somewhat “digested” in the record/mix process. Because on one side it has become part of the music production language, and on the other side you really need to smooth out peaks and frequencies buildups to get a good playback on most consumer systems. To obtain this I prefer use eq, compression, saturation with a very specific setting for each sound instead of put my tracks into a tape and slam up the levels. But, as I said, it’s matter of taste and maybe there’s some weird kind of generation gap that affects me.
@@GianlucaSibaldi
Very interesting :)
"To obtain this I prefer use eq, compression, saturation with a very specific setting for each sound instead of put my tracks into a tape and slam up the levels"
It's also interesting that now that the loudness war is hopefully over, we need to regain responsibility and technique of working with more dynamic material.
If before lots of peaks and buildups were eaten by all the compression/limiting/clipping now it's a different game I believe...
@Gianluca Sibaldi I agree with all you say I will only add that several styles of music deliberately destroy the sound as part of the effect. It’s supposed to sound like an old damaged tape.
because if you record everything with clean pres and mix everything with plugins it sounds completely flat and lifeless, and theres no opportunity to be creative with the defects because.. there aren’t any. that being said I would also never go back to the old days of resetting the console or waiting for a sampler to load or running out of cables/channels for things. I’m fine working on the computer and just bouncing things through the analog EQs/filters thanks :)
I'd love to see chowtape included in the tape shootout. It's a free tape plugin that I really enjoy using.
ChowTape rocks. For a heavy saturation pushing into distortion I think this Baby Audio one wins, but ChowTape is versatile, and free!
Yes to the tape analogue vs emulation shoot out. Please include:
• Steinberg’s Magneto II,
• Slate Digital’s Virtual Tape Machines,
• TAIP,
• Hornet’s Tape
Huge thanks 🙏🏽
J37 waves too
I respect that they still ask for your reviews. It makes me like them even more!
The mystery and sound of analog for me is in the spread and bleeding of frequencies across the tape. Every aspect of the process breaths in a way, from the music itself to the electrical conversion and the magnetic aspect of the medium as well as the rolling flux of the tape itself, it all breathes.
I bought it after trying the demo because I loved the sound it gave during my testing.
Don’t really care how it compares to others because plug-ins that color sound quite a bit will all have their specialty.
If you don’t like the sound of a plugin, simply skip it and go for the ones you personally enjoy. But always try the demo!
Black rooster audio - Magnetite
Softube - Tape
Fabfilter - saturn2 tape setting or preset
Shoot out. Shoot out. Please add u-he Satin to the tape plugin list. I’ve had it for years and feel I’m under utilizing it.
Dan worsll has a great video on it. Its super powerful, the emphais/deemphasis is literally magic
Its technically a compressor/expander in series, really really really cool to mess with on various things, and emphasis/deemphasis in general opens up a great world of possibilities
Hornet Tape, Wavesfactory Cassette
If it would be really doing some magic for you you would already know it and use it.
You said you asked the how they trained the ai, and that their answer was really interesting, but you never told us their answer.
@@epilektric the answer was that the AI could not handle the tape machines randomness
@@steverachmadofficial Sure, OK, but then Baby Audio didn't actually answer the question either. If the question is "How did you train your AI?" and the answer is "The AI couldn't handle the tape machine's randomness", that implies they did not train an AI. Obviously, they did. So the real answer would elaborate on the first with something like "We had to isolate specific features of tape audio and then train it to recognized each one individually." Overall, I found that portion of the video a disappointing let down. I wanted to hear more about 'how' but instead I got a non-answer.
I think it sort of lead to that they didn't train an AI on any tape machine itself. So not like "this is a digital sine sweep" and "this is a sine sweep through a 1" studer with bias". So instead they prolly reverse engineered things that best showed the "tape effect". To train you need yes cases and no cases so then they have to give it really "tapey" songs and very modern digital songs. And probably some testing files like solo drums, sine sweeps, and so on. Train it to know the difference between the sounds and then take that difference, create a transfer curve, and apply it to a sound effect.
