SEZ User Guide

Character Echo · by GDP Audio · macOS & Windows

Download the PDF · SEZ product page · Release notes

Overview · Controls · Factory Presets · Support

Overview

SEZ is a character echo for beatmakers. Choose one of four echo voices — TAPE, BUCKET, SAMPLER or CLEAN — and every repeat passes through it again, so the repeats wear, wobble or crunch a little more each time while the original stays untouched. Lock the time to your tempo or play it free, shape the repeats with TONE and CHARACTER, spread them out in stereo, and let them duck under your vocal. Two performance buttons make it an instrument: hold THROW to send a single word or snare hit into the echo at full level, and press FREEZE to loop whatever is ringing.

System Requirements

Installation

macOS

Run the SEZ macOS installer (the .pkg file you downloaded) and follow the on-screen steps. The installer places files at:

Windows

Run the SEZ Windows installer (the .exe file you downloaded) and follow the on-screen steps. The installer places files at:

Most DAWs find SEZ automatically on their next plugin scan. If it doesn't appear, rescan plugins from your DAW's plugin manager.

Licensing

SEZ runs in demo mode until a license is activated. In demo mode a brief noise burst plays approximately every 45 seconds — all controls remain fully functional.

To purchase a license visit gdpaudio.com.

To activate:

1. Click the UNLICENSED - CLICK TO ACTIVATE pill in the plugin footer.
2. Paste the full contents of your license file into the text box.
3. Click Activate. The pill will change to LICENSED TO followed by the name on your license.

Your license file carries the name it was issued to, and the pill shows it (shortened if it is long). A license that carries no personal name simply shows LICENSED. Either way it unlocks the plugin in full.

Your license is stored at:

Using another computer — activate SEZ there with the same license file. No internet connection is required.

Uninstalling

macOS — open SEZ Uninstaller.app from your Applications folder and follow the prompts.

Windows — go to Settings → Apps → Installed apps, find SEZ by GDP Audio, and choose Uninstall.

Both remove the plugin files and your user presets. Your license file is kept, so reinstalling SEZ later doesn't require re-activation.

Controls

ENGINE — The voice of the repeats. TAPE: wobbly and worn, softens and saturates on every pass. BUCKET: murky and noisy, loses its top end quickly. SAMPLER: crunchy and aliased, each repeat re-sampled at a lower rate and bit depth. CLEAN: exact repeats. Switching engines crossfades, so it can be automated.

TIME — The time between repeats. With SYNC on it steps through note values locked to your song's tempo, from 1/32 to 1/1, including dotted (D) and triplet (T) values. With SYNC off it sets milliseconds, 1 to 2000 ms. Turning TIME while repeats are ringing bends their pitch, like moving a tape head.

SYNC — Locks TIME to the host tempo (on by default).

TAP — Click in time, two or more times, to set TIME in milliseconds from your taps. Turns SYNC off.

FEEDBACK — How many repeats. 0% gives a single repeat; higher values keep them going longer. Above 100% the echo builds on itself, but it is held back smoothly and never clips hard. Range: 0–110%.

TONE — Turn left for softer repeats (top end rolled off), right for thinner repeats (low end rolled off). The centre position, FLAT, leaves them untouched. TONE works on every pass, so later repeats change more than the first. Range: SOFT 100% to THIN 100%.

CHARACTER — How much of the engine you hear: TAPE wobble and saturation, BUCKET grit, noise and softness, SAMPLER crunch (lower sample rate and bit depth), or CLEAN gentle chorus-style movement. Range: 0–100%.

MIX — Dry to wet. The dry signal stays at full level up to 50%, and the echo reaches full level at 50%, so there is no dip in the middle. 100% is echo only. Range: 0–100%.

STEREO — MONO: repeats in the centre. WIDE: repeats keep the input's stereo picture, with the right side slightly later for width. PING-PONG: repeats bounce left, right, left.

DUCK — OFF: repeats always at full level. LIGHT: repeats dip a little while you play and come back up in the gaps. HEAVY: repeats get out of the way while you play — ideal for vocals.

THROW — Hold the button: everything you play goes into the echo at full level, whatever MIX is set to. Let go and the thrown repeats ring out. Use it to echo a single word, a snare hit or the end of a phrase.

FREEZE — Press to loop the repeats as they are: new input stays out and nothing fades, until you press it again.

REPEATS DISPLAY — Shows the original hit and the next four repeats at their real spacing, with the time and feedback above. Each bar is FEEDBACK times the one before; the bars change colour with TONE, dip when DUCK is working, and stop fading when FREEZE is on.

BYPASS — Bypass with a short crossfade. Follows the host's bypass. The echo keeps running underneath, so switching back on resumes with the repeats already in the loop.

OUTPUT METER — Output peak level, left and right.

DSP Signal Chain

Input → Send (THROW boosts it, FREEZE closes it) → + Feedback → Engine → TONE → Delay → Stereo routing → back to Feedback; Delay → × DUCK → MIX with the dry input → Output

The engine and TONE sit inside the feedback loop, which is why each repeat carries more character than the one before. SEZ adds no latency. The dry signal is never processed.

The Four Engines

TAPE — repeats soften and saturate a little on every pass, with slow wow and fast flutter. CHARACTER sets how much wobble and saturation. Turning TIME glides like a tape machine.

BUCKET — the sound of a bucket-brigade echo pedal: steep top-end loss, a little noise added on every pass and soft clipping. CHARACTER sets how murky and noisy.

SAMPLER — each repeat is re-sampled at a lower sample rate and bit depth, with no smoothing filter, so the repeats crunch and alias like an old sampler. CHARACTER goes from 32 kHz / 12-bit down to 8 kHz / 6-bit.

CLEAN — exact digital repeats. CHARACTER adds a gentle chorus-style movement; at 0 the repeats are identical copies.

THROW and FREEZE

THROW is the classic dub-style send. Set MIX low (for example 15%) so the track sounds almost dry, then hold THROW on the word or hit you want to echo: it enters the echo at full level and rings out after you let go. THROW is a host parameter, so you can automate it or map it to a controller.

FREEZE holds the repeats that are already ringing and keeps new audio out, so you can play over a frozen loop. It works best with long TIME values and high FEEDBACK; press FREEZE again to let the loop fade normally.

Tips

Start with MIX around 20–35%. On a vocal, DUCK HEAVY keeps the words clear and lets the repeats fill the gaps. Turn TONE toward THIN to keep repeats out of the low end on bass-heavy beats. With FEEDBACK above 100% the echo slowly builds: ride FEEDBACK or TONE for dub-style swells.

Factory Presets

24 factory presets are included. Click the preset name in the plugin header to open a list of every preset and pick one directly, or step through them with the < and > arrow buttons. Presets you save yourself appear at the bottom of the same list.

User presets are saved to ~/Library/Application Support/SEZ/ (macOS) or %APPDATA%\SEZ\ (Windows). Use SAVE to store settings, RENAME / DELETE to manage them.

Support

Support: support@gdpaudio.com · Release notes: gdpaudio.com/sez-release-notes

GDP Audio and the names of our products are trademarks of GDP Audio LLC. All other product and company names mentioned in this guide are trademarks of their respective owners. They are used only to describe the character of a sound or for compatibility, and do not imply any affiliation with, or endorsement by, those companies.