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Update: 2024-01-02

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PitchShiftDelay

PitchShiftDelay is a time domain pitch shifter based on usual delay. The quirk of pitch shifter is somewhat reduced by 16x oversampling. Also the internal buffer length can be changed in real time. PitchShiftDelay doesn’t equipped with formant correction. So applying to voice may sounds strange, like Helium is inhaled.

full package contains following builds.

Linux build is built on Ubuntu 22.04. If you are using distribution other than Ubuntu 22.04, plugin will not likely to run. In this case, please take a look at build instruction.

macOS package is recommended for macOS user. I can’t purchase Apple Developer Program, therefore installation requires a workaround to bypass Gatekeeper. Details of workaround are written in Installation -> macOS Specific section.

Contact

Feel free to contact me on GitHub repository or ryukau@gmail.com.

You can fund the development through paypal.me/ryukau.

Installation

Plugin

Move *.vst3 directory to:

DAW may provides additional VST3 directory. For more information, please refer to the manual of the DAW.

Presets

Notice: Some plugins don’t have presets provided by Uhhyou Plugins.

Presets are included in the plugin package linked at the top of this page. To install presets, follow the steps below.

  1. Download plugin from a link at the top of this page.
  2. Extract downloaded zip file.
  3. Open presets directory placed in extracted package.
  4. Move Uhhyou directory into an OS specific preset directory (see below).

Below is a list of preset directories for each OS.

Preset directory name must be the same as the plugin. If preset directory does not exist, create it.

Windows Specific

If DAW doesn’t recognize the plugin, try installing C++ redistributable (vc_redist.x64.exe). Installer can be found in the link below.

Linux Specific

On Ubuntu 22.04, those packages are required.

sudo apt install libxcb-cursor0  libxkbcommon-x11-0

If DAW doesn’t recognize the plugin, take a look at Package Requirements section of the link below and make sure all the VST3 related package is installed.

REAPER on Linux may not recognize the plugin. A workaround is to delete a file ~/.config/REAPER/reaper-vstplugins64.ini and restart REAPER.

macOS Specific

Important: full package is not confirmed working. When using full, try removing following files.

macOS package doesn’t contain above files. Also, all packages are in “ad-hoc signing” state set by codesign command.

Remove Quarantine

When trying to run plugin first time, following message may appear on macOS.

<PluginName>.vst3 is damaged and can't be opened. You should move it to the Trash.

In this case, open terminal and try running one or both of following command to unzipped .vst3 directory. Replace /path/to/PluginName.vst3 according to your install location.

xattr -rd com.apple.quarantine /path/to/PluginName.vst3
xattr -rc /path/to/PluginName.vst3

Bypass Gatekeeper

Plugin may be considered as unsigned/un-notarized application. In this case, open System Preferences, go to Security & Privacy → General, then click the Open Anyway button. The offcial Apple help page linked below has screenshots for the procedure. See “If you want to open an app that hasn’t been notarized or is from an unidentified developer” section.

If the plugin is still not working, try changing install location to /Library/Audio/Plug-ins/VST3/ or /Users/$USERNAME/Library/Audio/Plug-ins/VST3/ whichever still haven’t tried.

If all the above methods do not work, try following the steps below.

  1. Open terminal and run sudo spctl --master-disable.
  2. Go to System Preferences → Security and Privacy → General → Allow apps downloaded from, then select “Anywhere”.

Beware that steps above degrades security of your system. To revert the settings, follow the steps below.

  1. Go to System Preferences → Security and Privacy → General → Allow apps downloaded from, then select option to “App Store and identified developers”.
  2. Open terminal and run sudo spctl --master-enable.

Applying codesign

Note This section may not relevant to macOS packages. However it’s not verified. (GitHub issue)

To use full package, following command might be used.

sudo codesign --force --deep -s - /path/to/PluginName.vst3

codesign might not be available without installing Xcode.

Reference

GUI Style Configuration

At first time, create color config file to:

style.json will be loaded for each time a plugin window opens.

Several color themes are available on the link below.

Below is a example of style.json.