That, instead of learning the machine itself or running a live simulation inside your machine. My best guess anyways.
I don't think they know what AI really means.
@@steverachmadofficial it’s not random … to do this with AI one would need take a digital recording and then send it to tape … then train the Neural network on the differential …. It’s just a very very complicated equation and the end of the day
TAIP vs Wavesfactory Cassette vs U-He Satin vs RC20 vs Sketch Cassette II vs Softube Tape vs Waves J37 vs Waves Kramer Tape
vs psp vintage warmer 🤓
cassettes and reel 2 reel it's different things, in terms of sound and character
Definitely gotta include Taup from Acoustica and Slates VTM
Wow! That's some impressive stuff! Baby Audio really nailed the feeling of Tape in the coffin! I'm going to try this myself, really interested in the input "Hot" button you didn't touch. Great video as usual Wytse!
Black Rooster Magnetite (which has oversampling btw), Chow Tape Model (amazing free stuff), Ferric TDS Mk2 (updated free plugin), Ozone 9 Vintage Tape vs Hardware.
P.S. I hate that I can't stop those spinning reels!!)
Definitely interested in that shootout. Please use Black Rooster Magnetite in there, too!
Seconding this! Such an interning plugin because it can affect the signal so drastically but it’s not like wavesfactory cassette, it’s not my goto saturation 100% of the time of course but I love it to death
Glad to see baby audio working with intelligent producers such as yourself esp after smooth operator. They seem like a solid company and this plugin seems awesome!
They are a solid company indeed, always replying personally to emails and so forth.
It actually sounds pretty good, and I like the way it glues things together like tape does.
It's interesting they said that it's difficult to deal with noise when training an AI (if you actually want it to reproduce noise), which is exactly right. Machine learning algorithms always want to generalize/optimize what it's trained on. And when it's trained on noise it just tends to average out all randomness, and you end up with nothing/silence.
I've actually attempted to emulate tape using machine learning myself, and personally I couldn't get it all to quite work, so I'm quite impressed with what I'm hearing. I'm guessing the AI part of "tAIp" is purely related to the drive controls and such, but not the noisy controls like "wear" and "noise", but I could be wrong.
As far as I got myself with randomness using machine learning is capturing pseudo random number generators (which just seems like noise but actually isn't).
I found it really useful, it does have a diffent feel compared to other 'satuation' or 'tap emulation' . The test for me is 'does it stand out as a price of useable software regardless of whether it is a good emulation' . And yes itsxa very useful tool. I ran multiple instances, on drums, vocals (surprisingly good de-esser), chorused guitar, strings and bass. Really changed the dynamics of my mix. Thumbs up from me
Could be an interesting idea to test "Chow Tape Model" plugin as well. Its GUI is not so sexy, it's not "AI" but there're far more control (gap, wear, speed, bias, spacing, etc...)
How does it compete with this Taip?
Oh, yes, Chow Tape Model is free.
Agreed. It would be really nice to see how the free alternatives stack up, maybe checking out airwindows too.
I was on the fence with tAIp but I got it for a good price.
I've tried a fair number of tape plugins and watched many more demos but this is the first one that actually gave me the FEELING you described. AI is an overused buzzword but when applied with care and purpose it really does work magic.
Same here, it's the first time I hear a plugin that actually sounds similar to tape.
Also agree that the feeling is there and it is great fun to create with!
So why are we not hearing Magic then?
Yeah, would love to see real tape vs. plug-in shootout! BTW the word BYPASS pops up in the plug-in at 5:25 as you mouse over the BABY AUDIO logo :P
If you do a tape shootout video, you absolutely *need* to include IK Multimedia's Tape Machine Collection in there. As far as I can tell they're based on a very similar approach as Taip here, but give you considerably more control over the process and employ an even more detailed modelling.
