u-he Bazille Release Date Announced!

[4damind]

Sascha, I understand the idea.. but... it's a musical instrument so I would not think too much of artificial limitations only to make it "very special". If half of the world will use Bazille also for stabs, plucks, pads and other "typical" stuff I don't think that Urs will be unhappy
Anyway, this semi-modular concept is good and to add some (more) already existing FX algorithms should not be the big deal if people ask for it. It's not Diva, it's not Zebra.. it's more than ACE... I think this is a good product with not so much overlap with already existing U-He synth and it doesn't need some of this limitations in the FX department. Make it big

[Fernando Carvalho]

I like the selection of effects, the spring reverb has character and matches the synth very well too. If someone need different effects then you can use 3rd party.

By the way, I'm liking this synth a lot, I clicked with it much faster than with ACE. For ambient, drone and noise stuff that are my thing this fits just perfect.

[~Pd~]

I clicked with it much faster than with ACE.

It's funny, I was asking on the forum for more multiples and more oscillator shapes and cross-modulation possibilities in ACE, and it turns out Bazille is what I was asking for.

I'm getting into it faster than ACE too, but then I'm already familiar with the mechanics of ACE that Bazille has in common - the way it patches and daisy chains, the dropdown options for tuning, etc.

[ENV1]

Our fear is that including the usual suspects such as plate and chorus makes the majority of users create stabs, pads asf., but was not the focus of the product and doesn't do it justice.

Why would you 'fear' that? Shouldnt the choice what to do with an instrument be left to the users? No offense Sascha, but this almost sounds like the attitude of the guy who made that 303 emulation (forgot his name right now), who deliberately crippled an otherwise fine plugin with an absolutely unnecessary lock on the MIDI input because they insisted that people use the plugin according to their idea of how the instrument is used best. And i think we have all witnessed where that went; now the man is royally frustrated over the fact that so many people were frustrated by the plugin, while the users are frustrated over the fact that the developer is now too frustrated to consider doing any further work on the plugin. I dont know about you, but thats what i call a prime example of lose/lose. It proves very clearly that this kind of attitude is extremely problematic in an area where creativity and being free to do whatever comes to mind are everything.


Why the rant? Well, its just that this seems to be becoming a common problem and it just keeps angering me. Wherever you look, be it operating systems, browsers, games, you name it, more and more software developers seem to be taking this 'the user is stupid and i know best' stance. So they go ahead and change stuff around according to their idea of the 'perfect' application, totally disregarding how it might ruin the experience of other people. They add features that they think are useful, they remove features that they think are 'useless', they withhold features that they think 'nobody needs' or 'nobody should be using', they eliminate config options so the user has zero chance of making stuff work the way they want anymore, in other words what they do is arbitrarily forcing their idea of the 'perfect' application down the users throats on a 'whether they like it or not' basis. (Microsoft and Mozilla immediately spring to mind here.) And then, if a displeased user has the audacity to express their displeasure, some of those devs even start to behave like social neanderthals because after all somebody had the gall to communicate that there exists a certain discrepancy between their idea of best and their own idea of best. And in my opinion this nonsense needs to stop again immediately. The hand of creativity doesnt want to be forced into doing things a certain way only because a software developers thinks that their idea of something is the only valid idea of something. People will always be different and thus prefer different things. Forcing peoples creativity into the confines of your idea of 'best' will only anger and alienate those who know what best for them themselves.

[EvilDragon]

I have no problems with having just a spring reverb here. Carry on with great work, u-he, as far as I'm concerned.

[UncleAge]

I clicked with it much faster than with ACE.

It's funny, I was asking on the forum for more multiples and more oscillator shapes and cross-modulation possibilities in ACE, and it turns out Bazille is what I was asking for.

I'm getting into it faster than ACE too, but then I'm already familiar with the mechanics of ACE that Bazille has in common - the way it patches and daisy chains, the dropdown options for tuning, etc.

