New Pigments 2 Thread (On Topic Discussion Only, Please)

[BONES]

First of all, you sound like a fanboy who now will be covering his favourite synth to death, even bugs.

Except that I have made no attempt to do that, have I? The oscillator issue is definitely a bug and if the Matrix 12 filter isn't meant to sound like that, then that's a bug, too. But that all they are, they have nothing at all to do with sound quality, as you were suggesting, and 99.9% of professional users probably won't ever encounter either of them.

Did you read what I said, btw? If that was an intended behaviour, the Arturia woud said that a few months ago.

Assuming they knew. But it has just occurred to me, this instant, that I have Analog Lab, which I'm sure includes loads of presets from Matrix 12, so I might be able to see if the problem exists there, too.

Please read my text carefully, so you don't start writing same things twice.

I suggest you read my text carefully, as I never made any definitive statements, simply listed possibilities. That it's taken several bouts of back & forth for you to confirm that it is a bug is really quite annoying. But it will still be interesting to see if it's a bug in the V Collection Matrix 12, too, that just got copied and pasted across into Pigments. Because if it is, it means nobody has noticed (or maybe just not cared) for many years.

You have a point there, but it's entirely rational to think that every synth doesn't have to compete for every synthesis type or sound you can get from a synth.

No but I'd suggest that the area of overlap for most synths is more than 50%, especially synths as similar as Pigments and Hive. And with the new granular engine, I have to start thinking stupid things like "should I use Straylight or Pigments?"

The bigger question is whether you can and will use the synth, if the sounds it does well are useful to you. Personally before I even heard it I was sold, good UX counts, and Pigments is laid out so well I'm going to work with it, if everything in it was just mediocre it would still be useful. Being able to access everything quickly and fluently counts.

Absolutely, especially as it will ultimately allow you to do a better job of exploiting the instrument fully. That's my frustration with DUNE - it sounds better than anything else I have but getting what I want out of it can be a chore so I just don't bother most of the time. If I can get something that is 99% as good in half the time, then that's what I am going to do. Every time.

I worked through the 80's and 90's with just one or two synths and a sampler, I see no reason to go back to that.

Abso-freakin'-lutely! Through my best, most productive years as a solo artist I mostly just had a workstation - M1, followed by an O1/W, then a Trinity - and a sampler - DSS-1, then an ASR-10.

Now I can know for sure, that you don't own good pair of ears (I'm talking about real ones). All the rest of your comments now pretty obsolete to me.

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"They are just catering to a different market". What this suppose to mean? Lol. This sounds meangless to me.

That's because you've probably never spent even a minute thinking about it. Urs hangs around here, he knows what a bunch of sad losers you lot are, how you all jump on whatever the current trend is, so he tailors his products accordingly. OTOH, Arturia deal with real, professional musicians and producers, so that's the people they target with their products.

Also, I said above that Uhe synths are so polished quality wise - i cannot spot any ugly click, zipper noise, problem with the envelopes and so on. They are without those overlooked/bug sound artifacts.

And if that was the sum total of what makes a synth feel polished, I'd agree with you but it's just one aspect of it. When it comes to workflow, Hive 2 has become far too compromised. In their effort to squeeze more and more into it, they have sacrificed usability. Meanwhile, Arturia have managed to squeeze in just as much without it having the tiniest effect on workflow.

Then there are the presets and Pigments' presets are amazing and really different, Hive's are just what you hear everywhere. I used to use Hive 1.2 quite a bit but since the upgrade to v2, I've barely touched it. OTOH, when Pigments was at v1, it kind of interested me, although not enough to buy it, but the upgrade to v2 has made it better, without compromising on what made it good in the first place. It only took me an hour with the new demo to know that I wanted it, that it would provide me with all the kinds of sounds we use in our songs (the ones we put into albums and people buy with their actual, hard-earned money).

[BONES]

IMO it sounds like and does "modern" bass well.

What does that actually mean? As far as I can tell, the kinds of bass sounds people use haven't changed much in 25 years, except maybe for the wub-wub dubstep krap.

... DX7 or Minimoog type bass lines maybe not as well or easily as Diva or Arturia's DX7 clone? but why would you reach for Pigments for that?

Are you mad? I got some great bass sounds out of Pigments last night. I can't wait to start using them in songs. In fact, one of them inspired a cool bassline that will probably form the backbone of the next song I write. When I added a second Pigments instance and started playing around with one of the granular "strings" presets, it got even cooler. You can't put a price on that kind of inspiration.

why use Pigments to attempt to emulate a Moog for instance? when there's at least a dozen better softsynths if that's the sound you want?

My question would be "what is the validity of wanting to try and do that?" It's a way of thinking about music that I honestly cannot get my head around. Even if I just wanted a bass sound, a Moog emulation is the last synth I'd think of. I might think something like "the PolySix's filter might be perfect for what I've got in mind" or "unnamed synth 1 has a preset that's very close to what I'm after" but I'd never think "I need a bassline that sounds like a Moog" (or an Odyssey or a MonoPoly or anything else). My basslines need to sound like NOVAkILL basslines and that's all.

