IS FM synthesis your goto?

[GRUMP]

That may be, but it strongly depends on your Targets. There will never be a Synth that is the best for everything. And it´s just like with Food - Pizza may be good the one Day, but the other Day you´ll prefer something else?

I have tried Bazille and thought "EDM Monster". I don´t really know if this Judgement is justified, but Bazille and its Presets imposed it. Wild Modulations and i. m. O. harsh Overtones everywhere. It seems not the right Synth for siny Vibes and smooth Elegance. Or maybe let´s better say: it seems not to be made for these Types of Sounds (that I am after at the Moment). You probably get Results quicker with other Synths or at least leave too much of Bazilles Potential unused.You know what I mean? Why should you use a modular Synth to make a classic Noise HiHat? You can get it much cheaper from somewhere else.

And yes - the Uhe´s have not been chosen as the "Best Developers" here for no reason. Very User friendly. Ilike! But ...

BTW ... I have some pretty cool ZEB Sounds on my HD that I don´t want to miss. But the deeper you get into a Type of Synthesis and a Synthesizer the better you can evaluate Strenghts and Weaknesses. And there´s pretty much tu mention in both Categories if you ask me. Or as we´d say here in Germany: "Other Mothers have beautiful Daughters, too".

[WasteLand]

it seems, if you read the thread, is how you program your FM synth.... i use the FM8, no harshness, if i do not want it. strange that are all called FM, while it is phase modulation (hence you can get other waveforms, me thinks....).
FM8 i am used to, and with envelopes, and other stuff, you get crazy phasing stuff... or crazy, rich developing sounds. it is pad synth, and for other stuff of course, haha. but pads, or strange soundscapes, that can be played musically.. i am biased, as everyone.

is there a really a FM synth/modular?? by the way?

EDIT: for bias purposes: i do not make EDM, or trance, or psytrance, but industrial, shamanistic industrial music (which by the way is intrinsic in the term industrial, because of throbbing gristle, psychic tv, coil, clock DVA. ministry is a fork of industrial... and i like it too, to mention one.)
so what i want from a sound differs. it differs per musician/producer, me thinks, or not???

[empphryio]

Grump, I also couldn't find a single factory preset for bazille that I liked. I like the presets on u-he's other stuff. But I like the idea of bazille. And it's possible the presets for it just aren't good. And it's possible nobody in the OSC knew what they doing..... maybe? But more likely just different tastes.

[pdxindy]

Bazille sounds amazing... the sound quality is exceptional... because it is semi modular and can be freely wired in a truly vast number of ways, it is easy to make crap sounds too.

When I first started using Bazille I had no idea how to use it or what rectifiers or lag generators were for. Coming from more standard subtractive and fixed architecture synths, I had a learning curve. Someone coming from hardware modular could jump right in.

Once learned, it’s an amazing sonic playground!

Curious if you listened to the OSC for Bazille and Dexed and what thought if how they compared there?

No, I haven't listened to either OSC... I've been using Bazille for years. I have lots of hardware and software synths... If I could only have one synth from amongst everything in my studio (or from anywhere), it would be Bazille... so you shouldn't depend on me for an unbiased opinion... hehehe

Dexed is an excellent DX7 clone. Bazille is a different thing and can go all sorts of places a DX7 never could. Here are some of my own sounds from Bazille. Each a single preset and played realtime.

https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/Bazille32.mp3
https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/B41.mp3
https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/B75.mp3
https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/Bazille58a.mp3

https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/B-Melonkey.mp3
https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/B62.mp3
https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/B78.mp3
https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/B42.mp3

[e-crooner]

The fourth audio reminded me of the beginning of Bob James' and David Sanborn's Moon Tune

[pdxindy]

I have tried Bazille and thought "EDM Monster". I don´t really know if this Judgement is justified, but Bazille and its Presets imposed it. Wild Modulations and i. m. O. harsh Overtones everywhere. It seems not the right Synth for siny Vibes and smooth Elegance.