I think it was ACE that helped prep me for Bazille. ACE opened my mind up a bit from what I was used to doing with a software synth. That and the fact that I think the gui is very comfortable to use. Using the large setting with the gamma turned up to "brighter" works well for me. I know the sound should be the most important factor but if one of the main features of a synth is to get the user to experiment then I think the importance of a good gui should not be overlooked. I like this one a lot, I give it an A+.

My purchase is a matter of when, not if.

[Fernando Carvalho]

Our fear is that including the usual suspects such as plate and chorus makes the majority of users create stabs, pads asf., but was not the focus of the product and doesn't do it justice.

Why would you 'fear' that? Shouldnt the choice what to do with an instrument be left to the users? No offense Sascha, but this almost sounds like the attitude of the guy who made that 303 emulation (forgot his name right now), who deliberately crippled an otherwise fine plugin with an absolutely unnecessary lock on the MIDI input because they insisted that people use the plugin according to their idea of how the instrument is used best. And i think we have all witnessed where that went; now the man is royally frustrated over the fact that so many people were frustrated by the plugin, while the users are frustrated over the fact that the developer is now too frustrated to consider doing any further work on the plugin. I dont know about you, but thats what i call a prime example of lose/lose. It proves very clearly that this kind of attitude is extremely problematic in an area where creativity and being free to do whatever comes to mind are everything.


Why the rant? Well, its just that this seems to be becoming a common problem and it just keeps angering me. Wherever you look, be it operating systems, browsers, games, you name it, more and more software developers seem to be taking this 'the user is stupid and i know best' stance. So they go ahead and change stuff around according to their idea of the 'perfect' application, totally disregarding how it might ruin the experience of other people. They add features that they think are useful, they remove features that they think are 'useless', they withhold features that they think 'nobody needs' or 'nobody should be using', they eliminate config options so the user has zero chance of making stuff work the way they want anymore, in other words what they do is arbitrarily forcing their idea of the 'perfect' application down the users throats on a 'whether they like it or not' basis. (Microsoft and Mozilla immediately spring to mind here.) And then, if a displeased user has the audacity to express their displeasure, some of those devs even start to behave like social neanderthals because after all somebody had the gall to communicate that there exists a certain discrepancy between their idea of best and their own idea of best. And in my opinion this nonsense needs to stop again immediately. The hand of creativity doesnt want to be forced into doing things a certain way only because a software developers thinks that their idea of something is the only valid idea of something. People will always be different and thus prefer different things. Forcing peoples creativity into the confines of your idea of 'best' will only anger and alienate those who know what best for them themselves.

Aren't you exaggerating a little bit?

I think it is normal that developers try to give their products the features and character they think will differentiate they work. If market doesn't get it time will tell. If you want exactly the features you want then you should develop your own tools, learning something like max or reaktor inside out.

Users can give their ideas and opinions about new features and critisize what they don't like, of course, but developers must have the last word, it is their work and vision.

[DubLifeSD]

It's quite an adventure playing with this synth, you never know what sound you might generate. Lots of happy accidents. I love that.

[tonkatodd]

Our fear is that including the usual suspects such as plate and chorus makes the majority of users create stabs, pads asf., but was not the focus of the product and doesn't do it justice.

Why would you 'fear' that? Shouldnt the choice what to do with an instrument be left to the users? No offense Sascha, but this almost sounds like the attitude of the guy who made that 303 emulation (forgot his name right now), who deliberately crippled an otherwise fine plugin with an absolutely unnecessary lock on the MIDI input because they insisted that people use the plugin according to their idea of how the instrument is used best. And i think we have all witnessed where that went; now the man is royally frustrated over the fact that so many people were frustrated by the plugin, while the users are frustrated over the fact that the developer is now too frustrated to consider doing any further work on the plugin. I dont know about you, but thats what i call a prime example of lose/lose. It proves very clearly that this kind of attitude is extremely problematic in an area where creativity and being free to do whatever comes to mind are everything.

