Pigments 6

[BBFG#]

I do have V Collection and coincidentally reinstalled Synclavier a few days ago. Haven't really taken a deep dive yet but it looks really unique and potentially incredibly deep. May make it next month's Synth-To-Learn.

If you do check out these videos

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3P4 ... D00sIVUFGO

His YouTube channel is one phenomenal and goes into great detail on all sorts of plugins

Insomnia and spent a few hours watching some videos and playing the Syclavier. Is this one of the most deep and unique synths out there? How are people not raving about this?

Even just drawing in a bunch of random harmonics in one partial has yielded a beautiful chimey eerie pad, and there is basically nothing else happening.

Probably my only real complaint is the same as any of the non conventional synths- which is the steep learning curve and the hyper specificity of the acquired skill. If you learn, say, Serum you can export that knowledge to many other synths. Not so with stuff like Syclavier. The skill learned is largely only applicable in the one synth itself. Not so much a complaint as an observation.

What other little gems are there in V COLLECTION? I only have maybe 20% installed. I use the CS80, DX7, Mini V, piano, MS20, but the rest is gathering dust. Do you suggest anything else from V Collection? My main interests are making atonal weird atmospheric sounds and gritty fm stuff, the latter which is covered by countless other tools so more looking to make pads/drones/alien robots.

Synclavier single-handedly got me to buy into the Collection. Definitely special in their lineup IMO. Still not upgrading the whole Collection yet, but bought a sound set in the current sale. Lots of Augmented presets and a fair amount of Synclavier in it. What else surprised me was some really nice Prophet VS presets that show me it's quite special.

[planetearth]

I do have V Collection and coincidentally reinstalled Synclavier a few days ago. Haven't really taken a deep dive yet but it looks really unique and potentially incredibly deep. May make it next month's Synth-To-Learn.

If you do check out these videos

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3P4 ... D00sIVUFGO

His YouTube channel is one phenomenal and goes into great detail on all sorts of plugins

Insomnia and spent a few hours watching some videos and playing the Syclavier. Is this one of the most deep and unique synths out there? How are people not raving about this?

Even just drawing in a bunch of random harmonics in one partial has yielded a beautiful chimey eerie pad, and there is basically nothing else happening.

Probably my only real complaint is the same as any of the non conventional synths- which is the steep learning curve and the hyper specificity of the acquired skill. If you learn, say, Serum you can export that knowledge to many other synths. Not so with stuff like Syclavier. The skill learned is largely only applicable in the one synth itself. Not so much a complaint as an observation.

What other little gems are there in V COLLECTION? I only have maybe 20% installed. I use the CS80, DX7, Mini V, piano, MS20, but the rest is gathering dust. Do you suggest anything else from V Collection? My main interests are making atonal weird atmospheric sounds and gritty fm stuff, the latter which is covered by countless other tools so more looking to make pads/drones/alien robots.

"Weird atmospheric sounds and gritty FM stuff"? There's the DX7 V, the (Casio) CZ V, and the (Fairlight) CMI V and Emulator II V.

The Fairlight CMI V doesn't necessarily do "FM grit", but it does grit, and has some cool additive synthesis and spectral synthesis options.

Steve

[swilow11]

^Thanks for the head up- don't think I've ever installed the Fairlight or Emulator- will do so and see how much grit I can wring from em.

[planetearth]

^Thanks for the head up- don't think I've ever installed the Fairlight or Emulator- will do so and see how much grit I can wring from em.

Both of them can load samples from the real-world samplers they emulate. The Fairlight CMI isn't quite as good at it, but it can open some of the Fairlight CMI II samples Kate Bush and Peter Gabriel used. And there are dozens of libraries for the Emulator II V. But that's only if you want samples for them. If you're looking to make your own sounds, you'll probably still have a lot of fun with them.

Once you install the CMI V, be sure to type out "ARTURIA" on its on-screen computer keyboard. (Have your speakers/headphones on, at a moderate level.) You can thank me later.

Steve

[IvyBirds]

Do you suggest anything else from V Collection? My main interests are making atonal weird atmospheric sounds and gritty fm stuff, the latter which is covered by countless other tools so more looking to make pads/drones/alien robots.

I am into the same kinds of things and I HIGHLY recommend you use and abuse the Emulator II V

It's best trick is that it can playback WAV files of any length, any bit depth, and any sample rate (I have gone up to and hour just to experiment)

So take a sample of anything, go on Freesound.org and download some creative commons and/or public domain field recordings of literally anything. Load it into your DAW,.normalize it, flatten it to mono and then save it as WAV file at 44.1 or even 32 kHz bit depth and 16 bits. Doing that will save you quite a bit of CPU

Load it up drop it on a C key two octaves above Middle C and then load the same sample again again 1 octave up. Then press the C key an octave down from middle C and enjoy the deep spooky atmosphere, use some of its built in effects like reverb, chorus and delay to enhance it and make sure you have a slow attack and release on the envelope. If you loaded a 2 minute sample two octaves above Middle C, it will now be a 12 minute long sample so you don't really need to worry about loop points

You can of course sample all your other Synths the same way just record a C for as long as you want and then play it chromatically

Pigments is a great synth for this by sampling the granular engine as are any of the Augmented

You can create an entire weird gritty ambient track this way just in a single instance of the plugin

The other Synths besides those that I highly recommend is the SQ80, and Prophet VS both of those are stunning, and the CZ is also pretty cool. DX7 V is a really good FM synth that is better than FM8 IMHO but not as good as Plogue's OPS7 for emulating DX7 hardware but if you don't care much about that DX7-V makes a really good FM

Arturia has some really good Analog Emulations but they really shine with the digital ones

[Biome_Digital]

My new Pigments preset pack using the new features extensively. There's a free demo to download and try too.

https://newloops.com/products/supernova ... ts-presets

[Igro]

I hope that Arturia adds a third tab for the Oscillator. Because the Utility oscillator is sometimes used for noise. So the third could be a SUB oscillator.

