Quick start
- Put Tuff on an audio track with your bass plugged straight in (a DI).
- Arm the track, turn on monitoring and play.
- Pick a preset. Presets set up the whole chain, not just the knobs, so they're the quickest way to hear what Tuff can do.
- Click any block in the chain strip to open its controls in the big panel below.
- Set Input in the master panel so the meter peaks around two-thirds of the way up.
The window
- Header: the preset box, QUALITY (oversampling), TUNER and the power button (bypass).
- Chain strip: your rig, left to right: IN, the blocks before the split, the two lanes, MERGE, the blocks after, OUT.
- Block panel: the controls of whichever block you clicked, over an animated waveform in that block's colour.
- Master: Input, Output, meters and the split controls.
Building the chain
- Move a block: drag its tile.
- Switch it on or off: double-click it.
- More options: right-click it to switch it, move it to the other lane, or remove it.
- Add a block: click + ADD BLOCK. It goes where that kind of block usually sits: drives in lane A ahead of the amp, the cabinet after the amp, effects at the end. Then drag it wherever you like.
Each block can be in the chain once. Changing the layout fades the sound out and back in over a few milliseconds, so you can rearrange while playing.
The split
The split sends your bass down two lanes, A and B, and mixes them back together at MERGE.
| Control | What it does |
|---|---|
| Split On | With the split off, only lane A plays. |
| Blend | How much of each lane you hear, shown as A / B. |
| Clean Lows | Low-passes lane B (60 Hz to 1 kHz), so it adds only clean low end under a dirty lane A. |
An empty lane B is your clean, dry bass. The lanes are lined up in time automatically, and every drive keeps its polarity, so blending never cancels the lows.
Blocks
| Group | Block | Main controls |
|---|---|---|
| Dynamics | GATE | Threshold, Release |
| COMP | VCA (clean), OPTO (smooth) or FET (punchy); Sustain, Attack, Release, Blend (parallel), Level; gain reduction meter | |
| Synth & Filter | OCTAVE | -1, -2 and Up levels, Dry, Tone |
| SYNTH | Saw, square or pulse; unison or an octave down; Cutoff, Resonance, Envelope, Decay, Level, Dry. Play single notes. | |
| ENV FILTER | Low, band or high pass; Sensitivity, Start, Range, Resonance, Decay, Down, Mix | |
| PITCH | Shift ±24 semitones, Fine, Mix | |
| Drive | GRIND | Drive, Blend, Level; Grunt and Attack switches; Bass, Lo Mids, Hi Mids, Treble with frequency switches |
| WARM | Drive, Blend, Level, Era, Bass, Treble, Bright | |
| FUZZ | Drive, Shape (morphs between two fuzz voices), Tone, Gate, Blend, Level | |
| Amp | AMP | Five amps (below); Gain, Bass, Mid, Mid Freq, Treble, Master, BRIGHT, DEEP |
| NAM | Load a capture; Input, Output, Blend, NORMALISE, CALIBRATE | |
| CAB | Five cabinets or your own IR; Mic, Tweeter, DI Blend, Low Cut, High Cut | |
| EQ | EQ | 8 bands from 40 Hz to 5 kHz, ±12 dB, and Level |
| Space | CHORUS | Chorus or flanger; Rate, Depth, Mix, Low Cut |
| DELAY | Digital, Analog or Mod; Time or SYNC, Feedback, Tone, Low Cut, Mix, PING-PONG | |
| REVERB | Room, Plate, Hall or Shimmer; Size, Tone, Pre-delay, Low Cut, Mix |
The Blend knob on each drive mixes the driven sound with your clean bass inside the block, so the low end stays solid even at high drive. The Low Cut on the space blocks keeps your low end dry while the top gets the effect.
Amps
| Amp | Character |
|---|---|
| BASALT | A big all-tube 70s rock rig. Growls when you dig in. |
| FLINT | A vintage tube combo. Round, warm and woody. |
| PUMICE | A solid-state hi-fi head. Clean, punchy and fast, with a scooped contour. |
| SCORIA | A cranked British bass head with raw upper mids. |
| ONYX | A modern hybrid: a clean, tight low end under a grindy, compressed top. |
Mid Freq moves the Mid knob to 220 Hz, 450 Hz, 800 Hz, 1.6 kHz or 3 kHz. BRIGHT lifts the top and DEEP the lows. The amps are level-matched.
NAM captures
Add a NAM block (or drop a .nam file anywhere on Tuff, which adds one for you), then load a Neural Amp Modeler capture. tone3000.com has thousands.
- < and > step through the captures in the same folder. A summary line shows what the capture is, who made it and its sample rate.
- NORMALISE brings every capture to the same loudness. Blend mixes it with the dry signal.
- CALIBRATE feeds the capture at the level the real amp heard, using your interface's maximum input level in dBu. It's a setting for the computer, shared by every Brightwork plugin with captures.
- The capture is saved inside your project. A capture is mono, like a real amp.
Presets
29 presets in seven groups: GROWL, ROCK, CLEAN & VINTAGE, MODERN, SYNTH & FILTER, SPACE and NAM. They're level-matched, and each one sets the full chain layout. The up and down arrow keys step through them.
Tips
- The modern growl sound: GRIND in lane A with Blend around 60%, lane B empty, Clean Lows on at about 250 Hz, then the amp and cab after the merge.
- For synth bass, play single notes cleanly and put the SYNTH block first, before any drive.
- Turn QUALITY down while writing with lots of tracks, and back up before you bounce.
If something's wrong
- The synth or octave glitches: play one note at a time and mute strings you aren't playing. Pitch-tracking effects need a clear single note.
- The low end disappears when blending: check Clean Lows isn't set too low, and that the lane B blocks aren't cutting bass.
- High CPU with a capture: NAM captures are heavier than the built-in amps. Use one capture per track, or freeze the track.