Enigma is a frequency selectable swept flange effect with additional delay parameters, fun toy to play with - makes for some pretty neat tubular 'wow' type sounds.

Autotune... Has it's place, when used to fix small pitch problems, I suppose. It has a bad rap due to it's over use in current song productions. In some instances it's a joke (look it up on youtube. Boy that Obama video, that's a real knee slapper - ooh, or that thing that dude did on the Ellen show, boy howdy...), in others, it's an overused 'serious' effect (my opinions, mind you - I can't stand the thing, but to each his own). We have the rack mounted version at RC. I never use it, but had to learn the stupid thing so I could teach the other guys how. I've since forgotten what I learned. But I digress... To use it seriously to make small tweaks I would imagine you could go the cheapest route - Autotune EFX, or you could buy the rackmount on Ebay for around $200...

I don't know anything about Melodyne - it's pretty much the same as Autotune, isn't it?

Since we (or rather,I) started off discussing Enigma, Waves has some very good comp and limiter plugins. The Ultramaximizer is a decent down-and-dirty (not the sound of it, but the ease of use, mind you) limiter that really gets everything up and in your face. Quick and easy - hands down my favorite. Their other comps are equally valuable. There's a reason Yamaha licensed Waves (or vice-versa) on their Y56 and now the Y96 cards for their digital consoles (might have had something to do with my asking their rep about adding third party plugins as options when they came to the Mouse years ago and did a demo of the (at the time relatively new) PM1D - or maybe not... I can dream, can't I?).

who, been looking at the native plug-ins. Looks like I'm going to have to go back to robbing banks to pay for them... Now I know why studio/mixing time is so expensive. It's to pay for the software!! I guess I'm really going to have to pick the important ones...

Now I know why studio/mixing time is so expensive. It's to pay for the software!!

The software and the brains behind it (and the dudes pushing the faders, don't forget about them).

True, true. You have to know how to use it. but you know what i was saying. I did download a trial of the auto tune. I can see how it could be abused very easily. The trick is to make it NOT noticable. It works well if you keep it under control. I think it will help get my vocals to a new level for sure. I need to check out the others you suggested as well before making a purchase.

The trick is to make it NOT noticable.

Zactly!

the melodyne plugin is a very simple program to use.

you load it into your inserts on cubase. and you can pitch correct an entire track or just certain sections based on your needs.

the way it works is it breaks the vocal into syllables which get assigned note values. you then drag the note values to the desired note and choose how much correction you want to apply. 100 percent will be a pitch perfect note. this won't sound like T-Pain, but it does sound pitch corrected. a little less (50-85 percent) can impart a more natural sound. let your ears be the judge, rather than use set rules.

variaudio which comes with cubase is extremely easy to use. i dig it. it doesn't sound as good as melodyne, but it still sounds excellent if you take the time to learn it.

another benefit of melodyne is that it allows for extreme pitch correction that actually sounds pretty good. some of the others sound bizarre beyond a few semitones up or down

this makes melodyne excellent for creating natural sounding harmonies (just double the track and correct pitch to a harmonizing melody)