Matrix-12V: Some Experiences + Tips

[Ingonator]

Hi,

i just upgraded to V-collection 4 including Matrix-12V and curently try to get a bit deeper into programming it. So far i love what i could get from this synth.

I thought it would be nice to have a thread where to discuss some of my own exxperiencess and/or tips.
Of course others could share their own experiences too.

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Here some of my first impressions concerning the Voices page:

In Matrix 12V I observed voice stealing while playing some patches, even when only using 4-5 notes.

I found that there seems to be a built-in feature for this. Go to the "Voices" page. At the "Zones" section, at the right of the displayed mode (e.g. "Rotate") there is a "V. Steal" button. If this is highlighted (light green) voice stealing seems to be activated, if itÄs dark green (like the background) it seems to be off.

I also found you could reduce the CPU load by deactivating voices at the "Voices" page (default is all 12 voices on). Just click at the button left to the Voice number (e.g. "Voice 12") you want to deactivate and the button should switch from red (= activated) to black (= deactivated) then.

If you do not use unison usually 6-8 voices should be enough for most polyphonic sounds.

Unison could be activated by changing the mode (drop-down menu) in the Zones section at the Voices page. By default you use only one zone (Zone 1 or "Z1") but you could use up to 6.

at the Voices page you could also detune each voice either with Fine tune or by semitones which coukld lead to interesting results, especially with the Unison (where this could e.g. emulate having multiple oscillators at different octaves). The amount of unison voices depends on how many of the 12 voices you have activated (see the "Play" buttons left to the voice number). For a fat sound you could detune the voices individually.



Ingo

[Ingonator]

For improving the low end of Matrix-12v i currently use 2 external FXs.

This is my current "default" FX setup for Matrix-12V (with Klanghelm IVGI and PSP NobleQex):
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/532 ... eQex_1.png


Will also check with other Fxs soon, including built-in ones from e.g. Cubase 7.5.


Ingo

[electro]

For improving the low end of Matrix-12v i currently use 2 external FXs.

This is my current "default" FX setup for Matrix-12V (with Klanghelm IVGI and PSP NobleQex):
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/532 ... eQex_1.png


Will also check with other Fxs soon, including built-in ones from e.g. Cubase 7.5.


Ingo

Why would any of this be needed if Arturia already took measurements of their reference model?

[dumbledog]

If it sounds better that way then who cares what their measurements were?

[Ingonator]

Why would any of this be needed if Arturia already took measurements of their reference model?

Those FXs are only to add more low end (as already mentioned), not to change the basic sound.

With thoose FXs added it sounds much more to my own taste. I don't care if others call this "cheating" or if they tell me that the synth should create the desired sound without any external FXs...

At the moment i do not even really care if it's a 100% accurate emulation while i think that the "basic" sound character of the real thing is there IMO. It seems to sound good like it is (also with a little help of those FXs...) and offers tons of features, especially for modulations and filter modes, that you will hardly find in other synths in the same way.
IMO it is good that finally someone gave a try for an actual emulation of this synth even if it's mabye not the ultimate emulation yet in terms of authenticy. The way th GUi was changed in comparison to the real thing was a good choice IMO. For those who are familiar wit hthe real thing the original interface is maybe better but for others i think the GUi of this plugin is quit good. Adding all those features to a single page is not possible IMO while you could replace the keyboard display with the mod matrix or FXs display which keeps most parameters on one page. Using tabs for the many Envelopes, LFOs etc. seems to be inevitable.

This seems to be true for most Arturia emulations. While they maybe do not all seem to sound exactly like the real thing they got their own charm and/or offer additional features compared to the real thing.


At the moment i also started creating some patches with Matrix-12V while i start with some more basic patches (at least what could be caled "basic" for this synth...) and try to check the more complex features later. i also opened OBXD in the same project now for re-programming a few patches and comparing some of them.

[Ingonator]

For improving the low end of Matrix-12v i currently use 2 external FXs.

This is my current "default" FX setup for Matrix-12V (with Klanghelm IVGI and PSP NobleQex):
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/532 ... eQex_1.png

With those additional Saturation FX and EQ added i could get some really great sounds from the Matrix-12V plugin. Just started programming my own patches and got a really fat Brass sound (yes i love that kind of sounds...).
Actually with some "boost" from those additional FXs i maybe even prefer it over OBXd which so far was my favorite for Oberheim like sounds (while the Uhbie filter in Diva is cool too..).

Hhere is a demo of pad sound shown at the screenshot using the Klanghelm IVGI Saturation and the PSP NobleQ EQ:
Matrix12V + IVGI + NobleQ_Demo 01

This is the same demo without external FXs:
Matrix12V noFX_Demo 01

With both demos there is no big difference in the asic sound except a bigger low end which for some patches like e.g. Brasses and/or Basses could make a bigger difference than in this case.

I'll try to post more demos when i made a few of my own patches.



Ingo

[Ingonator]

While doing my own patches i first did not find Portamento/Glide in the Matrix-12V but then realized this is seems to be done by using the Lag generator with Keyboard as the source and activating "lag" for VCO1 and VCO2 in the "PAGE2" tab (the tab at the lower right of the GUI). At least using the Lag generator seems to have a comparable result.

[Toby@Arturia]

Hi Ingo,

first off thanks for the positive praise, here and on our forum, we really appreciate it. I just wanted to explain a quirky feature of the original (and our emulation) in terms of portamento and glissando. As you correctly mentioned you need to use the lag module to achieve these effects.

