Baby Audio Transit

Transitions are the name of the game here, and as always Baby Audio and Andrew Huang encourage you to get creative!

YouTube has become a promising route for musicians, songwriters and producers to find an audience for their creative output, and there have been some amazing success stories, one of which is Canadian musician/producer Andrew Huang. At the time of writing, his YouTube channel has well over 2,000,000 subscribers, who are attracted by the eclectic combination of weird and wonderful original music, discussions on music production, and quirky (but always interesting) musical challenges and collaborations.

His latest collaboration is with the plug‑in development team at Baby Audio. Both parties are well known for a creative approach to audio processing, so it’s perhaps not surprising that the result, Transit, is a multi‑effects plug‑in that’s designed to spice up your musical transitions. But it’s one with a bit of a twist — I mean that very literally, given the large ‘T’ knob on the GUI!

Plug & Play

By their nature, multi‑effects plug‑ins can be complex affairs, and considered against that context Transit’s GUI is something of a triumph! I’ll come back to the T macro knob in a minute, but you can place one of the 18 different effect types into each of the seven other slots in any order you choose, the only limitation being that only one instance of each effect can be used per preset. The top strip provides access to a very well‑stocked preset browser and some useful randomisation and MIDI options, while at the bottom you have horizontal sliders to control the overall Mix and Output levels.

The controls available in each of the effects panels vary by effect but, taking the Filter 24 module as an example, you get four rotary knobs allowing you to configure filter Type, Cutoff, Resonance and Mix levels. The top strip of each module slot includes a bypass button, a drag‑and‑drop button for changing the module’s position in the signal chain, the option to load/save module‑specific presets and the randomisation button for the module. The small dots in the centre allow you to link particular controls to the main T macro control; the dot turns yellow when linked in this way and you can then specify a minimum and maximum range for that specific effect parameter. As you then move the T knob, the linked parameters sweep through the specified range. You have the option to sweep a control forwards and backwards and to change the linearity of the response (just drag on the straight line in the centre of the specific knob; it can be bent).

Given the plug‑in’s name and its tagline as a creator of transition effects, it’s worth emphasising here that Transit can also operate as a conventional ‘static’ multi‑effects processor. Indeed, given the flexibility and diversity of effects provided here, Transit’s potential as a more straightforward creative multi‑effects processor really shouldn’t be downplayed. You can either set the T control to a fixed position or, on the top strip, toggle the Infinity button to switch the effects chain into an on state, even when the T knob is set to zero. Individual controls linked to the global macro knob then adopt their starting point values, while non‑linked controls simply use the set value.

Transit also offers sequencer‑style control to trigger your effects modulation, and the choice of effects modules is impressive.

Tools In The Box

The list of effects is impressive. You get panning, bit‑crushing, various modulation effects (chorus, flanger, phaser, tremolo), distortion, a multiband compressor (OTT), a pumping effect (which achieves a result rather like a side‑chained compressor), reverb, delay, stereo widening, pitch‑shift, and two filters (12 and 24 dB filter slopes and each with four filter styles). You also get a very useful Utility module with Gain, Tone and Pan controls, which can be great for some pre‑ or post‑processing at a specific point in your signal chain.

Transit’s Noise and Osc modules are perfect for adding an additional sonic element to your transitions.

All of these modules process the audio signal you feed through Transit and, where appropriate, modules (eg. Reverb, Delay, Distortion, Chorus) have dedicated Mix controls. But when it comes to transitions, you also might also want to create new sounds, rather than just process the signal. To that end, there are two modules, Noise and Osc, and as the names suggest these provide you with options to add noise or sound from a basic oscillator; the latter offers four waveform options. They can be used independently or together and, with a dollop of ambience, can easily be used to create a whooshing riser, either to blend in with whatever audio you are feeding into Transit or to be used on its own.

The effects sound good, and while things like the reverb or delay won’t offer the detailed control you might find in dedicated plug‑ins, they are very usable indeed in a multi‑effects chain. The compact control set for each module — there are never more than four controls to adjust — is a sensible design decision too. It helps keep the workflow, er… flowing.

All Rise

Having configured your effects chain and linked the desired parameters to the main T macro knob, applying your effects chain to create a riser, transition or drop effect simply requires you to turn that control: you can use the mouse, your standard DAW options to link to a hardware controller or create automation data. The last of those is both flexible and precise: a single automation lane lets you control the exact length of the transition for all the macro‑linked effects parameters, whether you want it to occur over a beat, a bar, or a full song section. Whatever the effects chain you’ve created, this is a super‑efficient means of controlling when it occurs and the depth of any processing applied. Risers, full transitions (increase T, hit a peak, and then decrease T again), or drops (moving T from a downbeat; some pitch‑shift can work well here). It’s an impressively simple process.

The T knob, though, is not your only option. Clicking the double arrow icon in the T module switches the synchronisation to Sequencer mode. Click (or automate) the Play button and the transition will trigger at the start of the next bar, lasting however many bars you set (up to a maximum of 16). The Pendulum mode takes the transition up and then back down again (so you get a rise/fall effect). Finally, and very cool indeed, once it’s triggered the Loop switch keeps the sequencer running all the time. So if you want to use Transit to add a constant sense of subtle (or perhaps not so subtle!) effects‑based movement to any sound, it can do that too.

The randomisation options are particularly worth noting, because they offer you more control over the results than most.

I can only really scratch the surface of what’s possible with Transit — this is definitely a plug‑in you’ll want to spend some time experimenting with — but the randomisation options are particularly worth noting, because they offer you more control over the results than most. You can apply randomisation at the global level (the dice icon in the upper control strip) or at the individual module level (the dice icon found at the top right of each module). There is also a lock/unlock system that lets you control which parameters will be subject to randomisation, and this includes the effects choices themselves. As you can also trigger the global randomisation button via MIDI, if you have something like a synth loop or drum loop being processed by Transit, and you keep the degree of randomisation to just a few key effects controls, you can ‘perform’ with the effects and gently randomise what they are doing during playback. It’s a very cool way to generate some low‑level ear candy in an otherwise static track. It does take a little time to work out exactly how all the randomisation options interact but, hopefully, you can see that they’re well worth exploring.

When rolling the dice you can choose which parameters will be affected.

A Multitude of Multis

The bottom line here is that Transit sounds great, provides some fabulous creative sound processing options, and yet still manages to be very accessible. Whether for pop, electronic music, or creative effects for scoring work, it has plenty to offer, and can be equally at home being used on a single instrument, an instrument bus or your master bus. Individually, the effects are all easy to use and the the well‑thought‑out GUI and control set deliver an overall workflow that encourages experimentation.

There are plenty of other creative multi‑effects plug‑ins, whether built into DAWs (such as Cubase’s FX Modulator) or available separately (Narcotic, ShaperBox 3, Movement, Boost, Tantra 2). But for me Transit’s most obvious point of comparison is Sugar Bytes’ Turnado. Both are massively creative and sonically impressive, and while I’d say Turnado does probably have the edge in terms of depth, Transit is definitely less intimidating. It’s impressive, compelling, a joy to use and very competitively priced (the free, fully functional trial version just adds a few seconds of silence every minute during playback and is well worth giving a try). Recommended!