Cradle Orion is a plugin designed for drums. Its purpose is to give drums dynamic clarity, warmth, depth, and freshness.
This plugin uses the principles of saturation, compression, harmonic enhancement, and parallel techniques to boost the audio signal. It works similarly to the FL Studio 24 soundgoodlizer plugin. But the only difference is the soundgoodlizer is one knob plugin, but this plugin has a lot of c controls for customization purposes.
This plugin is designed for ease of use. This article explores how it works and its key features and provides valuable insights for music producers and mixing engineers.
How Does Orion Work?
The Cradle Orion plugin has the following three principles.
Saturation:
First, the plugin applies saturation to the audio signal. This uplifts the signal’s harmonic content, causing the sound to be excited without being overwhelmed.
Those involved in drum mixing know that saturation is the first step to making the drums sound fuller and more vibrant. Saturation is the basic and first step in this process. It can add more to the drums if applied with other techniques. Here are the steps involved in this process.
Steps:
Input Signal Analysis: First of all, when the signal comes into the plugin, it analyzes the audio signal and tries to understand the frequency spectrum and dynamics.
Harmonic Generation: This plugin uses sophisticated algorithms to generate additional harmonics based on the incoming signal. This adds warmth and character to the sound without overpowering the original input signal.
Adjustable Drive Control: There is also a drive knob present in this plugin. With the help of this knob, the user can set the right amount of saturation to the sound.
High-Pass Filtering: This plugin also includes a high-pass filter. Saturation can sometimes make the high frequencies harsh and unbearable, so a high-pass filter is vital in this case. It is here to tame those high frequencies.
Dynamic control:
The art of perfect mixing is about finding the right balance between the various elements of the mix. This can be done by the dynamic control system. Controlling the dynamics is also an important step in drum mixing. For this reason, it is the second step in the Cradle Orion plugin’s workings.
This plugin has an inbuilt compressor, which controls the sound’s dynamics. If the compressor is not used, the sound’s audio level will be imbalanced, which can cause problems in the mastering.
Parallel Processing:
The next and last step of parallel processing is one of the most important. Parallel processing has made complex routing very easy.
With the help of parallel processing, the user can easily cut/boost the high, mid, and low frequencies by sharpening the transients simultaneously.