At the AES NY 2023 Convention in New York City, Eventide Audio announced the introduction of immersive audio versions of two plugins, the Blackhole Immersive and MicroPitch Immersive, that are designed from the ground up for surround and immersive workflows that include Dolby Atmos.
Blackhole Immersive expands the signature sound of the stereo version of Eventide’s reverb across immersive mixes, while the company’s MicroPitch panned pitch and delay effect can be employed to create wide stereo sound fields.
With Blackhole Immersive, the workflow gives full control over the reverb across channels for an evolving immersive experience. MicroPitch Immersive users can spread, tilt and dynamically morph the effect across the width, depth and height of an immersive mix. With both plugins, the front, top and rear loudspeakers can be equalized separately, and users can morph between two distinct settings.
“Blackhole Immersive provides a way to design infinitely vast soundscapes while maintaining precise multichannel control,” says engineer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist Scott Michael Smith (The Walking Dead, The Handmaid’s Tale, The Revenant). “Instantly musical and absolutely gorgeous sounding. I love this plugin!”
Used as a send or insert, Blackhole Immersive fosters track positioning, with Gravity, Size and Feedback parameters designed to allow faster, easier tailoring of the reverb to an immersive space while the crossfeed control lets users blend the reverb between loudspeakers – a mono source can become truly immersive with one simple gesture. “Blackhole Immersive takes my favorite reverb ever and makes it even more vast and otherworldly,” says composer/producer Matt Lange. “An absolute must-have for immersive mixing and production.”
“MicroPitch Immersive is an invaluable tool for spreading sources around in ways from subtle to in your face,” adds producer/engineer Andrew Scheps (Red Hot Chili Peppers, Adele, Jay-Z). “You might think it isn’t doing much until you turn it off; then you get sad.”
With up to 12 channels of spatialized, detuned delays, plus modulation, EQ and crossfeed controls, MicroPitch Immersive can be used in creating both real and unreal immersive realities with boundaries that reflect, move, diffuse, and dissolve. Tilting the Left/Right, Front/Back and Top/Main Detune parameters allow asymmetrical detuning and space fine tuning. The plugin’s enhanced delay and modulation capability can be used to create slapbacks, add movement with pitch modulation, or create exciting motion with patterned Loop Delay.
Both plugins offer a UI optimized for immersive workflows with identical core controls for all channel layouts – no menu diving is required. The signal processing is designed to deliver the same sonic effect across all immersive formats and maintain incoming spatial image integrity. Individual loudspeaker levels can be quickly set using the integrated Levels control section whether mixing in the supported LCR, Quadraphonic, 5.0-5.1.4, and 7.0-7.1.4 channel layouts. Kill Dry, Kill Wet and Freeze controls allow the creation of drastic effects, while the Mix Lock function allows for scrolling through presets or settings while keeping the wet/dry mix constant. The GUI offers Undo/Redo and A/B comparison. Both come with comprehensive presets libraries.
