# Limiter plugin - worth the investment?



## Secret Soundworks (Sep 28, 2020)

I currently use the stock limiter plugin in Studio One 5. It has a nice, clear, easy to use, straight to the point interface, nothing fancy really.

Now I have several plugins I bought and use for reverbs, delays, compressors, gate, etc. but I'm wondering, how much would getting a limiter plugin benefit me? What does something like Fabfilter Pro L have that the stock limiter in Studio One doesn't?

Up until now I haven't really been doing anything fancy with limiters. I was considering getting the Pro L from Fabfilter since I have their Pro R and Pro C + Saturn plugins and I like those. But I just wasn't sure what it would give me and if it would be worth the investment.

A limiter is really the last thing I have on my list of fx / plugins to get on my list for now, but only if it's worth it. If not, I'll stick to my Studio One limiter for the time being.

I'd be interested to know your thoughts and expertise on this 

P.S. I should mention I also have Kilohearts' Limiter Snap in, not sure if that one was a freebie, but yeah.


----------



## Kent (Sep 28, 2020)

Honestly, if you don't know _exactly_ why you should buy something...you probably shouldn't buy it


----------



## Secret Soundworks (Sep 28, 2020)

kmaster said:


> Honestly, if you don't know _exactly_ why you should buy something...you probably shouldn't buy it



That's true! I was just wondering for limiters specifically, what exactly do they bring to the table, the fancy ones.

But yes I agree with your advice haha


----------



## thorwald (Sep 28, 2020)

Advanced limiters are generally better-sounding, just like with a professional reverb plugin, when they apply changes to your sound, it should sound a lot better.

This is a very generalized opinion though, as needing a limiter largely depends on the music and the mixes you make.

As an example, Hornet Plugins makes a plugin called Master Tool. Among other things, it includes two limiters, one of which can set your audio to a target LUFS value. This is very useful, as various media outlets have their separate volume requirements. But at the same time, overusing a limiter can affect your sound negatively as well.

As an orchestral composer, I always try to add as little as possible, unless I have to do a bold and loud track, where volume is important. With a good mix, in my case, a limiter is almost never needed, at least to duck the audio, because my track volume levels are low enough by default. Your experience may vary.

While there are definitely great limiters out there, @kmaster is right in saying that unless you have a reason to, don't bother getting a separate limiter plugin at this time.


----------



## Secret Soundworks (Sep 28, 2020)

thorwald said:


> Advanced limiters are generally better-sounding, just like with a professional reverb plugin, when they apply changes to your sound, it should sound a lot better.
> 
> This is a very generalized opinion though, as needing a limiter largely depends on the music and the mixes you make.
> 
> ...



I see, thanks for the explanation! 

Makes sense, I assume the thing that makes them sound "better" is a better algorithm ? (compared to their free counterparts)

Yeah I generally don't do super loud stuff at the moment, but I do plan to do more big loud sounding trailer music in the near future.


----------



## twincities (Sep 28, 2020)

while sounding "better" is a rabbit hole i don't want to dive down, i do find different limiters sound significantly different, to the point that i regularly switch between 3 of them for different purposes. 

waves L2 is a really obvious, in your face limiter. it sounds like limiting, but it's also the sound of pop music for the last ~20 years, so the ear is pretty used to it. FF pro-l2 is much better at transparent. in general it's just more flexible, but even when going for quick aggressive L2 style limiting, it doesn't have quite the same grit. 

i'm not here to say one of these sounds "better". but they do have different use cases. people like to throw limiters into the utility pile and treat them as though they all sound identical, which i think couldn't be further from the truth. personally, at least how i use them, i find them to be more varied than compressors, plugin to plugin.


----------



## pixel (Sep 29, 2020)

What is your expected output level? Do you push a lot to limiter fighting for loud mix or you don't need it and limiter only occasionally cut some peaks? 
In th latter situation basic limiter will do the job just fine. Ideally would be to have true-peak limiter to avoid inter-sample issues. I don't know if limiter in Studio One has this feature, eventually I'm pretty sure that there's free one that should do the job. 
But if you target loud and very loud mixes where limiter is working a lot (or even all the time) then it's worth to invest in very good commercial brickwall limiter like Pro-Q, IKM Invisible Limiter, Ozone Limiter or similar. These can handle the job with much less distortion and artefacts and help to prevent natural sound (to some extend of course). Basic limiter in such case will quickly bring artefacts like pumping, distortion and very quirky dynamics changes.


----------



## Consona (Sep 29, 2020)




----------



## Neutron Star (Sep 29, 2020)

Different limiters have a profound effect on sound and especially the more they pushed. Try demos of various ones. My personal favorite is fabfilter. I have studio one 5 and would never use the limiter in that. There are much better third party ones.


----------



## Jimmy Hellfire (Sep 29, 2020)

I never found limiters to have any really interesting effect on the track. I don't hear it, and honestly don't really care to listen for it. I use whatever I have lying around.

Perhaps it's because I'm somewhat conservative with limiting. I only use them to prevent clipping and set them mostly so that it barely touches the peaks. I don't make music that benefits from being squashed or where the character of the transients plays a huge role, and if I push it to get more loudness out of the track, in the limiting stage it'll be an additional 4 dB _at max._ Maybe that's too little to really hear anything interesting about the characteristics of a limiter?

In any case, I can probably think of a dozen of areas where money is better invested in upgrades before cranking out extra money for a 3rd party limiter.


----------



## jcrosby (Sep 29, 2020)

A good limiter is all about transparency. Higher quality limiters will let you do a little more gain reduction and maintain some transparency.... Some also have higher quality dithering options than the stock DAW dither options... But the advice rings true that if you're not sure _why, _hold off and buy something when you have a better idea of what exactly it is you want it to achieve. There are a ton of fantastic options but you should do some research about brickwall limiters before buying anything.

