One Synth Challenge #129: Lith by Soda Devices (TheNeverScene Wins!)

[Eauson]

This synth seems a bit weird in its behaviour, sustain causes issues, release is a bit strange and fm/poly mode makes my PC chug, for some reason it reminds me of Matt Tytels helm with the modulation possibilities, its got great potential, just wish the envelopes were easier to mess with. This could be more me than the synth, so we'll see

[ilmai]

Also, I came up with this great e-piano (no fx apart from the reverb) - but I can't get any action from my sustain pedal. Am I missing something there??

https://soundcloud.com/terjefjelde/e-pi ... in/s-dhh0F

Wow that sounds really nice! Great sound design.

[Taron]

This is about as far as my machine takes me with this one:
https://soundcloud.com/taronium/lilith/s-Rf6k8
Kinda fun until it stutters and begs me to stop... that's like 6 instances.

[z.prime]

... had to be named Lilith

[SodaDevices]

Hello,
I was surprised to pick up this synth.
Thank you very much.

As you say, I recognize that CPU consumption is high.
I will do my best.

I was trying to change a modulation source from one envelope to another. You have to double-click to open the menu of options, which leaves your mouse directly over controls 5-8. picking those crashes the synth

I thought no one would use 8 CTRLs, so I reduced them only from the UI.
If the screen doesn't feel noisy, I'll restored it.

[SodaDevices]

Also, I came up with this great e-piano (no fx apart from the reverb) - but I can't get any action from my sustain pedal. Am I missing something there??

Great performance!

Actually, VST3 still cannot receive MIDI signals except for Note.
Deal with that as soon as possible.

[RichardSemper]

I thought no one would use 8 CTRLs, so I reduced them only from the UI.
If the screen doesn't feel noisy, I'll restored it.

Hi, and welcome to OSC! Good to have you on board

I too managed to easily replicate the crash clicking controls 5-8.
I personally don't feel the extra controls would clutter the interface too much.
And you never know - someone on here is bound to use them

So far finding this synth pretty easy to use and intuitive. I like the level of control over the envelopes.

[Taron]

Welcome, Soda! Very cool that you join in! ...I should say: welcome to dev bootcamp, haha!
OSC has a whole bunch of relentless hardcore sound designers from all levels of expertise, working on all platforms, even with computers and from all ages. If you ever thought a beta group was harsh and merciless, how harmless they will appear to you now.
I have to tell you, after I had figured out the right-click on parameters to bring up the modulation routing, sound designing itself became very pleasant, direct and intuitive, as Rich already said. Getting used to the fickle little gadgets went quicker than I expected. But the CPU does get hit way too hard. I'm sure there are a few decent tricks, which could lighten the load nicely. I still remember the amazing leap my processing made after avoiding denormals, for example, but in my case this was particularly important as my synths always compute waveforms on the fly. But I can imagine there are a few things you might be able to approach differently without compromising the sound.
The quality vs render settings is a nice tough, but very dangerous, too. As a sound designer one has to be keenly aware that things will sound very different, particularly when the quality is less than 1, while render is 1 or higher. Once one has enough experience with that, it's probably much less of an issue, of course.
Other than that, Lith has plenty of potential and can be great fun to program. If you allow poly limits to be lower, it may also help with the CPU usage a bit in the meantime. Once you've found the hungriest parts of your code and manage to wrestle it into shape for the OSC Olympics, you may have a real gem on your hands and can expect a whole bunch of phenomenal demotracks to emerge from here! ...Jasinski, however, may have some trouble with his 60+ instances for his royal tracks!

Anyway, welcome once again and we all love it, when the dev shows up ( ), so thank you for that and THANK YOU for even creating and sharing Lith!

[schiing]

Wow that sounds really nice! Great sound design.

Thanks! So easy and intuitive to dial in some velocity expression on hammer and pluck instruments with this one

Great performance!

