Straightliner - public beta release

[Music Engineer]

small first patch set
download

worx fine in Live7 btw.

p.s. can we have some more filter

thanks. works well in VSTHost, too. nice, that you also utilized the 'module-presets'. ...and more filter types are definitely high on the priority list. i must now think of an elegant and easy way to organize contributions from different parties ...but first: sleep.

[blatanville]

Robin:

this synth is awesome.

it has a beautiful, clear tone.
it has balls enough to vibrate the walls.
it has those wonderful envelopes that have obviated the need for LFOs.
it has a clear and clean interface that truly takes us away from the hardware paradigm (I recall you showing off the interface in another thread) and makes visualizing your patch a breeze.
I love the xml patch & envelope definition formats.

Now, finish the full version!

Pretty-please

(posted twice in this forum, my boo-boo)

[Music Engineer]

Robin:

this synth is awesome.

it has a beautiful, clear tone.
it has balls enough to vibrate the walls.
it has those wonderful envelopes that have obviated the need for LFOs.
it has a clear and clean interface that truly takes us away from the hardware paradigm (I recall you showing off the interface in another thread) and makes visualizing your patch a breeze.
I love the xml patch & envelope definition formats.

Now, finish the full version!

thanks for these words of praise!! well, for now i'm working on a small XML-file batch processor to facilitate messing with the preset files. this will come in handy, when you change something about the directory tree of the samples folder or when you want to replace .wav files with .flac versions, etc.. but yeah, i'll return to the synth itself when this is done.

[Paulie Phonick]

An amazing synth indeed. I love an instrument that makes me play and this is one of them. Great sound, I don't think I've heard such earthshaking bass from a plug-in since Poly-Ana.

I know it at early beta stage, so I don't expect it to be perfect, but here's what I miss most at the moment:

* All parameters available for host automation - and/or - a built-in MIDI learn function to map CC's to parameters (this would be the better option)

* Smoothing for parameters - controlling eg. Cutoff via MIDI CC at the moment results in nasty steps, which are in full contrast to the smooth sound of the synth

* The ability to set the pitch bend range (or have I missed it?)

* More filter types (obviously)

Oh, and:

when the Plugin Window is open I can surf through the presets without problems.
When you close and reopen the plugin window it forget the current preset.
You hear it but when you click the + it starts at the first preset.

[...] if that seems like an unexpected behaviour, i might need to change that.

Please do, IMHO it's not only unexpected, but also quite annoying.

[Music Engineer]

An amazing synth indeed. I love an instrument that makes me play and this is one of them. Great sound, I don't think I've heard such earthshaking bass from a plug-in since Poly-Ana.

thanks Paulie, and nice to meet you again. as for your feature requests:

* All parameters available for host automation - and/or - a built-in MIDI learn function to map CC's to parameters (this would be the better option)

O.K. i will make as much parameters available for automation as possible (some just can't be automated like the 'Spectrum' and pretty much all the envlope stuff). MIDI-learn - mmhh, i always wonder where the mappings are supposed to be stored then. in a global preferences file? or in the preset? i'm actually not really a fan of this feature: it either breaks your song-projects when tranferred to another machine (when mappings are stored globally) or it makes for a completely inconistent MIDI implementation in the sense that each patch may potentially react different on control-changes (when mappings are part of the preset)

* Smoothing for parameters - controlling eg. Cutoff via MIDI CC at the moment results in nasty steps, which are in full contrast to the smooth sound of the synth

for cutoff and maybe resonance, yes. but more? well, that would cost CPU: every smoother is a filter which has to be calculated (per voice, per sample)

* The ability to set the pitch bend range (or have I missed it?)

it's not there, true. shouldn't be a big deal, to include that.

* More filter types (obviously)

obviously.

and as for the preset thing: this will be a bit more involved, but if it's annoying, i think, i can find a solution. and as it seems to be indeed annoying, i will do.

[blatanville]

Robin,

Straightliner doesnt seem to listen to my sustain pedal...

[Music Engineer]

Robin,

Straightliner doesnt seem to listen to my sustain pedal...

indeed does it not listen to sustain. sustain in a synth...do you regard that as an important feature? i mean, for a piano it makes sense - here it simply extends the release phase, because plucked/struck string based acoustic instruments generally do not exhibit infinite sustain (even when the sustain pedal is active). synths do. hmmm...as for the metaphor to acoustic instruments - it would be quite similar to having sustain in an organ. do organs generally have such a feature? the only halfway sensible way that comes to my mind could be to extend the release-phase when sustain is active. should i do this?

[blatanville]

Robin,

gettin' all philosophical on us!

Since Straightliner IS a synth, I naturally expected it to behave much like most other softsynths: depressing the sustain pedal holds all currently-sounding notes in the sustain loop. I don't use this as a performance feature (I don't perform! I can, however, imagine others wanting to use this in a performance situation), but it's invaluable when tweaking & patch-building.


Perhaps a simple switch to toggle sustain functionality on and off?

[Music Engineer]

depressing the sustain pedal holds all currently-sounding notes in the sustain loop.

ah, O.K., so you want indeed infinite sustain

I don't use this as a performance feature (I don't perform! I can, however, imagine others wanting to use this in a performance situation), but it's invaluable when tweaking & patch-building.

yes, that's what my concern would have been - it would not seem very reasonable to sport infinite sustain in performance (or playback) situations. for patch design it seems to make more sense. i'll think about a way to include this feature.

Perhaps a simple switch to toggle sustain functionality on and off?

why? the sustain pedal is already just that switch, no?

[ehdyn]

Yes, and a mac version too!

[Music Engineer]

Yes, and a mac version too!

ultimately, there will be mac versions of all of my plugins, but that will probably not happen too soon - i'm just about to start

[ehdyn]

Wicked.

Looking forward to the function shaper. You should put that in the synth.

[Music Engineer]

Wicked.

Looking forward to the function shaper. You should put that in the synth.

someday there might be a mutli-fx section which includes some func-shapery distortion, but that has a sowhat lower priority at the moment (filter-types and several of the other feature requests are higher, and i'm also working on a single-cycle waveform generator app...). for the meanwhile - simply put the func-shaper in chain.

[ehdyn]

Sounds like were in good hands.
I'm just thankful somebody's finally going to make a synth with a more academic bent.
Please keep up with the scheme of allowing precise parameter adjustment by entering values in fields and providing concise feedback.

Without precision we might as well be looking at one of those arbitrary al gore global warming graphs. He should work for Apple:)

[Music Engineer]

Sounds like were in good hands.
I'm just thankful somebody's finally going to make a synth with a more academic bent.
Please keep up with the scheme of allowing precise parameter adjustment by entering values in fields and providing concise feedback.

Without precision we might as well be looking at one of those arbitrary al gore global warming graphs. He should work for Apple:)

haha yes - something that is annoys me as well: presenting some arbitrary pseudo graphs. ...as often seen in commercial spots for toothpaste. you won't see something like that from me. all graphs represent the real data. and yes: the precise value adjustment is of concern to me, too.

ahh just for info: i splitted the waveform-generator stuff off to a new thread.