Fathom Synth Development Thread

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

Fathom Version 2.1 is out

Mac OSX users download now. Very important bug fixes in this release.

https://www.fathomsynth.com/updates
https://www.fathomsynth.com/versions

Being in Brazil does it matter which download link I use? I figure the international link is for Europe.

[FathomSynth]

The mediafire download should be the fastest in the America's.
If that doesn't work try the Google Drive download which I added for people in Europe.

So for decay there's two ways, if you want the note to hold a little bit of volume while you hold the note down and then die down to nothing after you release it, then load the Retro preset Tight Stab, which has 5 different ADSR envelopes all of which use the Note Off line.

The note off line shows up black in the envelope view and is enabled with the toggle on the far left side second down. It tells the envelope follow your envelope until the user releases the note, then jump here and do the rest of the envelope after the note off line. Just like a normal ADSR on any synth.

However, it sounds like you really want a true plucked string effect which actually has no sustain at all. The envelope dies down starting from the highest point based on the physics of the string regardless of how long you hold the note. To do this, simply turn off the Note Off toggle so there is no black line. You can still make a long release time but it just is not influenced by the note. Now your envelope shape will not be impacted by someone's fingers.

[Bodhisan]

i am having trouble figuring out how to set up an envelope that simply decays like a hammered string.
Either it cuts off when iI release the key or I have to have sustain in order to have release.

Any thoughts? I know its right in front of me I just cant see it.

I'm not having any issues getting an envelope to behave properly, at least on a Mac - speaking of which, the browser is now opening up to at least the "Sounds" folder in each instance (no more clicking through a dozen folders), and my presets are saving in my own folders ( ) - ah, you don't miss the water til the well runs dry. Too, in the prior version, when I would delete a modulator, it would delete the oscillator, as well, lol - now I don't cringe when I delete a modulator - the osc remains - valiantly, I might add.

Not that it's a big deal, but as you're adjusting, at least the envelopes, there is a delay in how the envelope affects the sound - it's not instantaneous. But beggars can't be choosers. I really do enjoy this synth - mucho! (Scrubbing Monkeys - nice video, dude)

I want to add that cpu is WAY down for me with this release.

[braj]

What about LFO? If I have an LFO modulate the filter, for example, there doesn't seem to be any way to make its output zero, it is always on, so I can't get subtle modulation. I am guessing I'm missing something simple.

[Bodhisan]

What about LFO? If I have an LFO modulate the filter, for example, there doesn't seem to be any way to make its output zero, it is always on, so I can't get subtle modulation. I am guessing I'm missing something simple.

Try the "Multiply Floor" option on the LFO...

[provoc]

Deat FathomSynth/Everett,

I picked up the $5 Fathom bargain recently (BTW no probs with paypal that a bit of patience couldn't solve!) so wanted to give you some feedback.

Firstly I would like to commend you on your work so far, a very impressive development effort that not many individuals would be up to!

That said I have spent the last few evenings experimenting with Fathom including giving the manual a solid read and going through this thread and my primary conclusion is that I am glad to see that you are abandoning the 128 partial limit since in fact this was one of the first things I encountered in a negative way.

OSCILLATORS:
My first exploration of Fathom involved firing up the analog saw oscillator and seeing what I could do with the unison and after some experimenting I just couldn't help thinking "you know what, I just can't get this thing to sound good to my ears!". So I pulled up a few other synths to compare and fired up the spectrum analyser and straight away I saw the steep cutoff where the 128 partial limit kicks in (especially on low notes).

Now one could argue this doesn't matter but the DSP text books are quick to point out that such spectra do not occur naturally and at least in my own case my ears are very sensitive to it. For example if I hit a C0 note on the analog saw I can hear ringing harmonics. Now I expect this is probably a case of my tired old ears (late 40s ) but it is certainly fatiguing and I have not experienced this on other synths.

In fact in most cases I find I can actually tweak any synth and get something I like out of it (by running multiple detuned/panned instances, using effects, external automation etc.) and have always been a bit sceptical of the immense praise or criticism of certain synths, but in the case of the sharp oscillator cut off it proved to be a bit of a brick wall in my individual case.

BTW I have done some DSP myself including generating wavetables from curves so you might like to look at the Lanczos Sigma function which can be used to avoid the abrupt cutoff when using limited partials by tapering the high partials in a smooth way (you mentioned in a post that you have seen this in Sylenth and this is quite possibly how they did it).

