The World’s Most Famous AI-assisted EQ Is Better Than Ever
For creating polished mixes in mere minutes, Sonible’s AI-assisted plug-in offerings have become near necessities in project and professional studios. Of course, smart:EQ is among the most renowned, with a unique smart:filter that balances tracks by simply grouping them via drag and drop, selecting profiles, and deciding which tracks take priority in that group’s hierarchy. Sonible has upped the ante for smart:EQ 4, improving the plug-in’s versatility and adding new control features for even more utility. Any instance within the same group can be “remote controlled” from any other instance. The famous AI-powered profiles have also been expanded with new genre-based Mix profiles. You can import your own reference tracks, and smart:EQ will use these as the basis for your own track’s sound. Standard EQ bands can now behave like Dynamic EQs with familiar compressor and gate-style controls, and they have a new Smoothing control for more subtle filtering. Finally, you’ll get comprehensive mid-side functions and an Auto Gain function that compensates for level adjustments.
Note: Customers who purchased smart:EQ 3 on or after October 20, 2023, will receive a free upgrade to smart:EQ 4. Please contact your Sweetwater Sales Engineer for further details.
Related Videos: smart:EQ 4 Plug-in
How it works
The AI-powered smart:filter represents the heart and soul of smart:EQ 4. It approaches multitrack balancing and unmasking by grouping tracks, selecting profiles, and then building a hierarchy. For example, you can group lead and background vocal tracks together, select a Vocal profile, and then assign your lead vocal track as first in the hierarchy followed by the other vocal tracks in descending order of importance. The plug-in then balances the tracks according to where they rank. Sweetwater mix engineers agree: this is a massive timesaver! For smart:EQ 4, Sonible added new genre-specific Mix profiles trained by entire mixes. There’s also a new Reference profile allowing you to load an entire finished mix or individual instrument, which smart:EQ 4 will analyze and then impart its balance and character onto your channel or bus.
You can also mix traditionally
You have the option to use Smart:EQ 4’s AI-assisted smart:filter across three modes: Track, Group, or Track and Group. Track mode balances the channel; Group mode reduces masking between group members (without affecting the individual channel); and Track and Group mode combines the two. You don’t have to let AI have all the fun, however. Smart:EQ 4 offers simplified controls for each channel, allowing you to mix using traditional bottom-up or top-down approaches. Smart:EQ 4’s regular EQ bands now feature dynamic EQ behavior, with controls for Threshold, Ratio, Attack, Release, and Range. Use these regular EQ bands alongside or instead of the main smart:filter bands for any smart:EQ 4 instance.
Sonible smart:EQ 4 Plug-in Features:
- The flagship of Sonible’s powerful AI-assisted suite of plug-ins
- smart:filter technology with Track, Group, Track and Group modes
- Simple drag-and-drop functionality provides easy, nearly instant spectral balancing of single tracks and buses
- Create an unmasking “hierarchy” of up to 10 tracks
- Intelligent cross-channel processing between instances with “remote control” of EQ for multiple tracks in any instance within the same Group
- Much larger range of profiles for instruments, speech, and even entire mixes according to genre
- Create custom profiles from your own reference tracks
- New Dynamic EQ behavior for regular EQ bands with controls for Threshold, Ratio, Attack, and Release
- Auto Gain compensates for level adjustments
- Comprehensive M-S processing
- Custom learning time for smart:filter computation
