KVR Audio

bmanic · Post by **bmanic** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 3:45 pm

Well, UI is important for anybody who is ACTUALLY using a synth. For all you preset users I'm sure you can get by with anything (magenta on neon green?).

People actually looking at something for hours need to not have their eyes blown out by the graphics. It's an added bonus if things are sensibly laid out and color coded.

.. still, having said that, the UI could have been worse. It's not pleasant at all as it is now (too much contrast) but it could have been much much worse. At least it's flat and simple. Perhaps a bit crowded but I could probably work with this if the color scheme is changed a bit.

Robmobius · Post by **Robmobius** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 3:53 pm

I wouldn't touch that synth while it had such a poor UI. It's one of the worst I've ever seen (imo).

Robmobius · Post by **Robmobius** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 3:53 pm

lengro · Post by **lengro** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 4:18 pm

Haven't seen CGA graphics in a while. It sounds interesting and the greek poet already haunts me.
Looking forward to the demo.

It needs more yellow though!

Halonmusic · Post by **Halonmusic** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 5:27 pm

I kinda like the gui

xalama qo · Post by **xalama qo** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 6:22 pm

Aaah this is awesome! Love the audio demos.
Mad genius GUI sophisticated simplicity, Synth1 style. Really well done.
Regarding colours, it would be cool if the user could
- choose to desaturate the background, or any gray-scale colour from white to black
- pick any text/knob colour using the windows colour mixer
- save the colour scheme as a theme/skin preset
- option for old Greek dude pic or acid smiley face

Congrats on a great sounding synth!

bmanic · Post by **bmanic** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 6:54 pm

Well.. got to say the audio demos are quite interesting. Shows a huge range of possible sounds.

Anybody purchased it yet? It's only like two meals at a burger joint. I'm most worried about the UI being too small for my old eyes to see and for the contrast burning my eyes out.. also the CPU usage is a complete question mark.

Anybody know how the license system works? Serial number? Challenge/response? iLok? What is it?

Erich.Pfister · Post by **Erich.Pfister** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 7:33 pm

KVR product page has been updated with demo download link - please give it a shot if you have the time / inclination!

Erich.Pfister · Post by **Erich.Pfister** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 7:41 pm

@bmanic You will probably find the GUI somewhat infuriating once the patch cables start to overlap. I've been contemplating a color coded UI for some time now, should be fairly trivial to implement. Would you like me to give you a heads up if/when I implement color coding? In the meantime, please feel free to try the demo - I'm interested in how the GUI ends up working for you / if you'll have any further insight once you've given it a shot!

To everyone - thanks for the encouraging feedback and general excitement! I've been building this thing for the past 10ish years off and on and I'm thankful for all of your responses.

Edit: CPU usage is dependent on voice count and superoscillator count. Unused/unpatched portions of the synthesizer do not perform any major calculations.

I run a Phenom II Quad Core, using ASIO4ALL and a buffer size of 512 samples at 48khz.

With other apps running in the background I can play the following patch live without frame drops:

6 voice polyphony
64 sawtooth oscillators on each of the 3 oscillators for a total of 1152 running oscillators.
4 filters per voice for a total of 24 running filters
1 aux envelope modulating 2 filters per voice
1 lfo modulating 2 filters per voice

Erich.Pfister · Post by **Erich.Pfister** » Thu Jul 30, 2020 7:47 pm

@xalama qo - thank you for your enthusiasm and great ideas. I'm probably not going to be interested in a color picker, but I am interested in having a small config file that will allow users to skin the GUI. If I go this route, I will make it so that the audio carrying cables match the source module's color. I can't say how long that will take, but I want to make it available after reading all of this feedback.

bmanic · Post by **bmanic** » Fri Jul 31, 2020 1:33 am

One thing you could implement for the cables is a simple button/key toggle or whatever to simply turn them invisible (with perhaps some sort of 'X' or marker where a cable has been inserted/output from. Then one could more easily get to the overall control view of the synth while performing with it live or just jamming.

.. and thanks for the demo! Will download and check it out!

Question: Can I run this on both my studio computer and my laptop with the license (obviously it wouldn't be at the same time as one is at work and one at home)? I've got 3 computers but mainly use my laptop and studio computer (age old but fast Windows 7 system).

bmanic · Post by **bmanic** » Fri Jul 31, 2020 1:51 am

I downloaded the demo but can't get any sound out of it at all. I've routed the oscillator directly to the main outputs.. no sound. I also tried with the noise module. Nothing.

This is on Windows 8 running Reaper.

Will give the 32bit .dll a try and see if that one works.

EDIT: Nope, can't get the 32bit .dll to show at all nor load up in anything.

EDIT2: Tried loading Anacreon2.5-64.vst3 through Metaplugin and it immediately crashed the host (Reaper).

Teksonik · Post by **Teksonik** » Fri Jul 31, 2020 2:17 am

To the developer, can you really look at that GUI for any length of time without eye fatigue ? I can't even look at the screenshot for more than a few seconds without discomfort.

But good luck, I wish you success with your project.

Erich.Pfister · Post by **Erich.Pfister** » Fri Jul 31, 2020 3:43 am

@bmanic - regarding the silence on the 64 bit version of the plugin that ran but was silent, could you check to see if you turned the oscillator's volume knob away from 12 o'clock? Every gain knob on this synth is through zero and a vertical knob position is zero/silent.

I'll try and reproduce the error on Reaper tomorrow after my day job and run a debugger with metaplugin to see what's going on with that crash!

Thanks for taking the time to try the demo and reporting your findings, I sincerely appreciate the level of detail in your post.

Edit

The plugin has no DRM - you can run it anywhere you want. Your license key will entitle you to free updates / upgrades - it's not for the software so much as it is for me to know who gets access those services.

Erich.Pfister · Post by **Erich.Pfister** » Fri Jul 31, 2020 3:45 am

@teksonik yes, yes i can. I think that I might have underestimated my own near-sightedness. I'm starting to think that I like the contrast because I can't see sharp lines due to my eyes not focusing correctly in general. I will work on getting a multicolored/skinnable version together ASAP.

Anacreon Synthesizer | Anacreon 2.5 Released