I wasn't aware of the Calf plugins being a source of crashes. Recent versions of Ardour have never crashed on me (different story for earlier versions). "Basic DSP mistakes" also sounds alarming. I'll take note of that for future projects.
Perhaps the pretty UI could be adapted for suggested alternatives. It would help all those superficial people like me to migrate :)
On a more serious note I like how intuitive the Calf UI is; almost every plugin lays out its primary parameters in a way that is very compatible with how I approach my work. I'm a command line person, so I certainly could make do with automatically generated interfaces from the LV2 manifests, but ... I try to shed my developer persona when having fun with audio, so anything pretty that keeps me from thinking too much helps to keep me in the zone.
It does, but as a musician, I don't think anyone should care so much about this. If you like how it sounds, and it's working in your productions - great!
(of course, "DSP mistakes" can often be used creatively and there's nothing wrong with that)
Until a decade or two ago, almost no musician ever mixed their own music, they relied on audio engineers to do that. The proliferation of DAWs and cheap powerful computers has changed that so that now many musicians believe they can/should do this work themselves. They're not necessarily wrong, but a little humility is required I think, mostly by remembering that good audio engineering is a distinct skill set, quite different from being a good musician.
Although there are few exceptions, I'd wager that almost no example of whatever you (or anyone else) considers "great music" was mixed by the musicians who made it.
Exactly. That's why PaulDavisThe1st's suggestion was IMO completely reasonable. Mixing is a skillset that not only takes time to master, but also requires that you keep your ears healthy - which is something that many musicians don't always do (myself included). Not only that, a professional mixer understands that you can only mix for so long in a single session before your ears become fatigued and you can no longer trust them (until you give them rest).
I would argue that if someone cares primarily about the end result of the music then it should be easy to put aside their pride and allow the experts to do their job and help them sound better.
That said, I did find a couple of spots where I forgot to crossfade the edges of punch in/out points, so there are quiet but audible clicks. Oh well. That's what happens when you mix audio with the headphones slightly off to be able to hear if the baby is sleeping poorly next door... :)
The point was to have some creative fun and have it quickly. That's what it was, so I'm happy.
I discovered the Dragonfly Reverb [0] at some point and I never looked back.
PS, every time I encounter you on the internet I make sure to say, THANK YOU for Ardour!
Is there a list of these anywhere?
https://manual.ardour.org/working-with-plugins/getting-plugi...
People should be aware that we (the developers of Ardour) STRONGLY recommend against the use of the CALF plugin suite. Not only do numerous of these plugins have basic DSP mistakes in them, but they are also one of the most regular source of crashes for Ardour users.
There are better alternatives for every single plugin the CALF suite, and we encourage you to use try them, even if they don't look quite so "pretty".