VST plugins are software add-ons that can be used to add a variety of different effects
and instruments to digital audio workstations on windows.
They can be available for free, or purchased from different companies.
Today, we’ll be doing a basic tutorial on how to use these plugins and instruments that
you can apply to basically any digital audio workstation you’ll be using to record music
in the home studio.
The exact way this is done may change a little, but the basic idea of how it works will remain
the same for whatever program you add them to.
Many digital audio workstations used for home recording will include a variety of different
plugins and instruments that are installed with the software.
A lot of these are great starting points, especially for our mixing tools such as compression
and equalization.
However, there’s a lot more options that are available online that you can download,
and then just add these for a little more customization to your software.
VST plugins and instruments can be added to just about any digital audio workstation with
a few exceptions.
There are some digital audio workstations that are fully free, such as Cakewalk by BandLab,
and there are some that are basically just demo versions, such as PreSonus Studio One
4 and Pro Tools First.
In these cases, it’s not possible to install VST plugins and instruments in the software.
That’s one of the limitations, and we’re stuck with the included plugins and instruments.
Many of these programs also have a limited number of plugins and instruments, and this
is one way to convince people to purchase the full version of the software.
Just keep that in mind when deciding if trying to install VST plugins, since you need to
make sure it’s possible in your program first.
There are many free plugins available from websites such as vst4free.com, which just
provides a collection of plugins from many different developers.
From these websites, just download the plugin to the downloads folder on your computer.
From here, I recommend finding a way to organize the plugins in a folder system on your computer.
I have mine saved on an extra hard drive where I keep a lot of extra files, but you can save
them anywhere as long as they’re kept organized.
For my organization, I have a few folders from videos I made, but I usually like to
keep the plugins organized by developers.
You can do it this way, or by the type of plugins, such as keeping compressors or equalizers
together.
I like organizing by developers because sometimes you might get packages that hold a bunch of
plugins of different types.
What you do now is just take the plugin from the downloads folder and drag and drop it
into the folder where you want to store your plugins.
Some plugins may require you to run an installer to get them running.
This is often those plugin packages that come with many plugins, or plugins from developers
that charge money for their software.
In this case, it all works the same, except you’ll be running the installer instead.
When running the installer, you’ll often get the option to choose a folder to install
the plugins in.
Choose the folders where we’ll be saving them, just like the others.
Of course, only run programs like this from developers and sources that you trust.
Depending on the developer, you may need to have some sort of licensing software running
on your computer in order to keep the plugins activated.
An example is the iLok License Manager, used by a lot of different developers.
This manages some programs such as Pro Tools, and plugins that are often paid, or some that
are included with hardware, such as the ones I received with my Akai MIDI controllers.
I have plugins from Softube and Sonivox that require this software to be running in order
to work.
Other plugins may require you to log into your account from the plugin itself in order
to activate it.
This is the case with some plugins I have from Tracktion, and the login process happens
when you go to use the plugin for the first time from the digital audio workstation, after
it has been installed.
From there, you may need to log back in every few weeks to keep it active, but this is a
fairly simple process.
Now to get the plugins to work, we have to tell our digital audio workstation where the
plugins are located.
This is the step that will differ between different digital audio workstations, and
you may have to look through some of the settings to figure this out for your particular software,
but it’s usually very easy to find.
This is usually from the dropdown window at the top of the screen.
Within the settings, there’s usually a section for plugins.
From here, there is usually some sort of field that allows us to browse for folders on our
computer where our plugins are located.
The default should be the folder where the plugins included with the software are found.
What we want to do is add a new folder.
We’ll click the add, or browse button, whatever it is in our software, navigate to that folder
where we organized all the plugins, and add it.
The digital audio workstation now sees this as a location where all the plugins are stored.
Now as long as all the plugins work properly, they should be available in the digital audio
workstation.
Our normal plugins that are applied to audio are found as plugins under the inserts section
of the track, just like the plugins that would be included with the software.
Sometimes though, they won’t be organized like the built in plugins and might be found
under an “Other” section and then be organized by the developer.
Virtual instruments are also installed in the same way, but they are then accessed from
an instrument track, and we select the plugin when we create the instrument track.
Then to get it to play, we just use a MIDI controller to input notes, or add notes on
the piano roll.
These virtual instrument plugins then give us an audio output from the MIDI input.
So this basically covers everything for installing VST plugins and instruments in a digital audio
workstation.
A lot of these techniques can be applied to just about any digital audio workstation,
that way we can use third party plugins in whatever DAW we’re using.
Thanks for checking out this video on installing VST plugins and instruments in a digital audio
workstation.
If this video helped you out, don’t forget to give it a like, subscribe to the channel,
and press the bell icon to get notified whenever a new video is released.
You can also check the video description for social media links to keep up to date on all
our new content.