KVR Audio

alligatorlizard · Post by **alligatorlizard** » Sat May 30, 2015 8:38 pm

Hi,

Just spent two days demo-ing Ohmicide and Trash 2. Both sound excellent, loads of fancy presets, very clear modern sound - however I'm not convinced the actual distortion in either is as good as the pedals/amps in Guitar Rig 5. Or as a guitarist, am I just used to the sound of stomp distortion pedals??

Currently my distortion setup is a combination of guitar rig (for heavy drive/dist) and Saturn (for more subtle saturation). I don't find guitar rig is great on drums tho (except for trashy sort of fx), and Saturn while great for saturation, isn't great for crazy/smooth/thick dist. Hence why looking at Ohmicide/Trash2 - I also like putting (occasionally heavy) distortion on synth/bass so looking for something that can do this well too.

Here's what I'm finding from the demos:

Ohmicide: creates ultra-cool sfx - lovely crisp clear sound - presets would be great for sound-design/loop mangling. However when I tried it in existing mixes, found it hard to get good results - presets are too sfx-y, and just auditioning the distortion types on their own (ie single band no fx), I wasn't too impressed with the sound of the distortion. Despite really cool sounding drum presets for sfx, hard to dial in for example a simple nice gritty dist.

Trash 2: more of a workhorse unit I feel - also some impressive presets and seems more versatile than ohmicide, more intuitive workflow & UI too... In existing mixes, I found it much more useful, and auditioning the individual distortion types, there seemed to be a much wider variety, and nicer types than Ohmicide - some more classic sounding ones maybe? Not such wild drum presets as Ohmicide, but found it very easy to dial in a nice basic dist however on existing drum parts.

While demoing, I was initially so impressed with the sound of these plugins I could see myself completely replacing guitar rig as far as synth/drum dist go. However, as I compared in more depth I started to feel that the guitar rig distortion pedals actually sound far better as far as the distortion itself goes - and that what was making ohmicide/trash2 sound so good is the other parameters e.g. the body/shape/compression in ohmicide, the filters and convolution in Trash2. Turning off all fx but the distortion, I think I prefer guitar rig. And GR does have filters/compressors, or I've got others to augment the signal chain. eg A sausage fattener after GR makes it sound a lot closer to the crisp compressed sound of the other plugins.

However, there's one thing that bothers me - guitar rig seems to "muffle" the sound slightly, whereas ohmicide/trash2 leave it completely crisp and clear. Maybe this is to do with the distortion being modeled on analog pedal units, which maybe do have a limited or altered frequency response? Also I do realise GR is not multiband like the other plugins, but while comparing specifically the distortion types I was using ohmicide/trash2 on single band.

It's probably a case of "each plugin has it's uses" - guitar rig for more real/classic sounding analog dist - ohmicide or trash2 for more crisp modern/digital/sfx sounds - but curious to hear if anyone else has any thoughts on these plugins, and why it might be that though I'm preferring the actual distortion sound of guitar rig, it's just not giving me as crisp and sharp a sound overall as ohmicide/trash2.

foosnark · Post by **foosnark** » Sat May 30, 2015 9:00 pm

Guitar Rig is meant to model common stomp boxes designed for guitars, including frequency response. And a lot of stompboxes roll off highs that you'd often want to keep on a synth or drums. Some fuzz pedals are a bit more pointed, though.

I use Guitar Rig pretty much 100% of the time for lap steel and bass, but rarely for synths or drums.

For synth/drums distortion I have a few fuzz stompboxes and also use a variety of plugins -- some commercial, some free, some I wrote myself.

I find Ohmicide does weird very well; I don't use it for much else.

realmarco · Post by **realmarco** » Sun May 31, 2015 1:41 am

yeah guitar rig isnt supposed to be compared to Trash and ohms's stuff

you can do Multiband and really get deep, but its designed for Guitar and bass.

if u want to get Dubstep or wutever ohms or trash are quicker

morelia · Post by **morelia** » Sun May 31, 2015 1:51 am

Trash seems to have presets and settings that suggest it is intended to compete with amp sims, at least to some degree ("Trash features extremely realistic amp, device, cabinet, effect and speaker convolution modeling"). Personally I don't think it succeeds in that domain though. I should add that, like the OP I am a guitar player and that probably influences my sonic preference a bit. I've demoed Trash and Trash 2 many times, wanting to like it for the features but never went for the sound. Ohmicide immediately grabbed me though. Not an amp sim at all but great distortion sounds. Have even used it as a stompbox distortion (on steroids) in front of various amp sims (e.g. Guitar Rig).

TIMT · Post by **TIMT** » Sun May 31, 2015 12:55 pm

blergh

alligatorlizard · Post by **alligatorlizard** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 3:47 pm

Thanks for the input, useful to know how others use these plugins.

After more demoing, I think I probably will end up buying Trash 2 - it covers a lot of ground (with great filters/convolution etc) and it's distortion definitely works in cases where guitar rig is too wild and muddy or where Saturn is too subtle.

As for Ohmicide, i really wanted to like it, but it's such an incomprehensible plugin to start with, and by the time you get the hang of it, the demo craps out with white noise... I reckon I could create a great track around ohmicide and it special fx - but I reckon Trash 2 will be a lot more useful in the mix.

