Every so often, whenever I find myself underwhelmed by the current offering of VST plugins, I bump into something that previously had escaped my attention. Well, to be fair, I noticed Incipit from Inear Display when it was released (in March) earlier this year; I just never really bothered to run the demo and check it out. But now that I’ve been test driving a good number of multi-effects plugins lately, this one has quickly shot to the top of my go-to list.
Of course, it’s not the most powerful delay within the scope of existence, but its strength lies in its stability. Most plugins with multiple delay lines and a plethora of modulation options swallow up vital system resources, so I’m very happy to say that that’s not the case here.
Incipit was made to be used and abused, pushed to its limits without pushing your CPU past the breaking point. Delay-based effects are easily the most CPU intensive, especially when you modulate delay times, so developer and owner of Inear Display Thomas Hennebert took it upon himself to create a multi-delay plugin that specializes in that (among other things) without the burden of potentially fatal CPU spikes.
The Review
Incipit has three “Effects Chains”, each with a dedicated Pitch Shifter, a host-syncable Delay module and Amplifier controls referred to as “Gainer” and “Panner” in the Modulation Matrix. In the “Output” section, there’s a multimode filter with the typical lowpass, highpass, bandpass and notch filter. Also, there’s a file browser (accessible via the Preset bar above the oscilloscope), a highly sophisticated Randomizer engine, four host-syncable LFOs, a global “Mod Scale” knob and three Macro controls, which are also targeted within the Modulation Matrix. On the whole, it’s a lot of power in a plugin that doesn’t require much of it.
I’m just gonna get this out of the way since it’s something you’ll probably notice immediately: there is no feedback filtering, which is a pretty big deal, especially when you’re messing around with lots of feedback. However, I’ve discussed this with Thomas, who plans to include feedback filtering at some point down the road in a future update. That being said, I haven’t experienced too many problems with high feedback settings, so it’s not a complete dealbreaker, but it’s a pretty important feature that should be implemented.
See also: Tritik Moodal REVIEW!The “Pitch” shifting controls are actually pitch shifting “grain streams” anywhere from 10-200 ms in length, so don’t expect velvety smooth pitching shifting here; in fact, I’ve found these pitched grains so dissonant (for sustained sounds anyway) that I hardly see the point of trying to use them musically. Perhaps the results might be a little more musical if we could decimate pitch values and tune the grain streams ever so slightly apart for a fatter sound. However, I do find the pitch shifting controls incredibly useful for dialing in strange inharmonic overtones, so I’d love an option to adjust the pitch in frequency instead of semitones.
Okay, that’s enough ice cold criticism. Now let’s look at what Incipit does extraordinarily well: modulation! The Modulation Matrix offers six targets for each Effects Chain, two for each LFO, three for the Output, three for Macro controls, and a Global Scale level for all of the above, which allows you to manipulate any one of these thirty-two parameters at once with the global Mod Scale knob on the front panel. I rarely see modulation targets for LFO parameters, so that’s a big fat thumbs up; you can create beautifully complex, evolving sounds with a daisy chain of modulated LFO rates and depths. I would like to have the option to modulate the feedback in the Pitch Shifter and Delay modules, or maybe the grain size for a “jitter” effect, but things like that are usually very CPU intensive and would most certainly hinder Incipit’s performance.
Even though you might not be able to modulate some of the parameters you would like to, the “MIDI Map” option within the “Config” menu lets you recall MIDI CC mappings so you can control those parameters however you want, even if your host doesn’t feature a MIDI learning system. There’s even a “MIDI” folder in the plugin’s internal folder structure that appears in the preset browser. MIDI assignments are quick and painless: simply press and hold the ALT key, then left-click on virtually any parameter on the front panel and you can setup your own MIDI mappings in a matter of minutes.
Another really useful feature in the Config menu is the “New Random Seed” option that will more or less scramble the settings under the hood within the Randomizer engine, which just so happens to be one of the most flexible randomizers I’ve used in some time. You can randomize settings split up into four groups, each of which have a designated button for LFO, Matrix, FX and All. A depth knob at the center of the Randomizer will adjust the amount of random values sent to the desired parameters. I usually pride myself on dialing in presets the old fashioned way, but I can’t deny that tinkering with Incipit’s Randomizer is both inspiring and fun. You can create a lot of really quirky sounds this way.
The Verdict
For the purpose of modulating delay lines to create flanger effects or more extreme modulations that often remind me of old 1980’s analog audio cassette tape destruction, this is a perfect tool for anyone who might be dissatisfied with more traditional delay plugins that focus more on the coloration of the delayed signal instead of the manipulation of delay times. It will need a few more updates until it has earned “workhorse” status, but the developer is obviously very well aware of that. However, at a modest price of forty euros, I think Incipit deserves a considerable amount of praise, especially when taking into account the arsenal of features it has on offer, and its surprisingly feather-light CPU load.
More info: Incipit (€39 + VAT)
Inear Display Incipit Delay Review
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Features8
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Sound7
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Workflow7
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Performance9
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Design8
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Pricing10
