Two of the coolest plug-ins at AES were from SoundToys, whose marketing director Mitch Thomas sported spiky purple hair especially for the event. PanMan, as the name suggests, is an auto-panner that makes your stereo field a creative destination for complex modulation. With PanMan’s user-programmable rhythm editor, MIDI sync and user-definable LFO shapes, you can set up stereo patterns that just weren’t possible until now.

Decapitator, as the name implies, has a potentially radical effect on audio signals. Decapitator is a saturation processor offering settings that range from slightly grungy to flat-out overdrive. It beefs up your sound by modeling five types of analog gear. Once you find a sound you like, clicking on the Punish button pushes it right over a cliff without losing any of its analog-sounding edge. SoundToys says that Panner and Decapitator should be available before the end of the year.