CLAP... thoughts?

[teilo]

This being the CLAP thread in the instrument forum, it looks like TAL is starting to create CLAP plugins with TAL U-No-LX v4.60 being the first instrument across the line. However, there doesn't appear to be any polyphonic modulation capabilities as of yet. I'm sure all of that will take time, but figured I'd mention it here.

TAL-DRUM was first, and he has added TAL-DAC.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

This being the CLAP thread in the instrument forum, it looks like TAL is starting to create CLAP plugins with TAL U-No-LX v4.60 being the first instrument across the line. However, there doesn't appear to be any polyphonic modulation capabilities as of yet. I'm sure all of that will take time, but figured I'd mention it here.

TAL-DRUM was first, and he has added TAL-DAC.

Yep. My post was really just to call attention to PolyMod not working on it yet in case others were curious.

[baconpaul]

I read something from BaconPaul on another forum that indicates this might not take so long. That's how I read it anyway, but of course that doesn't mean much.

I certainly wouldn’t say that about a codebase I hadn’t seen.

I might have said for a fresh codebase like the demo synth it was not a hard add. For surge it was medium difficulty. I can imagine lots of ways it could be easy or hard for other voice and modulation systems.

[baconpaul]

I can imagine their simpler synths getting taken to the next level by the poly-mod features.

I was musing recently that developers may start getting a little light with modulation sources/capabilities in their synths and begin saying things like, "hey, if you want more modulation, use the CLAP version in Bitwig..."

...That wouldn't really happen though right?

I was musing something similar, that in daw modulation systems can change the grain size of the smallest useful synth. Speaking as a person who works on a pretty maximalist synth, we are not planning on dropping any modulators, but there might be interesting new products which are possible that use more advanced daw composition.

[Andreya_Autumn]

I certainly wouldn’t say that about a codebase I hadn’t seen.

Figures, sorry about that. I should probably be more careful recounting programming-related things.

[Andreya_Autumn]

I can imagine their simpler synths getting taken to the next level by the poly-mod features.

I was musing recently that developers may start getting a little light with modulation sources/capabilities in their synths and begin saying things like, "hey, if you want more modulation, use the CLAP version in Bitwig..."

...That wouldn't really happen though right?

I was musing something similar, that in daw modulation systems can change the grain size of the smallest useful synth. Speaking as a person who works on a pretty maximalist synth, we are not planning on dropping any modulators, but there might be interesting new products which are possible that use more advanced daw composition.

Yeah, I'm with this line of thought for sure.

On a smaller scale I've already experienced this. For example there's a Reaper JS called Complex X Filter Synth.

It has a super sweet, somewhat unique sound. Reminds me a bit of Newfangled Pendulate. The developer kept a very streamlined simplified feature set, but with reapers modulation system you can get lotsa extra envelopes and LFO's in there. All monophonic though.
So yeah, I see this being a thing for sure!

For one thing, this could allow a developer to focus purely on building interesting-sounding oscillators. IDK how that would turn out in practice, but it seems cool in theory!

[baconpaul]

I certainly wouldn’t say that about a codebase I hadn’t seen.

Figures, sorry about that. I should probably be more careful recounting programming-related things.

No need to apologize! Just don’t want other devs getting mad at me

[baconpaul]

I can imagine their simpler synths getting taken to the next level by the poly-mod features.

I was musing recently that developers may start getting a little light with modulation sources/capabilities in their synths and begin saying things like, "hey, if you want more modulation, use the CLAP version in Bitwig..."

...That wouldn't really happen though right?

I was musing something similar, that in daw modulation systems can change the grain size of the smallest useful synth. Speaking as a person who works on a pretty maximalist synth, we are not planning on dropping any modulators, but there might be interesting new products which are possible that use more advanced daw composition.

Yeah, I'm with this line of thought for sure.

On a smaller scale I've already experienced this. For example there's a Reaper JS called Complex X Filter Synth.

It has a super sweet, somewhat unique sound. Reminds me a bit of Newfangled Pendulate. The developer kept a very streamlined simplified feature set, but with reapers modulation system you can get lotsa extra envelopes and LFO's in there. All monophonic though.
So yeah, I see this being a thing for sure!

For one thing, this could allow a developer to focus purely on building interesting-sounding oscillators. IDK how that would turn out in practice, but it seems cool in theory!

Yeah the clap saw demo is a super simple synth but with it and the airwindows claps I have been able to make interesting music. I think you need a bit more than just an oscillator since the note modulation is not audio voice splits so an oscillator plus a filter plus a vca seems the minimum. But maybe no envelopes…. Just a post gate release time.

