Omnisphere - will it be worth the hype ?

[spectrum]

Sometimes I feel like I spend more time listening to, and organizing my samples and presets than I do making music.

I feel the same!

That's why we invested so much time into the new Browser.

I bought Logic 8 when it came out and I spent 6 hours installing it and all of its libraries. After a few weeks I spent some more time unloading sound libraries that I realized I would never use.

Sure....me too.

But that's a completely different thing. That's a "bunch of bundled content" approach, that's not really about pushing the envelope on quality.

Just like I did with the D-50 and the JD-800, we designed Omnisphere's, engine, interface and the core library of waveforms as a total unit. The features of the engine and the soundsources themselves are designed to take advantage of those features.

So it's a synth in exactly the same way as the D-50 is....just a whole lot better!

Now that more details about the actual synthesis features have come forth, it's sounding even more interesting. It would be very slick to have both synth-based and sample-based sound design under one hood.

Yep. That's the idea.

I do wish there was a more in-depth tour of exactly what the voice architecture consists of.

More at the site on September 15th.

[spectrum]

Is some of the bass material from Trilogy rolled into Omni's core library as well, or just material from Atmosphere?

Since Eric has said that the STEAM engine will be used for the Trilogy update, I'm guessing that those waveforms probably won't be in Omnisphere

Correct. There will be a STEAM-based successor to Trilogy, but that's all we're saying at this point.

So many questions. I'm afraid demand may outstrip supply at first and that pre-ordering soon would be advisable, but it doesn't look like a really detailed, extensive description of Omni's features is going to arrive until the product is released.

Right...on the 15th, we'll show the whole thing.

I'll just keep my fingers crossed that it runs smoothly in Sonar

So far, so good in Sonar.

But yeah, I'm ordering the upgrade from Atmosphere as soon as it's available. Should be around the 8th or so for ordering the upgrade, then the plug ships on the 15th.

The upgrade is going to open on the 15th as well.

For anything to live up to that amount hype, it would have to contain the largest library of sounds evarrrr (sic) and also descend from the skies to end all wars and stop world hunger.

Perhaps on the former, but the latter we're saving for 2.0

According to a Sound-on-Sound preview, you will not be able to import your own samples, "at least for the moment" (exactly how Sound-on-Sound described it). So, I think people will be glad they have all those samples to start with. BTW, that preview never stated you would ever be able to import your own samples. It may have implied that you will be able to at some point-in-time, or just that they only know you won't be able to do so at the onset.

Right.

We understand how desirable that feature would be, but we want to make sure people get a feel for Omnisphere as a synth first.

Look at all the confusion about Omnisphere around here even without sample-importing.

Correct me if I'm wrong (I often am), but I don't think you will be able to make a preset from scratch.

Definitely wrong on that one.

You can absolutely make patches from scratch.

I don't get upset if a price is higher than I want to pay. I just buy something else or nothing at all. It's not like our VSTI choices are limited.

agreed.

I used to tweak a lot back in the day, then things got busier in my life, and I haven't done nearly as much synth programming as I used to. I think Omnisphere is one synth that I am going to enjoy getting to know my way around, much like the Roland D50. I spent many hours creating new patches for that instrument.

I think you'll enjoy this one too.

Have they announced the upgrade price for Atmosphere owners yet?

We'll be announcing everything on September 15th. The same day you can get it.

Well then, I hope his latest work lives up to his reputation and the hype.

Thanks!

Much appreciated,

spectrum
(aka: Eric Persing)

PS. I may have beaten my old friend Squids' KvR record with the length of this reply.....no?

[Reverend Rhythm]

I may have beaten my old friend Squids' KvR record with the length of this reply.....no?

Wow!

[putte]

PS. I may have beaten my old friend Squids' KvR record with the length of this reply.....no?

.. no way! you spent way too much time with quoting .. +

[Casar1973]

From what I can gather Spectrasonics has made cool decisions in the approach of this synth thing. I don't understand the "too many presets" kind of whining. People use their creativity in a number of ways...you can have the cookie and eat it too. Without having any hands-on experience with it, it does sound like this one is going to be a major hit. Personally I like the larger than life philosophy as well - as long as it is covered by ample quality. From what I have seen I like everything revealed about it so far - unless there's dongle to boot. I feel Omnisphere is the most promising new synth that I know of together with John Bowens Solaris hardware thing.

I also agree with Eric's notion that there are new sounds to be discovered and particularly new ways to approach and interface with sound generation and tweaking. I always thought that visionary Kai Krause should have done a GUI and engine design for next-gen synths, the same way he did for 2D/3D tools.

[Melodialworks]

Thanks, Eric, so much for your detailed responses. It's great to have some additional FACTS from the developer, no less! I certainly hope that Spectrasonics servers are up to the task - they're going to be CLOBBERED on Sept. 15!

Lawrence

[krraqk]

How does up to 10 oscillators per patch sound?

Good!, I was really worried by the "two layers only" approach of the architecture of Omnisphere that can be seen in the videos. That sounded like an important and sad limitation which would have limited greatly the capacity to make complex sounds by merging different samples, something that multi oscilators synths can produce. That multi oscillator structure at the patch level is one of the important aspects of the workstations or "romplers", very much of the complex sounds that those can produce came from this multi oscillator architecture.

