One Synth Challenge #105 - Thorn by Dmitry Sches (J. Ruegg Wins!)

[Local Man]

Speaking of drums: I got an awesome bass drum and a good snare so far, but compared to those, my hi-hat sounds like a lame swoosh of noise. Any tips on creating better hats?

If you're hearing a swoosh it sounds to me like your amp envelope is too open and maybe you have too much modulation going on. Too me the best hi hats are very simple. Usually just a high pitched sine (or otherwise simple waveform) and some noise. A very tight amp envelope (no sustain, very quick decay) for the closed hat and a slower decay (to taste) for open. The open hat usually sounds best with more emphasis on the noise, particularly of the clangy variety.

[Local Man]

And I forgot to mention re: hi hat that you can then really bring it to life with subtle use of the filter envelope (and effects and whatever else to fine tune). Agaim i think the key is keeping the envelopes tight. At least that's the style of hi hat I like. One that just accentuates the pulse but doesn't muddy up any space in your mix.

[Taron]

Speaking of drums: I got an awesome bass drum and a good snare so far, but compared to those, my hi-hat sounds like a lame swoosh of noise. Any tips on creating better hats?

Yes! I'm using NOISE 07 (no loop) and made on OSC 1 a sound with only a few high harmonics, spread to just accent bell like frequencies. Then a dirty HP on the filter and a decent AMP ENV. I even left sustain up a little to have open and closed hihats, which work surprisingly well, I find.

Much more you can achieve, though, I just didn't play too much with it, yet. You could easily get away without any noise, I'm absolutely certain. You can get nice metallic hihats with just playing the harmonics, using 2 or even 3 OSCs and then carefully detune them, for example. Then it's only a matter of envelopes and filters. Not to mention the whole harmonic filter section...uh... can't wait to start making cymbals!

[teilo]

Ya, well, I'm right now falling a little bit in love with this synth.

Same. I'm very impressed with this synth. It gives Serum a serious run for its money. In fact, I liked it so much that I bought it.

[Taron]

Unbelievable.
This thing is unbelievable.
Unisono, detune with spread. Copy to osc 2, octave up, volume down, detune more. Add percussion noise (loop off, key on), noodle the harmonic filter a little and put a subtle lfo on the shape.... AMP key like e-piano keys (hard attack, slow decay, 0 sustain, little release). Turn on de-clicker. Holy moly, what beautifully rich sound. Add a tiny bit reverb, maybe a tiny mix of soft tube... pffff...and just get lost playing keys. Unbelievable warmth, unbelievable depth and rich and juicy, but still so clean in the best of ways.
Hmmmm...of this kind of synths, the spectral kind, this is in all likelihood the best of its kind. Really gorgeous.
Wished the gui would come up faster, but beyond that...meh...perfection!

[ontrackp]

Wow.... Taron, do you like this synth?

[functionform]

I'm a little tickled that I don't see the word "additive" applied anywhere on the marketing of this synth, but isn't that what these oscillators are?

[Daru925]

Its addictive synthesis, that it should be marketed as lol

[Taron]

Yeah, that's about the only thing I was looking for in vein... FM, AM or RM link between the oscillators. A simple RM would've made me already ecstatic. But it's all good.

[cb8rwh]

If you rclick on 'PHS' label you can choose FM and RM. OSC 2 -> OSC 1, OSC 3 -> OSC 2, Noise OSC -> OSC 3

I hope that is what you meant!

[Taron]

Get the f...outta here... NNnnnooOOOOoOOo!

perfection.

(yep, I should've probably considered looking into the manual or click on everything...pfff...xcode all over again! )
THANK YOU, of course!

[asi4]

Great synth! Dmitry make really cool-sounding and awesome looking plugins!
Now I have some trouble with Thorn crashes in Reaper 5.61 on my mac. Later I try it on my PC, maybe it's only macOS problem.

[cb8rwh]

Get the f...outta here... NNnnnooOOOOoOOo!

perfection.

(yep, I should've probably considered looking into the manual or click on everything...pfff...xcode all over again! )
THANK YOU, of course!

I do the same, get so involved in playing with a new toy, forget to actually look at the manual, until someone mentions something and I think 'Oh sh!t I didn't know you could do that!'

[sqigls]

I'm half way through my track and haven't even opened the manual yet

[Medniex]

Just a quick note further to the non-use of extra samples in Thorns Noise OSC - some the the presets in the ones I linked have used a custom sample. If anyone uses them I would check to make sure that they don't include a sample. I didn't think about this when I put up the link to the presets. I will alter the post to let people know. Apologies.

Ups! I already started to play around with your presets so.. yeah let us know which-ones incorporate custom samples so I can opt them out in library for my own safety Or alternatively let me know how to detect them since I don't know yet how to tell which-one has custom samples.