The sketch cassette needs to be in the shoot out, please!
version II that is :)
This plugin really surprised me. I used it in my master chain with the "start here" default preset... And it really cleared and lifted the master up without distorting it. Nice one! And then I turned presence, hi-shape and lo-shape to 100 and I was like wtf 🤯 it was so clear, balanced and bassy that I doubted my skills because of the difference between with and without taip. Maybe it was the 3 bottles of champaign that confused me but... What the heck... I have to test that out when I'm back sober again... (probably the hights are going to kill me, but we'll see 😅). Check that for yourself... I'll be back for another review...
You missed trying the middle buttons and you also missed out where the bypass resides, which is surprising, not only that, not only do the knobs expand, they contract as well, so you can zero in on exactly the tone, texture and volume you want.
Where is the bypass, tho? In the logo?
@@timoheinrich8763 in the text "baby audio"
@@anders671 totally obvious ui choice. Does the label change to adult Audio ? 😉
@@realraven2000 hahaha good one
I think it’s amazing UX feedback. The bypass is absolutely hidden, and Taip should be updated to give better UX. The other things you mention are the same thing. It’s perfectly fine to miss things. It means the UX is bad.
I just got this plugin too! I like it. Just used it to create some effected background vocals last night that I'm pretty pumped about 😄
I have all of Baby Audio's plugins and use them often. Nice sound to all of them and easy to use.
Yes Tape Shootout please! ToneEmpire Reelight, UHE Satin, some Waves tapes, Slate VTM
Huh, this is one of the only plugins that actually sounds like a tape. Still $39 a month later btw, awesome
Yes, do the shootout! Use the IK Multimedia tape machines. They are really good as well. :)
I always have many questions with AI-powered plugins. Over the last few years, I have been developing and researching several AI-powered tools in the game industry and big leaps are being made by working to getter and sharing ideas often in the form of research papers. In audio/DSP development that uses AI, this seems to be happening much less often and thus very hard to verify what they are adding. What neural network configuration are you running, what part of the audio pipeline is AI, which inference engine are you using etc. It's the training and data that adds value to your work not so much the network itself so why are these companies so secretive about their "AI"...
To be fair to this plugin though this can be a genuine use for AI and is much less questionable than the "helps generate rhythm or melody AI" plugins that I personally see often in ads. but some openness and clarity will not only be nice for consumers but also amazing for developers who are pushing this relatively new tech forwards.
Agreed - And while it sure sounds as if they are using a GAN to do this, it's just not clear. I really hope they publish some research or at least a process summary and if I ever find one, I'll probably come back here and link it wherever it applies.
_'AI is an overused - and often misused - term._ They figured if they preemptively state that we'd be less inclined to think that TAIP is part and contributor to that very problem.
What I've learned recently (by way of my fave tech podcast, Trashfuture) is that a lot of AI in general is usually neither A nor I. It's more often still people behind the tech, duck taping things together to make it function. AI is more of a buzz word that's good for PR. It's like when in the 1950s a, tech company claimed they built an intelligent robot ls to showcase at the world's fair, and it turned out to just be a guy in a suit.
In most cases AI is just a cleverly written algorithm, not machine learning. And in a *lot* of cases, can fit the use case much better and more consistently than the ML option. They do imply quite heavily on their website that they're using a neural net(ML), but they don't say that's what they're doing, they use the wording 'we can' multiple times rather than 'we did' so I'm inclined to believe that they aren't using ML and are only trying to get people to think they did.
If it sounds good and you think the value is there, go ahead and use it, but this sounds like it's walking very close to the line of what's considered false advertising.
You are one funny dude! I love your silliness backed by your solid knowledge. And I like the song. Groove On!.
I tried a lot of tape emulations in the last few years and I have to say that for my ears this is the first plugin that adds some real vibe... perhaps too much vibe for things like mastering and adding subtle saturation in a mix (I'd still use Saturn 2 and Softube's Tape for these use-cases).
