Essential vocal plugins?

[Freak Of Metal]

I realized that there arent many threads on here about mixing vocals. So I was wondering if anyone can name a few essential plugins for using in my DAW when mixing vocals?

Cheers!

 

[greyskull]

melodyne gets a lot of use
Really like the Uad 1176 and neve 1073

 

[Freak Of Metal]

Cool. I shall check those out. Thanks.

 

[Morgan C]

Spitfish is a good free de-esser.
There's a good free compressor for aggressive, upfront vocals, puts a lot of high mids into them. TLA I think.

Other than that, good saturation (I <3 PSP) and I use Melodyne also, and Voxengo Marquis comp.

 

[Fragle]

1176 or la2a style comp (depending on the vocal) works wonders - the antress modern stuff is pretty cool. i'm sure the UAD stuff is excellent too. soooo different to just compressing with a "regular" compressor like blockfish, classic compressor etc.

delays, the classic delay is ok, and free. i haven't found a better one yet, in the freeware realm at least.

ferox saturation is also cool, but really depends on the source.

for reverb, freeverb 2 is excellent. also great for drums.

with those ambience effects it's really important to eq them to fit in the mix better.
but if i had to name one thing that's absolutely essential for *that* vocal sound, it would be the compression. you can use basically anything that's not total shite for ambience, but trying to get the compression right with slower attack comps is an uphill battle imho.

 

[006]

I cannot stress to anyone enough how great Waves RVox has been since I first got it. It is simply the easiest vocal compression plug to use. Has a threshold for the gate, threshold for the compressor and a makeup gain. Lately I have been using RVox and then PODfarm (gasp!) afterwards with a preamp model (usually API sim) and then a reverb unit. After that, topped off with Event Horizon to limit them nicely.

 

[Skinny Viking]

I love my McDSP plugs on vocals ... Filterbank EQ into one of the compressors and then AC1 for some saturation. Vocals pop out nicely with that chain and they're very easy and intuitive to use, albeit a little pricey

I've also been digging the sound of the Smack! compressor on vox lately ... still playing around trying to get good with it

Izotope Trash is a pretty versatile and great sounding plug for vocals as well. Has a little bit of everything in it

 

[dcb]

uad 1176 and la2a and you have the holy grail ! putting the 1176 on my vocal tracks even without affecting the gain of the track makes it sound sooo much more pro! also waves rvox is cool for backing vocals. and i sometimes use tal tube driver to fatten the lead vocals.

 

[Plankis]

I'm a bit unsure about some links so please correct me if I'm wrong.

Compressors:
Uad 1176 - http://www.uaudio.com/products/software/1176se/index.html
Uad Teletronix La2a - http://www.uaudio.com/products/hardware/la2a/index.html
Blockfish - http://www.digitalfishphones.com/main.php?item=2&subItem=5
Classic Compressor - http://www.kjaerhusaudio.com/classic-compressor.php
Voxengo Marquis comp - http://www.voxengo.com/product/marquiscomp/
Antress Modern - http://antress.er-webs.com/
Waves Rvox - http://www.waves.com/Content.aspx?id=183
McDSP AC1 - http://www.mcdsp.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=40&Itemid=271
Digidesign Smack! compressor - http://www.digidesign.com/index.cfm?navid=115&itemid=4461

De-esser:
Spitfish - http://www.digitalfishphones.com/main.php?item=2&subItem=5

Delay:
Classic Delay - http://www.kjaerhusaudio.com/classic-delay.php

Equalizer:
McDSP Filterbank - http://www.mcdsp.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=38&Itemid=271
Neve 1073 - http://www.uaudio.com/products/software/neve1073/

Limiter:
Stillwell Event Horizon - http://www.stillwellaudio.com/?page_id=16

Reverb:
Freeverb 2 - http://www.audiomastermind.com/detail-freeverb_2-9040.html

Saturation
Ferox Tape Simulator - http://www.jeroenbreebaart.com/audio_vst.htm#ferox
Izotope Thrash - http://www.izotope.com/products/audio/Trash/
Tal Tube - http://www.brothersoft.com/tal-tube-138363.html

 

[Freak Of Metal]

Fantastic! I'll try to dig through them and find what suites me.

Cheers!

 

[pattonfreak1]

CamelCrusher. Seems no one ever thinks to use it on vocals but it works wonders.

 

[Ronixis]

Chris Lord-Alge uses Waves L1 on vocals. Source: http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/may07/articles/cla.htm