I guess he meant dirty analog. I’d probably take Thorn for that though... (just to provoke comments like “what? Thorn is far from analog”...)

Yeah but it's got a great distortion effect. One of the best I've heard, actually, so dirty is easy.

But the choice of synth, in case you got more than one is a matter of taste, and your personal experience. If you have a sound in mind you take the tool of your first association, usually that which gives you an immediate path how to sculpt it. There are synths which also inspire to walk into unknown territory. That is the domain of synths like Pigments, Lion or the Grid...

I have this stupid idea in my head that basslines are easy and I don't need a big synth like DUNE or HIVE or Pigments to make them, so I go through a bunch of useless synths before I end up using DUNE, Thorn or ArcSyn anyway. The exception to that would be TRK-01, which is stupidly simple but does great basslines. But because it is stupidly simple, it is a bit more limited and can't always do what I want/need.

[nirm123]

I find this thread quite funny, even when a person (say me) is writing again and again that he really likes the synth it's like I'm supposed to favour it in any situation over any other synth.

of course that dirty is easy, and of course there is an analog engine, but for ME there are other synths who do analog and dirty MUCH better.

same way as I wouldn't use the legend for crystal clear sounds (although it can do it quite well), in this case I'll go to pigments who can do it very easily and it will just sound great and will overall excel in digital clean sounds.

sound preference is completely subjective, so it's not relevant to argue about it. you really like pigments distortion ? great, go use it, other ppl may not like it as they don't share the exact same taste as you.

going over the 154 bass presets was a very strange experience as most of them didn't even sound as bass presets (complete lack of bottom end) but much more as leads/keys ones instead, I only found 3,4 useable presets and it also occurred to me when I started programming my own sounds.

Going over the legend bass presets (and programming my own...) only made me found 3,4 presets which I didn't think were for MY liking.

So for the last time a great great synth, I just don't like it for bass sounds (and I'm glad I don't fancy it for every possible sound otherwise buying all these other fantastic synths would have been a complete waste of money).

[machinesworking]

Going over the legend bass presets (and programming my own...) only made me found 3,4 presets which I didn't think were for MY liking.

This is what I was talking about, your ears like moog type bass sounds, the Legend is attempting to model the Minimoog, and it's considered the best emulation. I wouldn't attempt a modern bass sound, digital, additive, or FM etc. with the Legend.

Mostly bass presets in soft synths are weak, the Legend modeling a classic keyboard used for bass synth for the last 50 years or so it's kinda gonna do it for a lot of people, besides Bones obviously!

[BONES]

Again, what the hell is a "modern bass sound"? And where is your evidence that hardware synths do better bass? I've owned a lot of 'em over the years and none of them come close to Wasp.

I find this thread quite funny, even when a person (say me) is writing again and again that he really likes the synth it's like I'm supposed to favour it in any situation over any other synth.

I"m not sure how you get that out of anything that anyone else has written. Just because we both like something doesn't mean we are going to agree about everything.

sound preference is completely subjective, so it's not relevant to argue about it. you really like pigments distortion ?

I didn't much like it at first but it does the job for something like adding a bit of grit to a sound. But then last night I added it to this patch - http://www.novakill.com/stuff/Pigments_ ... 21h07.pgtx - and, well, you can hear for yourself that it actually works pretty well. The other cool thing about this patch is that it is fat as f**k without using any unison.

going over the 154 bass presets was a very strange experience as most of them didn't even sound as bass presets (complete lack of bottom end) but much more as leads/keys ones instead, I only found 3,4 useable presets and it also occurred to me when I started programming my own sounds.

I haven't listened to any of them but 3 or 4 usable presets is about all I ever get out of any synth and it is rare any of them are bass patches. They are things I pretty much always end up making myself from scratch.

Going over the legend bass presets (and programming my own...) only made me found 3,4 presets which I didn't think were for MY liking.

Again, despite being a beta tester, I've never listened to Legend's bass presets, either. But it only comes with half-a-dozen or so bass presets, doesn't it? Or am I still using a beta, maybe? For a while my bandmate was using Bass Carpet as his default bass sound. I think I've kept it in a couple of places but mostly I've changed it to something I can fit into a mix. I was just playing around with the two of them - Legend and Pigments - and I didn't have much trouble getting Pigments to sound as full-on as Legend. What makes Legend so big is the drive into the filter and the saturation and I'd definitely like to see some of that stuff available in Pigments. But in my efforts to get by without it I got some really good results with Overdrive. Scary good, in fact. I may have come up with a whole new class of bass patch (for us, if not for the world).

So for the last time a great great synth, I just don't like it for bass sounds (and I'm glad I don't fancy it for every possible sound otherwise buying all these other fantastic synths would have been a complete waste of money).