{
  "fontFamily": "Tinos",
  "fontBold": true,
  "fontItalic": true,
  "foreground": "#000000",
  "foregroundButtonOn": "#000000",
  "foregroundInactive": "#8a8a8a",
  "background": "#ffffff",
  "boxBackground": "#ffffff",
  "border": "#000000",
  "borderCheckbox": "#000000",
  "borderLabel": "#000000",
  "unfocused": "#dddddd",
  "highlightMain": "#0ba4f1",
  "highlightAccent": "#13c136",
  "highlightButton": "#fcc04f",
  "highlightWarning": "#fc8080",
  "overlay": "#00000088",
  "overlayHighlight": "#00ff0033"
}

Font Options

Following is a list of font options.

To use custom font, place *.ttf file into custom font path: *.vst3/Contents/Resources/Fonts.

Notice: If the combination of fontFamily, fontBold, fontItalic is not exists in custom font path, default font of VSTGUI is used.

If fontFamily is set to empty string "", then "Tinos" is used as fallback. If the length is greater than 1 and the font family name doesn’t exists, default font of VSTGUI is used.

Styles other than bold, italic or bold-italic are not supported by VSTGUI. For example, “Thin”, “Light”, “Medium”, and “Black” weights cannot be used.

Color Options

Hex color codes are used.

First letter # is conventional. Plugins ignore the first letter of color code, thus ?102938, \n11335577 are valid.

Do not use characters outside of 0-9a-f for color value.

Following is a list of color options. If an option is missing, default color will be used.

Controls

Right Click on the controls pops up a context menu provided by DAW.

Knob and slider provides following controls:

Control with many blue vertical bars (BarBox) have some keyboard shortcuts. LFO Wave on Main tab and Gain, Width, Pitch, Phase on Wavetable tab are using BarBox. Shortcuts are enabled after left clicking BarBox and mouse cursor is on the inside of BarBox. Cheat sheet is available on Infomation tab.

Input Control
Left Drag Change Value
Shift + Left Drag Change Value (Snapped)
Ctrl + Left Drag Reset to Default
Ctrl + Shift + Left Drag Change Value (Skip Between Frames)
Middle Drag Draw Line
Shift + Middle Drag Edit One Bar
Ctrl + Middle Drag Reset to Default
Ctrl + Shift + Middle Drag Toggle Lock
a Alternate Sign
d Reset Everything to Default
D Toggle Min/Mid/Max
e Emphasize Low
E Emphasize High
f Low-pass Filter
F High-pass Filter
i Invert Value (Preserve minimum)
I Invert Value (Minimum to 0)
l Toggle Lock under Mouse Cursor
L Toggle Lock for All
n Normalize (Preserve minimum)
N Normalize (Minimum to 0)
p Permute
r Randomize
R Sparse Randomize
s Sort Descending Order
S Sort Ascending Order
t Subtle Randomize (Random walk)
T Subtle Randomize (Converge to 0)
z Undo
Z Redo
, (Comma) Rotate Back
. (Period) Rotate Forward
1 Decrease
2-4 Decrease 2n-4n
5-9 Decimate by holding 2n-5n

Snapping is not available for all BarBox. If you’d like to have snapping for certain BarBox, feel free to open issue to GitHub repository.

Edit One Bar with Shift + Right Drag holds a bar under the cursor when mouse right button is pressed. Then only changes that one bar while holding down mouse right button.

Toggle Lock with Ctrl + Shift + Right Drag behaves as line edit. When right mouse button (RMB) is pressed, it holds the opposite state of the bar below mouse cursor, then use the state for the rest of bars. For example, if RMB is pressed on a locked bar, dragging unlocks bars while holding down RMB.

Some BarBox has scroll bar to zoom in. Scroll bar has handles on left end and right end. To control zoom, use Left Drag on one of the handle. Scroll bar also has following controls:

Block Diagram

If the image is small, use Ctrl + Mouse Wheel or “View Image” on right click menu to scale.

Diagram only shows overview. It’s not exact implementation.

