Repro-5 public beta (Repro V1.1)

[Urs]

A bunch of answers to questions raised over past two or so pages.

One of the main complaints about Diva is that people can't map the controls to their hardware synth/controller. More features, more difficulty. The current layout of Repros are however pretty well suited for that. We're following a common feature request to stick to more faithful, less bloated emulations which are easier to map and handle.

Most people rely on presets. One can totally say "hey, use only the features of the original hardware if you want the original hardware". But that doesn't help preset users. They *want* authenticity right there in the presets. We decided that in order to be a faithful emulation, the presets need to stick within certain boundaries to sound design freedom. Velocity, Aftertouch yes, but no to dual voicing, poly glide, extra LFOs.

Why add effects? - Because in this day and age one can't sell a synth plug-in without built-in effects. And besides being gorgeous, they fit the sound and vibe very well.

[starla*]

All functions to make good synth sounds are already there. It's not a good idea imo to try and make a synth that can do everything, it's just distracting. Just use a different synth for your needs. But =) I would like to see an option to modulate the VCA for boards of Canada zoetrope kind of sounds

[Hanz Meyzer]

A bunch of answers to questions raised over past two or so pages.

One of the main complaints about Diva is that people can't map the controls to their hardware synth/controller. More features, more difficulty. The current layout of Repros are however pretty well suited for that. We're following a common feature request to stick to more faithful, less bloated emulations which are easier to map and handle.

Most people rely on presets. One can totally say "hey, use only the features of the original hardware if you want the original hardware". But that doesn't help preset users. They *want* authenticity right there in the presets. We decided that in order to be a faithful emulation, the presets need to stick within certain boundaries to sound design freedom. Velocity, Aftertouch yes, but no to dual voicing, poly glide, extra LFOs.

Why add effects? - Because in this day and age one can't sell a synth plug-in without built-in effects. And besides being gorgeous, they fit the sound and vibe very well.

Fully understand this and respect this, Urs. Still looking forward for a "Repro5 Deluxe" edition, bringing us a accurate analog emulation + all advantages of the modern world For now I will use DAW's LFOs then. Oh btw. does Repro5 support note expression or MPE? Maybe I asked this already, sorry then.

[pdxindy]

Oh btw. does Repro5 support note expression or MPE? Maybe I asked this already, sorry then.

Yes

[tasmaniandevil]

https://app.box.com/s/oh8rwxvs0zviq5jjknoq6q3ixeu72d22
Stripped the project of everything irrelevant to the report.
Just hit the play button and keep shift+leftclicking on the 3rd R5 instance on the bottom.

I checked your project. To be honest, I have never seen anyone placing multiple instances of a synth on the same track. I totally forgot that there might be DAWs out there supporting such a workflow. The usual procedure would be to give each synth instance its own track, and if they are supposed to play the same MIDI notes, to simply copy the MIDI clip to each track.
But thanks for making us aware of this issue. I have created a ticket in our system so someone can look into this. But this might not happen before the release of Repro-5, so a workaround for the time being might be to simply use one track for each synth instance you are using.

[tasmaniandevil]

I just stumbled across a pretty bad bug. In Bitwig 2.2 64 bit (latest), I made my own patch and saved, shut down, but I didn't save the preset. Upon reopening the project this morning, I saw the meter of Repro-5's channel was pegged, but no sound was coming from my monitors. I'd get pops when changing presets, but nothing I did would actually make the plugin make an audible sound. I tried changing most everything but only deleting and reloading the plugin would make it work again. I got a loud pop when I deleted it.

Thanks for reporting it, I'll try to reproduce this asap. Sounds like it could be related to another report we got where an instance of Repro simply stayed silent after reloading the project in Bitwig, until one clicked on the HQ button.
Maybe Bitwig is initializing the plugins in a very special way, causing these kind of issues.

Do you still have that buggy project lying around? It would be great to see if the same thing happens over here on my computer.

[zerocrossing]

I am grinding through programming some Arturia Prophet V patches into Repro 5. The difference in sound quality is unreal. I used the Arturia plugin quite a bit, and now it just sounds like a toy. Or like an MP3 VS vinyl.

Just a reminder that the Arturia emulation has been pretty well respected for over a decade and is much lower on the CPU use scale (not to mention is has the hybrid 5/VS mode). I think saying it sounds like a toy is just a tad unfair. If it really sounded like a toy you probably wouldn't have used it quite a bit as you noted. I'd hope in that over a decade we've made some progress on the programming front but Arturia was there a long time ago with a decent emulation.

Fair enough, it does not sound like a toy, some of the simpler patches I tested actually sound identical. Once you start hearing any resonance, they diverge significantly and I was rather awe struck by that, especially testing apples to apples side by side. Sorry that bothered you so much, not my intention. I will try to be more thoughtful in my comments.