Why? You are allowed to use more than one synth for each type of sound you want. We typically have up to three different basslines in any given song and they are usually three different synths, especially now that we can't use Wasp any more.

[simon.a.billington]

Man I think the standard library really taps dances around what this things is really capable of. It's really deep. Well, maybe not Reaktor deep, but for a non-modular, starlight forward synth it has huge potential. I only wish I had the time to get into sound designing with it. My usual MO is to tweak a standard patch so it fits better into my production. Sometimes the change is just slight, other times its mores significant

There are quite a few sounds, but considering it's capability I would like to see much more.

[exponent1]

Again, what the hell is a "modern bass sound"? And where is your evidence that hardware synths do better bass? I've owned a lot of 'em over the years and none of them come close to Wasp.

I think he's referring to the modern Dubstep basses, not 100% sure though.

[machinesworking]

Again, what the hell is a "modern bass sound"? And where is your evidence that hardware synths do better bass? I've owned a lot of 'em over the years and none of them come close to Wasp.

I think he's referring to the modern Dubstep basses, not 100% sure though.

I would just flatly say anything that isn't trying to copy signature bass sounds from the 80's that everyone loves in analog/subtractive synths and emulations of the DX7.

Not trying to be rude but if you like almost all the bass sounds in something like the Legend which is a direct emulation of a Minimoog, then you're probably only interested in classic bass sounds.

Probably would've not been a discussion at all had I said "classic 80's" bass sounds.

[Tj Shredder]

@BONES as Wasp expert, how good is daHornet? (And to stay on topic, can Pigments compete? ; - )

[vurt]

@BONES as Wasp expert, how good is daHornet? (And to stay on topic, can Pigments compete? ; - )

dahornet is a wasp(hardware emu)
the wasp bones loves was part of orion and i believe fruity too (not sure which was first i only used orion) and beyond the name not the same at all.
a very nice synth to be sure, just not relevant here i think to your question

[duncanm]

Usually a bit of a lurker, but had to pop a few words in here because it is a joy to use. I've always been something of a preset person but this synth is a pleasure to use. I'm rarely one to veer far off presets but it's a great toolbox, everything is laid out nicely and makes perfect sense and to borrow from arturia, it's a 'manual you'll actually use'. Loads of fun.

[misterpatrick]

I have a really stupid Pigments 2 question - what format do samples need to be in for import? I'm on OSX and when I try to import .wav or samples from say Iris, Alchemy or Kontakt it doesn't show them. Manual doesn't specify format. I was thinking because I was using the demo that might be the issue but now that I've purchased still a problem. I've been making do with included samples but would love to figure out how to get my own samples in there. Thanks!

[BONES]

Dunno, I have no interest in importing my own samples so I haven't looked at that aspect of it at all.

Again, what the hell is a "modern bass sound"? And where is your evidence that hardware synths do better bass? I've owned a lot of 'em over the years and none of them come close to Wasp.

I think he's referring to the modern Dubstep basses, not 100% sure though.

But they are really easy to do in any old synth. They just aren't sounds that would have been thought of as bass sounds back in the day.

Not trying to be rude

The good thing about this place is you don't have to try, people will be offended no matter what you say or how you say it.

… but if you like almost all the bass sounds in something like the Legend which is a direct emulation of a Minimoog, then you're probably only interested in classic bass sounds.
Probably would've not been a discussion at all had I said "classic 80's" bass sounds.

I dunno, Bass Carpet from Legend doesn't evoke "Classic 80s" to me at all. To me Moog is much more "Classic 70s". We'd moved on by the 80s, to ProOnes, Jupiter 8s, OB-Xs and Prophet 5s. Even synths like the Odyssey were pretty much done and dusted by the time the 80s rolled around.

@BONES as Wasp expert, how good is daHornet? (And to stay on topic, can Pigments compete? ; - )

Different Wasp. I am talking about the synth that came standard in Orion and eventually morphed beyond all recognition into DUNE. It was an evolution itself, of a synth Rich made for Fruiytloops, back before FL had VSTi support. FL used to sell a VSTi version of the original Wasp but it didn't get all the later updates.

[BONES]

One standout feature of Pigments that hasn't really been mentioned is the undo system. Not only can you undo/redo a step but, like Photoshop, it has a history list so you can go all the way back to where you started, even after hours of tweaking. I accidentally saved over a patch I'd made earlier, when I meant to do a "Save As", and I was able to roll it all the way back to the original patch I had started with, in one go, and save it again. I was really impressed.

[muki]

I have a really stupid Pigments 2 question - what format do samples need to be in for import?

simply drag&drop from finder

wav seems to work
i just tried the drones and FX from the Iris2 library

samples longer than 60s are not supported
and will be cropped

aiff seems NOT to be supportet (????)
i'll file a ticket

hth