Friendly critique on ACE

[justin3am]

If you want to see an example of this done right, check out Aalto.

But what is right? I love the sound of Aalto but the patching scheme drives me nuts. That isn't to say that Aalto is bad, I just have different preferences than people who think it's done right. I hope that doesn't read as confrontation. If it does, it wasn't my intention.

Honestly I prefer the UI of a hardware modular to all of these options, and you won't get anywhere with one of those without reading the manual.
...and some modules don't even have manuals!

[Urs]

One day I'll add labels that *change* with cable and all will be fine. The normalised modular synths that I had in mind when designing ACE (MS-20, ARP 2600) do not change their labels though when you plug a cable somewhere. That's because they are only analogue. ACE, being a contemporary digital synth, could do that and thus I've taken the idea long time ago, but haven't had time to add it yet.

[zerocrossing]

If you want to see an example of this done right, check out Aalto.

But what is right?

I think they did a good job of really differentiating between inputs and outputs in a really clear way. My only criticism of Aalto's UI is that the outputs are too small for my bad eyes on a high res monitor.

It's UI just "clicked" for me. No need to read the manual, I just understood it. I think ACE and Zebra both suffer in their approach to representing outputs and inputs. I like being able to drag an output "dot" over to a control knob and have the connection appear as a line. To me that's neater than a cable. With Zebra, the knobs used to throw me as they don't really read as knobs in the way ACE's do.

Once you get used to them, they're fine, I just felt that Aalto was more intuitive to me.

[Liero]

For me, one of the most confusing things, even after I learned about it, was that you can't instantly trust text on the GUI to be a description of what something is. It sounds really stupid and simple of me, but I'll elaborate:

Most often when you read a piece of text on the GUI you automatically associate the text to be a description of what the knob above the text is. Like "cutoff" under a knob in the VCF section tells you that this knob controls the cutoff. But even though all the text in ACE is in the same colour, the same font, same everything this simple thing is not true for a lot of knobs and a lot of texts, as you all probably know. Sometimes the text means what the default routing for that knob is and the description of the knob is simply left out. This was VERY baffling to me, mainly because it was in no way evident from the UI. A small thing like changing the colour of the text when it's not a description but a default routing info would change a lot for me (or maybe have default routings as tooltips), particularly in my first hours with ACE when I did not want to open the manual or tutorials yet. I know that someone might say that "ADSR2" is a description of a knob (because it is in a way when no patch cable is used), but I'd call the knob a modulation knob with just "mod" or something for clarity.

Other things that are unintuitive are knobs that have no text at all, or output jacks where you can't deduce what they do unless you read the manual or do trial and error and then try to remember (I'm specifically referring to the second output of VCO 1, the sub osc output).

[Crackbaby]

One day I'll add labels that *change* with cable and all will be fine. The normalised modular synths that I had in mind when designing ACE (MS-20, ARP 2600) do not change their labels though when you plug a cable somewhere. That's because they are only analogue. ACE, being a contemporary digital synth, could do that and thus I've taken the idea long time ago, but haven't had time to add it yet.

Surely the almighty Urs can bend time to fit his needs?

That's what my mom said when i was growing up at least!

[pdxindy]

A few points:

1) I wrote this critique with the sole thought that a dev would be interested in any users "first 48 hours" experience with a product they made. So I won't try to explain away the stuff that seemed like critique directed at me for posting this, this is just the way that things went with ACE and me, and I tried to put it to words as best as I could.

2) I don't see myself as a synth beginner (although I have no idea what "cross modulation" is). My workhorse synth at the moment is Omnisphere, which is a synth where I did not ever have to open the manual. There was definitely a learning period, but you could learn the synth intuitively. Another synth I use is Massive, where the only thing I had to look up was some mouse modifiers for enabling modulation on the knobs. The rest I learned just by doing. This is something that I felt ACE could not accomplish. Of course others might have felt otherwise and without a doubt many are smarter than me when it comes to synths. I'm also not saying that ACE is as simple as Omni or Massive, if someone thinks that those are very simple synths.

3) I don't really see ACE as a synth that, simply because of its inherent complexity, could NOT be made to be more intuitive. Does everyone else here think that it's GUI is as good as it can get? I think it would totally benefit from some colour coding and arrows just for starters.

I would say a lot of fixed architecture synths are easier to learn because most people have already used the basic design and so find it easier to learn right from the get go. ACE is different and most synths are not doing what ACE does so I think it is inevitable for it to take more time to understand well. It is just a different design.

The thing I might like to have is an option to click a button and have the default be wired... I would say color coding is a problem cause color code it for default and then rewire it and the basic color coding no longer makes sense. The signal flow can be so varied, it is hard to point to a signal flow like with fixed path synths.

[Liero]

Well, one valid option would be a version (a different .DLL perhaps) with no default routings whatsoever? I honestly think that would be actually easier for a beginner to tackle than the numerous "why did patching this one cable do something totally unexpected to everything" moments I had, which just made me frustrated.

I know I'm starting to sound like a stupid, impatient kid here. Maybe I'm a bit too stressed ATM.

[jacobaaron]

Hey Liero, someone mentioned it earlier and I would strongly second that you try out Tyrell. It's free (you can download it from the Uhe site)and as far as my ears are concerned there's a fair amount of crossover with ACE. Urs really gave us a gem with Tyrell and I still can't believe it's freeware. If you find that Tyrell fits the bill, you should buy Uhbik to make up for the lack of effects (no I am not affiliated with Uhe, it's just that Urs is one of the coolest developers in the business and makes some of the absolute best software).

Another alternative could be Zebra (which I intend to purchase as soon as I can get around to selling my Virus). Although Zebra sounds different than Ace, it still sounds really, really good and I would never say that Ace sounds "better" (just different).

