AU/VST replacement for Logic "Space Designer"

[Prime Mover]

I use MainStage for all my live performance. I stay the heck away from any Apple VIs (mostly because I don't know them, and the ones I have used pale in comparison to my NI/Korg/GForce/Arturia stuff). But the ONE Apple effects plugin I have come to rely on heavily is "Space Designer", which is a glorified IR Reverb plugin, but seems to have an emphasis on huge, unrealistic, spacey presets, and has a lot of control over tail length, filter envelop, and feedback, things that, frankly, ProVerb (as good as it is) doesn't focus on.

I'm using it mainly for crazy, big pads and synth stuff with heavy delay. Unfortunately, when I try to re-produce my live setups for recording in DP, it's the ONE piece of the puzzle I haven't been able to match.

I have neither the money or desire to jump to something like Altiverb, which is a lot more than I need, since I'm looking for more "effectsy" type of stuff that doesn't really need the sheen that Altiverb offers (and costs). I'm trying to find another low-end plugin like Space Designer that offers a lot of the same features, sounds, and has a good number of presets, so I can switch to it and mirror my setups in MainStage and DP.

Any ideas?

[FMiguelez]

I really like Waves' IR-1.
If it's too expensive, they also have a "light" version of it.

Also, I have my eyes set on Valhalla room (say hello to Odin if you ever see him in Asgard). I keep hearing people raving about it (mostly for EDM).

[bayswater]

Set up Mainstage as an external processor for DP and use Space Designer.

[stubbsonic]

Of course, a convolver is only as good as your IR library, but perhaps you might be able to access and import your favorite IR's (either to ProVerb or another product).

You should check out Fog Convolver from AudioThing.

http://www.audiothing.net/effects/fog-convolver/

I got it on sale for $59. It is currently priced at $75, which seems quite reasonable. It allows you to do a fair amount of tweaking to the IR sample from within the GUI. I don't love the included IR library, but that's just my opinion; and I already have a very nice IR library.

[Prime Mover]

Some good thoughts, but keep them coming.

I have ValhallaRoom, and it's my go-to reverb for just about everything these days. It's one of those areas where it may not be the greatest thing ever, but the quality combined with the fact that I've spent hundreds of hours getting to know it make it my first (and usually only) choice for everything!

Just after I wrote this post, I discovered NI Reflektor inside of Guitar Rig. It's setup fairly similarly to Space Designer. One thing I'm missing is I often use a lot of the outdoor presets in SD, and Reflektor doesn't have that. SDs don't sound much like real outside reflections, but the fact that they have lots of spaced echoes (like a delay) but with some tails is really really nice for thick ambient material. I think this is really what I'm looking for. Yes, I could use a delay in combination with a reverb, but frankly, it tends to sound mechanical and takes me quite a bit of time to tweak to sound okay.

Set up Mainstage as an external processor for DP and use Space Designer.

I did that while recording my last album using SoundFlower, it was kind of pain in the ass, and the CPU hit of having two full hosts open was pretty excruciating. I'd rather not have to go through that again. But if there were an easier way to do this, I'd love to hear it! Unfortunately I can't rewire IN to MainStage.

[dewdman42]

There are a lot of products out there now and you're gonna get a lot of opinions. If you like space designer, I agree with bayswater, just run Mainstage and route the audio through there. The timing will be good enough for what you're doing.

[bayswater]

There are a lot of products out there now and you're gonna get a lot of opinions. If you like space designer, I agree with bayswater, just run Mainstage and route the audio through there. The timing will be good enough for what you're doing.

If the timing is off, it's easy to fix with any number of delays or time shifts. Concerning the CPU load: I use a Soundflower link between Logic and DP to access EXS24 hosted sounds. The CPU load of Logic itself is negligible, and I'd have too assume the load for Mainstage is even less Maybe it depends on the amount of RAM available. Though if I understand correctly, you can't actually send audio to Mainstage?

[dewdman42]

You can send audio to mainstage.

[bayswater]

You can send audio to mainstage.

Is that new to V3?

[dewdman42]

I don't think so, but I didn't own v2 so I don't know for sure. But mainstage comes with lots of vocal and guitar oriented templates that cater to processing audio input. You can setup audio channels and basically most everything you can do in the logic mixer, the main difference is that Logic has tracks to record on and playback, and mainstage does not.

[bayswater]

OK thanks. I thought I remembered people complaining that you couldn't route external audio into MS and process it there.

[Prime Mover]

You can route external audio, but I'm not sure about internal. It draws from the standard CORE audio ins/outs, so if you have something like Soundflower, you CAN make it work, but I believe SF is only 16bits, adds about 24ms of delay, and is generally kind of a pain. I really wish there was some integrated way of routing audio out. MS can use ReWire in, but not out (selfish bitches!) so ReWire hosts will post themselves to MS, but MS won't post itself in DP as a rewire host.

Whole thing is just kinda sketch.

[dewdman42]

certainly you can using JackOSX or Soundflower will work just fine between apps. I just did a test with JackOSX to make sure.

[bayswater]

I believe SF is only 16bits,

SF is 24 bit, or whatever is set in your sound prefs. It can do a 64 sample buffer, and presumably, any delay can be countered by adjusting pre-delay in the reverb.

[dewdman42]

JackOSX can also handle 24bits.

I don't think JackOSX introduces 24ms of latency, I'm actually not sure how much latency it is, but I have had tracks running between two apps, and I can't really hear a timing problem, FWIW. Even have had drum tracks going through Jack and using interapplication MIDI and it was quite usable.

I wouldn't really call it "sketchy' per say but you're right...its a little bit of a PITA to have to start up two apps and load file project files and deal with it..I hear ya.

In your case if you have a bunch of reverb sounds, which sound like they are definitely not too standard either but more in the realm of pyschadelic...in space designer...and so anyway you could use this kind of setup until you figure out another reverb plugin that will serve you as well as space designer for your intended purpose, then get back to doing it all in DP.

I don't think you want Altiverb...if you're big into convolution there are numerous ones out there, free ones even. but honestly, your specific sound need sounds a little out of the ordinary and you will have to find the one that will give you what you're looking for. Everyone says it always comes down to the IR's, but in your case I think there is more tweaking involved then that.