Care to fill me in on the last 15 years of software development?

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I’d say : « analog emulation » reached its peak 4/5 years ago. « Modular synthesis » is entering the « average soft synth » with lot of modulation generators, a great diversity in oscillators types with concepts borrowed from so-called « west coast synthesis ». This results in « new » kind of sounds which are more « harsh » and « soundscaping » than the « liquid analog » sound and so wavetables are all the rage because it’s an easy way to have those kind of sounds.

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hey chagzuki :)
it has been a while!

as for the last 15 years of software development, a hell of a lot of 1s and 0s.

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Hi vurt, nice to see the old faces... well, not faces, names. KvR looks remarkably familiar though: Bro, do you even 2020?
Every day takes figuring out all over again how to f#ckin’ live.

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2020 is being ignored.

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I see Bones is still going on about Orion's Wasp synth nearly 20 years later. 2020 is great... my favourite since 1991.
Every day takes figuring out all over again how to f#ckin’ live.

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Well, it all looks pretty positive to me.

Why is Falcon not getting more attention? I watched a couple of youtube reviews of it and I got the impression it was the best in it's class, a comprehensive solution to all sound creation needs. It's pricier than the competitors but it appears to cover more ground.
Every day takes figuring out all over again how to f#ckin’ live.

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chagzuki wrote: Fri Jul 31, 2020 8:58 pm I had a break from music... you could say. Quite a long time. For some reason I've felt an urge to get back into it, and I've been trying to recover files from old hard drives and computers... and figure out what synths I was using back in around 2005.
LOL, I had a similar break. Ten years off. Wow, a huge jump forward. FLStudio on Mac! Lots of virtual analogue synths with a incredibly rich sound. Super powered DAWs. Affordable orchestral libraries! Ableton Push! Granular synthesis for the masses. Korg Gadget. An analog synth in a USB stick. Modular software synths FOR FREE. An entire line of analog devices with proper DAW integration that actually works (I don't get why this isn't more common). An endless stream of old stuff emulations. Excellent quality portable audio recorders for less than 200 bucks.

And lots and lots and lots of top quality educational content for free or at a very low price.

I'm still trying to process all this.
chagzuki wrote: Sat Aug 01, 2020 1:14 pm Why is Falcon not getting more attention? I watched a couple of youtube reviews of it and I got the impression it was the best in it's class, a comprehensive solution to all sound creation needs. It's pricier than the competitors but it appears to cover more ground.
This is just my opinion, but the fact that you can't demo such a expensive product is probably pushing potential customers back. I mean, purchasing such a monster without even knowing whether it will crash your computer...
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chagzuki wrote: Sat Aug 01, 2020 1:14 pm Well, it all looks pretty positive to me.

Why is Falcon not getting more attention? I watched a couple of youtube reviews of it and I got the impression it was the best in it's class, a comprehensive solution to all sound creation needs. It's pricier than the competitors but it appears to cover more ground.
iLok (PACE-EDEN)
Which kills its possible market by probably twice or more for those that would buy it if they eliminated that requirement.

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Ah, iLock. Yuck.

Some opinions on Arturia Pigments would be handy... is it missing any features that it's competitors have? I've just had a quick go with the demo and the presets sound fantastic... although CPU usage looked high to me.
Every day takes figuring out all over again how to f#ckin’ live.

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I'm in a very similar position to you. Took several years out of music - not quite as long as you, but still long enough for plenty of changes to happen. Funnily, it didn't seem to change as much as I thought it would have.

I would say that FX have taken a leap in quality in some quarters. I was steered towards Valhalla, and have to say I was very impressed - superb delays, and the reverbs are considerably better than what was around a few years ago. For $50 each effect - great value. The weird thing is, stuff like their Shimmer harks back to the 80s. Nods to the old world are still going very strong. And despite some very impressive new FX, I still downloaded all the old impulses from Noisevault way back in the day - their EMT/Bricasti/960 impulses are still superb and very very useable. I thought I might splash out for the Lexicon VSTs, but TBH with a free 64bit impulse player and those old impulses you can still get superb reverb - so some areas have still not moved on that much. Those impulses must be 15 yrs old or so, but they are still IMO at the top end of quality in FX s/w.

