Vital - Released

[digitalboytn]

I mainly produce Swahili swing music with a touch of Gaelic folk and some overtones of Icelandic elevator pop thrown in for good measure and I find that the WT synths are perfect for that style...

all the music in my spotify queue is that style (or simply plain vanilla icelandic elevator pop). and, from what i've read on the internet, most of this music was made using vital! amazing...

But is it Icelandic ascending elevator pop or Icelandic descending elevator pop?

Enquiring minds need to know. Because there's nothing more important than getting your genre right.

o

You have to have the perfect balance of up and down...

That's vital

[Teksonik]

I wish the website would clearly state the latest version, so I dont have to download to find out if I need an update. Im on 1.0.3 is this the current?

Vital 121120-1.png

EDIT: I see zvenx already answered.

[opdobqo]

You have to have the perfect balance of up and down...

That's vital

[BenfordLaw]

I should have stated that when I was playing the first pad sound in the presets, and it used 39% of my i7 4790, I was playing three notes. Three notes and 39% CPU. So rather like Diva, it uses far too much CPU for no return that I can hear (perhaps others can), and also, far too many of the new sounds that people are creating on it are simply not 'musical' to me, and I fear it's going to become a go to synth for 'Dubstep' and 'wub wub' sounds, so loads of preset packs containing sounds that I can't stand.

Have you ever noticed how, when a new hardware synth comes out and is demoed at NAMM or some other exhibition, they almost always use old fashioned synth presets when demonstrating it? i.e. stuff that sounds musical and immediately usable, like synths used to? Then people view this as 'analogue' sounds, when really it's just a certain type of preset, that can just as easily be done on a VST? (No doubt on Vital too).

[fisherKing]

But is it Icelandic ascending elevator pop or Icelandic descending elevator pop?

Enquiring minds need to know. Because there's nothing more important than getting your genre right.

o

ha! i just checked, & it seems it's all 'stuck between floors' icelandic elevator pop; but i do also have some icelanic escalator pop, equally ascending & descending...

life is confusing. that's why i come to the kvr forums; to revel in that confusion.

[opdobqo]

But is it Icelandic ascending elevator pop or Icelandic descending elevator pop?

Enquiring minds need to know. Because there's nothing more important than getting your genre right.

o

ha! i just checked, & it seems it's all 'stuck between floors' icelandic elevator pop; but i do also have some icelanic escalator pop, equally ascending & descending...

life is confusing. that's why i come to the kvr forums; to revel in that confusion.

Escalator pop is nothing next to fire escape pop! But I'm likewise revelling in confusion.

On a more serious note, Vital is a lovely synth, capable of a whole bunch of quality noises, and the user interface is a triumph. I think it'll be something I'm going to use for a good few years to come.

o

[Teksonik]

For those who don't like Wavetable synths or can't get their heads around them get the free Echo Sound Works Wavetables:

https://www.echosoundworks.com/eswcorewavetables

There are some very nice analog waveforms in there from Moog,Jupiter, Korg, Arp etc. Saws, Squares, etc. You don't have to sweep the wavetables you can just use a single waveform and create analog patches with Vital.

Although I think that's like driving a Ferrari at twenty miles an hour Vital is capable of old analog sounds. It's not going to knock DIVA off its throne but it's quite capable none the less.

People have to realize that "musical" means a lot of different things to a lot of different musicians. Not everything has to sound like a forty year old limited analog dinosaur. There are certainly more than enough plugins to cover the old dinosaur sounds so it's refreshing when a new synth comes along and brings new sounds and flavors to the table. I don't do EDM but I'm having a blast creating sounds in Vital that can't be made with an Oberheim or Moog or any of their emulations.

Just because a synth has wavetable capabilities it doesn't mean it's only a wavetable synth.

[Sleepwalker]

I wish the website would clearly state the latest version, so I dont have to download to find out if I need an update. Im on 1.0.3 is this the current?

Vital 121120-1.png

EDIT: I see zvenx already answered.

Great! For some reason it was nowhere to be found for me the other day, heh.

