CLIPOTYPE MANUAL

Installation

Download the installer for your system from the Clipotype page.

macOS

Requires macOS 11 or later, on Apple Silicon or Intel.

1. Open Clipotype-v1.1-macOS.pkg and follow the installer. It is signed and notarized by Apple, so it opens without warnings.
2. Choose which formats to install. They go to:
   • VST3: /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3
   • AU: /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/Components
   • Standalone: /Applications
3. Restart your DAW or rescan plug-ins. Clipotype is listed under BopsAudio.

To uninstall, delete Clipotype.vst3, Clipotype.component and Clipotype.app from those folders.

Windows

Requires Windows 10 or 11, 64-bit. Windows gets the VST3 and the standalone app; there is no AU on Windows.

1. Run Clipotype-v1.1.0-Windows-Setup.exe. If SmartScreen warns you, click More info → Run anyway.
2. Choose the VST3 plugin and, if you want it, the standalone app. They go to:
   • VST3: C:\Program Files\Common Files\VST3\Clipotype.vst3
   • Standalone: C:\Program Files\BopsAudio\Clipotype, with a Start menu shortcut
3. Restart your DAW or rescan plug-ins.

To uninstall, use Settings → Apps → Installed apps (or Apps & features) and remove Clipotype.

Quick start

1. Put Clipotype on a track or bus and play some audio. The spectrum at the bottom of the window starts moving.
2. Turn up Drive. Clipotype is now saturating the whole signal.
3. Move Intensity to choose the character: low values round the peaks off softly, high values clip them hard.
4. Want different treatment for the lows and highs? Click on the spectrum to drop a crossover there. You now have two bands; click LOW or HIGH above the knobs (or click inside a band on the spectrum) to choose which one the knobs control.
5. Use Amount to blend the result with the original, and B to compare against bypass.

Clipotype doesn’t compensate output level. When you push Drive or lower Threshold the output gets louder and denser, so level-match (with Amount or your channel fader) before judging whether it sounds better.

The window

From top to bottom:

• Band labels (LOW, MID, HIGH) choose which band the knobs below control. They only appear once you have more than one band. The S button at the right end of this row solos the selected band.
• Knobs: Intensity, Drive and Stereo belong to the selected band; Threshold is shared by all bands. Hover a knob to see its value.
• Amount slider, with the D (delta) and B (bypass) buttons to its right. Hover the slider to see its value.
• Spectrum: a live analyzer of the incoming audio with the crossover lines on top, so you can place splits where the sound actually has energy. Hovering it shows the frequency under the cursor.

The window takes on the colour of the selected band: terracotta for low, slate blue for mid, sage green for high, and cream when there is only one band.

You can resize the window by dragging its bottom-right corner, from 720×600 up to 1440×1200. The size is saved with your session.

Bands and crossovers

Clipotype starts with one band covering the whole spectrum. Crossovers split it into up to three bands, and each band has its own Intensity, Drive and Stereo.

• Add a crossover: click on the spectrum where you want the split. One crossover gives you LOW and HIGH; a second one adds MID between them. Crossovers can sit anywhere from 20 Hz to 20 kHz.
• Move a crossover: drag its line left or right. The two lines can’t cross each other.
• Remove a crossover: right-click its line (on a Mac trackpad, two-finger click or Control-click).
• Select a band: click its label above the knobs, or click inside the band on the spectrum once you have two crossovers.

Removing a crossover merges two bands, and the band that disappears is reset to its defaults. Going from two bands to one resets HIGH; going from three to two resets MID. If you want those settings back, undo in your DAW or re-enter them.

Controls reference

All of these are automatable from your DAW. “Per band” controls have separate LOW, MID and HIGH parameters, for example Low Drive, Mid Drive and High Drive.