Parameters

Delay

Pitch

Main pitch shift amount.

Main shifter multiplies pitch by the value of Pitch + LFO amount.

Because of the 16 fold oversampling, aliasing noise don’t affect the output when Pitch is below 31 which is equal to 16 * 2 - 1.

Offset

Unison shifter pitch offset from Pitch.

Unison shifter pitch is calculated by following equation:

unisonPitch = mainPitch;
if (Mirror) unisonPitch = max(1 / unisonPitch, 1000);
if (S2 Reverse) unisonPitch = -unisonPitch;
unisonPitch += ((To Pitch) + (To Unison)) * lfo;
Pitch Cross

Cross feedback amount between main shifter and unison shifter.

Mirror

When checked, it changes unison shifter pitch to 1 / Pitch.

Checking Mirror after initial state results in that the feedback pitch will always be Pitch or 1 / Pitch. This state will be kept until one of Offset, Pitch Cross, To Pitch, or To Unison is changed from default.

S1 Reverse

Reverse the playback of main shifter.

Internally, S1 Reverse changes the sign of Pitch to negative to moving the read pointer to reverse direction.

S2 Reverse

Reverse the playback of unison shifter.

L-R Lean

The ratio of Delay Time between left and right channels. L-R Lean also works when Channel Type is M-S.

Delay Time [s]

Buffer length of pitch shifter. Note that the value only accurate when Pitch is set to 1.

The exact delay time depends on the pitch shift amount and buffer length. LFO farther complicates the computation of exact delay time. So the value of Delay Time is usually a rough indication rather than exact delay time.

Feedback

Feedback gain in amplitude.

Stereo Cross

Cross feedback amount between stereo channels. When the value is set to 1.0, output becomes ping-pong delay.

Channel Type

Select input channel type from left-right (L-R) or mid-side (M-S).

Highpass [Hz]

Cutoff frequency of highpass filter inserted on feedback path.

Mix

Dry [dB]

Input bypass gain.

Wet [dB]

Output gain of the signal that go through PitchShiftDelay.

Unison Mix

Mixing ratio of main shifter and unison shifter.

Smoothing [s]

Paramter smoothing time in seconds.

For example, if the value of Smoothing is set to 0.01 or something short, the change of parameter almost immediately applies. So it sounds more snappy, but may introduce audible pop noise.

On the other hand, if thevalue of Smoothing is set to1.0for example, the change of parameter is only slowly followed. So when changingPitch`, it may sounds like long slide/portamento.

LFO

Sync.

When checked, it enables tempo synchronization (tempo sync). LFO phase also synchronize to the exact position derived from sync interval, and time passed from the start of playback.

When not checked, LFO behaves as same as if synchronizing to 120 BPM. It also disables LFO phase sync.

Tempo Upper

Numerator of sync interval.

LFO synchronizes to 1 bar when (Tempo Upper) / (Tempo Lower) is 1/1. 1/4 synchronizes to 1 beat when time signature of 4/4. Note that Rate multiplies the sync interval.

Following is the equation to calculate sync interval.

syncInterval = (Rate) * (Tempo Upper) / (Tempo Lower);
Tempo Lower

Denominator of sync interval.

Note that Rate multiplies the sync interval.

Rate

Multiplier to sync interval.

Rate is convenient when changing sync interval while keeping the values of Tempo Upper and Tempo Lower.

Stereo Offset

LFO phase offset between stereo channels.

Unison Offset

LFO phase offset between main shifter and unison shifter.

Wave Interp.

LFO wave form interpolation method.

Step makes LFO to act like a sequencer. Linear sounds similar to PCHIP, and the computation cost is lower. PCHIP is the most smooth among all 3.

To Pitch

LFO modulation amount to main pitch.

To Unison

LFO modulation amount to unison shifter pitch that is added to To Pitch amount.

Change Log

Old Versions

License

PitchShiftDelay is licensed under GPLv3. Complete licenses are linked below.

If the link above doesn’t work, please send email to ryukau@gmail.com.

About VST

VST is a trademark of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH, registered in Europe and other countries.