Convert Substrative instruments to Collective

[JordiTR]

Hi you all. Substractive looks a subset of Collective features and I was considering converting my Substractive instruments to Collective in order to only use one of both synth and simplify my workflow. Is there a way to convert Substrative instruments to Collective ?? Thanks !!

[mkobain]

you could always sample it and use it in sampler player

[Peter Widdicombe]

I could be all wrong here, but my guess is the menu style between the two is similar to ease use of the two; but the internals (waveforms/oscillators/filters) internals are probably not compatible with each other ? So a simple "export" from subtractive to import back into collective presumably won't work.

I'd LIKE to be wrong here B-)

[Watchful]

Subtractive is a full-blown synth that depends on subtractive synthesis.

Collective is a three-headed animal that uses sample playback, four-operator FM synthesis, and sample/subtractive synthesis to produce a wide variety of sounds. I don't think Collective by itself has the same capabilities on the subtractive front except for, perhaps, very simple analog-type sounds.

[JordiTR]

Hi you all, in fact patches are completely compatible. Both synths share the same structure, and Collective simply adds more things to its synth engine. I looked inside both synths instrument files and I realized they are saved in some sort of XML structure, being these structures very similar.

So I created a "User" instruments folder for "Collective" and from "Substractive" saved my selected instruments inside. After that the instrument is not automatically recognized, we still have to change the file extension from ".subsinst" to ".collinst". After that, you close any instance of Collective you have opened on your sessions of Waveform and reopen it and the new instrument is there !!

I selected the most interesting sounds on Substractive and saved them for being "Collective" sounds. Once I converted them opened one instance of each synth on different tracks and compared the sound and parameters. And guess what ? Collective sounds exactly the same than Substractive. That confirms to me that Collective is just a "superset" of Substractive, and that makes me wonder that probably "Biotek" is a superset of "Collective"...

I have to admit that a couple of instruments don't sound the same. One "Substractive" sound which I like a lot called "Cave" sounds different, and I don't understand why because each and every parameter is at the same level on both... I've been activating diffent parts of the synth engine and it looks to be something related with the ressonance of the second filter.

[Watchful]

Fascinating and surprising! Thanks for sharing.