I wanted to alert Ardour users to the arrival of a couple of interesting new plugins in LV2/Linux format. LinuxDSP has been producing several JACK clients that implement rather good traditional DSP processing, and have recently started implementing some of them as LV2 plugins for easier integration into a DAW like Ardour. At present the MX-EQ1 (a parametric equaliser) and MX-DYN1 (dynamics processing) are available as free (mono-only) versions or as paid-for stereo ones. With Ardour 2.8.3 and above, you will also get the shiny chrome GUIs that some people seem to love. Please consider supporting Mike’s work - he has a background as an engineer with SSL and is genuinely interested in improving the plugin landscape on Linux.
Great news, cause it’s nice if the plugin landscape on Linux could be improved.
It would be better though if you guys can construct a model which enables Mike to get some money and to open the source of the plugins. Like the Ardour-model… or combine the two projects in some way.
Such a model would be better for Linux in the long run I think.
Great News 
@rozea: I agree. Perhaps it could be something like Ardour OSX + AU Support. A Linux Ardour Version with bundled LinuxDSP in a payed version. That would also solve the beginner problem “Ardour has no equalizer/compressor?”.
@beowulf666 yeah there are possibilities for sure imo.
Anyway I’d rather invest some money in open source software then in closed source stuff.
Hi,
I understand your point of view, but please be realistic: The Ardour payment system only works how it works because Ardour got such a huge userbase AND such a huge range of support / new releases / new features. How many other projects have succeded even for a short while with this payment system?
Ah, and combining Ardour + Linux DSP for sale would not make it open source, right?
I absolutely believe that such a good DSP code is worth some bucks. Remember that you only have to pay anything, like a few dollars, to get the full versions.
The big advantage of Ardour being open source is, in my opinion, not that it’s free of charge (as you can see, it’s not free of charge, if no one would pay it wouldn’t improve) but that anyone can bring in her/his ideas, code some bits, talk to the devs about problems, request features, independence of corporations (right now at least), etc. I do not see that this would make that much sense with a single (but sophisticated) DSP code. Additionally, Mike is as reachable and open to ideas / requests as the best open source devs I’ve ever talked to 
I’d love to see more good Linux effects as I think the lack of these is the major downside of Linux audio production.
Benjamin
Just spent some time messing around with the plug-ins, and they are lovely. I’ll definitely be putting down some money for the stereo versions. Thanks for the work!
@ Benjamin, I agree with you for a main part… It is true that it is hard to get money for a GPL licenced plugin suite…
But maybe there is some kind of open source license for it, other then GPL? So other devs can learn from the code Mike has written? In this way you’re not improving the plugin landscape on your own, and we as community, are not dependent of one developer of such plugins (Mike)…
But I don’t know how this looks like from the perspective of an developer (Mike and the virtual developer who might be able to learn (or not) from the code if it’s open…)
Just to add to one or two of the points Paul made in the news article, as he says, I have a background in pro-audio, having worked for SSL for many years, (until recently when regrettably they found themselves unable to continue employing as many engineers as they once had.) For various reasons I should point out that the linuxDSP plugins are in no way connected with SSL - or endorsed by them in any way, and there is no SSL intellectual property contained within the code (although one might say that being fortunate enough to work for a such a major pro-audio company provided valuable experience.)
I now find myself in a position to devote more time to developing the linuxDSP software, but this is now (more than ever) dependent upon the financial support the project can generate. More plugins will be released soon, I am normally contactable via the linuxDSP website and open to ideas or suggestions for improvements or new plugins etc.
How does your commercial model work? What should be donated to get what kind of access to the plugins?
Is it possible to subscribe in some way to linuxdsp, to get always the latests plugins, for example?
@rozea: The ‘commercial’ model is still evolving. As far as possible I would like to be able to provide the plugins as donationware so that they are essentially ‘free’ (in cost) but I would hope that those who can afford to donate would do so, in order that the project can move forward and more plugins can be developed as well as existing ones supported. It is important to be aware that free software very definitely isn’t free to produce or maintain. At the moment, the number of donations has been low in relation to the number of downloads which is why I have reluctantly had to release some of the plugins as ‘paid for’ in as much as you have to donate ‘something’ for them. I have been considering a subscription option - which would guarantee access to the latest plugins. This would provide a more predictable source of income. Some of the plugins have also been included in a commercial product (Indamixx) although this has not happened quite as soon as I had hoped and as such is not generating any income for the site at the present time.
As regards what should be donated to get what kind of access to the plugins, If you mean ‘what else do I get for donating’, I prefer to think of it like this:
You can download the plugins and not donate, in which case you got something that cost money to develop, for free. That’s great, but if everybody does that, the site cannot exist and so eventually the plugins aren’t supported or available any more and everybody loses. Which is not so good.
Or
You can download the plugins and donate whatever you can or want to afford, in which case you get good quality software for a fair price and the software can continue to be developed, maintained and improved.
I hope this answers some of your questions.
Hi folks, I’m just getting back into linux audio after a long hiatus. There are vastly more plugins available for Ardour now than when I disappeared. Wondering if these would be considered best of the breed? I have no problems supporting the authors of Ardour and linuxdsp with what contributions I can, but would love to know where people think they rank in terms of audio quality vs others.
btw, Mike, is a convolution reverb in the works? In the past I’ve always gotten great results by using high quality convolution and printing the wet tracks so I can just mix wet-to-dry in the mixer and separately eq/compress the wet and dry signals.
thanks!
Iain
I’ll see what I can do about a convolution reverb - no promises as to if or when it will happen though as there is still a lot of work to be done porting and maintaining existing plugins as well as developing one or two new ideas. There should be an LV2 port of my algorithmic reverb soon-ish. As usual, a lot of the timescale depends on the level of support that can be generated - simply because otherwise I have to spend a more significant amount of my time either trying to get funding or working on other projects just so the site can survive. As to whether they are the ‘best of the breed’ - of course they are but then I would say that… Actually, there are lots of excellent plugins out there, but as to what’s best, I think it really comes down to how well they work or sound for a particuar situation.
@iainduncan: jconv already exists as a JACK client. Its quite tricky to get the thread design correct for really high quality convolution reverb in a plugin context. jconv runs 2-4 additional worker threads to get its job done.
Thanks Paul and Mike. So is jconv appropriate for the print-to-track approach then?
I would expect that you could do something like ‘print to track’ - since jconv is a jack client it should be possible to route the audio through it in a way that will achieve what you want, providing it has the ability to let you set the wet / dry mix to ‘wet only’. You may find it easier to do the jack routing stuff using a jack patchbay application (I have one on my website - or there are the options in qjackctl or other apps like patchage).
My algorithmic ‘SR-2A’ Stereo Reverb has a ‘wet only’ switch for this purpose - might be worth a go if you haven’t already tried it.