Silver Bullet iOS Launch

Silver Bullet mk2 has officially launched on iOS today! You'll find three Unfiltered Audio Mojo modules included: Vinyl Saturation, Helical Scan, and VHS AF, which are based around algorithms adapted from Needlepoint and LO-FI-AF. 

I'll use the opportunity to finally write a bit about our collaboration with Brad McGowan from Louder than Liftoff. He's been a great colleague and friend over the past many years, and the process of porting Silver Bullet to software was a lot more intense and exploratory than it might first appear. It got to the point that it started to take on a life of its own and I think the result probably takes hardware modeling further than it has even been pushed, at least on a few fronts. It forced us to re-imagine what analog modeling could and should be, and to extend it to the furthest reaches we could envision, charting some new territory that I hope we and others will continue to explore. 

The Silver Bullet itself is a sort of flagship for Louder than Liftoff, and so obviously Brad wanted to match it perfectly. Gary did a world-class job of the base model, so that was a great start. What's cool though, is that during the process Brad and I both tried to approach it from a completely blank slate, getting to the point where we were trying to both ask and answer the question of "what IS hardware modeling?" and "why do people like the 'analog sound' and what are they actually hearing? Why?" 

Part of the whole allure of analog anything, is the kind of proof-is-in-the-pudding nature it has. When trying to explain what makes it great, the best argument is often, "just listen to this freaking thing! Listen to how it moves! Listen to how alive that sounds! Listen to the stereo field!" It's true. That's why my favorite video on Silver Bullet is the hardware vs. software shootout done by Rapid Flow after release. I don't know anything about his channel and we didn't ask him to create the video, but it's absolute perfection and the results speak for themselves:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QO5bB3U-Iro

While we ran a million tests during development but I'd never done one in a mix with a perfectly calibrated A-B hardware vs. software system like he's doing here, so when this video dropped it was like getting to see something fly at high altitude for the first time, and passing the test with flying colors and style points and fun surprises. Super touching memory for me personally. 

Let's talk about what makes the plugin special. People talk about analog as having "movement" and "life" but what does that mean, and what causes it? Well at a low level, components (resistors, capacitors, transformers, etc.) change when they heat up, so the process of running sound through hardware changes its sound ever so slightly, constantly. We started asking each other questions like, "well what if we did that by adding microscopic LFOs on every single software modeled component? What if we increased the range on that so much that it would become audible? What if we allowed the user to sync that movement to tempo? Would this be in some ways 'more analog than real analog' or 'hyper-analog?' How cool is that!" 

How many other pieces of software have unique behavior for every serial number? It's one of those things that seems obvious when you think about it, but then you look around and don't see other examples. Maybe the reason is that we were looking at the problem with fresh eyes and very few pre-conceived notions of how things should be done. Every hardware Silver Bullet has slightly different components, so why shouldn't that also be true in the software? "Let's try it. How would we do it? Well what about a virtual parts-bin, where components are actually selected in a different configuration for each unit. Yeah! Oh and there could be A-Stock and B-Stock. Haha totally! What if we allowed people to try different serial numbers until they found their "golden unit? Yeah! That'd be awesome!" That was the birth of the "Dyna-Realism" engine.

And then later: "Wait, you guys should put some of the Unfiltered Audio effects in as Mojo modes! That'd be so fun for the users! Done! Wait, what's this Bitmaker thing? A UA-sample-reduced version of Hitmaker? Wacky! Wait, let's add an SP-1200-inspired mode! Could Gary model that? People would love it!" 

This gives you a look into the development process, which was a lot of long conversations with Brad and I and/or Mike or Gary or Bill on the phone, where we were trying to really figure out how we could venture into unexplored territory, as we also always try to do through Unfiltered Audio. So much of audio software is trying to pick up abandoned paths and to "turn the knob to 11," as it were, breaking an algorithm or idea by moving it out of the normal range and finding new fertile sonic realms. Think Hendrix turning feedback into its own new instrument, just not nearly as cool. There were a lot of these moments and ideas during the Silver Bullet port. More information about some of that is available in this talk (when I still couldn't mention the project by name as I was trying to keep it a secret). Check it out around 10:30 if you find this interesting:

https://www.amusesmile.com/?p=766

Last thing I'll mention is that while people often say "it was an honor to work with X" on projects, when I say it was an honor to work with Brad, I mean that on the deepest possible level. I came out of every conversation with new information and wisdom that he'd impart from his expertise in a realm of audio that is honestly still a bit alien to my brain. Hardware is a different scene, and it has been both fun and illuminating to get a view into that world through him. I also appreciated that every conversation without exception, was always focused on how we could make things better, more valuable, and more fun for the users. The fans were the absolute focus, not the afterthought, showing me that his heart is in it. For all of that and more, I hope we continue collaborating for many years and on many projects moving forward. Stay tuned. 

- Josh