Control	Applies to	Range	Default	What it does
Intensity	Per band	0–100 %	0 %	Morphs the clipping curve from soft (a smooth tanh curve that rounds the peaks) at 0 % to hard (flat-topped clipping) at 100 %. Values in between blend the two.
Drive	Per band	0–100 %	0 %	How hard the band is pushed into the curve: 0 % adds no gain, 100 % adds 30 dB. More drive means more saturation and a denser, louder band.
Stereo	Per band	0–200 %	100 %	Mid/side width of the band after saturation. 0 % makes the band mono, 100 % leaves the width as it is, 200 % doubles the side signal.
Threshold	All bands	−30 to 0 dB	0 dB	The level the clipping curve is built around. Lowering it makes the saturation start on quieter material, so more of the signal gets shaped.
Amount	Whole plugin	0–100 %	100 %	Dry/wet mix. 0 % outputs the original signal untouched; 100 % outputs only the processed signal.
S (Solo)	Selected band	On / off	Off	Plays only the selected band. See below.
D (Delta)	Whole plugin	On / off	Off	Plays only what Clipotype adds to your sound. See below.
B (Bypass)	Whole plugin	On / off	Off	Passes your audio through unprocessed. Linked to your DAW’s bypass.

With Drive at 0 % the soft curve is close to transparent at normal levels, but peaks that get near the threshold are still gently rounded. Use B or D to hear exactly what is happening.

Solo, Delta and Bypass

S · Solo

Solo lets you hear one band on its own, fully processed, which makes it much easier to set crossovers and dial in a band. While a band is soloed, Amount and Delta are ignored so you hear the band exactly as Clipotype shapes it. If you select another band while solo is on, the solo follows your selection. Solo is only available when there is more than one band.

D · Delta

Delta plays the difference between the processed and the original signal: only the harmonics and clipping that Clipotype adds. It is boosted by 12 dB because that difference is usually quiet. It’s a quick way to check that you aren’t adding harshness you don’t want. Amount still applies after Delta, so set Amount to 100 % to hear the full difference.

B · Bypass

Bypass outputs your original audio, delayed by the same amount as the processed signal, so switching back and forth doesn’t shift the timing. It is the same parameter your DAW’s bypass button uses.

Tips

• Punchy low end without mud: split around 120–250 Hz, drive the LOW band with Intensity fairly high, and set its Stereo to 0 % so the sub stays mono.
• Grit on the mids only: make three bands, push Drive on MID and leave LOW and HIGH clean. The body of a bass or vocal gets character while the subs and air stay untouched.
• Air and width: on the HIGH band, keep Intensity low for soft saturation and raise Stereo above 100 % to open up the top.
• Parallel saturation: push things further than you need, then bring Amount down to blend it back in.
• As a clipper on drums or a bus: keep Drive low, set Intensity high, and lower Threshold until the peaks are just being caught. Check with Delta: you should hear only the transients clicking through.

Technical details

• Oversampling: the saturation runs at 4× the session sample rate (two stages of half-band FIR filters) to keep aliasing down.
• Latency: the oversampling filters add a small, fixed latency that Clipotype reports to your DAW, so plugin delay compensation lines everything up automatically.
• Crossovers: Linkwitz-Riley filters.
• Analyzer: shows the input to the plugin (a mono sum of both channels), before any processing.
• Formats: macOS: VST3, AU, Standalone. Windows: VST3, Standalone.
• Source code: Clipotype is open source under the AGPLv3, on GitHub.

Troubleshooting

Clipotype doesn’t show up in my DAW

• Rescan plug-ins, or restart the DAW. Look under the vendor BopsAudio.
• Ableton Live (macOS): in Settings → Plug-Ins, turn on “Use VST3 Plug-In System Folders” or “Use Audio Units v2”, then click Rescan.
• Logic Pro: open Logic Pro → Settings → Plug-in Manager, find Clipotype and click “Reset & Rescan Selection”.
• FL Studio (Windows): Options → Manage plugins → Find plugins.
• Check the plugin is where the installer put it (see Installation). Most DAWs need the VST3 in the system VST3 folder.

It got much louder

That’s expected: Clipotype doesn’t compensate level. Use Amount, lower Drive, or turn the channel down after it.

The low end sounds weaker or phasey on mono systems

Check the Stereo setting on the LOW band. Values above 100 % widen it; set it to 100 % or lower, or 0 % for a mono low end.

Something else

Please send feedback with your OS, DAW and what happened. Bug reports with steps to reproduce get fixed fastest.