Here's the slightly odd (but kind of cool) thing: if you go to the VCO page 2 section and turn on "lag" as well as keyboard follow, you will have a stepped slide from note to note, with steps of one semitone. However, if you activate "lag" but DEACTIVATE keyboard follow you will have a continuous slide between notes! Make of that what you will!

Thanks,

Toby

[Ingonator]

Hi Ingo,

first off thanks for the positive praise, here and on our forum, we really appreciate it. I just wanted to explain a quirky feature of the original (and our emulation) in terms of portamento and glissando. As you correctly mentioned you need to use the lag module to achieve these effects.

Here's the slightly odd (but kind of cool) thing: if you go to the VCO page 2 section and turn on "lag" as well as keyboard follow, you will have a stepped slide from note to note, with steps of one semitone. However, if you activate "lag" but DEACTIVATE keyboard follow you will have a continuous slide between notes! Make of that what you will!

Thanks,

Toby

Hi Toby,

many thanks for your reply. You are right about using the Lag with the VCOs. Actually when alraedy using the Keyboard trough the lag generator you could indeed switch off the VCO keytreacking. The result sounds quite nice IMO.

When switching off both keytracking and Lag for a VCO you could create some nice "Drone" like sounds. I had used this in some other synths where you could switch off Osc keytracking like e.g. in the Waldorf Pulse 2.

Currently i am creating some Unison Basses (at the moment only with 4-5 voices as all 12 could be a bit too much...) and also started creating pads using PWM and advanced filter modes like BPF and the "3 PHASE" mode. With that 3 PHASE mode you could indeed get some really beautiful results. will also try the "3PHASE + 1LOW" combi mode soon.
Actually there seem to be only few VA synths that offer a 1 Pole LPF mode while it could be interesting. For example in the Moog Slim Phatty (and Little Phatty II) you were able to go from 1 Pole up to 4 Poles (= default).
I also find the 3-Pole Lowpass quite usefull. sometimes a 2-Pole is too bright and a 4-Pole cuts off too much highs. Also nice to have a 3-Pole HPF which seems to be quite rare AFAIK.


Ingo

[Ingonator]

Just checked the first tutorial video at the official Matrix-12V website. Some interseting stuff there like e.g. the sample & Hold LFO. This seems to be quite crazy as you could choose multiple different inputs for Sample & Hold including another LFO (which could be set to Noise for example...) and lots of other different sources like Keyboard, Lag, Track generators, Ramps, envelopes etc.

I just realized that exploring all possible features of Matrix 12V could take a while and really using them all is a different story.

[Ingonator]

Hi,

at the official Arturia forum i created a thread where i collected Matrix 12 + Xpander videos:
http://forum.arturia.com/index.php?topic=83591.0

This also includes tutorial videos about both the plugin and the real Matrix 12.

[Ingonator]

Matrix 12-V also includes a "Program Chain" page that could be used for easily accessing your 128 favorite patches while it seems to also be possible to access this by MIDI.

This is from the manual:

Matrix-12 V ships with hundreds of great presets, both Singles and Multis. Eventually you will find
yourself returning to certain sounds repeatedly and either using them in your projects or using
them as starting points to make your own Singles and Multis.
So why not put your favorites in one location so you can navigate to them more easily?
Matrix-12 V provides a feature for just that purpose: Program Chain mode. It allows you to take
any one of the presets, either Single or Multi, Factory or User, and place them in one of 128
locations for quick access.
What’s more, you can use MIDI Program change messages to select the presets when Matrix-12 V
is in Program Change mode. This is a great way to integrate Matrix-12 V into your live rig; just send
MIDI Program change messages from your controller keyboard and you’ll have easy access to
your favorite Matrix-12 V sounds on stage.

The MIDI Learn feature seems to allow to assign also the previous/next buttons in the main GUI and the comparable buttons at the left of the Program Chain page.
With the program change at the Program Chain page i just gave a try using 2 buttons at my Korg NanoKONTROL and those seem to work nicely for doing a program change. The patches seem to be loaded correctly.

Here is a screenshot of the Program chain view in MIDI Learn mode (controls that could be used for learning are violet, the buttons for switching patches in the Program Chain mode are marked in red):
https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/532 ... page_1.png


The patches saved at the Program Chain page seem to be saved with a preferences file for the plugin which means this will be also available with a new instance or with old DAW projects.
you could delete Patches from the Program Chain list by using the "X" at the right of the patch name (or replace it with another patch with the drop-down menu when clicking at it).

There are also "Next Preset" and "Previous Preset" automation parameters that switch the patches in the current bank at the main GUI (independent of the Program Chain mode). I have checked this in Cubase and it seems to work there.

For the Program Chain mode there are automation parameters like "LiveMap Next" and "LiveMap previous" .


Ingo

[deltaMACHINE]

Hallo,

i have the Xplorer Editor for the real Matrix 12 and there you see all the syx parameters so you can program this in the Arturia Matrix 12v!

It takes 5 minutes for a patch but i have to say the plugin sounds like the real machine

I dont understand people that say always software sounds not like the hardware.

This is so wrong !!!

Arturia Matrix 12 V sounds fantastic and even better cause its in the box

I program all the factory and user patches in the software and i love this synth a lot.

So on ...

[aMUSEd]

There's something very screwy with the host automation with this plugin, none of the controls are learnable using NI Kore 2 (or rather you can assign them but when you turn a Kore knob nothing happens).