- Polyverse Everything Bundle contains all four of Polyverse’s wild plugins
- Although not simple, the possibilities are endless
- In this review, we take a close look at each of the four plugins
We take a deep dive into the full plugin bundle from Polyverse – Polyverse Everything Bundle. Polyverse Everything Bundle contains all four of Polyverse’s wild plugins – Manipulator, I Wish, Comet, and the Gatekeeper.
I had the pleasure of trying out all four of these plugins throughout many sessions, and I have to say I was amazed by the immense creative potential of the Polyverse plugins.
From their most popular Manipulator plugin to Gatekeeper, the cutting edge of volume modulation, I’ll be sharing my honest thoughts about the Polyverse Everything Bundle.
Polyverse is proud to present the Everything Bundle, a collection of their 4 highly-rated and much-loved FX plugins.
- Limitless creative potential
- Very fun and interactive plugins
- Value for money
Manipulator
What Does It Do?
Polyverse’s Manipulator is the most popular plugin by Polyverse, and it is a unique vocal processing plugin that can dramatically alter the timbre and pitch of monophonic audio in infinite possibilities.
Manipulator is one of the most powerful vocal processing plugins available in the market, and it can be used as a normal audio plugin to manipulate vocals, but can also treat as a vocoder-like instrument to completely take your track to a different dimension.
From a single-page interface, you can either make subtle enhancements to your vocal or instrument track or completely change your track and make it unrecognizable from the source.
The Manipulator plugin was created in collaboration with the electronic/psytrance duo Infected Mushroom, and if you have listened to their music, you know that it gets pretty crazy.
But it is far from just a vocal effects plugin. The manipulator can serve as a vocal processing plugin and pitch-shifting vocoder for a wide range of musical genres like acoustic singer-songwriter, RnB, rock, pop, jazz, dance music, EDM, and more.
Controls
Manipulator has a surprising amount of controls and features all packed into a single page, and the main controls are divided into three sections – Pitch Shifter, Harmonics Shifter, and Grain Alternator.
With sub controls under these three sections, the Manipulator is well-organized and visually appealing to work with for a long period.
But because the range of sound can go from subtle to insane real quick, make sure to adjust little by little and experiment on both vocal tracks and instrument tracks.
Other than the three main controls, the Smear, Stereo, and Detune effects also come in very handy for quick vocal processing.
All of their effects have strong colors and characteristics, and you’ll be able to find some creative way ways to incorporate these additional effects into your music.
At the bottom of the plugin, there are four additional slots available for further processing and adding, ps touch to the sound. Four slots can each hold five modulation sources from Meta Knob, MIDI, Sequencer, Follower, and ADSR.
These four slots on the bottom are all independent sources, and the graphics are beautifully designed and easy to differentiate between different sources.
To go straight into exploring different presets, Polyverse had made a wide array of presets ranging from subtle presets, and inhuman sounds, to rhythmic presets.
If you’re first trying to explore the plugin, going straight to a preset is a great idea.
Features
Pitch Shifter is one of the main knobs used for shifting the pitch of the signal, and it is based on a unique granular based algorithm.
A feature that separates this pitch shifter from other plugins, is the ability to adjust the grains and the smoothness of the pitch shift. Make sure you check out the micro-slider between the Pitch and Formant knobs to go from natural sound to a metallic, robot-like tone.
Harmonic Shifter is the section for changing the timbre of the sound without affecting the pitch, and this plugin is capable of some extreme timbre manipulations that can go from natural-sounding vocals to monsters and robots.
Alongside the crazy altering possibilities, they can also be used as a subtle harmonics booster to get the best out of a vocal track.
Grain Alternator is another section that altered the tone and grain of the sound.
It’s a bit complex and very technical for many people (including myself) to fully grasp the meaning, but it was another tone-altering knob that manipulated the grains and added a watery effect while maintaining the pitch.
I found the additional non-pitch-related effects on the bottom – Smear, Stereo, and Detune, very useful for making subtle changes to my vocal track.
