Soundfield UPM ST to 5.1 upmixer?

[lexaudio]

http://www.soundfield.com/products/upm1-plugin.php

Anyone have any experience with this plugin?
I know there is the Waves version, but I didn't really find the Waves that great in compared to the TC unwrap in the 6000.

Thanks

LEX

[B4noon]

Originally Posted by lexaudio

http://www.soundfield.com/products/upm1-plugin.php

Anyone have any experience with this plugin?
I know there is the Waves version, but I didn't really find the Waves that great in compared to the TC unwrap in the 6000.

Thanks

LEX

Folds down to stereo well. Adds a short digital tail to everything (verb? Delay?). Earlier versions didn't have this "feature". Expensive. Don't have a good feeling about the company and any future AAX version. Just a feeling.

[Branko]

I listened to Soundfield's hardware upmix box. It sounded really good and very natural. They claim (and I believe them) that the plugin is a faithful copy of the hardware unit.
Other than that, I'm currently using TC Unwrap (I'm still on pt8!) and I wouldn't like to see it disappear from my list when I switch to PT 10. Unfortunately, it seems TC electronic has no plans for porting this software to AAX format.
Waves UM really doesn't sound good.

[Mike Thornton]

I have reviewed it see my review on Pro Tools Expert. But this is the core of the review

I tried it on a variety of content and found it incredibly natural, it just worked, no frills, the mono dialog was routed to the centre speaker but you do have the option to spill it into the front left & right speakers with the Divergence control. Also you can open out the front image width with a Width control. Only the ambience went to the surround channel, with only just a hint of the front dialog finding its way into the rear channels. There was no sound of any ‘processing’, which you can get with this kind of plug-in.

Hope that helps,

Mike

[FlorianE]

I fully agree with Mike's review.
Unfortunately also with his criticism. The need to place it on a 5.1 track all but completely defeats the purpose of this plugin, which ought to be placed on a stereo path and force its output to 5.1 - as is the case with its competitors. This is a big shame, because the UPM sounds very smooth and natural, but is almost unusable due to a silly routing oversight. I've been waiting for over a year now for them to fix this. Nice to hear that a new version is finally in the works.
Incidentally, mapping to D-Control is also flawed: parameters default to values from 0 to 1 at 0.1 steps ......
As to their competitors: both Unwrap and UM225/6 have their moments of glory and misery. Which one to prefer depends on source material and tweaking. Means: of those you basically need both. (Would be a great selling point for the UPM.)

Cheers
Florian

[diamondschwin]

I demoed it on a project and I really dig it, it's much better than the waves I find. Way more natural, doesn't sound like a phony up mix, that being said it I only tried it on stereo music, not sure how it reacts when feeding it a full mix. Its on my list for future purchases.

[Henchman]

Originally Posted by FlorianE

I fully agree with Mike's review.
Unfortunately also with his criticism. The need to place it on a 5.1 track all but completely defeats the purpose of this plugin, which ought to be placed on a stereo path and force its output to 5.1 - as is the case with its competitors. This is a big shame, because the UPM sounds very smooth and natural, but is almost unusable due to a silly routing oversight.

How so?
I mean, the way to use it, is on an aux track, that gets fed by the stereo tracks, right?
That's how I would use it, or any of the upmix plugins.

[Brandonx1]

Originally Posted by Henchman

How so?
I mean, the way to use it, is on an aux track, that gets fed by the stereo tracks, right?
That's how I would use it, or any of the upmix plugins.

The way I use upmixing plug ins is a little different. I put them on the stereo music track I'm trying to upmix. The input is stereo and the output is 5.1 or 7.1.

[Henchman]

Originally Posted by Brandonx1

The way I use upmixing plug ins is a little different. I put them on the stereo music track I'm trying to upmix. The input is stereo and the output is 5.1 or 7.1.

Hmm, I guess the reason I wouldn't do that, is because I want all my stems, to go into the same upmix plug-in and settings.

So, I will at most have 2 Upmix busses. One for source cues, and one for score stems.

[FlorianE]

Originally Posted by Henchman

How so?
I mean, the way to use it, is on an aux track, that gets fed by the stereo tracks, right?
That's how I would use it, or any of the upmix plugins.

That's how I use Unwrap and UM too, no question.
The reason for not doing so with UPM was, if I remember right (demoing was over a year ago), audible RTAS latency.

Florian