TL;DW: ButterComp2 is improved ButterComp with an output control and sound upgrades.

ButterComp2

As requested, ButterComp with output gain. And an unexpected bugfix. And a tone upgrade!

So here’s what happened: in working on the new ButterComp, I found a mistake. Because of a thing C programming lets you do (assign, in an if statement) it turned out the original ButterComp didn’t actually use the interleaved compressors after all. The one in CStrip does, but actual ButterComp (which has its own distinct fans!) doesn’t. It’s strictly a bi-polar compressor: it does each half of the wave different, and blends them.

Because of this, I’ve made the source code (also being released) represent what the plugin actually does in practice. It’s a little simplified, and it’s worth paying attention to, for people who like the simplest most minimal form of ButterComp.

But, because of this, I get to release ButterComp2 as very much its own thing! I even came up with a subtle tweak: it modifies its release just a touch, slowing it when the signal’s hot. That’s on a sample-by-sample basis… and it’s on the OUTPUT of the compressor. So, this further smoothing effect is subject to the output level control. And the dry/wet. In fact if you had it all dry, the release modification is therefore as if you had it on the input… making it blend not only between positive and negative wave compression, but also between feedback and feed-forward release time modifications :)

But really what you need to do is listen to it.

With the interleaved compressors fully working AND the bi-polar compression on each, there is indeed the four distinct compressors working in parallel. The whole thing is very gentle (hence the name) but you’ll get a glue and tonal reshaping out of it as it will even out the bulk of the waveform, making it balanced between positive and negative. It’ll also soak up treble detail in a characteristic way, and you’ll really hear the quality of ButterComp2 on ambiences and reverb tails. It’ll float things in space in this holographic way… I thought it made for a significant tonal improvement over the simpler ButterComp.

All this work is supported by my Patreon, and I’ve got plenty more to do so I appreciate the help. Although the challenges of continuing to deal with my Mom and Dad’s deaths (and even the gray cat: she passed away between Mom and Dad) are still with me, I’m keeping busy as much as I can, and some things have gone well: for anyone concerned about Steinberg’s plans for sunsetting VST2, I have now got their license to continue making VST2. Signed and everything, so I can’t help anybody post-October who wants to make VST2s but I’ll be able to keep making them, legally. Pretty sure I can also specify what files you’d need to add to my open source that would make the results build.

In the future, things like music and plugin-making become a kind of communication. There’ll be just one commercial plugin, with 57,000 knobs on it, and you can only rent it and everyone commercial must have it… and then the rest of us, we share interesting little creations back and forth, our works appreciated by a circle of friends who happen to be friends of music or of coding, linked across states and countries by our cooperation.

Until then… thanks for listening to my curious and awkward but helpful voice :)