Swan Audio is a sound design project from Stephen Wright aka ‘SWAN808’ on the producer forums, a London based musician and sound designer.

I developed a passion for vintage analogue synths, despite growing up and starting production during the computer and digital revolution (late 90’s early 00’s). I spent many years trying to get an analogue sound using plugins – enduring years of disappointments and frustrations not understanding why the images of the plugins in my DAW didn’t sound like my favourite music from the 80’s and 90’s. After years of saving I managed to get onto the analogue synth world, buying, selling and owning over 20 classic analogue synths as well as all the major VA brands. All the while continuing to test and compare plugins, because despite the accusations of bias from plugin fanatics, I always wanted a plugin which could match the wonderful sound of vintage analogue – due to the cost and convenience. Eventually when U-he came out with Diva I was initially disappointed with what I heard…it was only when I spent a long time transferring and perfecting sounds from an OB8 directly to Diva, did I realise that with care and understanding of analogue sound they could actually sound very close. On presenting the Gearspace community with a series of blind tests, and their subsequent results (majority could not tell the difference), I realised that the preset library in Diva had given me the wrong impression – and that it could in fact closely match real analogue synths. This was the start of Swan Audio as a preset brand – where I decided to take my knowledge of analogue synthesis and tune the best analogue emulation plugins to help others out there get the most convincing results without needing the budget or room to own the original machines…

My preset creation for Diva is supported by the awesome graphics work of Satyatunes, a GUI designer who helps create the accompanying themed Diva skins which add that extra visual touch to the sound packs.

I love hearing feedback from people so please let me know what you think using the email at the top of the page left, and you can sign up to the newsletter for discounts and if you would like to be kept in touch about new releases…