Initial Audio releases Initial Clipper, a freeware soft clipper effect in VST and AU plugin formats for digital audio workstations on Windows and macOS.
Initial Clipper is a soft clipper plugin with a few extra bells and whistles. Namely, it features a real-time peak display, a LUFS meter, and additional saturation controls.
Let’s start with the saturation controls. Initial Clipper sports two separate saturation knobs (Positive and Negative), which apply harmonic and non-harmonic distortion, respectively. Thanks to these controls, you can add extra harmonics to your signal on top of those already generated by soft clipping.
The only other two control parameters are the Input Gain and Threshold knobs. These control the soft clipper circuit. Input Gain boosts the signal volume on the input, and Threshold sets the level at which the clipping occurs.
The real-time peak display at the top of the interface shows the input signal’s peak volume. It’s a convenient way to visualize how much clipping is applied to the signal.
Lastly, the LUFS meter on the output helps monitor the signal loudness. That’s a handy feature if you’re using the plugin on the master channel. I often place a clipper before the limiter to give the signal a subtle loudness boost.
The GUI looks nice and clean, with a dark color scheme that’s easy on the eyes. More importantly, it’s resizable by clicking and dragging the bottom-right corner.
So there you go; Initial Clipper is a soft clipper with several extra features, all of which are pretty useful. The saturation controls are my favorite, and I think I’ll keep Initial Clipper in my sound design arsenal.
Here’s more info from the product page:
“Initial Clipper is a free soft clipper plugin that prevents your audio signal from going above zero decibels. It does this by smoothing the peaks with soft clipping starting from the threshold. The faster and higher the peaks, the more you need to bring down the threshold to get a pleasing sound.”
Initial Clipper is free to download from Initial Audio’s website. A valid email address is required to complete the checkout process. You’ll find the download on the My Account page.
If you’re looking for more ways to distort your audio, check out our free BPB Dirty Filter and BPB Saturator plugins.
Download: Initial Clipper (12.9 MB download size, ZIP archive, 64-bit VST2/VST3/AU plugin formats for Windows & macOS)
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Last Updated on November 10, 2021 by Tomislav Zlatic.