Thanks! Just one of my "music store performances," you know, the ones where you put in some 7s and 9s so people will think you can actually play.

Actually, VST3 still cannot receive MIDI signals except for Note.
Deal with that as soon as possible.

Ah, I didn't realize that - I'd better switch to VST2 for now, then. Thanks for clearing that up! And great to see you here - welcome!

[schiing]

I was thinking - I'm wondering how to adjust my workflow to this month's challenge. A performance like the one I did with the e-piano earlier fills my CPU single-handedly, and that's with 32GB of RAM. So I assume that this is gonna be a major headache for all of us.

Now, I always assumed that bouncing were only allowed for whole tracks, but re-reading the rules, it doesn't say that, exactly - only that you may not use bouncing to alter the sound or to get a consistent sound.

So if I'm interpreting the rules correctly, I'm allowed to bounce down my performances to several snippets as I go along - track1 / bars 1-8; track1 / bars 9-16; etc. - it doesn't have to big one big track bounce.

Does this seem like a fair interpretation?

And if so, does it also mean that I can do stuff like copy and paste an 8-bar kick loop across the track - or even mute a part of an audio event as long as I don't do it to achieve an effect? What I'm essentially asking: Does there have to be a 1:1 correlation between midi data and audio?

Thoughts would be much appreciated.

[RichardSemper]

Discovered an issue.
When reloading a project with multiple instances of Lith it does not properly recall the parameters:
Instead it seems to reload tracks using the saved patch file and applies changes made since the patch was saved.
Problem is, if another patch has been saved with a higher alphabetical file name, all the instances with names further down the list get the wrong patch loaded - as though loading from the position in the list of saved patches rather than their name.
My workaround for now is to number each patch saved i.e. 01 Kick, 02 Snare etc, so the position in the list will be maintained.
I am using mulab, but checked and same thing happening in cubase 7.5

[RichardSemper]

Now, I always assumed that bouncing were only allowed for whole tracks, but re-reading the rules, it doesn't say that, exactly - only that you may not use bouncing to alter the sound or to get a consistent sound.

So if I'm interpreting the rules correctly, I'm allowed to bounce down my performances to several snippets as I go along - track1 / bars 1-8; track1 / bars 9-16; etc. - it doesn't have to big one big track bounce.

Does this seem like a fair interpretation?

This seems reasonable to me, in order to save CPU and allow you to achieve your best performance.

Of course, not all instances are going to be power hungry. Careful control of envelopes seems to be one of the most important power saving approaches with this synth. Basic percussions seem quite possible without stressing cpu too much. So use your best judgement as to your approach to saving cpu cycles.

[schiing]

This seems reasonable to me, in order to save CPU and allow you to achieve your best performance.

Of course, not all instances are going to be power hungry. Careful control of envelopes seems to be one of the most important power saving approaches with this synth. Basic percussions seem quite possible without stressing cpu too much. So use your best judgement as to your approach to saving cpu cycles.

Thanks. Yeah, I agree - you can load up a lot of instances with minimal imprint on memory and get a good groove going with short percussive instruments.

The problems start occuring when you get into 3+ sec piano decay territory. Like I mentioned earlier, I've been playing without the sustain pedal so far (and with minimal release on the patches), but interestingly, it still piles up!

Oh, well, no problems here as long as I can bounce down the CPU-hungry chord tracks incrementally

[RichardSemper]

Worth noting another observation - Just having the synth interface open has large hit on cpu. Close the interface before playing on the keyboard and instantly there's more available power.

[Taron]

I still can't shake the feeling that there's a little mistake in the processing release, like it may keep processing without having to produce any sound anymore. I used to have that in my own and then just put a threshold on certain relevant parameters to know when to stop processing. Hopefully this is one of the troubles and may be solved reasonably "easy" (IT ALMOST NEVER IS! ...but there is hope. ).
OH, dang, schiing, almost forgot to praise you on your little e-piano indulgence!!!