- Smear is quite literally smearing the sound by looping and crossfading grains. It has its strong characteristics, and I found it useful as a blending tool for ambient effects.
- Stereo is a mono-compatible mono-compatible widener that widens both mono and stereo audio sources, and it is useful for broadening and widening your track.
- Detune is super unique, and it creates this weird chorus effect for creating special effects.
Pros and Cons
Pros
The pros of this plugin are pretty clear: it is extremely diverse, has so many options, and has everything you need to take your track to outer space.
With this vast amount of controls and options all packed into a well-organized single-page plugin, it’s perfect for an experienced musician wanting the maximum manipulation.
It’s one plugin that can act as a simple vocal processor or be treated as an instrument for completely altering your sound.
With up to ten different effects that can alter the pitch, timbre, and grain, and add special effects from widening to various independent modulators, it’s an exciting creative tool if you know what you’re doing.
Cons
The downside is that it’s too complicated and can be quite overwhelming for inexperienced producers and musicians who might not have much experience with vocal processors or modulators.
For musicians who need the simplest pitch-shifting plugins, there are plenty of simple plugins available for that purpose.
I Wish
What Does It Do?
Polyverse’s I Wish is another plugin created in collaboration with the electronic duo Infected Mushroom, and it’s a very unique pitch freezer plugin for taking a small fragment of any audio and turning it into a MIDI waveform synth.
This plugin was named after Infected Mushroom’s track “I Wish”, and they designed this plugin based on a special effect that they have created by manually chopping off and editing tiny loops for several days.
The I Wish plugin was designed to create that effect instantly with just a few clicks.
The I Wish plugin creates a hard and aggressive, unconventional synth sound that can only work for a certain type of musical genre like EDM, electronic, or other experimental genres.
This plugin is only recommended if you like the special effect/sound (which can be heard on the track “I Wish” by Infected Mushroom) created by this plugin.
Controls
The controls are extremely well-organized and the I Wish plugin is composed of the two main controls – PITCH and FORMANT controls with some additional features like X-Fade, LFO, ENV, and AMP.
At the bottom, there are additional knobs like Poly, Glide, Delay, and Pitch Wheel for even more detailed adjustments.
The preset menu is quite useful as well – serving presets ranging from simple vibrato effects, for drums effects, to crazy outer space and aliens presets.
Features
You would first need to side-chain another audio track and process that audio into the I Wish plugin to use this plugin. I Wish is a MIDI plugin, and you need a pre-recorded audio track or MIDI track to use the plugin.
As soon as you record audio into the plugin, don’t expect to hear natural-sounding effects on your audio track. Right away, the plugin will change the color of the audio and turn it into a synth of its own.
Playing lower notes on the MIDI keyboard will create long loops, and playing higher notes on the MIDI keyboard will create shorter, more recognizable note-like loops.
It took some time for me to learn how it works, and get a musical MIDI sound. If you want to get more musical synth sounds from this plugin, make sure to experiment with the PITCH and FORMANT controls as well as the LFO and Envelop filters to find a tone that would work with your song.
Continuous audio, whether it is guitar, voice, or drums, is more usable for this plugin because then there will always be usable audio for the plugin to sample.
After quantizing my MIDI notes, I was able to use this plugin as a rhythmic synthesizer and create a fun loop to jam on.
Pros and Cons
Pros
The I Wish plugin is great for creating experimental synth sounds with any audio track, and it will be suitable for producers looking to create a whole new sound with pre-existing audio tracks. The controls are quite easy to learn and get used to as well.
Cons
The I Wish plugin is not a conventional modulation nor a synthesizer plugin, so it is for those who love experimenting with sound and creating unique electronic sounds.
Comet
What Does It Do?
Comet is a reverb plugin based on a “morphing” algorithm, and as the name suggests, it’s a reverb plugin that can take your sound to outer space.
