OCELOT Clipper

Name: OCELOT Clipper
Price: 69 USD
Author: Fuse Audio Labs

by Fuse Audio Labs · Clipper · Peak clipper and shaper

Not rated yet

OCELOT Clipper is a peak reduction tool for mastering and mix prep, with separate knee controls for positive and negative signal swings.

It offers up to 32x oversampling or ADAA anti-aliasing, a true peak mode and latency under 1.5 ms, for $69.

Best for: Mastering, Mix Bus, Drum Bus, Drums. Genres: Hip-Hop & Trap, Electronic & EDM, Pop.

Keywords: oversampling, true-peak, warm, bass, drums, mastering, corrective, bus processing, enhancement, full mix, gritty, mixing, built-in analyzer, auto-gain, clean, drum bus, mix bus, resizable UI, simple, single-band, visual feedback.

What it does

OCELOT Clipper is the clipper in Fuse Audio Labs' OCELOT series, described as "a streamlined approach for managing loudness." It shaves peaks with control over how the clipping sounds, from clean to warm or gritty.

Main controls: Input Gain, Knee and Ceiling.
Asymmetric knee: separate Positive and Negative Knee settings, so you can clip peaks hard and troughs softly, or the other way round.
Harmonic shaping: the knee settings add warmth or grit, or keep peak taming clean.
Anti-aliasing: oversampling from 2x to 32x, or an HQ mode using ADAA (antiderivative anti-aliasing).
Listening aids: One-to-One for level-matched comparison and Delta to hear only what the clipper removes.
True peak: a True Peak mode for inter-sample peak control, with latency under 1.5 ms.
Displays: a real-time waveform view of input and output, a waveshaper curve, and a harmonic spectrum display; the window is resizable.

The current version is 1.0.

Source: Fuse Audio Labs product page

When to use it

OCELOT Clipper is the pick when you want to shape the sound of clipping, not just its amount. Its main draw over SIR Audio Tools StandardCLIP and Kazrog KClip 3 is the separate positive and negative knees, which let you clip the two halves of the wave differently. Compared with Venn Audio Free Clip 2, it costs money but adds a True Peak mode, ADAA and a harmonic display. Compared with Boz Digital Big Clipper 2, it has no multiband splitting, so it clips the whole signal at once.

Best for: raising loudness before a limiter, taming drum and bass peaks, and adding controlled warmth to bass.
Genres: hip-hop, trap, EDM, pop and rock.
Look elsewhere if: you want multiband clipping (Big Clipper 2) or a free tool (Free Clip 2).
Tip: set a hard positive knee and a softer negative knee to add warmth to bass parts.

What producers say

Early coverage is positive, focused on the asymmetric knee.

Mixing.co.kr said the independent positive and negative knees set it apart from other clippers, and praised its range across drums, bass and mastering at a fair price.
CPU note: the same review measured about 2.5% CPU at 2x oversampling, rising past 20% at 32x.

Mixing.co.kr review

Where to buy

Fuse Audio Labs: $69
Plugin Boutique: $69

Tutorials and reviews

Similar plugins

OVC-128 by Voxengo · Oversampled soft/hard clipper · $51
THE_CLIPPER by Phil Speiser · Anti-aliased clipper · $49.99
SKYE Clipper by Signum Audio · Anti-aliased clipper · $58.79
bx_clipper by Brainworx · Soft/hard clipper · $125
CLIP by Echelon Audio · Oversampled clipper · $69
Planer by HoRNet · Soft clipper with adjustable curve · $10.21
P22 Rail by Pulsar Modular · Converter-style mastering clipper · $225
Bus Clipper by Slate Digital · Bus clipper · $99
StandardCLIP by SIR Audio Tools · Soft/hard clipper · $28.39
TBPAClip by TBProAudio · Single and multiband clipper · $44.28

All clippers