Camel Crusher in Bitwig

Tutorial | Sep 11, 2024

In today's video, I walk you through my attempt to replicate the beloved early 2000s plugin, CamelCrusher, inside of Bitwig Studio, focusing on its Tube and Mac distortion algorithms, and the filter. Although I left out the compressor and some features like preset saving, I think my version gets pretty close to the original, especially in hitting the key harmonics. You can try my free preset by downloading it from the link in the description—it's a handy alternative to the non-resizable 32-bit VST.

You can watch the Video on Youtube

• support me on Patreon
• download Bitwig Preset
• CamelCrusher Website

Summary #

Maybe you don't watch the video, here are some important takeaways:

Hey folks, in today’s video, I'm diving into the small but mighty plugin called CamelCrusher. For those who aren’t familiar, CamelCrusher was a highly popular plugin in the early 2000s, especially in the techno, bass line, and drum and bass scenes for adding those dirty overtones that a lot of producers loved.

A number of people asked me to replicate CamelCrusher inside Bitwig Studio, and that’s what I’ve attempted to do. The main focus was on the two distortion algorithms, Tube and Mech, since they are the key features. There’s also a filter in the original plugin, which I tried to replicate. However, I left out the compressor section because it's primarily used for leveling the audio. You can always add your own compressor before or after the effects if needed.

The master section where you can adjust volume and blend in the dry signal is also excluded, as well as the randomize feature because saving presets inside Bitwig Studio’s Grid isn’t possible.

First, let’s switch back to my desktop. Here, we start with using the VST version of CamelCrusher on a sine wave. With the Tube setting, CamelCrusher seems to use one transfer curve that's shaped by two knobs. In Bitwig, however, we have static transfer curves, so I had to use fading techniques and multiple shapes to approximate the effect. Next up is the filter—though it looks like it’s placed after the distortion in the GUI, I believe it’s actually in front of the distortion. Here's why: Distorting a sine wave (which has no overtones) and then applying the filter shows no effect because the filter needs overtones to work. However, with a saw wave (which has plenty of overtones), the filter does affect the sound, indicating it's positioned before the distortion.

My preset in Bitwig looks pretty close to the original. I also added a hard clipper at the end to keep everything below 0 dB if needed, and you can push the output through this hard clipper for additional distortion.

Now, let’s compare how my preset and the VST version sound. First, disabling all effects other than Tube. The presets don’t cancel each other out perfectly but get pretty close in terms of hitting the right harmonics. cancellation is hard to achieve 100%, but I think it sounds very similar.

I tried my best to recreate the CamelCrusher experience in Bitwig. This preset is completely free, and you can find the download link in the description below. So you don't need to rely on the original 32-bit, non-resizable CamelCrusher plugin, and you still get a very similar sound with all the essential harmonics.

Thank you for watching! If you enjoyed the video, don’t forget to like it, leave your comments and requests below, and I’ll see you in the next one. Bye!

Transcription #

This is what im talking about in this video. The text is transcribed by AI, so it might not be perfect. If you find any mistakes, please let me know.
You can also click on the timestamps to jump to the right part of the video, which should be helpful.

