VST errors with Stratus reverb

Hi, I recently picked up the Stratus reverb from Exponential Audio. Beautiful plugin.

Unfortunately, Fairlight isn't playing well with it. The plugin doesn't have different versions for mono, stereo, 5.1, etc. Instead it appears to configure itself based on data provided by the application. Using Nuendo or Pro Tools, the plugin properly registers the track format and routes everything correctly. In Fairlight, it doesn't.

Here's what the configuration shows when I try to add the plugin to a 5.1 track:

Capture.PNG (152.81 KiB) Viewed 958 times

As you can see it registers 6 channels in the track but configures itself in 5.0 mode for some reason. On top of that, channel routing is incorrect, as the LFE send comes in over the left surround after going through the reverb. 7.1 tracks are even worse. There I can't get the center channel to properly send through the reverb at all (and there too it loads incorrectly as 7.0).

This issue happens in both VST3 and VST2 versions of Stratus.

It would be nice if Blackmagic could take a good look at this issue as it's one of the main reasons I decided at this point not to invest further in Fairlight. Like I said it loads and performs flawlessly in Nuendo, so it's unlikely that the issue is with the VST plugin itself.

Known issue with Exponential Audio plugins and certain hosts including Resolve and Reaper. This has been communicated to iZotope as it requires a fix on their end. The lookup tables of all current surround and immersive capable Exponential Audio plugins are not correct.

Older builds of the Exponential Audio plugins use different lookup tables for each host and therefore map correctly in Resolve 17 including across NHK22.2 Busses.

If you are on macOS I may be able to supply the older installers for R2Surround (v2.0.7), PhoenixVerb Surround (v2.0.7), Stratus 3D (v1.0.4), and Symphony 3D (v1.0.4). The Stratus 3D and Symphony 3D installers include the standard surround versions.

If on a recent version of macOS, note that the installers are 32bit and so will not launch. In this case, I may be able to provide the VST3 plugins separately (which are required for the immersive formats in Resolve Studio 17. The VST2.4 versions only support up to 7.1).

They kicked the can to Blackmagic when I contacted them a month ago

I've tried it in Reaper as well and while the routing is odd, it can be used because you are able to manually patch a plugin's inputs and outputs, something that Fairlight currently doesn't allow.

Unfortunately I'm on Windows and the only version I can access is 3.0 (the latest).

Same in Windows with EA plugs, on multiple hosts. So annoying. I bought Stratus just before Michael sold to Izotope. Izotope have told me that they won't be developing them any further. Will never spend another cent with them.

Same in Windows with EA plugs, on multiple hosts. So annoying. I bought Stratus just before Michael sold to Izotope. Izotope have told me that they won't be developing them any further. Will never spend another cent with them.

They said that? Well, guess I'm the sucker.

Yep.

I have done a lot of testing of surround plugins, and it seems to be that a lot of the issue is that plugin developers try and make the multi I/O differentiation automatic. Then you have issues implicit in the VST specification I believe (3 is much better than 2 in this regard), and then frameworks like Juce introduce their own I/O assumptions (which are outdated and wrong). It's a minefield.

What would be better, is if plugin dev's incorporated some kind of configuration facility external to the plugin, where the user can setup the I/O structure before the plugin in instantiated. Yes more hoops to jump through, but at least you could use the products you've paid for. I have too many surround plugins that don't work properly. In this respct, AAX and Pro Tools seem to be the winners.

Big shout at to Voxengo at this point: way out in front with the best VST surround support I've seen. Unfortunately tops out at 8 channels and no good reverbs