I also disagree with the post above. The Studio One Limiter's actually pretty damn good for a stock DAW limiter. It has a soft-clipping option which can let you do one of two things, achieve a higher level without it sounding compressed, and can be great on percussion material for reigning in the peaks without it sounding audibly squashed. the downside to clippers is distortion, but if used in sane amounts it actually sounds pretty sweet.

This is a pretty straight forward primer on limiters in a mastering context:


----------



## darcvision (Sep 29, 2020)

TDR Limiter 6 GE, affordable prices, could do transparent/aggresive, has glue/different compressor, soft clipper, de-esser, and LUFS meter.


----------



## vitocorleone123 (Sep 29, 2020)

A limiter known to be "transparent" the also offers brickwall limiting is a tool most, if not everyone, should have. You don't really need a ton of limiters, at least if not an engineer. You can use a limiter to squash a peak and keep things from clipping. Many modern compressors can be limiters if you turn it up past 20:1 compression or so - but they won't necessarily do transparent, brickwall, true peak limiting. If your DAW limiter can do all that, go for it. Otherwise, Limter6GE for $30 on sale (if it's still onsale) is a solid choice.


----------



## Henu (Sep 29, 2020)

If you need to ask yourself do you need one at all, you probably do just fine with the stock one that came with your DAW.


----------



## José Herring (Sep 29, 2020)

Secret Soundworks said:


> I currently use the stock limiter plugin in Studio One 5. It has a nice, clear, easy to use, straight to the point interface, nothing fancy really.
> 
> Now I have several plugins I bought and use for reverbs, delays, compressors, gate, etc. but I'm wondering, how much would getting a limiter plugin benefit me? What does something like Fabfilter Pro L have that the stock limiter in Studio One doesn't?
> 
> ...


I've had a bit of experience with various limiters but truth be told on the master buss my favorite limiter was one that I used YEARS ago by a company called Toneboosters. I think it was even free at the time and I liked it because it did its job and was completely transparent. I eventually stopped using it because of the psychological effect of "since it was free it must be making my music sound cheap.". This leads me to my second point.

A LOT of purchases on the plugin level of more "sophisticated" plugins are done for the reason I mentioned above. People don't trust free or cheap as much as they do paying a little for something. Most plugins will do a great job on most materials and I hate to say it the stock plugins on most professional level DAWS are actually really good these days. It wasn't that way in the past but now yes they are good. I used a lot of free ones in my day and got really good results. But......

Good doesn't mean great! And you want your stuff to sound great. A lot of that has to do with your own skill but the other part of it is having the right tools.

Many top flight plugins offer that little extra that cumulatively add up to something great. 

Ozone is a great Mastering tool. Fantastic but complicated. Fabfilter stuff is fantastic. There are many many others and what you want are choices. 

So get 3 or more top limiters and test it out. Not everything will be right for every piece of music you create. So it is good to have choices.

Also, you can put a limiter that's good for Brass on your Brass buss, another one that's good for drums on your drum buss including orchestral drums. I use to do that and it made orchestral drums sound less old fashion and gives you a bit of control over the sound. 

Then glue it all together on the master buss with a very transparent limiter.


----------



## sostenuto (Sep 30, 2020)

jfyi ___ Today .... Plugin Alliance has $20. Voucher and many heavily discounted items. 

bx_ XL V2 M/S Mastering Limiter @ 'net' $10. 
Lindell Audio 254E Limiter @ 'net' $20. 









Brainworx bx_XL V2


The New Loud! bx_XL V2 is an M/S stereo mastering limiter for competitively loud masters that retain all those desirable dynamics!




www.plugin-alliance.com


----------



## Wally Garten (Sep 30, 2020)

José Herring said:


> you want your stuff to sound great. A lot of that has to do with your own skill but the other part of it is having the right tools.



Skill is definitely the limiting factor for me. (I am sorry for the pun, but it's true!)

On the cheap/free tip --

On my last project, I used a free limiter -- Frontier by D16 -- and loved it for that project, which was intentionally retro, gritty, and not-quite-lo-fi. But I don't think it's completely transparent (and doesn't advertise itself as such). 

I've also gotten very nice results with Ozone Elements as a finisher, although I didn't completely understand what it was doing.... (See paragraph 1.)

But generally the Logic stock limiter has been fine for me, just to bring up the loudness a little and control peaking. (But see paragraph 1.)


----------



## José Herring (Sep 30, 2020)

Wally Garten said:


> Skill is definitely the limiting factor for me. (I am sorry for the pun, but it's true!)
> 
> On the cheap/free tip --
> 
> ...



Don't feel too bad regarding Ozone. Even the free one is hard to understand. When I got it I spent a lot of time trying to learn it. That was back when it was Ozone 3. I used that for so long that the next version I got was Ozone 7. So much had changed that I've given up on Ozone for now. I still use it on occasion but I'm a preset man now with regards to Ozone. I just dial up the presents and listen for what sounds good.

I'm not a good screencaster but I tried to do one several years ago. The content has been well received but the video lacks a bit of that flare to keep people interested. You can check it out if you want. I cued the video up to were I start talking about mastering.


----------



## Secret Soundworks (Oct 3, 2020)

Thanks for the detailed responses guys, now it's more clear to me what the better limiters offer!Will definitely check out the videos linked above as well


----------



## Kamil Biedrzycki (Oct 19, 2020)

For me the best is Ozone with True Peak options. When I had demo of FabFIlter Pro - L2 it was really good too. But be carefull with limiting. If you limit about 2- 3 dB it's ok, when you need more then you should go back to your mixes.


----------