I genuinely enjoy this a lot.
As a borderline-millennial home recorder/producer I never even saw a realt tape machine in my entire life so I don't really know how it relates to the real thing... but I totally see myself using this as a sound design and tone shaping tool for the years to come.
Definite +1 for doing a tape comparison video - I'd vote TAIP (which I've been pronouncing "tape"), RC-20 (which does many other things also but is such a go-to for many people that its tape aspect should really be zoomed in on), and Cassette by Wavesfactory (because Wavesfactory makes incredible things). I don't have Satin so can't say there. Maybe by narrowing down the features you could compare several.
What TAIP is doing is really unique and a clever approach, I think: they used the AI (likely a Generative Adversarial Network / GAN) to compare the difference between dry and tape-recorded specimens, and to recreate the difference space. I do appreciate the relative *simplicity* of its controls compared to others mentioned.
Tape is magic! Let's do some deep dives to discover just why!
I suggest make the video again :) more detailed.
This plug in in my opinion it’s a game changer in the way it works and the sound is really good. Baby Audio deserves
Sounds pretty good! And yeah, please bring us the shootout! 👍🏻😀
For the Tape Emulation Shootout we DEFINITELY need the Fabfilter Saturn².
It is my main Saturation Plugin and i would really like to see if it holds up against competition in a fair comparison video.
(Also Cpu-Load would be kinda interesting to see in that test as well)
Thanks 🤘
The 'tape reels' are rotating in the wrong direction, they should be going counterclockwise.
Isn't the bypass button the "Baby Audio" Logo in the top-middle like on smooth operator?
Your tape machine, TAIP, Black Rooster Audio Magnetite, Waves J37, UAD Oxide (or any of them), Slate VTM
The bypass button is in the middle. I bought this plugin today and I am very satisfied. I'm going to use it often (I think :)
Lets be honest... Been in the business for 35 years... Worked with 24 tracks/Dolby SR for many years... Our goal then was to record and playback as " transparently and accurately " as possible.
We did as much as we could to keep the dynamics natural and opened and the freq spectrum as wide as possible...
And remember that what we did ended up on vinyl... The MOST restrictive medium in all the analog chain...
Analog is a world of " limitations"...
Today's digital high end converters and DAWs are way more transparent and accurate than any analog gear you can get. its paradoxical...
Therefore to get the analog feel and sound, didital recording must subtract elements from its full data.
Tape saturation is a good example.
It is in fact a reduced dynamic response
in the mostly audible range in the highest part of the freq spectrum.
Same principle goes for limiters and compressors in a wider spectrum.
But why do we still want to sound
like 50 years ago ? Its all " cultural".
Its part of a long history in the pop culture when vinyl records and radio
dictated the technical restrictions to suit
their limitations... And we got used to it .
Just listen to the best recent digital classical recordings VS the vinyls and you get the idea...
To bad we got stuck in this " compressed limited saturated distorted
low pass cut high pass cut restrictive "
way of producing non classical music...
It's emotional not rational.
@@hornox4life That's when the problems begin...😏
Thank you for reminding me how much I don't miss tape or analog for that matter. I maintained tape machines of all kinds tape machines in recording studios and broadcast. I've spent most of my professional career trying to record the source more accurately. I think the question really is, does it really sound better or does just sound more familiar?
white sea you really ought to link the songs used in the videos because they're complete bangers
Yeah I definitely need a comparison with different plugins, so we can hear if AI really makes the difference or not.
My recommendations: Slate Tape, IK Track-S Tape 99, etc.
Yes, we need that shout-out. Some suggestions: Softube Tape, U_HE Satin, TAIP, TAIPEI STUDIO (London Acoustics), Tonebooster Reelbus and IK Multimedia Tape Rack!
