Anyone using the Brainworx bx_saturator? Opinions?

[remmet]

The list price is $229, but it's on sale now for $79. Is it worth having?

R

[Len911]

yes. I have a melda saturator, I have a couple Brainworx other plugins.
Essentially the saturators work on harmonics, 2nd order, 3rd, 4th, 5th.

They're different than an eq in that an eq can boost or cut freq volume for the fundamental freqs or all harmonics in the selected region, whereas with harmonics you can boost or cut selected harmonics ad finitum, all or none approach. In other words, you can change the timbre of an instrument somewhat, while eq doesn't.

I recently used it on a "modelled sax". It's not perfect, but the original timbre is thin and sounds almost like a toy in comparison to a real sax. You can certainly over do the harmonic thingy especially if you don't maintain a sense of balance between the harmonics.
2nd order harms can give a warmer texture, and the 5th order seems to add a little volume and emphasizes upper mids, so you can see what happens if you turn the 2nd harms all the way up and don't balance with the other harms. You can also end up with distortion by either boosting or cutting certain harmonics extremely, maybe a good thing?

[jdhogg]

I have this, I think it is the best one for natural distortion also very flexible to put the distortion just in one part of the frequency range.

I often use it to mimic the subtle distortion ( which is more subtle EQ like in nature ) introduced via vintage equipment.

[mojobone]

Pretty powerful plugins, given that you can apply intense gain to a given harmonic or a set thereof. Keep in mind that you can't boost a frequency that ain't there, in the file, but you could think of it as kind of a super intense EQ.