So to summarise this point, I am definitely looking forward to the next generation of oscillators since the synth otherwise has a huge amount of flexibility and potential

USER INTERFACE:
In terms of the UI overall I found it pretty good. The overall layout and the drag and drop stuff, waveform editing etc. is excellent. That said some of the workflows, especially the modulation matrix (e.g. the delete process) I found to be a bit of work but nothing that a bit of practise wouldn't fix.

The only one specific functionality that I would offer some advice on (since it cost me quite a lot of time working out and was the only thing I had to go beyond experimenting and the manual .. i.e. go to youtube vids and forum to work out) is modulating the modulation depth.

Since this is a bit hard to explain I will use the following terms below: "modulated depth" (the modulator such as LFO who's depth will be modulated) and the "modulating depth" (the depth of the modulator e.g. MIDI mod wheel that will be modulating the modulated depth).

The confusion I had is UI related since the actual behaviour clearly makes sense once I worked it out i.e. as an example set the modulated depth to 0 and set the modulating depth to 100% "add", and away you go for simple vibrato or tremolo. But what tripped me up is that when you adjust the modulating depth it changes the UI display of the modulated depth but in no way indicates what is actually going to happen, and this is what initially threw me off and only after a bit of KVR searching was I able to figure it out.

Therefore my preferred suggestion if possible would be to display the modulated depth in a similar two color range like the main parameters. Might be a bit tricky with such a small dial though.

So failing this I would suggest not changing the display of the modulated depth at all. This way we can see what its current unmodulated value is and derive any effects that will occur from the depth and type of the modulating depth. I think this is one page of the otherwise pretty clear manual that could use an update too since a more thorough explanation of the behaviour even without a UI change would probably do the trick at least for keen manual readers like myself.

And the final point which others have mentioned is undo. The complexity of this synth is really crying out for a full multilevel undo/redo list especially since none of the undo state is exposed to the daw.

In fact at least in the case of Reaper if I load fathom and do a whole lot of work without doing anything else outside fathom and then press ctrl-z it actually undoes the add FX and if I then redo all the work is lost since the instance gets reinitialized when added by redo!).

So beyond the oscillators this would be my primary suggestion for a critical priority that could easily be the difference between people choosing to use or not use your synth. That said I am pretty tolerant, I once edited a complex vocal arrangement with the magware version of Vielklang (total crashbox but as a hobbyist I didn't want to cough up for Melodyne ) so have been known to press save regularly where necessary

Anyway, please don't in anyway consider this (hopefully not TL;DR!) post as negative since as you can see from my post count I don't post a lot but in this case I am impressed with your work and wanted to offer some encouragement and constructive advice for improvement.

But in my case it is really only the current oscillator design that is an issue so hopefully the next oscillator update will put Fathom in my top synths list

All the best,

provoc

[teilo]

i am having trouble figuring out how to set up an envelope that simply decays like a hammered string.
Either it cuts off when iI release the key or I have to have sustain in order to have release.

When I first started playing with this in 2.0, I was having a similar problem. I was also getting a weird cutting out at the end of the envelope. Not sure entirely what was causing it, but it hasn't happened since.

In any case, step by step, here's what I do:

• * Turn master volume all the way down
  * Add ADSR to the master volume
  * Set modulation to Plus
  * Turn modulation amount all the way up
  * Adjust envelope to taste

To get a long release, you will have to click the background of the envelope editor, and drag up to zoom the envelope window out.

Also: Creating an ADSR from scratch (using the Envelope rather than the pre-set ADSR mod) is not obvious at first. The trick is to select the node just before the release, and set "Note Off" to Enable.

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

The mediafire download should be the fastest in the America's.
If that doesn't work try the Google Drive download which I added for people in Europe.

So for decay there's two ways, if you want the note to hold a little bit of volume while you hold the note down and then die down to nothing after you release it, then load the Retro preset Tight Stab, which has 5 different ADSR envelopes all of which use the Note Off line.

The note off line shows up black in the envelope view and is enabled with the toggle on the far left side second down. It tells the envelope follow your envelope until the user releases the note, then jump here and do the rest of the envelope after the note off line. Just like a normal ADSR on any synth.

However, it sounds like you really want a true plucked string effect which actually has no sustain at all. The envelope dies down starting from the highest point based on the physics of the string regardless of how long you hold the note. To do this, simply turn off the Note Off toggle so there is no black line. You can still make a long release time but it just is not influenced by the note. Now your envelope shape will not be impacted by someone's fingers.

