Audio Monitor VST

Use the Resonance Audio Monitor VST plugin to preview Ambisonic soundfield assets that your users will hear in your YouTube 360 videos, VR, AR, or gaming experiences.

The Resonance Audio Monitor VST plugin lets you render Ambisonic content just like it will sound on platforms powered by Resonance Audio, including YouTube and the Resonance Audio SDKs.

This guide shows you how to install the Resonance Audio Monitor VST plugin in a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) to monitor Ambisonic sound assets during post-production.

Set up your development environment

You can use the Resonance Audio Monitor VST plugin in any product that supports Steinberg’s Virtual Studio Technology (VST).

Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) Requirements

You’ll need a DAW that:

  • Can render four-channel audio files

  • Hosts VST plugins


    VST PlugIn Technology by Steinberg Media Technologies

Audio asset requirements

  • To use the Resonance Audio monitor plugin, your audio assets must be Ambisonically-encoded.
    Support for different Ambisonic orders varies depending on the product where you are using Resonance Audio.

Download the Resonance Audio monitor plugin

  1. Download the plugin from the releases page on GitHub.

Import the Resonance Audio monitor plugin

  1. Copy the plugin file that you downloaded into one of the following directories.
    • MacOS: ~/Library/Audio/Plug-ins
    • Windows: /Program Files(x86)/Common Files/VST3/

Integrate the plugin into your DAW project

About this tutorial

For tutorial purposes, this guide uses REAPER, a DAW that hosts Virtual Studio Technology (VST) plugins and can monitor and output Ambisonic audio files.

If you want to use REAPER, you can download and install the latest Windows or MacOS version from the REAPER download page.

If you are not using REAPER, you can use any DAW that supports four-channel audio files and hosts VST plugins.

Note that if you are using a different DAW, some instructions and interface details might vary from those described here.

Configure binaural stereo monitoring track to preview Ambisonic tracks

With the Resonance Audio Monitor VST plugin, Ambisonic audio sent to your monitor is decoded and rendered using Head Related Transfer Functions (HRTFs).

  1. Open REAPER and select File > New project.

  2. Select View > Monitoring FX to create a monitoring FX track.

  3. Add the ResonanceAudioMonitor VST plugin to your monitoring FX:

  4. If you are using other plugins, make sure that the Resonance Audio Monitor VST is the last plugin on the monitor track.

Add an Ambisonic audio track

  1. Select Track > Insert new track to create a new audio track.

  2. Select Insert > Media file… and choose an ambiX file. You can download and use the ResonanceAudioMonitorVst_*_samples.zip file from the plugin releases page on GitHub.

Configure your MASTER bus routing

To be able to binaurally render your Ambisonic audio in the Monitor FX chain, the MASTER bus routing needs to be set to 4 channels:

  1. In the Mixer view for your source track, click Routing.

  2. Set Track channels to 4.

  3. In Hardware, set output to Multichannel source > 4 channels > 1-4.

  4. Press Play. You should hear your Ambisonic audio rendered using HRTFs.

(Optional) Add head rotation

You can opt to include head rotation support on your monitor track. This allows Resonance Audio to maintain sound source locations around the user in response to their head movements.

  1. Download the ambiX Ambisonic plugin suite.

  2. Copy the plugin file that you downloaded into one of the following directories.
    • MacOS: ~/Library/Audio/Plug-ins
    • Windows: /Program Files(x86)/Common Files/VST3/

  3. In REAPER, select View > Monitoring FX.

  4. Add the ambix_rotator_o1 VST plugin to your monitoring FX.

  5. Make sure the ambix_rotator_o1 plugin, and any other plugins, are positioned before the ResonanceAudioMonitor plugin on the monitor track.

Next steps

To learn more about YouTube 360/VR video requirements, see this support page.