Spectralis devlog #49
—Hello again proggers—
Procrastinated on the advanced stuff from devlog #48 and went down a DSP rabbit hole instead. Not a small detour either — a real batch of new processing across coloring, mastering, and spatial categories.
productive procrastination is still procrastination, i’m not fooling anyone
Cat or dog? IR.wav
Okay let’s get into it~
—Yap—
Three buckets this round: creative coloring effects, utility/mastering tools, and spatial/immersive processing. Some of these are straightforward additions, a couple tie directly into the 3D worlds work from devlog #48.
—The Great Suffering—
1 — Creative / Coloring
Saturation, tape, and tube warmth for soft-clip harmonic coloring — fits naturally next to the existing “cozy” preset feel. Distortion/overdrive for harder, more aggressive clipping. Chorus for modulated pitch/delay width. Flanger/phaser for swept comb-filter and all-pass effects, good territory for the more experimental world and capsule presets. Stereo widener/imager for mid-side width manipulation without needing true multi-mic recording.
2 — Utility / Mastering
Limiter as a hard ceiling that pairs naturally with existing compression — comp handles dynamics, limiter catches peaks. Noise gate for cutting signal below a threshold, useful for cleaning up quiet passages or hiss. De-esser for targeted sibilance reduction, mainly relevant if capsules ever carry vocal-heavy content. Multiband compression for independent per-frequency-band control, more complex than single-band but genuinely mastering-grade. Transient shaper for punch and attack control independent of overall level.
3 — Spatial / Immersive
Convolution reverb using real impulse responses instead of the current algorithmic reverb — much richer, heavier on CPU and asset cost since it needs IR files. Delay/echo, a basic tempo-syncable version, oddly missing until now despite being more commonly used than reverb alone. Stereo/binaural panner for spatial positioning, directly relevant to the 3D worlds from devlog #48 — a sound at a location in a world could map to real panning. Room/ambience simulation as a lighter-weight alternative to full convolution, parametric size/damping style but modeling early reflections separately from the existing reverb.
—FAQ (no one asked these but they are here)—
Q: What is a “progger”?
A: A human programmer. You. The one who somehow turned “procrastinate on the hard feature” into “build 14 DSP effects instead.”
Q: How does the binaural panner connect to the 3D worlds from devlog #48?
A: Sound positioned at a location in a world can map to actual spatial panning instead of flat stereo, which is exactly what explorable 3D worlds need to feel real.
Q: Is convolution reverb replacing the existing reverb?
A: No, sitting alongside it — algorithmic reverb stays lighter-weight, convolution’s the heavier, richer option when it’s worth the CPU and asset cost.
Q: Are all of these implemented already?
A: This is the buildout round, not confirmation everything’s fully polished yet.
Q: Back to the advanced 6.1.0 stuff next?
A: Presumably, eventually. No promises given the track record.
—This is the end*—
*end for now, impulse responses permitting
PRESET!!!