[Sleepwalker]

Regarding cpu problems, I run a 7 year old i7 laptop, and its running so far 8 instances of Vital, no problem at all. Peaks at around 30%.

Windows 7
16gb ram, ssds, i7 quad was new 7 years ago. Not the top model.

[pdxindy]

Just because a synth has wavetable capabilities it doesn't mean it's only a wavetable synth.

If someone doesn't want lots of wavetables, get rid of most of them.

I find a single wavetable to be a faster and more effective way to have a bunch of waveforms than a pull-down menu with a number of waveform options. I can manually scan through the wavetable to find a suitable waveform all while say a sequence is playing.

Wavetables are awesome and super fun and fast to work with. It is so easy in Vital to draw a couple basic shapes as individual waves and then morph between them to find unique waveforms. Vital can be used all sorts of ways without ever scrolling through hundreds or dozens of wavetables.

[Teksonik]

That's true but I don't find scrolling through a lot of Wavetables any different than scrolling through a lot of presets. Or choosing static waveforms from a large selection in a drop down.

Sure it's easy and fun to make your own wavetables but sometimes those made by others bring shapes you wouldn't have thought of or aren't able to easily duplicate on your own like the Echo Soundworks waves taken from hardware.

Vital 121120-2.png

[fisherKing]

it's refreshing when a new synth comes along and brings new sounds and flavors to the table.

WT synths are hardly new....

teksonik said the synth is new, with 'new sounds and flavors'... nothing about WT synths being 'new'...

[plexuss]

Here's a calming piece of music of mine to to distract yourself from replying :


https://soundcloud.com/musicofplexus/dr ... ts/ambient

[bmanic]

The most useful and common application is simply to balance a preset's volume over the keyboard range. Some sounds will have naturally multiplying output amplitude at certain key intervals due to resonance buildup in various places of the preset, thus making it difficult to play it over the full range of the keyboard in a natural way. This can be countered with modulation mapping extremely easily.

Or a compressor.

For harmonic buildup an EQ would actually be the more accurate choice but even an EQ needs to be automated if you want it to only apply at specific moments on specific tones.. and even then it will impact everything else while that one tone happens, for instance in a polyphonic preset that plays chords. If you use a modulation mapper, you have individual note control in all cases and always instantly (unlike a compressor).

Add to this the ability to precisely control the cutoff frequency of any filter over the keyboard range, not just a simple % or common keyboard tracking.

That's another thing I've never found a use for. I always turn key tracking off, it does nothing but annoy me.

Fair enough.

In general it allows you to create sounds that play more consistently over the wanted keyboard range without having to do that manually with velocity or automation (the latter being impossible to do when playing live).

That's not true at all. You can put automation into a track without notes. If you know what you're going to play, you can do some very sophisticated stuff that way. I only use it so I can fade a song out while I'm still playing but there would be plenty of other stuff you could do if you wanted.

Good point.. but that means "prepping" the live session before playing. I was mainly talking about improvisation situations where nothing is prepared. My bad, should have been more specific.

With mod mapping you get a kind of control over the difference between a good and a bad acoustic instrument (violin, piano, guitar etc), one of the common traits being the even/uneven response and tonality of the instrument.

You mean stuff that virtuosos spend a lifetime trying to eliminate from their performance? I like to annoy them by making all my stuff perfect without any practice at all.

Well, a virtuoso can't do much about a piano with uneven tonality. He can control the velocity and the tonality to a degree but if the felt on the hammer is broken there's nothing you can do, even as a virtuoso, to fix that with your playing.

Anyhow, good point. Tone and control is definitely in the hands of the player as well but it's not a coincidence that virtuosos usually choose good instruments with even response and thus comfortable and easy to play.

Cheers!
bM

[pdxindy]

That's true but I don't find scrolling through a lot of Wavetables any different than scrolling through a lot of presets. Or choosing static waveforms from a large selection in a drop down.

Sure it's easy and fun to make your own wavetables but sometimes those made by others bring shapes you wouldn't have thought of or aren't able to easily duplicate on your own like the Echo Soundworks waves taken from hardware.

Sure... my point was for people who said they don't like scrolling through lists of wavetables and that there are other ways to use Vital that don't require that.