18.6.13

BOSS PEDAL PLUGIN FOR LOGIC

I've always felt that there were two sides to my creative output. One is graphic design. The other being sound production. I went to school for graphic design and it ultimately turned into viable career, but sound design is something that has always been treated more as a hobby. I don't love one over the other. They are both equal in their own rights. I just happen to make the most money designing websites than I do producing records.

About four months ago, I was looking for a decent digital audio workstation to write and record on. Because I had become so familiar with Garageband, the next logical step would be to dive into, well….. Logic. Logic is a great program because of its intuitive control and easy set up. 
Logic also comes fully equipped with a wide array of amp modelers and effects processors. There must be at least a billion different sound configurations that you can play with. Because I live in such a tight space with little room for real musical equipment, the ability to plug my guitar into my computer and gain a plethora of great sounds is essential in crafting a solid recording. The pedalboard is personally my favorite thing to explore. From there, I took it upon myself to design a mock of what the pedal board would look like if say, a company like BOSS, had implemented their own plugin. Think about it. There are thousands of third party plugins out there that all do different things. A company like BOSS has been making high quality effects pedals for many years now. Isn't it time they jump on the digital bandwagon. 

This project was more of an exercise in understanding UI when it comes to plugins and sound generation. The basic idea is that the user can have all their favorite BOSS pedals at their fingertips without dealing with the inconvenience of setting up a pedal chain and getting tangled up in a variety of patch cables. Here, it's as simple as plugging your guitar into a channel strip, activating the plugin, and combining your favorite BOSS sounds. 

The user also has the ability to select from a variety of presets. And of course, they have the option to create and save their own. I added a level/pan section to the interface so the user can specifically pan their desired effect to either the left or right speaker. This goes for the level as well. Say you want a subtle flange effect in the hard left speaker…… Select the flanger pedal, dial in your specific sound, and then pan it to either the left and right speaker. This will specifically target that pedal while keeping the rest of your sound centered. This can be done multiple times over with a plethora of different pedals. Flanger on one side, digital delay on the other? Easy!

Okay, so I really just wanted to give you a little run down of what I created here. Like I said, this is more or less an experimentation of what a plugin like this would look like. I wish this really existed.