NEST Acoustics Color Play

[noahrbc]

It’s sooooo quick and easy to make great sounds and especially with the samples that come with it. And then importing your own makes it even more powerful and endless.

[Loopy C]

To anyone who owns/is using this…Is there a limit to how long/big either sample can be? (i.e. tied to a set limit or RAM amount, etc?) For example, could you ‘tune’ two 20 minute plus environmental recordings together? Or longer??

Also, does it support flac, aiff, mp3?

Thanks in advance

[kraster]

To anyone who owns/is using this…Is there a limit to how long/big either sample can be? (i.e. tied to a set limit or RAM amount, etc?) For example, could you ‘tune’ two 20 minute plus environmental recordings together? Or longer??

Also, does it support flac, aiff, mp3?

Thanks in advance

I pulled in a 90 minute file and it worked. I don't know if it's ram based but there doesn't seem to be any hard limit.

It supports wav, aiff, mp3 and ogg.

[osiris]

That's impressive.

[Loopy C]

I pulled in a 90 minute file and it worked. I don't know if it's ram based but there doesn't seem to be any hard limit.

It supports wav, aiff, mp3 and ogg.

Thanks for checking kraster

[Loopy C]

Hmmm, seeing some red flags for Nest Acoustics? The ever-growing ‘Morphology’ series stopped growing several years ago? ‘Delta’ users complaining of it being unstable/unusable?? Paid subscribers/purchasers ghosted???

I had almost talked myself into taking the chance that ‘Color Play’ would be easier than setting up some sort of PVOC chain, but can’t abide freezing/crashing plug-ins without support if the reports I am finding are accurate…guess I’ll wait to see if a demo is ever offered to test myself

Will watch this thread for positive user reports to perhaps balance out what are currently the mostly negative user experiences that are turning up in my searches?

[Loopy C]

Any feedback on quality, stability, usability, communications with developer, etc from those who have purchased?

Thanks in advance

[Loopy C]

(I guess what I am asking…IF, one were inclined to purchase based on video, has there been any reason in your usage/experiences to NOT pick it up? I am on a Macbook Pro M4/macOS 15 btw).

[kraster]

(I guess what I am asking…IF, one were inclined to purchase based on video, has there been any reason in your usage/experiences to NOT pick it up? I am on a Macbook Pro M4/macOS 15 btw).

The biggest con is the CPU usage. It can get pretty intense.

I'm on an M1,Tahoe and Ableton Live so the M4 may able to handle it better.

As I mentioned above the odd thing about it is that it's more CPU intensive when you're NOT using the granular modes in the sampler.

Dev said they were working on optimisation.

Another issue (but less important) is the lack of documentation. I'm still a little fuzzy about what the central controls do. I have a decent handle on them in general but would love more specific information.

The lack of window resizing could be a con depending on your screen resolution.

Outside of that I've been having a blast with it. It's a very immediate synth and very tweakable. The centre spectral section (as much as I understand it) gives you a lot of scope. The swap where you can instantly swap the signal and contour button is great.

Haven't had any crashes so far.

I think some nice additions would be the ability to sync the grain generation rate and lfo rate and more modulations in general.

One thing to Note is that this is a collaboration between Nest acoustics and an Icelandic developer Inorganic Audio. It definitely has a good deal of that Icelandic indie aesthetic running through it.

[Loopy C]

Fantastic kraster, thank you so much for your detailed feedback and notes!
I appreciate you taking the time to share your experience…definitely helps offset the ‘vague’ concerns I was picking up on in general (not much has been shared about ‘Color Play’, it was mainly one or two less than complimentary posts about ‘DELTA’).

Thanks again

[Loopy C]

FWIW, I got this in my mail today:

‘Great news! Color Play 1.1.0 is now available.

What's new:

- Introducing the "External" playback mode, a new playback option that streams a live sidechain audio signal from your DAW through Source A, B or both instead of a loaded sample.
- AAX now supported on Mac and Windows ‘

!!! VERY cool…really look forward to running a live source(s)! (was probably my one most wanted added feature )

[kneebone77]

This looks and sounds very compelling...

[noahrbc]

This looks and sounds very compelling...

I've been enjoying it quite a lot. Definitely recommend it.