Spire is an EDM Synth... Bazille isn't. Bazille is not aimed at that. It is a complex and diverse synth that is not genre specific. It is up to the user to shape it into what you want.

I find Bazille gorgeous for smooth, soft, flowing tones. It can be so expressive and nuanced and deep while remaining coherent and present. That is why I love it so much. But if you are not aiming for that, it tends by default to be more sharp and cutting. Bazille requires some learning and it is not like say Diva which pretty much sounds great no matter what you do. Bazille can make all sorts of discordant racket! But just on the edge of chaos, there are amazing tones not to be found anywhere else.

[empphryio]

Thank you for your time pdxindy.

[JoaquinAce]

I've always used FM8, sometimes even for kick drums for harder styles of EDM, I guess that's hardFM . Having all that modulation available makes layering of kicks a breeze and makes them super hard with hardFM. What I haven't done yet is trying Zebra2 for FM sound design so that's something I definitely want to check out. I really have a soft spot for Sytrus, but I only have the FL studio version and I don't use FL studio that much, so I'm waiting for a sale to get the VST version of Sytrus. I'm also planning to demo Bazille since it does hardFM so well (lol) for hardEDM etc. I suspect many of the differences in FM between the synths can be attributed to the filter and not the FM oscillators per se. That's the difference between hardFM and softFM. Just a thought and IMPO.

[gentleclockdivider]

At grump , stop your ridiculous reasoning
Here's a file , modulator ratio 2:1 going into carrier set to 1:1
Can you tell which one is zebra an which one is dexed ?
https://app.box.com/s/buokfy1o33wxvua8g86bynzioyw2vaew

[empphryio]

At grump , stop your ridiculous reasoning
Here's a file , modulator ratio 2:1 going into carrier set to 1:1
Can you tell which one is zebra an which one is dexed ?
https://app.box.com/s/buokfy1o33wxvua8g86bynzioyw2vaew

The second one is Dexed. Definitely.

[gentleclockdivider]

Well actually , the first one was dexed
I think it was (subtly) obvious , the emulated dac noise is present when you turn up the gain .
The best way to get the dx envelope behaviour in zebra , you have to modulate the output volume of the modulator and keep the fm knob (of the carrier) at a fixed position .

[foosnark]

strange that are all called FM, while it is phase modulation (hence you can get other waveforms, me thinks....).

is there a really a FM synth/modular?? by the way?

Mathematically, FM and PM are closely related. My calculus is not really sufficient to describe it properly, but frequency is phase change over time. E.g. if you phase modulate a signal with a steady, upward linear ramp from 0 to 360 degrees of phase, that is exactly the same as increasing its frequency by a steady amount. That sort of phase modulation is like a constant push faster in time, if that makes sense.

But the nice thing is, if you phase modulate with a sine rather than an upward ramp, you get effectively the same result as frequency modulating with a sine. And if it's not a sine, well, close enough for synthesis purposes for the most part.

I wrote up an article a while back, about how FM and PM are related, how they relate to wavefolding and some cool modular tricks you can do with it.

And yes, there are synths that genuinely do FM rather than phase modulation. It's pretty common in modular hardware. FM comes in both linear and exponential varieties; linear is what people tend to think of as "FM synthesis" while exponential FM is dependent on both the amplitude and frequency of the carrier but is more common with analog oscillators. There's also the issue of "thru-zero linear FM" -- some oscillators cannot go below 0 Hz and simply stop, which limits the potential linear FM depth and pushes them out of tune, while others do (-100Hz is exactly the same as 100Hz with inverse phase). Not an issue one has to worry about with FM in software, generally, though there are a few synths where you can do exponential FM.

