{"id":662232,"date":"2025-08-12T09:18:20","date_gmt":"2025-08-12T13:18:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/?p=662232"},"modified":"2025-08-15T14:19:56","modified_gmt":"2025-08-15T18:19:56","slug":"senior-design-project-aberrant-dsp-662232","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/newscenter\/senior-design-project-aberrant-dsp-662232\/","title":{"rendered":"Staying in the mix: How a senior design project became a successful business"},"content":{"rendered":"

Daniel Fine \u201919 and Ben Schmitz \u201919 create digital plug-ins that add unique effects to musical tracks, delighting amateur hobbyists and award-winning producers. <\/strong><\/h2>\n

Cassette tapes may be relics of a bygone era to most twentysomethings, but they\u2019re etched in the childhood memories of Daniel Fine \u201919 and Ben Schmitz \u201919.<\/p>\n

\u201cCassettes were still very common, especially in cars, when Daniel and I were having our first formative experiences listening to music,\u201d says Schmitz, from Barre, Massachusetts, who met Fine, from Kingstown, Rhode Island, on a Facebook page for incoming Ä¢¹½´«Ã½<\/a> students. \u201cI still listen to some albums that my dad had on cassette tapes when I was three or four. The sound was quirky\u2014and unforgettable.\u201d<\/p>\n

So unforgettable, in fact, that it was the basis for Schmitz and Fine\u2019s senior design project<\/a> at the Hajim School of Engineering & Applied Sciences<\/a>\u2014a project that later became the foundation for their five-year-old company, Aberrant DSP<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Specializing in creative mixing and audio production tools, the now Brooklyn-based Aberrant DSP sells plug-ins that offer a range of sounds uncommon in today\u2019s digital audio workflows. Its signature product, SketchCassette II<\/a>, allows users to add wow, flutters, warbles, and other lo-fi effects associated with four-track cassette tapes to their musical tracks.<\/p>\n

Another popular item is Digitalis<\/a>, a digital degradation and glitch tool that Fine \u00a0describes as being \u201cinspired by bad converters, unearthed CDs, weak internet connections, and catastrophic errors.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA metaphor we use a lot is Instagram, where people put sepia tones on their images,\u201d Schmitz says. \u201cYou still have people who like to take photos in black and white. Our goal is to help music makers achieve a refreshing sound that\u2019s strange and exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

An idea rooted in Rochester<\/strong><\/h3>\n

After connecting on Facebook, Schmitz and Fine were drawn together as music lovers who both intended to major in audio and music engineering<\/a>. The idea that eventually became Aberrant DSP was percolating from the day they set foot on the River Campus.<\/p>\n

\"Ben
MEET THE MUSIC MEN:<\/strong> Rochester alumni Daniel Fine (left) and Ben Schmitz cofounded Aberrant DSP, a Brooklyn-based company specializing in creative mixing and audio production tools that started as a student capstone project. (Photo provided)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cFrom their first year, Ben and Dan expressed interest in cassettes as a sonic medium, appreciated mixtapes, and did their best to emulate the sound in their projects,\u201d says Stephen Roessner \u201914 (MS), \u201923 (PhD)<\/a>, an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering<\/a>, and a Grammy-winning sound engineer. \u201cWhen they were seniors, they were looking for an idea for their senior design project, and I pitched them the idea of a cassette-based plug-in.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/span>The uniqueness of the audio and music engineering program drew us both to Rochester. Without the program and the mentors who taught us, we would not be here today.\u201d<\/div>\n

At the time, plug-ins had become mainstream in the audio industry and the default way of processing audio because of the leaps made in coding. \u201cPlug-ins had finally reached acceptance,\u201d Roessner says, \u201cand I was itching for someone to emulate the particular sonic charm of cassettes.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s when Fine and Schmitz, partnering with three other audio and music engineering seniors, stepped up to the plate. \u201cBen and Dan took the idea and knocked it out of the park,\u201d Roessner says. \u201cI was astounded by the sound, interface, and commitment they made to the project.\u201d<\/p>\n

After presenting SketchCassette\u2014and its fanciful graphical user interface (GUI) that Fine drew by hand using markers and colored pencils\u2014at Hajim\u2019s Senior Design Day<\/a>, the team went their separate ways. Schmitz entered graduate school at Rochester, and Fine moved back to Rhode Island for an internship with a repertory theater in Providence.<\/p>\n

The two friends continued to talk about turning their design project into a business, and Schmitz left school after one semester to start work on their new company early in 2020. A few months later, the COVID-19 pandemic changed everything. Fine\u2019s internship abruptly ended, and he moved to Rochester to join Schmitz on the new project.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe figured if it failed, it failed,\u201d Fine says. \u201cNobody was hiring anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Stack
PLUG-IN AND PLAY:<\/strong> Aberrant DSP offers several plug-ins, with sales totaling nearly $1.3 million. (Ä¢¹½´«Ã½ photo \/ J. Adam Fenster and Michael Osadciw)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The sweet sounds of success<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The duo\u2019s first order of business was choosing a name. \u201cAberrant means \u2018departing from the accepted standard,\u2019 and DSP stands for \u2018digital signal processing,\u2019 which is the process of manipulating audio signals with software to alter their sonic qualities. \u201cWe thought it fit perfectly,\u201d Schmitz says.<\/p>\n

The company also fit perfectly with the climate in a strange, new world. \u201cPlug-in sales were through the roof the first few months of COVID-19,\u201d Fine says. \u201cPeople were inside, bored, out of jobs, looking for a way to escape the real world. And a lot of them were making music.\u201d<\/p>\n

Aberrant DSP currently offers several plug-ins that range in price from $24 to $36, plus a free tool kit that incorporates effects from SketchCassette, Digitalis, and other products. Net sales total nearly $1.3 million, including more than 30,000 downloads on Plugin Boutique<\/a>, a central online marketplace.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we started making music as teenagers, a lot of the music software was in the hundreds of dollars range,\u201d Schmitz says. \u201cWe couldn\u2019t afford them. So we decided when we built this company that we would always keep the price down, and that has been a big piece of the puzzle to our success.\u201d<\/p>\n

Another piece is the adoration they\u2019ve received from the music industry. While Schmitz and Fine estimate their clients are nearly all amateur hobbyists, there have been some notable exceptions.<\/p>\n

\n
@varietymagazine<\/a> #Finneas<\/a> breaks down all the components of #BillieEilish<\/a> \u266c original sound – Variety<\/a><\/section>\n<\/blockquote>\n