Hey. Melda Productions did machine learning years ago already. This technique has its limits. For a Shootout video I recommend Satin from U-he and P42 Climax (Tape Studer preset) from Pulsar Modular. Satin was the king for many many years but the P42 plays in another league and took over the crown effortless. Unbelievable audio quality and legit vividness with non linearity and little things happening with randomness. When you do such a shootout, have in mind a tape emulation (also the good and interesting TAIP) only can show its real power when put on all channels and compare their cumulative effect. Every instance of P42 for example will act a tiny bit different. Like real hardware. Thank you. Enjoy. Cheers
Crown is uad atr102 for mastering, not distorted gi.micks. Tape by Softube, is fantastic also. The rest is alright.
@@levondarratt787 if you aren't into distorted gimmicks, you'll sure love P42 Climax. Awesome saturation with a soft very natural break-up behavoir, completely different from what I heard so far ITB.
@@nichttuntun3364 that one is unknown to me. Thanks for the recommend, NotDoDo :)
@@levondarratt787 hey cool :) I am curious how you like it. "nichttuntun" is from ZEN and roughly translated would be "to do not-doing" what means being focused in here and now. diffucult to translate ;)
Tape shoot out would be awesome, waves J37 , Kramer Tape, Softube tape, Acustica Taupe, Overloud gem tape, Slate virtual tape machines, baby audio.
I’m using it from two weeks and I think that is one of the best tape emulator plugin that there are outside…..
this guy has one of the best personalities ever. keep being you my friend.
Well, I was waiting for your review.
Your vocal idea at 7:11 is gold material 🧡🤣
Would be cool to hear your opinions on Toneboosters Reelbus 4. Everyone seems to skip that in every test on tape-plugins.
I find the 3 a lot better!
Definitely great bang for the buck
@@nickskywalker2568 i've liked 4 a lot more. but i have no chance to compare it to a real thing.
Reelbus 4 > TAIP IMHO not just Pancz x Softube Tape
It sounds like it's just a bundled set of compressors, modulation, eq, noise generator, and some distortion. But made with a specific set of parameters to create that emulation. It's something that can be done even with Reaper's stock plugins, though it's a lot of work. But this one in one single VST, does make the workflow more convenient.
Yes. Please do a shootout video. When I started out in music we only had 2 inch 24 track. I still remember the long, long nights (and HORROR) manually "editing" some song by literally cutting and splicing the actual tape. ONE bad edit and it was back to the drawing board. At that time in my life my apartment mate's father use to work as a producer in one of our major local TV news centers and would sell me their used, soon to be decommissioned Ampex 2 inch tapes for $125 USD when brand new were well over $250 from Sam Ash music stores and started at $500 if purchased directly from the recording studio. Ahhh, those were the days. FYI....I was in my late teens/early twenty's back then...so 30+ years ago? Where does the time go????
Yes, on the shootout idea. I'd like to see the Waves J37 emulator. It's better than you might expect.
This thing looks cool, but it doesn't really remind me that much of tape. It's more like an AI box that magically makes things sound better. Which is both fascinating, and depressing. Is it really going to be that hard to train a AI to just mix and master the whole damn song? You and I are probably already relics of the past, my friend.
But it sounds great, that warm feel its what some of us want to add when tape effect is needed.
I mentioned before that I really like the tAIp plugin, but not as an actual tape emulation. In truth it´s not meant to be used as an true emulation of a real tape machine, there are other plugins that does that. I mainly use tAIp as a saturation and sound shaping effect which it does very good. The only gripe I have with this plugin is it´s aliasing it´s making, they should add at least 8x oversampling in a future update.
What plugins do you recommend for emulation?
Yessss. Do it! Waves Kramer and J37 would be good to hear compared and maybe Soundtoys tape delay without the delay?
I think that this plugin is unreachable in the impact that provides. It's fantastic - sounds like a real tape and even better! Wowwww - I hope they gonna make it even better with future updates with oversampling and more stuff but eventhough if you put it in anything it makes dramatic impact and brings to life everything!! I can't believe this plugin
I want to see that shoot out, FabFilter, Waves, and this one... so cool.