[00:00:00] Hey folks, in today's video it's about this small guy here called CamelCrusher.
[00:00:06] And this was a very popular and very beloved plugin back in the early 2000s and it was
[00:00:12] used on many, many techno productions and on bass lines and drum and bass to create
[00:00:18] dirty overtones.
[00:00:20] And a lot of people love this.
[00:00:22] So some people asked me to replicate this inside of Bitwig Studio and I tried my best
[00:00:29] and I think it's mainly about these two distortion algorithms here, Tube and Mac.
[00:00:36] So this was my focus to replicate this in Bitwig Studio and there's also a filter in
[00:00:42] there and I also tried to replicate this and I left out the compressor section here because
[00:00:47] I think it's only there to level the audio or to level the gain and you can use your
[00:00:53] own compressor in front or in post FX if you want.
[00:00:58] So I left this out but if you want I can try to model it but I left it out for now.
[00:01:03] And there's also a master section here where you can change the volume and of course mix
[00:01:07] it in or blend it in with a dry signal.
[00:01:11] And a nice randomized feature here.
[00:01:12] So I also left this out because I can't save presets inside of the grid.
[00:01:17] It's not possible.
[00:01:19] And I want to show you how it sounds and how my preset sounds and how they compare.
[00:01:24] Okay.
[00:01:25] So let's switch it back to desktop.
[00:01:27] And let's use here the VST first on a sine.
[00:01:41] So this is Tube.
[00:01:50] And I think in this plug in here they use one shape or function, one transfer curve.
[00:01:57] And you shape this transfer curve with these two knobs.
[00:02:01] And that's not possible inside of Bitwig Studio because we have static transfer curves and
[00:02:06] I try to come close with just fading techniques and multiple shapes that I crossfade between.
[00:02:14] And it kind of works really okayish and I show you this in a minute here.
[00:02:19] And then there's a filter here you can switch on.
[00:02:22] And it looks like here from the interface that the filter is after the distortion but
[00:02:27] I think it's actually in front and I show you why I think that because we bring in here
[00:02:33] a sine, right?
[00:02:34] And the sine has no overtones which means the filter has no effect because there are
[00:02:40] no overtones, right?
[00:02:42] It's just one partial here.
[00:02:44] There's nothing you can filter or can filter away.
[00:02:48] But then we bring in here distortion and we create overtones.
[00:02:59] But you can see the filter doesn't actually anything on these overtones because it's not
[00:03:04] after this distortion, it's in front of the distortion.
[00:03:08] And you can also see this here by switching to saw.
[00:03:20] So here it works because the saw has overtones and the filter is in front so we can filter
[00:03:26] away some of the overtones and it has an effect.
[00:03:29] But the sine doesn't do anything here.
[00:03:37] You can only see at the bottom when I cross basically this fundamental frequency.
[00:03:43] So that's why I think the filter is actually in front of the distortion.
[00:03:46] It makes also a lot of sense because you get a lot of nice overtones out in this way.
[00:03:54] Okay, so this is the VST version.
[00:03:58] My preset looks like this here.
[00:04:21] And again no effect here because it's a sine.
[00:04:35] Then it works.
[00:04:37] I also implemented here at the end some kind of hard clipper.
[00:04:42] So if you want to keep everything below 0 dB, you can just switch on your hard clipper
[00:04:49] and everything is chopped off at 0 dB.
[00:04:54] And there's also clip drive here so you can push everything that we get here from the
[00:05:00] tube and the Mac, you can push into this hard clipper that clips at 0 dB.
[00:05:06] So you get additional distortion if you want to.
[00:05:09] Sounds like this.
[00:05:19] You can see it doesn't go over 0 dB.
[00:05:22] And here this kind of noise is coming from the filter.
[00:05:26] For some reason the filters in Bitwig have a lot of noise.
[00:05:32] But I kind of like it.
[00:05:35] Okay, so that's my preset or how my preset sounds.
[00:05:39] And in here you can see I try to model basically at the tube shape in different stages and
[00:05:47] also the Mac shape in different stages.
[00:05:50] And there's also here presets for the shaper that you get with this way can use it maybe
[00:05:57] in the, let's say at some point here, the filter plus device, right?
[00:06:02] You can just load in here this shape if you want to in different places.
[00:06:06] Okay, so I try to model this here with some fading and it kind of works really well actually.
[00:06:14] So I show you this here by disabling everything.
[00:06:17] We go for tube and also here this one on the plug in we disable the filter and we go for
[00:06:24] tube only.
[00:06:27] And this plug in here is polarity flipped or phase flipped.
[00:06:34] So we try to cancel basically the preset against the VST.
[00:06:45] We go for sign.
[00:06:54] So this is the tube and the Mac sounds like this.
[00:07:08] So it's not canceling 100%.
[00:07:10] But I think it gets pretty close.
[00:07:13] I hit all the harmonics, the important harmonics, maybe not in the right amount or the right
[00:07:18] volume.
[00:07:19] It's very hard to actually try to cancel everything to 100%.
[00:07:25] It's probably impossible.
[00:07:27] So I tried my best here to implement the CamelCrusher inside of Bitwig.
[00:07:33] Like I said, this preset again is completely free.
[00:07:35] I'll put the link in the description below so you can try it out and give it a go and
[00:07:40] you don't need to use here this 32-bit VST plug-in that you can't resize.
[00:07:46] And you still get a nice sound or the original kind of sound you hit all the harmonics and
[00:07:53] I think it's pretty handy to have.
[00:07:56] So yeah, that's it.
[00:07:57] Thanks for watching.
[00:07:58] Leave a like if you liked the video.
[00:08:00] Hit me up with the comments or the requests.
[00:08:04] And thanks for watching.
[00:08:05] See you in the next video.