I dont understand why so many people are so negative when a synth uses samples as a complement of the synthesis capabilities of the engine. There are many sounds and timbres that cant be created by analog classic synths, a LOT. So samples as waveforms is very welcome IMO.

Thanks for your input.

[Vectorman]

Anyone that likes synths with powerful modulation capabilities like Absynth, the V-Synth and Zebra2 is going to really love Omnisphere.

It's right up your alley. Smile

But can you imagine what would it be like if those kinds of instruments had much more powerful sample playback oscillators and a high-quaility 40gig core library of interesting and unique waveforms?

That's exactly what took me from "I'll probably buy this when it comes out" to "I want to get my pre-order in now," Eric. When I saw those brief glimpses of the multi-stage envelopes and LFO's and saw Diego demonstrating a patch that he had done from scratch in Omni without even using samples, it made it clear that there will be an extensive voice architecture under the hood for shaping both sample-based and synthesized sounds. As a big fan of Zebra (as well as Kontakt, which I tend to think of as Zebra's counterpart in the sampling world in terms of its sound design depth), this is right up my alley indeed.

[spectrum]

How does up to 10 oscillators per patch sound?

Good!, I was really worried by the "two layers only" approach of the architecture of Omnisphere that can be seen in the videos. That sounded like an important and sad limitation which would have limited greatly the capacity to make complex sounds by merging different samples, something that multi oscilators synths can produce. That multi oscillator structure at the patch level is one of the important aspects of the workstations or "romplers", very much of the complex sounds that those can produce came from this multi oscillator architecture.

Yeah...what you can do in a single layer in Omnisphere is pretty scary.

The surprising thing is that oftentimes, the second layer is overkill. But it's great to have that when it's needed.

And of course when you want to get really insane, you can stack/x-fade all eight parts into a single sound!

16 layers with independent FX racks, and 8 Arps anyone?

I dont understand why so many people are so negative when a synth uses samples as a complement of the synthesis capabilities of the engine. There are many sounds and timbres that cant be created by analog classic synths, a LOT. So samples as waveforms is very welcome IMO.

Absolutely.

I guess people start to freak out if they think that the synthesis is being "faked" by having a large core library of samples. You don't hear people angry that the V-Synth can use samples after all, even though it's far more limited in its sample-handling than Omnisphere.

The idea with Omnisphere is to have the best of all worlds.

Thanks for your input.

My pleasure. We've been waiting a long time to be able to speak freely about what this synth can do.

spectrum

[spectrum]

From what I can gather Spectrasonics has made cool decisions in the approach of this synth thing. I don't understand the "too many presets" kind of whining. People use their creativity in a number of ways...you can have the cookie and eat it too. Without having any hands-on experience with it, it does sound like this one is going to be a major hit. Personally I like the larger than life philosophy as well - as long as it is covered by ample quality. From what I have seen I like everything revealed about it so far - unless there's dongle to boot.

No dongle. Same system as RMX.

I feel Omnisphere is the most promising new synth that I know of together with John Bowens Solaris hardware thing.

Now that's some good company.

Yeah, John's an old friend and it's great to see him doing such wonderful things with his new synth.

spectrum

[untoweechja]

Thanks, Eric, so much for your detailed responses. It's great to have some additional FACTS from the developer, no less!
Lawrence

Thanks indeed. I've actually planned time off work around Omnisphere's release so I have multitudes of unencumbered play time. It's exciting to hear everything's on track.

IMO, though, I think you're doing yourself a bit of a disservice by not posting at least the minimum hardware specs for Omnisphere prior to September 15th.

I'll bet there are plenty others like myself who are hesitating to pre-order *only* because we don't know if we've got enough computing power. My machine isn't exactly a dinosaur, but it's not the latest greatest, either. I'd pre-order it tonight if I knew it would work on my machine.

I'd even pre-order it knowing I might not be able to use or create computationally intense patches but could still tap into at least 75% of its overall functionality.

I guess I've waited this long, though, so a couple more weeks ain't gonna kill me.

[Shy]

It will not be worth the hype.

[pavvel]

No dongle. Same system as RMX.

Good move, thats me sold, roll on the 15th

[spectrum]

It will not be worth the hype.

Awesome. Thanks for the vote of confidence.

[krraqk]

Yeah...what you can do in a single layer in Omnisphere is pretty scary.

The surprising thing is that oftentimes, the second layer is overkill. But it's great to have that when it's needed.

And of course when you want to get really insane, you can stack/x-fade all eight parts into a single sound!

16 layers with independent FX racks, and 8 Arps anyone?

Humm... then if there is 10 voices per patch but 2 layers, that means that Omnisphere has 5 voices per layer?

I know you stated that there will not be more info until 15 sept, but can you elaborate a bit more about this aspect of the voice architecture? 5 voices with which functionality, tools and modifiers?

There will be sound presets done with several parts in the library included?

I guess people start to freak out if they think that the synthesis is being "faked" by having a large core library of samples. You don't hear people angry that the V-Synth can use samples after all, even though it's far more limited in its sample-handling than Omnisphere.

V-Synth has some cool synth engines like the pitch shift with formants, Omnisphere has some about it inside?

Excuse me but Im waiting many months to know more about the Omnisphere synth engine and your comments here opened my curiosity another time.