[pdxindy]

I can imagine their simpler synths getting taken to the next level by the poly-mod features.

I was musing recently that developers may start getting a little light with modulation sources/capabilities in their synths and begin saying things like, "hey, if you want more modulation, use the CLAP version in Bitwig..."

...That wouldn't really happen though right?

It wouldn't happen anytime soon! None of the most popular DAW's have poly modulation as a feature

[Andreya_Autumn]

...since the note modulation is not audio voice splits so an oscillator plus a filter plus a vca seems the minimum. But maybe no envelopes…. Just a post gate release time.

Not sure I follow that. But I guess what you're saying is, synths don't output voices independently, so an oscillator-only synth wouldn't allow per-voice filtering. Is that what you mean?

Now you've got me imagining a future where every plugin has multi I/O and the ability to manage note ID's to send and/or process independent voices. Then you could have an oscillators-only synth, and amp/filter each voices with FF Volcano, modulate with Echobode, distort with IVGI, etc etc.

Not saying I think that should happen though. Maybe it's good to keep that sort of functionality boxed-in to a specific environment, like Bidule or The Grid or whatever.

[ThomasHelzle]

Well, we already have all kinds of modular synths, from VCV Rack to Bitwigs Grid, where all of the above already happens and exists and even the separate voices after the oscillator have solutions.
I'm not sure if this kind of minimal CLAP synth would add anything to those concepts, since
a.) the GUI would be much less coherent than one integrated synth/system if you rely on DAW modulation/modules and
b.) it reduces portability of presets massively.
Bitwigs "The DAW is the instrument" approach is already there in my book and it's very useful to be able to add some more modulation to a synth, smaller entities would basically re-create the modular systems.

If Bitwigs Grid would allow to load such advanced CLAP-modules though, that would indeed be interesting

But yeah, it will be fascinating to see if polyphonic modulation will show up in more hosts. That would definitely make sense.

Interesting times.

[baconpaul]

Yeah that’s exactly what I meant. Audio is summed in stereo out even though logical notes are separate.

[Tj Shredder]

Yeah the clap saw demo is a super simple synth but with it and the airwindows claps I have been able to make interesting music. I think you need a bit more than just an oscillator since the note modulation is not audio voice splits so an oscillator plus a filter plus a vca seems the minimum. But maybe no envelopes…. Just a post gate release time.

At least one envelope is necessary, or you would need to set that post gate release time some how twice. Once in the minimal synth and once in the envelope. How else would you know when to stop cpu processing when there is nothing to hear?
It is getting too complex if the host has to decide about those optimizations, the synth might know it better…
If there is communication from the plugin to the host about a state of silence, it could help the host to also stop modulation that has no effect anymore…

[baconpaul]

Yeah the clap saw demo is a super simple synth but with it and the airwindows claps I have been able to make interesting music. I think you need a bit more than just an oscillator since the note modulation is not audio voice splits so an oscillator plus a filter plus a vca seems the minimum. But maybe no envelopes…. Just a post gate release time.

At least one envelope is necessary, or you would need to set that post gate release time some how twice. Once in the minimal synth and once in the envelope. How else would you know when to stop cpu processing when there is nothing to hear?
It is getting too complex if the host has to decide about those optimizations, the synth might know it better…
If there is communication from the plugin to the host about a state of silence, it could help the host to also stop modulation that has no effect anymore…

The clap saw demo has a simple adsr but it also has a mode where the envelope is just a gate for note on plus fixed time. So you set it to be constant volume for a 5 second release with no attack or decay and then modulate the vca, for exactly this reason. A vca modulator which hasn’t zeroed by the end of the gate will indeed truncate improperly

I almost coded it so the note sustained until it got a modulation level 3 Events in a row below 1e-5 but just went with fixed gate instead

[No_Use]

And imho the problematic part is §9. It gives Steinberg the right to terminate the agreement if they want to. Say if A VST4 SDK gets released and for whatever reason a dev wants/needs to use that, the VST3 agreement gets terminated within 6 months, and then you could be not allowed to distribute VST3 anymore. Even without a new version, they can terminate the agreement within two years.
This is clearly something Steinberg “learned” from the VST2/VST3 debacle and I think what Urs referred to with “future risks of investment “.

Also this sentence:

5. The right to extraordinary termination for good cause shall remain unaffected.

Where 'good cause' is totally undefined.