Dune: mostly just EDM?

[kLoSDeyes]

Dune 3 is a quite versatile synth, very well thought out and programmed (light on CPU). At first you may have an impression that it lacks lots of features (only two simple hard-wired EG? c'mon...) but then you discover two things: it more than enough to get great sounds and you can use them in very different ways (D3 has its depth, it's much more than rather simple GUI suggests). Also very quick to program. Definitely not EDM/cinematic/*-only thing.

[e-crooner]

I do think that it has a very modern sound character, a bit sterile and cold, which may not be appropriate for any genre.

[GRUMP]

DUNE has 8 Layers and the exploration has not been finished yet

[clipnotic]

Saw a demo of Dune 3, sounds nice, looks like a lot of features...but seems very or almost entirely oriented to EDM. Agree/disagree? I'm not into EDM and have more than enough such sounds elsewhere if I ever need.

absolutely not! I have all expansions and some from 3rd party and I also program my own sounds with it and Dune can do almost everything!

[zerocrossing]

I do think that it has a very modern sound character, a bit sterile and cold, which may not be appropriate for any genre.

False.

[zerocrossing]

Yeah I'm a preset jockey more or less, so that's largely what I was getting at. I think some synths do tend to lend themselves not to an exact genre necessarily, but a more general type of music vs others.

I think the presets might somewhat favor “EDM” (not even sure what that means... it all sounds like some Trance variant to me) but they’re not all that way, and with a bit of knowledge, it’s very easy to make your own presets or tweak an “EDM” preset to be something entirely different.

Step 1: Remove any supersaw/unison oscillator modes, or lower them to 2.
Step 2: Remove any “trance gate” style effect/LFOs.
Step 3: Remove any syncopated delay effect
Step 4: Substitute compression effect for velocity to filter amount modulation.
Step 5: Remove arpeggio, or go to classic arp modes.
Step 6 (Optional) remove or significantly lower reverb amount and time.

There! Now you have a sound usable in any genre! You’re welcome!

[fisherKing]

...which may not be appropriate for any genre.

haha. your comment may not be appropriate for any genre.

seriously, what does that mean? 'i use dune 3 when i don't want to make music...'

it's a great synth if you like it, as many do. and if it's not for you, then it's not for you. and that's ok...

[DJ Warmonger]

Dune 3 has a buttload of trance presets, but...

Trance is the one genre that often uses clean and beautiful sounds for melodies, so that's not a suprise. For some genres you can do all the 'sound design' with Minimoog, so there's not much place for incredible preset showcase anyway.

[e-crooner]

I do think that it has a very modern sound character, a bit sterile and cold, which may not be appropriate for any genre.

False.

Not a convincing argument

I think it sounds rather different from the new Tal synth for instance, different in a negative way. Much of it probably has to do with the filter.

[ReleaseCandidate]

I do think that it has a very modern sound character, a bit sterile and cold, which may not be appropriate for any genre.

False.

I think it sounds rather different from the new Tal synth for instance, different in a negative way. Much of it probably has to do with the filter.

I'd say there are quite some different types of sound between a Roland Jupiter 8 and 'a very modern sound character, a bit sterile and cold'

[functionform]

Disagree. Has some very nice keys patches that are totally playable as interesting EP ish. It's very expressive imo, and it has a nice strong character to it, but not screechy or harsh like some edm focused synths can be.

[Teksonik]

I do think that it has a very modern sound character, a bit sterile and cold

Sterile and cold ? You've never actually tried Dune 3 have you ? Or you've only flipped through a handful of factory presets.

Dune 3 Patch "Sea of Life"

[Teksonik]

I think it sounds rather different from the new Tal synth for instance, different in a negative way. Much of it probably has to do with the filter.

Which of the 30 different filters do you mean ? The 5 Analog Modeled Filters ?

D3 010521.png

Be honest when was the last time you actually tried Dune 3 ?

[canadian_moose]

Considering it has Wavetable, VA and FM I was shocked just how good the VA section is when I got it.
It really is a Swiss Army knife of a synth.
I love it.

[Teksonik]

Exactly. I think people see Dune 3 has Wavetable capabilities and think that it's just a WT synth. To me it's one of the most under rated VA synths on the market.

In case anyone needs to learn more about Dune 3's Analog Modeled Filters which are among its 30 available filters. From the Manual:

With the exception of the Alpha filter, the analog-modeled filters use 3x oversampling to improve
their accuracy and feature multiple non-linearities.

• Alpha 24 dB
A four-pole lowpass filter based on a state-variable design, with 24 dB attenuation per octave
above the cutoff frequency.
• Polaris 24 dB
A four-pole lowpass filter with 24 dB attenuation per octave, inspired by the CEM 3372 chip.
A unique sounding chip which was put only into a handful of hardware synthesizers.
• Saturn 24 dB
A four-pole filter based on a frequently used custom OTA chip. This filter type can be used
to simulate a wide range of vintage-analog synthesizers.
• Pro 12 dB
Enhanced version of the Transistor ladder filter, with 12 dB attenuation per octave.
• Pro 24 dB
Enhanced version of the Transistor ladder filter, with 24 dB attenuation per octave.

Sallen-Key
The Sallen-Key filters are two-pole, multi-mode filter designs.
• SK Lowpass 12 dB
A two-pole lowpass filter, with 12 dB attenuation per octave above the cutoff frequency.
• SK Bandpass 12 dB
A two-pole bandpass filter, with 6 dB attenuation per octave on either side around the cutoff
• SK Highpass 12 dB
A two-pole highpass filter, with 12 dB attenuation per octave below the cutoff frequency.