Blue Cat defines PatchWork as a “Universal Plug-ins Patchbay”.
Normally this column is dedicated to new products, but this week the selection was rather slim. Instead, I thought I’d talk about an existing software product that you may not have heard of, but is extremely useful: Blue Cat Audio Patchwork.
Blue Cat defines PatchWork as a “universal plug-in patchbay”. It includes plug-in and standalone versions and allows you to chain multiple plug-ins in series or in parallel. Another key feature is the ability to host plug-ins of all common formats. For example, you can open VST, VST3 or AU plug-ins in Pro Tools. You can also open AAX plug-ins in a VST, VST3 or AU host. Within PatchWork, you can mix and match plug-in formats.
PatchWork can handle both virtual instrument and audio effect plug-ins, and includes separate versions for both. The effects version lets you create up to eight parallel chains of eight effects each, each in a single plug-in instance. The instrument version can handle up to eight virtual instruments simultaneously.
In the effects and instrument versions, you can insert up to eight pre-effects before the parallel chains and four post-effects after them. The pre- and post-effects are connected in series. At the very beginning of the signal chain there is an input gain control and at the very end one for the output gain.
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You can freely rearrange the plug-in order in the Pre, Post and Parallel Chains sections. All three sections have individual enable/bypass buttons and a button that opens each plug-in’s GUI. The Parallel Chains section also provides controls for pre and post gain, phase flip and solo.
The output of the parallel chains is summed and sent to the post section. You can choose one of two summing modes: Average is best for effects as it avoids gain increases that can occur when plug-ins are stacked. Sum is better for instruments as it evenly sums the outputs of the instruments in the chain.
Not only can you open any plug-in installed on your computer in PatchWork, but it also has 30 built-in effects. These include delays, reverbs, dynamics, EQ, modulation effects, and utilities. You can insert these in the Pre and Post sections of the Effects or Instrument version of the plug-in, and in the Parallel Chains section of the Effects plug-in. You can easily combine effects from your collection with Blue Cat’s built-in effects.
Other key features include a side-chain input for the audio effects version, latency compensation, multicore processing support, MIDI mapping, audio I/O routing, a CPU usage indicator, control of plug-in parameters with external MIDI controllers, and global mix control (wet/dry).
If you want to get creative with stacking or chaining effects or virtual instruments, PatchWork offers a powerful and flexible solution. PatchWork is available for $99. Visit the Blue Cat Audio website for more information.