Available for download, Eventide’s Elevate is a multiband limiter for mixing and mastering that aims for a natural sound. Using the same auditory filter bank as the EQuivocate Graphic EQ, the plug-in allows you to raise and control levels in a way that’s powerful, yet subtle. On the main parameters tab of the GUI, you’ll find controls for Limiter Gain, Speed, and Ceiling; these help you achieve the desired loudness. A transient section is on hand to preserve or emphasize the transient content of programmatic material being fed into the limiter. From here, audio is passed into the Spectral Clipper, in which you can add harmonic distortion to the mix for effect, if that’s your desire. Note that the drive control of this clipper stage works in conjunction with the gain parameter to dictate your overall level at the output.
Elevate is technically a multiband limiter, as it uses the same filter-bank as EQuivocate, a graphic equalizer, which uses the Mel scale to better approximate how human beings hear and respond to frequency changes. Elevate uses artificial intelligence algorithms to handle the gain, transient variation, and speed of each band under the hood. You’ll be able to control the interdependency of these bands to some extent with the Adaptive Gain, Adaptive Speed, and Adaptive Transient parameters. You can effectively use the limiter in single-band mode by turning these adaptive controls all the way down, or by toggling them off entirely.
In another window of the GUI, you’ll find access to the auditory filter bank, and here you can work on a band level by soloing bands to hear how they’re working, changing their center frequency or reducing/augmenting the number of bands in use at any one time. You also have further control over the individual bands in the Limiter/EQ module. Here you can adjust the gain of each individual band, all while watching the input gain, output gain, and gain-reduction metering provided for each band. In the Transient module, you’ll be able to adjust transient emphasis on a per-band basis. Other common limiter parameters, such as input control, output control, and auto-output for gain matching, is on hand, as are different visual meters to help you see what you’re doing.
This software is compatible with Mac and Windows computers, and will work within AU, AAX and VST formats. An iLok account is required to activate Elevate, though you need not purchase their dongle.
- Analyzes and alters the gain, speed, and transients of each filter band in real time
- Includes presets by APS Mastering, Matt Lange, Jeremy Lubsey, Eric Beam, ROCAsound, Chris Tabron, and John McCaig
- Automatically adapts the attack, release, and look-ahead parameters for each filter band to greatly reduce pumping and breathing artifacts, as well as perceived distortion
- Preserves or emphasizes fast transients to avoid squashing your mix
- Manipulates transients across the critical bands to preserve the attacks from kick drums, snares, and cymbals, without affecting the entire mix
- Uses linear phase auditory filters based on the Mel Scale to manipulate the audio in a way that is natural to your inner ear
- Solo the output of one band (or a number of bands) to hone in on problem frequencies, tweak transients or alter gain
- Use the Auto Output Level feature to compare the limited signal to non-limited signals with the same amount of gain; this allows you to hear the exact sonic impact of your processing
- Use the Spectral Clipper to overdrive the final output without affecting the tonal balance or allowing the signal to get tubby
- 6 different types of metering allow you to keep an eye on every aspect of your output audio