[Gonga]

I think the OP's comments are constructive and I'm sure he appreciates the fact that the developer has acknowledged his input.

With the glut of VAs available many have said "pick a great synth and spend some serious time with it." ACE is such a synth. Besides being of extraordinarily high quality, it also has unique "digital modular" capabilities that will reward the musician who considers designing and playing with the sound an important part of the creative process itself.

As Sendy said, designing your own sounds is a special part of the creative music process. That's what ACE excels at. If you want to create sounds that are different, or that are just as you "pictured" in your mind, then a library won't do...you need a synth like this. Or if like me you like to create sounds that are set up to be altered in timbre in certain ways during performance, exactly the way you want, no library will do that. Many keyboardists just dial up sounds and play them all with the same keyboard techniques, rather than adapting new, creative ways of performing to bring out an original expressive idea. Listen to Sendy's work and you'll hear, straight away, the type of musician drawn to ACE - one who thinks sound is just as important as other components of a piece (or even more important for some...)

I cut my teeth during the 70's on the first Japanese synth, a Roland SH-1000 (I just retired it for Zebra this week). I spent years with just that little synth, and it still amazes me what was possible! It's a monophonic synth with one oscillator, but with it's small panels of knobs, switches and sliders, I learned I had everything I needed to create many amazingly beautiful sounds, some of which are, to this day, still uniquely fresh - mine! And I developed techniques on that synth that I can't use today because it had a unique interface. For example, it had a transpose toggle with 3 positions. I could transpose my playing up or down one octave while playing, and often did so throughout a solo, often at very high rates of speed. this technique isn't possible with any of my current controllers because they don't have 3-position toggles, but I doubt they'd sound as sweet if I did that anyway. My point is synths are really great for being creative with sound, and also with playing technique.

The playing technique part is the underserved part of the equation imo. I'm waiting for the era of customizable keyboard controllers (with multiple choices regarding left hand controllers and they're locations, etc.) Keyboardists haven't caught up with guitarists at all with regard to custom set-up.

[petedako]

i was getting the impression that there's more than plenty of mind bogglingly weird controllers out there already!
like deadmau5's "menome" here:

http://www.wired.com/video/dj-deadmau5- ... 0390630001

have any of you tried using any iPhone or iPad apps as a controller? not sure if it was just vapourware, but i saw an article about an iPad app online awhile ago that looked like an extension unit for a mackie universal control...

I'm waiting for the era of customizable keyboard controllers (with multiple choices regarding left hand controllers and they're locations, etc.) Keyboardists haven't caught up with guitarists at all with regard to custom set-up.

[Gonga]

I think touch screens are great for control of parameters, but I don't think you get my point. Pushing buttons isn't the equal of playing a fine instrument. You can make noise but you don't have fine, intimate, nuanced control. Imagine a guitarist with an iPad on the end of the neck instead of strings - I don't think so. Think about how limited "keytar" controllers are. Keyboards need to be able to be customized, like guitars, with different types of controllers for bending pitch, etc. and these controllers need to be solidly attached to the instrument exactly where the player wants them. I need multiple controllers, all within reach of my five left fingers without moving my hand. Imagine a joystick with two spring-loaded wands immediately left of it - one for the middle finger and one for the pinkie. One could be a whammy bar, for dropping pitch an octave or two in a tightly-controlled vibrato fashion if desired. I desire to have direct, complete control over every subtle aspect of the sound, just like a real musician.

Keyboard players are not taking advantage of what synths offer because we lack imagination, particularly as it relates to playing the instrument as an instrument, rather than a machine with buttons to push and knobs to turn. We need controllers that give us nuanced control the way a finger can affect a string. If you've ever played an acoustic instrument with lots of control over timbre, you understand, but with synths it can be a lot more than timbre. We need a company with vision to produce a keyboard with multiple, modular controllers that can be chosen and positioned in multiple ways at the end of the keyboard. When you like a particular keyboard, you just have to take whatever limited design comes with it. It shows that synthesists aren't players, or they'd be demanding finer instruments for playing. They're either just keyboardists, playing all keyboards the same old way, or synthesists pushing buttons. Synths are still in the dark ages from an instrumentalist's point of view, or as compared to any traditional instrument.

Sorry about hijacking the thread so badly. I've been doing that lately...

[Liero]

Thanks for everyone's comments, especially the mention of Tyrell. It is indeed VERY good. I was sure there was going to be no x64 version but I was proven wrong, which made me very happy. The GUI is a lot clearer for me and the sound remains awesome. Of course not as many features, but for the simpler bass synth purposes I was looking for, it looks like it might be perfect. Thanks!

[muleskinner]

FWIW I think this is a fair point. I found ACE really confusing at first as well, purely due not not being able to understand the default routing. With Bazille on the other hand (which is more complex) I was up, running and tweaking to my heart's content straight away.

All it took to understand ACE was a read of the manual though (which I found helpful and well-written). There's often a trade-off in UI design between efficient (ie using up less screen real-estate, doing more with less interface elements) and intuitive. ACE definitely veers towards the former which is what makes it more like hardware in a way!

[Howard]

I was going to mention reading the manual, but thought better of it. Anyway, I really can't see all that much room for major improvement of the ACE layout / labelling. Certainly not colored "flow" lines on the panel or similar...

[jonahs]

Maybe someone older and wiser can chime in and tell me if this is true or not, but I was just thinking that it's pretty unusual in the grand scheme of synthesizer history to have all this synthesis power available without "paying your dues" using limited monosynths. Even most people that used modulars would either have to build up slowly due to price reasons or they had a teacher "built in" because the synth belonged to a university.

Maybe a good way to ease people into ACE would be to put "power" buttons on the modules to disable and hide them and introduce each through tutorials.