This was my personal favorite in this bundle, and not only it is great for just getting a lush and gorgeous reverb for basic vocal and instrument recording, but Comet is also an instrument of its own that you can explore with.
The most striking aspect is its incredible range of Size and Decay controls, which can go from 1 cubic centimetre centimeter to 1 cubic kilometer, and has up to an infinite 100% Decay time setting.
Controls
The Comet plugin looks like a Mission Control Center of a spaceship in many ways. It has a futuristic design with the two main controls – Size and Decay controls with a knob to control the amount of dry/wet on the bottom.
With Comet, you can even control the input volume and adjust the output signal volume of the reverb, and Diffuse controls are there for you to control the density and lushness of the reverb.
As if that wasn’t enough, you can also get into additional controls like Detune, Hi Damp, Low Damp, and Color of the reverb.
The presets are fantastic and cover a wide range of reverb from just basic small to large room effects to space-like reverb effects.
To be honest, there are more presets for outer space and artsy effects than “normal” reverb presets.
Features
Comet reminded me of boutique reverb pedals like
Just messing with the Size and Decay controls was crazy enough, and when paired with some simple guitar or synth chords, you can easily make space-like sounds.
The Pre-Delay control is there to get the tempo and timing of the delay, and Diffuse and Color controls can be used to control the timbre and color of the reverb.
“Epic” would be the right word to describe Comet’s exceptionally rich, smooth, and lush sounds, and this would be a great tool for composers and producers to have in their arsenal.
Pros and Cons
Pros
Comet is more than just a reverb plugin, it is a sound-designing tool for producers and composers to take simple sounds into different dimensions.
From the whole layout and the selection of control knobs, it’s a beautiful instrument that is worth having for experienced and professional producers.
Cons
There are not many cons, except that Comet might be a little too expensive or overwhelming if you’re looking for a very simplistic reverb plugin for basic use.
Gatekeeper
Gatekeeper is the last mind-boggling plugin on this bundle, and this is a very aggressive volume modulator effect plugin by Polyverse.
Gatekeeper showcases the cutting-edge technology in volume modulation, and it is a great tool for making expressive and rhythmic sounds with relatively simple MIDI sounds.
If you’ve ever wanted to experiment with volume modulation and volume automation, the Gatekeeper will cover it all.
Controls
Like all the other plugins by Polyverse, Gatekeeper has a very futuristic design with a bright line that represents volume automation.
The amazing thing about Gatekeeper is its very visual approach, where you can easily draw the desired automation that you envisioned in your head.
Gatekeeper probably has the least amount of knobs to work within this bundle, and most of the work dis one by selecting from a vast amount of presets or drawing in your desired volume modulation.
But the control knobs and envelope selectors are quite complicated, so make sure to carefully read through the Gatekeeper Manual to fully appreciate all the creative details.
Features
Polyverse Gatekeeper features a 100% sample accuracy and a total of eight envelopes that you can toggle on and off.
The MIDI learn button can enable you to program envelopes, and other features like Trigger and Grid controls, Smoothing controls, Envelope Node Creation Tools, and Paint Tools are there for your maximum creative uses.
Additionally, you get a stereo ping-pong Delay option for more crazy effects.
All of these features will give you a headache at first, but start with the presets and play around with one feature at a time.
Pros and Cons
Pros
For experienced audio engineers and producers who have dealt with volume automation and modulations a lot and are looking for more, Gatekeeper will be a great tool.
It is truly a unique volume modulator that takes one signal through eight different envelopes and enables you to program it into different parts of the stereo field.
Cons
Just like all the other Polyverse plugins, the Gatekeeper volume modulating plugin will be too overwhelming for musicians who haven’t had much experience with volume modulation.
Polyverse is proud to present the Everything Bundle, a collection of their 4 highly-rated and much-loved FX plugins.
- Limitless creative potential
- Very fun and interactive plugins
- Value for money
Up next, check out Mask Movement: An Audio Visual Suite For The Modern Creative