[HOTF]

I hope that Arturia adds a third tab for the Oscillator. Because the Utility oscillator is sometimes used for noise. So the third could be a SUB oscillator.

I'm not sure I understand your request but the utility engine has one virtual analog oscillator and two sample-based sound sources. The classic use would be for those is to use them as a noise sources / sub osc but you are not limited to that. Creating a fourth tab just for that VA oscillator would be very silly imho.

[Igro]

I hope that Arturia adds a third tab for the Oscillator. Because the Utility oscillator is sometimes used for noise. So the third could be a SUB oscillator.

I'm not sure I understand your request but the utility engine has one virtual analog oscillator and two sample-based sound sources. The classic use would be for those is to use them as a noise sources / sub osc but you are not limited to that. Creating a fourth tab just for that VA oscillator would be very silly imho.

You are right, i forgot that in the utility tab there is actually a separate noise oscillator.

Also, I didn't mean a fourth tab, but a third wavetable tab oscillator (with different generators. Just like the first two tabs)

[Rastkovic]

The new Classic filters sound really good, that was always the biggest issue for me. A very positive surprise.

[felis]

Just got an email for a Pigments survey with a giveaway.
It's fairly long at 50 questions and covers a lot of ground.
I let them know that I'd most like to see release velocity as a mod source.
Fingers crossed.

[Igro]

Do you suggest anything else from V Collection? My main interests are making atonal weird atmospheric sounds and gritty fm stuff, the latter which is covered by countless other tools so more looking to make pads/drones/alien robots.

I am into the same kinds of things and I HIGHLY recommend you use and abuse the Emulator II V

It's best trick is that it can playback WAV files of any length, any bit depth, and any sample rate (I have gone up to and hour just to experiment)

It has a bug though. Load a sample with a prominent transient and its sampler will eat that transient out.

[IvyBirds]

Do you suggest anything else from V Collection? My main interests are making atonal weird atmospheric sounds and gritty fm stuff, the latter which is covered by countless other tools so more looking to make pads/drones/alien robots.

I am into the same kinds of things and I HIGHLY recommend you use and abuse the Emulator II V

It's best trick is that it can playback WAV files of any length, any bit depth, and any sample rate (I have gone up to and hour just to experiment)

It has a bug though. Load a sample with a prominent transient and its sampler will eat that transient out.

So did the original which it emulates (pardon the pun)

What you describe is inherent in the DPCM Mu-255 companding that is utilized in both the original hardware and the Arturia where 13-14 bits of data can be stored in 8 bits of storage.

That μ-law non-linear quantization however comes at the cost of reduced peak levels and reduction in the perception of transients

This wasn't an issue for the original with its short sample times with things like drum samples as it could easily be corrected with envelopes but is harder to do with long sample lengths and extended playback of them using ADSR envelopes

Usually however when people make pads and drones which was the context of my response those things don't have prominent transients anyway so it's a non factor

[Igro]

Do you suggest anything else from V Collection? My main interests are making atonal weird atmospheric sounds and gritty fm stuff, the latter which is covered by countless other tools so more looking to make pads/drones/alien robots.

I am into the same kinds of things and I HIGHLY recommend you use and abuse the Emulator II V

It's best trick is that it can playback WAV files of any length, any bit depth, and any sample rate (I have gone up to and hour just to experiment)

It has a bug though. Load a sample with a prominent transient and its sampler will eat that transient out.

So did the original which it emulates (pardon the pun)

What you describe is inherent in the DPCM Mu-255 companding that is utilized in both the original hardware and the Arturia where 13-14 bits of data can be stored in 8 bits of storage.

That μ-law non-linear quantization however comes at the cost of reduced peak levels and reduction in the perception of transients

This wasn't an issue for the original with its short sample times with things like drum samples as it could easily be corrected with envelopes but is harder to do with long sample lengths and extended playback of them using ADSR envelopes

Usually however when people make pads and drones which was the context of my response those things don't have prominent transients anyway so it's a non factor

That's very interesting! I reported this bug to Arturia 2 years ago. They didn't say me that. Seems like their support is not educated or informed.

Could you give more details about this, please:
"it could easily be corrected with envelopes"

I'm not sure how? No matter what I do, the kick will loose the transient anyway. Not a big deal, I would use any other sampler for that, but still....

[pocvecem]

You can always try to cut the sample at the beginning or move the sample start a few ms to get a "clicky" attack. Sometimes it works well and sometimes it doesn't.