Native Instruments Massive X Synth - Sequel to Massive (Out Now!)

[sadowickproduction]

Why is the decay shape linked to the release shape in the Mod Env?

Because there is no separate "release shape". They did it probably because they couldn't fit separate release shape knob into the UI without reducing size of other elements and the usecase for having separate shape for both stages was probably far too niche.

If you wanted to, though, you totally could. You'd need one of the T-modulators, assign it into note off and simply put it into the shape. As soon as note is off, it will affect the shape parameter. This might seem too much work compared to having a direct knob adjustment for it, but really, the usecase is extremely niche.

On the website they state "...Modulation Envelopes with in-depth shaping, hold, and behavior controls. Tune each of them down to the finest detail for careful sound design".

I dont think its niche, right now I cant even make a kickdrum in this synth.

[Noumena]

this thread has caused me to quit kvr. again.

[Functional]

There are a few guys here who like to personally attack anyone who says something bad about MX and control the narrative. Don't let them.

This just isn't true. The people who have been attacked either are clearly clueless and/or give MX an unfair treatment.

Unfair treatement is already an evaluation and that's personal. Some people dislike it very much. Others glorify it to the point they are blind for the issues.
But only 1 of these 2 groups is using ad hominems.

Sure, but if you come to the conclusion that X is unacceptable because of Y while not holding everything else to the same standard and presenting your opinion as a fact, then you run into issues.

And really, who here has glorified it to the point where they are supposedly blind to the issues?

As for ad hominems, who cares? Knowing how to name an ethical fallacy doesn't really get you far, one must also reason why it makes someone wrong. And not only that, but you're also wrong. For example, there were people who questioned ED on the basis that he is affiliated with NI. That is categorically speaking an ad hominem, even though it's also reasonable to point out that there might be bias. In fact, every time someone points out a potential bias, they are making an ad hominem statement. Bias is never relevant when evaluating the exactly laid out logical arguments, so if you think ad hominems invalidate any arguments categorically, then anyone who points out a simple bias will lose the argument. Greenpeace for example might disagree whenever it's worthwhile to point out that certain statistics by certain, uh, think-tanks are funded by certain industries on the mere grounds that by doing so they are effectively guilty of ad hominem (yup, replacing a person with another entity still should count as such)

So will, for example, people who question someone based on their apparent lack of technical knowledge or understanding. True as it may be, it is never relevant in an argument because you could just focus on the content itself, not who made it and with what background. Yet, you see even academics do this. Hell, I doubt there's a single academic who:

1. debates on the internet
2. doesn't consistently make ad hominem statements

So please, take a lesson in rhetoric fallacies (to which ethical fallacies such as ad hominem belong to). One of the first ones should be that generally speaking fallacies do not invalidate arguments on the mere grounds that you can point them out.

[zerocrossing]

I’m going to say something controversial. It is highly possible that some people may be unsatisfied by something that other people find very satisfying.

[realtrance]

I’m going to say something controversial. It is highly possible that some people may be unsatisfied by something that other people find very satisfying.

Hear, hear!

I will add: if you don’t like the programming, change the channel. You’ve probably got it set to Omni and that clearly isn’t working for you!

[Functional]

I dont think its niche, right now I cant even make a kickdrum in this synth.

Sigh, it is niche. Want to have a separate shaping for your release and decay phases? Here's how you do it:

At the bottom right, there are T1-4 modulators. Pick any one of them that is not in use by anything else. Inside that particular modulator, assign it to "Inverse Gate", meaning that it will activate as soon as the gate deactivates (i.e. "note off").

You will also see a ramp in the graphic. The default behavior (as I just found out myself) is that inverse gate will produce random values. What you want to do is assign each of these values to "max". In addition, for the sake of making things easier, you want the T1 behavior to be unipolar, not bipolar.

If you did everything correctly, this is what it should look like:



What you have now is a modulator that will output its max value as soon as you stop hitting a note. Cool, right? So how do we use this to get a separate "release shape"? Simple, you assign it to the decay shape. The initial value of the shape is however you'd like it to be when it affects the decay phase of the envelope, whereas you set this modulator output to whatever you want it to be during the release phase.

Here, as a demonstration, I've set it so that decay curve is logarithmic whereas the release curve is exponential. Pretty cool, huh? (what isn't cool that I don't actually know if they are log and exp because no graphic and I'm not bothered enough to check, I'll just assume so)



And there you have it. But this is still niche use, there's just no denying that. And there's also no denying that the modulation possibilities are wide. Think about what we just did here: we used a modulator to give us two separate curves for decay phase and release phase that are both under the same knob! Not simple, true, but I figured it out as soon as I read what you wrote!

There's couple caveats with the way I set it up though so you should be aware:

1. I don't know how this works polyphonically. So if you ever need this polyphonically, I simply can't say how it behaves and I'm not bothered too much to try right now.

2. "Velocity Off" can also be used it seems instead of the inverse gate. It seems to be velocity sensitive version of it rather than a version that produces random values. Maybe it could also have implications regarding the polyphony? I wouldn't know. BUT, the cool thing is, you can actually adjust the release length based on the note-off velocity! Not so useful for kick drums though because you'd unlikely play them manually and I find that daws don't really support easy way of customizing note off events (at least Cubase).

[realtrance]

Why is the decay shape linked to the release shape in the Mod Env?

Because there is no separate "release shape". They did it probably because they couldn't fit separate release shape knob into the UI without reducing size of other elements and the usecase for having separate shape for both stages was probably far too niche.