Synths - there's a really good choice nowadays, but analogue soundalike is still strong. First thing I did was buy the Korg set (again - years old, but superb and cheap) and the latest version of impOSCar. There is a plethora of other options but IMO too many of the other big synths are trying too hard to be everything. I like the sound of them, but they just aren't quick and easy to program. Great if you play presets, but for in depth making your own patches - sorry, but old one-knob analogue is still intuitive and quicker...much quicker. SOme of these big synths have pages and pages of screens and way too many knobs. They just immediately turned me off. Some great sounding filters though.

And - real analogue is still going strong. Surprisingly strong actually. Behringer have really gone hard at it. They're remaking all kinds of old classics at unbelievable prices. I'm seriously tempted by the MonoPoly they make, and some of their own new creations are similarly priced with goodies like audio rate modulation. Even Korg have been releasing things like real new MS20s in all kinds of sizes and colours, and their new Wavestate (Wavestation mk 2) is top of my next buy list. It's an oldie done up with stunning new possibilities. If you haven't seen the vids for Wavestate - go have a listen - even back in the day I didn't dream about some of the amazing shit they threw into the new version. I can actually see me seriously getting back into a proper h/w studio with all this affordable analogue stuff. And h/w fits with s/w probably better than it used to. I could happily buy a big digital desk and run everything straight into my laptop - and that's another thing - I used to hate laptops, but now they're pretty nifty. I had no problem moving from a desktop into laptop recording.

DAWs - from my perspective, things haven't really moved on that much. They do the same thing just with more bells and whistles. Last time I did music I was using Cubase SX2 (I just never upgraded - I think it was up to Cubase 5 or so). So I got Cubase 10.5 - and TBH it doesn't do anything that amazes me, just more of it and better. Same as many of the other DAWs - I looked around and for me, DAWs just plodded along on the same trajectory mostly. They're definitely better, but just not in any kind of different world from 10 years ago IMO.

There's a great mix of new and old, and the choice of quality has drastically improved for quite good value. I still see a very strong influence of old gear though - both in new analogue synths and especially FX s/w that harks directly back to old gear.

Great value for money available now compared to even a handful of years ago. :)

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breaks can be great for making music. Welcome back, hope to hear some good stuff soon from you. :tu:
my music: http://www.alexcooperusa.com
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More developers in the market, more choice, more competition, more quality for less money, customers happy (well, except for those that like to complain regardless of what, and they flock to KVR ;) )
seems like the free market actually does work :D

Although there have been loads of new developers, the big(ger) companies from fifteen years ago are still same: NI, Waves, UA, IK. Trying to think of a company that didn’t exist back then but has become a big player in the market. Plugin alliance, maybe. Izotope are older, but had the biggest growth in the past ten years.

Relatively few companies that closed or vanished, I think.

Also, new buzzwords:
Zero delay filter, real-time spice circuit simulation, powered by machine learning, component modeling...

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As others have mentioned, the vintage analog craze has given way to reasonably-priced reissues, clones and new instruments. Some really innovative stuff is happening in Eurorack, but not a lot of it has made its way to software synths yet.

Between Razor, Thorn and Europa, additive synthesis has become a lot more accesible.

Prices have dropped and are quite mobile. Most things will hit a $29 sale if you wait long enough...

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for the most part people don't make music anymore, and it's not the creative endeavor it used to be. the preset designers killed anything smart or exploratory. in fact they have software that explodes premade songs into its individual components for rearrangement. just move a few parts around and you're a musician! no hands or anything required. just make sure your marketing is on point because that's way more important than anything else. kids like to latch onto popular things, and man is it popular now! i bet your grandma is making beats on her dell instead of knitting now.

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oh yeah i forgot, the EDM kids rediscovered wave tables, fm, and have recently rediscovered noise (which i find the most entertaining of all in a digital prefabbed space).

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