Strongly recommend this plugin. The formant pitch shifting is pretty much the only way I can get a good femme vocal recording from my testosterone laden cig-y vocal chords. The rest of the Soundtoys collection is pretty fantastic, but replacable. Alterboy is the only plugin I know of that lets you pitch shift the way it does.

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[–] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 4 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Is there one that makes femm voices sound more masc? isaac-pog

[–] LeylaLove@hexbear.net 5 points 2 years ago (1 children)

Alterboy will do this yeah! Or as other commenters have mentioned, there are other formant shifting plugins, Alterboy is just the one I've been using for 4+ years. When I do vocal mixing, I often add it in small doses to already masc voices to add more grit. You also hear it a lot on Brent Faiyaz's vocals, his engineer LOVES formant shifting. You just pull the knobs down instead of up.

Basics of formant pitching so it makes sense why it's a big deal for trans people. Normal pitching is just slowing or speeding up a sound. I think this is why we see so many trans people in PC music and Hyperpop, the speed change pitching done out of necessity (aka dysphoria) from older musicians just became a defining part of the sound. Formant shifting takes the peak frequencies of the sound, the formant, and will adjust those to change the pitch instead. It can be used for a variety of different sound effects. The best example I can give for the masc-ification of Alterboy is Story of OJ by Jay Z where the formant shifting is used on the vocal sample to both raise and lower the pitch. The part where the sample says "black... is yellow" is a great use of making a femme performance more masc.

[–] Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net 5 points 2 years ago

That rules, thank you meow-hug