If you wanted to, though, you totally could. You'd need one of the T-modulators, assign it into note off and simply put it into the shape. As soon as note is off, it will affect the shape parameter. This might seem too much work compared to having a direct knob adjustment for it, but really, the usecase is extremely niche.

On the website they state "...Modulation Envelopes with in-depth shaping, hold, and behavior controls. Tune each of them down to the finest detail for careful sound design".

I dont think its niche, right now I cant even make a kickdrum in this synth.

Do you need an explanation for how to do this?

[Forgotten]

I’m going to say something controversial. It is highly possible that some people may be unsatisfied by something that other people find very satisfying.

Hear, hear!

I will add: if you don’t like the programming, change the channel. You’ve probably got it set to Omni and that clearly isn’t working for you!

There are some who will keep it on the channel because their M.O. is deliberately looking for fault and then refusing to listen to any counter-arguments.

[drzhnn]

Has anyone figured out yet what those little controls are for?

[Functional]

Also, if one bothered to look at the presets in MX, they would find at least one kick drum. I didn't even try any patches, I just instantly thought "Monark King" has to be a kick drum and there it is: it's a kick drum alright.

Someone managed to make a kick drum without even using separate release/decay shapes or the trick I described to achieve the effect. How could this be? Oh right... in fact, none of the drum patches use this trick.

Has anyone figured out yet what those little controls are for?

The square-shape I can't really tell what it is for, but the small circles are some sort of mod priorities. You can test out how they work by assigning a MW to some parameter and then an envelope. Drag the Envelope up and leave the MW so that it doesn't even affect that parameter, instead change the circles. I'm not sure how the ordering works but basically you should be able to achieve something where the MW only affects the amount of that envelope modulation goes through, rather than directly affecting the parameter.

[realtrance]

It’s a delight to have someone as curious, knowledgeable and articulate as Functional in this thread.

Thank you for your participation.

[realtrance]

I’m going to say something controversial. It is highly possible that some people may be unsatisfied by something that other people find very satisfying.

Hear, hear!

I will add: if you don’t like the programming, change the channel. You’ve probably got it set to Omni and that clearly isn’t working for you!

There are some who will keep it on the channel because their M.O. is deliberately looking for fault and then refusing to listen to any counter-arguments.

Sad. But true. The mystery to me is, don’t they have something better to do?

[sadowickproduction]

So the attack gets its own curve control but the release curve is linked to the decay even though the ui doesnt make that clear. During adjustments of the decay curve people will get confused as to why their release length is begin effected. Who allowed that?

[Stefken]

There are a few guys here who like to personally attack anyone who says something bad about MX and control the narrative. Don't let them.

This just isn't true. The people who have been attacked either are clearly clueless and/or give MX an unfair treatment.

Unfair treatement is already an evaluation and that's personal. Some people dislike it very much. Others glorify it to the point they are blind for the issues.
But only 1 of these 2 groups is using ad hominems.

Sure, but if you come to the conclusion that X is unacceptable because of Y while not holding everything else to the same standard and presenting your opinion as a fact, then you run into issues.

And really, who here has glorified it to the point where they are supposedly blind to the issues?

As for ad hominems, who cares? Knowing how to name an ethical fallacy doesn't really get you far, one must also reason why it makes someone wrong. And not only that, but you're also wrong. For example, there were people who questioned ED on the basis that he is affiliated with NI. That is categorically speaking an ad hominem, even though it's also reasonable to point out that there might be bias. In fact, every time someone points out a potential bias, they are making an ad hominem statement. Bias is never relevant when evaluating the exactly laid out logical arguments, so if you think ad hominems invalidate any arguments categorically, then anyone who points out a simple bias will lose the argument. Greenpeace for example might disagree whenever it's worthwhile to point out that certain statistics by certain, uh, think-tanks are funded by certain industries on the mere grounds that by doing so they are effectively guilty of ad hominem (yup, replacing a person with another entity still should count as such)

So will, for example, people who question someone based on their apparent lack of technical knowledge or understanding. True as it may be, it is never relevant in an argument because you could just focus on the content itself, not who made it and with what background. Yet, you see even academics do this. Hell, I doubt there's a single academic who:

1. debates on the internet
2. doesn't consistently make ad hominem statements

So please, take a lesson in rhetoric fallacies (to which ethical fallacies such as ad hominem belong to). One of the first ones should be that generally speaking fallacies do not invalidate arguments on the mere grounds that you can point them out.

This is too much BS to validate with an answer so I won't.

[experimental.crow]

Also, if one bothered to look at the presets in MX, they would find at least one kick drum. I didn't even try any patches, I just instantly thought "Monark King" has to be a kick drum and there it is: it's a kick drum alright.

Someone managed to make a kick drum without even using separate release/decay shapes or the trick I described to achieve the effect. How could this be? Oh right... in fact, none of the drum patches use this trick.

Has anyone figured out yet what those little controls are for?

The square-shape I can't really tell what it is for, but the small circles are some sort of mod priorities. You can test out how they work by assigning a MW to some parameter and then an envelope. Drag the Envelope up and leave the MW so that it doesn't even affect that parameter, instead change the circles. I'm not sure how the ordering works but basically you should be able to achieve something where the MW only affects the amount of that envelope modulation goes through, rather than directly affecting the parameter.

i believe they are bipolar mod amount gauges ...
tipped clockwise for positive amount , tipped anti-clockwise for negative amount ...
madrona labs uses something similar ...