Thanks for sending me to Retro Tight Stab. That explains what I was doing.

Just like in the video I shared.......I always set my volume to zero, then set the envelope depth to 100%. This must be fundamentally wrong. If I leave the oscillator volume at default and the envelope mod depth at 0%. It acts as it should.

Now I am baffled but will try and think it through.

[FathomSynth]

Braj, Set the modulation type to Add, then you can set the modulation amount to zero or a very low number and the dial will modulate is much or as little as you want, or not at all.

Teilo, SM, You are both correct, and it’s a matter of taste, both methods work fine, I prefer to set the mod type to multiply and set the dial to the max value I want the envelope to hit, that way I can see the number on the dial, rather than setting it to Add, setting the dial to the low value and increasing the modulation amount (which still works). Of course now it does not matter because the dial shows the minimum and maximum of the range as you move the modulationi amount.

Provoc, yes that’s correct in the next release 2.2 I will be doing some redesign of the oscillators, improving the CPU, and increasing the partials limit to infinity or up to the Nyquist limit (half the sample rate) for all oscillators.

However, there will still be a partials dial so you can lower it if you want and modulate it. Not all synths allow you to do that. Keep in mind modulating the partials dial essentially gives you a zero delay filter.

Thanks for the pointer to Lanczos Sigma, I will check that out.

I see your point on the double modulation depth. Good eye, that is actually something I’ve been planning on fixing for a long time, but it always seems to be preempted by another feature. The problem is that the total dial range is not updated for a double modulation. If I fix that then you will see the dial range update as you move the second modulation depth. I think you will find that solves the problem for you with the correct visual feedback.

Also brilliant idea on your part of putting the orange red range on the mod slat dial just like the big dials, to be consistent, that would really help, I will make it so.

I will make sure that change goes into 2.2 along with the oscillator stuff.

Yes, again you are so right, an undo system would be so loved by so many people, and save so much agony around the world.

But sadly, (a chorus of undulating boooo’s) it will have to wait until I do the oscillator redesign first.

Don’t worry your post is not negative at all. Several advanced users here at KVR have made very in depth detailed analysis’s of Fathom and been honest about its weaknesses. And that is exactly what I use to make the changes and improve it.

But man you are so right about the oscillators, everyone with hearing over 10K has mentioned that! You’re going to love 2.2!

[Lutin mutin]

to "Scrubbing Monkeys"

Thank you very much for your videos for newbies.
Thanks to you, I will be able to do my very first PAD using a synth...

so... Scrubbing Monkeys, you saved my musical future world !!
and... don't hesitate in doing more videos !!...

Thanks again !
Lutin mutin
(from France).

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

to "Scrubbing Monkeys"

Thank you very much for your videos for newbies.
Thanks to you, I will be able to do my very first PAD using a synth...

so... Scrubbing Monkeys, you saved my musical future world !!
and... don't hesitate in doing more videos !!...

Thanks again !
Lutin mutin
(from France).

Congratulations Lutin Mutin,

That is great to hear. I am truly greatful to able to pass on things I have learned and continue to learn from folks here.

[provoc]

Provoc, yes that’s correct in the next release 2.2 I will be doing some redesign of the oscillators, improving the CPU, and increasing the partials limit to infinity or up to the Nyquist limit (half the sample rate) for all oscillators.

However, there will still be a partials dial so you can lower it if you want and modulate it. Not all synths allow you to do that. Keep in mind modulating the partials dial essentially gives you a zero delay filter.

Sounds great! I wonder if it would be useful to incorporate some sort of mode switch for the partials dial? e.g. eco (max 128), precise (nyquist) and the non band-limited "vintage digital". If nothing else it would be a nice marketing feature

[braj]

Just a thought, but it would be cool is there were something like partial presets, basically a series of modules and their modulators that could be loaded as a unit in an active patch, so you could load in an effect string that you use a lot, or a filter with its modulators, without having to start from scratch or a finished preset.

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

Just a thought, but it would be cool is there were something like partial presets, basically a series of modules and their modulators that could be loaded as a unit in an active patch, so you could load in an effect string that you use a lot, or a filter with its modulators, without having to start from scratch or a finished preset.

+1

[jmg8]

Downloaded the update but the folder is password protected, how to I get the password?
Yes, I have purchased it.