I also noticed that there are a lot of good demo's/tutorials for Trash 2 (and saturn) on youtube, with people building sounds from scratch - whereas with ohmicide, every single video is just people going thru the presets and going "that's cool!"

Anyway, they're all good plugins, and tho I'll almost certainly buy Trash 2, I think I'll keep going back to guitar rig for any really extreme analog type fx (and don't forget, tho it's not multiband, gr5 has all sorts of filter/eq/modulation modules - in fact you can set up modulations to the distortion that you can't do in the other plugins!)

VariKusBrainZ · Post by **VariKusBrainZ** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 4:01 pm

Also worth checking for creative disto

http://www.glitchmachines.com/products/subvert

SKnote should be soon releasing a VST emulation of the Distressor, which will no doubt sound superb

geroyannis · Post by **geroyannis** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 4:37 pm

alligatorlizard wrote:[...] I think I'll keep going back to guitar rig for any really extreme analog type fx (and don't forget, tho it's not multiband, gr5 has all sorts of filter/eq/modulation modules [...]

GuitarRig can do multiband. It's not the most convenient plugin to set up, but it can definitely work in multiband mode if you want to, using the Split tool.

Aubrey Lamont · Post by **Aubrey Lamont** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 6:53 pm

VariKusBrainZ wrote:Also worth checking for creative disto

http://www.glitchmachines.com/products/subvert

SKnote should be soon releasing a VST emulation of the Distressor, which will no doubt sound superb

That's excellent news, but isn't a distressor a compressor rather than a distortion box?

gaf_thit · Post by **gaf_thit** » Mon Jun 01, 2015 11:55 pm

Have you tried Melda Multibanddistortion? Quite nice in my opinion. Though I must confess I haven't tried it on synth more than once. Good result if I remember correctly.

alligatorlizard · Post by **alligatorlizard** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 11:28 am

geroyannis wrote:
alligatorlizard wrote:[...] I think I'll keep going back to guitar rig for any really extreme analog type fx (and don't forget, tho it's not multiband, gr5 has all sorts of filter/eq/modulation modules [...]
GuitarRig can do multiband. It's not the most convenient plugin to set up, but it can definitely work in multiband mode if you want to, using the Split tool.

Ah, I do use the splitter for dry/wet on inserts but hadn't realised it can split freq bands too! Good to know - although I'm quite happy to use just one distortion and shape with eq generally - only plugin where i find multiband really intuitive is saturn, maybe as there aren't so many different dist types to choose from - it's therefore easy to pick say a warm tube for bass freq then gentle saturation or smooth amp for higher etc. - not really tried multiband yet with Trash as haven't got familiar enough with the myriad of different distortions as to know which is best for bass or for mids etc.

Apostate · Post by **Apostate** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 11:33 am

I used Guitar Rig all over my upcoming album, for both my BC Rich V and my 70s Strat. Sounds really good, but because of the HS pickups in my Strat I had to add extra drive with an old Yngwie DOD 308 pedal.

Ohmicide is killer for distortion, I use it for synths mostly, sometimes a tiny bit on a drum bus. Depends.

GaryG · Post by **GaryG** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 11:57 am

geroyannis wrote:
alligatorlizard wrote:[...] I think I'll keep going back to guitar rig for any really extreme analog type fx (and don't forget, tho it's not multiband, gr5 has all sorts of filter/eq/modulation modules [...]
GuitarRig can do multiband. It's not the most convenient plugin to set up, but it can definitely work in multiband mode if you want to, using the Split tool.

FTR, I think you use the Crossover Mix tool for frequency splits.

alligatorlizard · Post by **alligatorlizard** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 5:53 pm

Apostate wrote:I used Guitar Rig all over my upcoming album, for both my BC Rich V and my 70s Strat. Sounds really good, but because of the HS pickups in my Strat I had to add extra drive with an old Yngwie DOD 308 pedal.

Ohmicide is killer for distortion, I use it for synths mostly, sometimes a tiny bit on a drum bus. Depends.

Yeah I think I'll be sticking with guitar rig for guitars (and maybe the odd synth lead) - not impressed with trash/saturn or ohmicide on guitars - but for synths/drums, these plugins do seem much better suited.

Anyway, have now bought Trash 2 - especially as it's on sale right now, couldn't find a good reason not to. The included convolutions are amazing too, what a great idea to put this feature in a distortion unit!

geroyannis · Post by **geroyannis** » Wed Jun 03, 2015 11:38 pm

GaryG wrote:
geroyannis wrote:
alligatorlizard wrote:[...] I think I'll keep going back to guitar rig for any really extreme analog type fx (and don't forget, tho it's not multiband, gr5 has all sorts of filter/eq/modulation modules [...]
GuitarRig can do multiband. It's not the most convenient plugin to set up, but it can definitely work in multiband mode if you want to, using the Split tool.
FTR, I think you use the Crossover Mix tool for frequency splits.

You are correct, of course

Guitar Rig distortion compared to Ohmicide & Trash 2 (for synth & drums)