I'd be interested in comparison with Softube tape, iZotope vintage tape & Toneboosters Reel tape
Add the CHOW tape plugin to the shootout! It's free but really nice
Just bought it - I love a bit of tape around but honestly can't be bothered with the real thing. I haven't used any "real" hardware for at least 10 years now and it has been a real freedom! I'm not really bothered about authenticity - the difference between the plugin and the hardware is similar to the difference between two examples of a piece of vintage hardware anyway.
Yes!!! Shootout between “in the box” and actual hardware! Please, please! Thank you as always.
A plugin with a slider for adding noise as a feature while getting noise in the music is the biggest issue for the rest of the world. Great show !
I would like to hear that tape comparison! It would be awesome.
Love to see a tape shootout. My favorite is IK Tape Machines (Tape 24 specifically) definitely add those to the shootout!
Shoooooooot out! I've been impressed with a tape plugin called Chow Tape Model. Very utilitarian and very free.
+1 for Chow Tape Model
The baby audio words at the top of UI is the bypass button.
Would love to see a shootout between your machine and software including Taip and perhaps Acustica Taupe, Black Rooster Magnetite and Fabfilter Saturn in the line up.
Shootout ftw - Softube Tape, Fabfilter Saturn, Taip, Satin. Man, I love saturation.
This is my favourite saturation plugin now
Yes! I needed my Sandstorm fix! Thank You! :)
yeeesss, tape machines shootout!... the IK multimedia stuff would be a good contender
TAIP, U-he Satin, Hornet Tape, Tapeface from KIIVE Audio, London Acoustics Taipei Studio, Acustica Audio Taupe and hardware tape.
I need to get this plugin right away
Would like to see CHOW Tape Model in the shootout, if possible?
Yeah would be sweet!
Sketch casette, this, reels and your machine
Would love to see a shootout video and please test the Softube Tape plugin too in that case ☺️🙏🏻
awesome review!
chow tape needs to be in the comparison as well !
subbed just so I can check out that tape plugin shootout in the future, asap
Nice Test, love it. I would love the tape shootout. Put the IK Tapes and Waves Tapes in the shootout ja
Please try to include the Black Rooster Audio tape plugin (Magnetite) in your shootout. It's frequently on sale for $29 and I personally think it sounds awesome. I reach for it often.
Throw TB Reelbus v4 into the shootout. It's the only plugin that I thought sounded really close to a Studer a812.
Love your review style!
Would like a shootout (This one, Slate Digital, Waves & Your Actual Hardware Tape). Thanks. Love your videos
1) Slate's tape pluguin
2) Waves j27 if i'm not wrong
3) Softtube Tape
4) Airwindows has a tape pluguin
5) And the best free tape - Chow DSP ChowTape
At least some of them should be compared...
Absolutely yes, shootout including 'Tape' by Softube!
I like your Barry White voice :)
With the size of your channel, you shouldn't have much issue finding a Dev willing to give an interview and demystify the 'magic' of hw emulation plugins, that would be awesome.
This could well be one of the best plugins in terms of simulating wow, flutter and the real tape feeling if only the input stage wouldn‘t alias like crazy, no matter what you do. There is no oversampling option and the plugin runs at 48kHz internally. So external oversampling or higher sample rates in the DAW don‘t help.
Hope they‘re gonna fix this….
Developer here: AI-based audio algorithms are often limited to the samplerate of the training data. Basically if what you're saying is true, they most likely used 48kHz training data to create the model. There are a lot of memory constraints and limitations you have to factor in with real-time AI-based audio algorithms, let alone CPU usage.
Agree with the input Alias'ing. It is hard to dial in a more subtle amount of drive.
Nice to know that this plug in runs at 48k. I was going to buy it but will now wait to see if it gets revised for 96k.