vst.media_addon
version 0.4.0



Introduction

Installing

Configuration

Usage

Examples

Limitations

Contact





VST is a trademark von Steinberg Soft- und Hardware GmbH

Usage


As the name implies, the VST add-on is not an application itself (well, it does include the preferences application, but that's another story). To make real use of VST plugins you'll still need a Media Kit savvy application that is able to instantiate and stream data through media add-ons. At the time of this writing, the only application to support this was Cortex. But you can expect more applications featuring this kind of functionality in the near future, and even with Cortex alone you can already accomplish a whole slew of different things. The following is a basic description of how to use VST plugins within Cortex.

Dormant Nodes

Media-AddOns window After launching Cortex, you should see the VST plugins you've installed listed in Cortex' Media-AddOns window. Effect plugins (which are the only ones supported currently) will show up with a yellow "stomp-box" icon.

This list tells you what nodes are available on your system, they are referred to as dormant (inactive) nodes.

  • You can get a short description of a dormant node by resting the mouse over it to bring up a tool-tip. For more detailled information, right-click on the item and select Get Info.

Instantiating a Node

To instantiate (activate) such a node, just drag its entry out of the Media Add-Ons windows and drop it onto a free spot in Cortex' main window.

Node panel In the main window, a corresponding node panel should show up, displaying the name and icon of the node.



  • This will not make the dormant node disappear from the Media Add-Ons window. Effectively, you can have many different instances of a particular dormant node in the main window by repeating the operation above.

As with dormant nodes, you can right-click on the panel and select Get Info from the context menu to see some information about the node. This is not the same info as for the dormant node, rather it will include things like latency and run mode.
  • The latency displayed in Cortex' info windows is always the total latency, ie the time in ms it will take from the input of the node to your speakers, effectively including the latency of all nodes down the stream. In addition, the VST add-on will calculate latency dynamically based on buffer size and complexity of the plugins algorithm.

Getting Connected

The node panel of an instantiated plugin will display the nodes input and outputs, where inputs are on the left side and outputs on the right side of the panel (or if you're using Cortex in "Mini Icon View", inputs are at the top and outputs at the bottom), showing an abbreviation of their names as label. To view the full name of an input or output, rest the mouse over it and a tool-tip will appear displaying its name and the type of media it supports (raw audio in this case).
  • Again you can select Get Info from the inputs/outputs context menu for detailled information, including the preferred data format of that "jack".

VST plugins can currently have one the following input/output configurations:
  • Single mono input, single mono output
  • Single mono input, single stereo output
  • Single stereo input, single stereo output
  • Single stereo input, single mono output
  • Both stereo and mono inputs, single stereo output, where the two inputs are alternatives and can not be connected at the same time. These are provided for plugins that do stereo processing by default but can also accept the same signal on both channels.
  • Both stereo and mono inputs, single mono output.
  • The VST specification does actually allow for more inputs and outputs, but generally very few host applications can make use of such plugins. Nevertheless, support for any number of inputs and outputs will be added to the VST add-on very soon.

To actually connect two nodes, they will have to negotiate a common media format. Steinberg has chosen 32 bit floating point format for the VST specification, so this is the format preferred by VST plugins. However, the VST add-on has been designed to handle the conversion from and to many common audio formats, most prominently 16 bit Integer as used by most consumer-level soundcards and the vast majority of sound file formats. What this means is that you're able to directly connect VST plugins to most audio nodes, and if conversion is necessary it will be done automatically.

In Cortex, connecting two nodes works by dragging a virtual wire from one jack to the other. If format negotiation succeeds the wire will remain in place, otherwise you'll get an error message.
  • Currently, you should always connect the input of a VST plugin first, because this usually determines the buffer-size that will be used for format negotiation on the output.

Note that you'll always have to connect a stereo output to the stereo input of a VST plugin, and a mono output to the mono input of a VST plugin. Sometimes this will not be possible.
  • To find out whether an input of a VST plugin is stereo or mono, just wait for the tool-tip to display, as the name of the input includes this information (it will be something like "[plugin-name] Stereo/Mono Input"). Other nodes will not necessarily do this, so you might have to request an info window on the jack (by invoking Get Info from the context menu).

Tweaking a Plugins Parameters

One of the first things you'll want to do with a plugin is to look at the parameters it offers to configure its "behaviour". The VST add-on offers three different kind of interfaces for this:
  • Parameter View:
    VST plugins export their set of parameters to the Media Kit via standard Parameter Webs. These simply define the name, type and range of every parameter and can be displayed using different themes. This is what you get when you double click a node or select Tweak Parameters from the node panels' context menu.

    Parameter View


  • Custom Control Panel:
    Some plugins include their own spiffy user interface. You can bring that up by selecting Start Control Panel from the Advanced sub menu in the node panels' context menu.

  • Default Control Panel:
    If you invoke Start Control Panel on a plugin without a custom editor, a default control panel will be displayed.

    Default Control Panel


    Often this interface will be better readable than the parameter view, because it displays the current value for every parameter as text. To change a parameter, select its entry in the list so it gets highlighted, and either:
    • drag the vertical slider on the right side of the window
    • drag horizontally inside the list itself (use the left mouse button for normal precision and the right button for fine grained control)
    • or use the left/right arrow keys on your keyboard


    Pressing the Mute button will instantly cause the plugin to stop passing incoming data further downstream, while Bypass will just bypass the effect, which means you'll be hearing the original audio data.

    If supported by the plugin, you'll also get a peak display at the bottom of the window. It is neither really precise nor beautiful, but at least the latter might change in future.


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