Personally I get fed up with the same old effects that get included in Instruments and I tend to turn them off and use 3rd party effects. More often than not they end up being second rate fillers. I really like the included effects in Bazille. The distortion which is similar to the one in Zebra sounds fantastic and really fills out the sound and the spring reverb sounds excellent as well as the delay. They really make the sound unique and ad a lot of character. I can't see how a developer can cover every base and include everything every potential user would like and if they tried then how close would they be to their original vision? Not very close I suspect. One thing I really like about instruments and effects that are getting developed recently is their unique character eg Bazille, Kaivo and Molekular and If I needed a bread and butter effect to ad to the sound then I would just use one I have or one that's included in "insert any daw here".

[ENV1]

Aren't you exaggerating a little bit?

I wish i were.

I really do.

Users can give their ideas and opinions about new features and critisize what they don't like, of course, but developers must have the last word, it is their work and vision.

Well of course its their work and vision. And obviously they will have the last word whether some users like that last word or not. The point was simply that the forcing into a certain 'vision' is being done more agressively now than ever. While extensive configurability was still king a couple of years ago, today the trend is more and more going toward pre-configurations, often with no means of changing anything. And that is something that turns off all power users, not just me. Hence my advocating for a return to a 'let the users decide for themselves whats best for them' attitude so people can be as productive/creative with the software as they can be. In the area of music creation this would mean that musicians arent actually expected to use their instruments only in some ways but not in others because the developer fears that the results might not be doing the plugin 'justice'. (Whatever that means, in my opinion the only thing that counts is whether im getting the results i need so i dont see what there is to fear here.)

[pdxindy]

Our fear is that including the usual suspects such as plate and chorus makes the majority of users create stabs, pads asf., but was not the focus of the product and doesn't do it justice.

Why would you 'fear' that? Shouldnt the choice what to do with an instrument be left to the users?

The choice IS left to the users... you can use Bazille however you want... It is not like Urs and Co. made Bazille incapable of a supersaw type sound. In fact, it does some beautiful soft saw pads...

It is also easy to put a chorus or plate/room verb after Bazille... everyone has them. Nobody is constrained or hindered in the use of Bazille.

Highlighting the strengths of the synth does not stop anyone from using it however they want...

[tonkatodd]

Hence my advocating for a return to a 'let the users decide for themselves whats best for them' attitude so people can be as productive/creative with the software as they can be. In the area of music creation this would mean that musicians arent actually expected to use their instruments only in some ways but not in others because the developer fears that the results might not be doing the plugin 'justice'. (Whatever that means, in my opinion the only thing that counts is whether im getting the results i need so i dont see what there is to fear here.)

Sascha explained why the spring reverb worked best within Bazille and not a plate or room reverb. Pretty easy to not use a global reverb and use your own if you don't want to use it. I think wanting to include a reverb that complimented and suited the rest of the instrument is completely reasonable and not a symbol of oppression.

[pdxindy]

The point was simply that the forcing into a certain 'vision' is being done more agressively now than ever. While extensive configurability was still king a couple of years ago, today the trend is more and more going toward pre-configurations, often with no means of changing anything. And that is something that turns off all power users, not just me.

Maybe you are talking about some general trend, but I think you picked the wrong synth to make the point with. Bazille is for power users. Show me a synth with more flexible signal path routing. You can create arbitrary feedback loops that will explode the signal and overload your system. I think Bazille has more of the quality you are asking for than most any synth you can get today. It's a wild untamed beast! Speakers beware!!

[Urs]

If we don't make decisions then all our synths will end up doing the same sounds. Now that we're selling, uhm, 5 different synth plug-ins, we need to put emphasize on their strengths. Otherwise we end up selling a bunch of all equal sounding synths with virtually the same presets and same same everything-possible-ness.

Bazille is foremost an FM synth. FM is great for strong transients and thick basses. FM is not so great for warm pad sounds. Chorus and plate reverb are great for pad sounds - but they are bad for transients and thick basses. Therefore it never occurred to us to add a chorus or a plate reverb.

[kingtubby]

I just bought a license, but having previously entered the beta license number there is now no option to enter new license details when clicking on the data window area - any ideas?