The Arturia sounds like a decade old softsynth... sure they did a credible job matching parameters and such, but it is missing the almost wild aliveness of the original and which RePro-5 gets. So yeah, depending on the preset it can sound kinda toy like... as in not so nuanced, dimensional and powerful. RePro just grabs you and takes you for a ride!

Arturia isn’t even in the race as far as I’m concerned. They’re better at hardware anyway.

[zerocrossing]

I just stumbled across a pretty bad bug. In Bitwig 2.2 64 bit (latest), I made my own patch and saved, shut down, but I didn't save the preset. Upon reopening the project this morning, I saw the meter of Repro-5's channel was pegged, but no sound was coming from my monitors. I'd get pops when changing presets, but nothing I did would actually make the plugin make an audible sound. I tried changing most everything but only deleting and reloading the plugin would make it work again. I got a loud pop when I deleted it.

Thanks for reporting it, I'll try to reproduce this asap. Sounds like it could be related to another report we got where an instance of Repro simply stayed silent after reloading the project in Bitwig, until one clicked on the HQ button.
Maybe Bitwig is initializing the plugins in a very special way, causing these kind of issues.

Do you still have that buggy project lying around? It would be great to see if the same thing happens over here on my computer.

Yeah, let me know how to send it to you. I didn’t have a lot of time yesterday, but I’ll see if I get the same behavior out of it today.

[Mutant]

To be honest, I have never seen anyone placing multiple instances of a synth on the same track. I totally forgot that there might be DAWs out there supporting such a workflow. The usual procedure would be to give each synth instance its own track, and if they are supposed to play the same MIDI notes, to simply copy the MIDI clip to each track.

I think more like "1 sound per 1 track", so if that 1 sound needs more than 1 synth, then i will layer all the synths on 1 track.
Doing it over multiple tracks would very soon look extremely messy.
Though it would be neccessary if these synths had no main volume knobs for me to mix them into that 1 sound as i wanted.

[tasmaniandevil]

Yeah, let me know how to send it to you. I didn’t have a lot of time yesterday, but I’ll see if I get the same behavior out of it today.

If it still exhibits this strange behaviour, I'd be really curious to check it out, since I wasn't able to reproduce the problem yet. You can either send it to me via PM on KVR or you can send it via email to support @ u-he and I'll get it from there. Thanks a lot in advance.

[Sound Author]

In Howard's factory pad "HS Edge Nine", how did he get the sample & hold via Wheel Mod Mix to modulate Oscillator A frequency without the mod wheel engaged?

[EvilDragon]

See where the red triangle is. That's the modulation value when modwheel is all the way down.

[Sound Author]

Oooooooooooh! Okay, thanks!

[zerocrossing]

I don't think so. A few years ago I did a poll on Gearslutz as to what people preferred, straight emulations/reissues, or new instruments and reissues that went a lot further than the originals, and the numbers were clear. People mostly wanted instruments that went beyond the originals by a pretty big margin. Maybe the people who want straight 1:1 emulations are just the noisiest.

Frankly, I don't get it. When any instrument is made, be it hardware or software, the instrument designer wants to make the instrument they imagine in their head. Of course, reality butts up against our dreams, so compromises are made. If you don't think that Dave Smith wanted effects, velocity and aftertouch on the Prophet 5, then why would he have added them to the Prophet 6 and all his latest instruments? The technology of the time just plain and simply wasn't able to include all those functions and keep the price at something he felt would sell. Wanting to limit new instruments or emulations of the originals just seems really close minded, and kind of the antithesis of what I feel synthesis is all about.

Right, but in this case you already got aftertouch, amp/filter velocity, two mod slots, effects, more voices, a tweaks page. It's much more than just a Prophet-5. And in this case, the instrument designer's are the U-he team. They clearly made the synth they wanted to make. And it's already an expanded version of the original. You could add another oscillator, a second LFO, another filter, and more modulation slots, and at some point it would just stop being a Prophet-5 emulation. I think U-he has enough sales data to support the idea that some folks want emulations of classic synths, and some people want Zebra and Bazille. As a company, they offer both types of products. But what they haven't done to date is offer a 1:1 reproduction of an analog synth. There's always been extras added.

I'm not sure if we're disagreeing... anyway, the very different nature of a software synth makes it already something different. Hell, the Prophet 5 didn't even originally have MIDI. There is no such thing as a 1:1 software reproduction of an analog synth. Would I dig two more mod slots? Yes, please. Would I dig an extra LFO? Yes, please. Would I dig a LFO delay? Yes, Please. However, I'm not lobbying for those additions because I get the nature of this product and I can clearly see that too much would A) add to the already high processing needs, and B) dilute the emulation concept too much. I think U-He's struck a nice balance between capturing the vibe of the original without shackling it to the past.

[mholloway]

Just a reminder that the Arturia emulation has been pretty well respected for over a decade and is much lower on the CPU use scale

Arturia, well respected?

I'm very glad I'm not a part of your circle of music peers....where I come from Arturia is the laughing stock of the 'virtual analog' industry.