With that in mind, I found another difference between phase modulation and linear thru-zero FM. If you're already applying exponential FM (with nice clean settings and perfect tracking so it's not throwing your carrier out of tune), if you also bring in linear FM you're going to mess up the tuning. But if you bring in phase modulation on top of expo FM, it works fine. Outside of rare examples in a modular context that's not going to be very useful to know, but there it is.

(...I've been obsessing over FM in modular for a couple of years now...)

[WasteLand]

strange that are all called FM, while it is phase modulation (hence you can get other waveforms, me thinks....).

is there a really a FM synth/modular?? by the way?

Mathematically, FM and PM are closely related. My calculus is not really sufficient to describe it properly, but frequency is phase change over time. E.g. if you phase modulate a signal with a steady, upward linear ramp from 0 to 360 degrees of phase, that is exactly the same as increasing its frequency by a steady amount. That sort of phase modulation is like a constant push faster in time, if that makes sense.

But the nice thing is, if you phase modulate with a sine rather than an upward ramp, you get effectively the same result as frequency modulating with a sine. And if it's not a sine, well, close enough for synthesis purposes for the most part.

I wrote up an article a while back, about how FM and PM are related, how they relate to wavefolding and some cool modular tricks you can do with it.

And yes, there are synths that genuinely do FM rather than phase modulation. It's pretty common in modular hardware. FM comes in both linear and exponential varieties; linear is what people tend to think of as "FM synthesis" while exponential FM is dependent on both the amplitude and frequency of the carrier but is more common with analog oscillators. There's also the issue of "thru-zero linear FM" -- some oscillators cannot go below 0 Hz and simply stop, which limits the potential linear FM depth and pushes them out of tune, while others do (-100Hz is exactly the same as 100Hz with inverse phase). Not an issue one has to worry about with FM in software, generally, though there are a few synths where you can do exponential FM.

With that in mind, I found another difference between phase modulation and linear thru-zero FM. If you're already applying exponential FM (with nice clean settings and perfect tracking so it's not throwing your carrier out of tune), if you also bring in linear FM you're going to mess up the tuning. But if you bring in phase modulation on top of expo FM, it works fine. Outside of rare examples in a modular context that's not going to be very useful to know, but there it is.

(...I've been obsessing over FM in modular for a couple of years now...)

thanks for your answer, i have to read i several times. but that's why i asked it, to understand it deeper. i know stuff, but i am far from an expert. i can make sounds, master soft-synths, and... soft modulars (i have two osc (one in softube modular and one in voltage modular) with thru-zero FM, which now still not truly get, and of course some reaktor blocks (for racks..).
when you such stuff, i get a feeling what it does, and of course, i read stuff, manuals also.. haha... so to know more about what i am doing.
but sometimes i am eager to know more fundamental things, because in the end they will giver me greater control, and more possibilities.

i shall read your article too. this is a fast reply. maybe i must print out your reaction (and your article), and experiment, to hear it. then you learn it. i have learned stuff. great tutorials for softube modular by, i forgot his name, tsjech guy, which explains it very deeply.

your an FM expert, so i must, i repeat, read it several times. no problem! i am a philosopher, i know how to deal with difficult texts.. haha..

again thanks, your example with the ramp i will try to reproduce, to see what is happening.

and yes many soft-modules, have FM, but what kind? never stated, except for the buchla ones i have. i am into soft. haha. has several reasons.

great! to read how someone can grasp it, and reproduce it. and i am now, for now, a student for your reaction.

[WasteLand]

frecquency is phase changing over time.

that alone is worth a lot of thought! and i can almost understand it fully........ or better: i get the basics. haha.

visually: when you phase a wave; it looks like changing its frequency, not really, because the whole wave phases, but phasing has a something similar, visually. i can't explain it better. much food for thought. thanks, again!

[kvotchin]

No. Subtractive synthesis and sample manipulation is my bread and butter.

But I do use it sometimes. I still find it less intuitive, but it’s more about the kinds of sounds that it favours. They’re just less useful (to me), most of the time.