Announcing the launch of ULTRA

[ultra_audio]

Hi Nigel
One small annoying "bug": I resized Ultra because I am on 4K, everything smooth so far. But everytime I reopen Ultra it says "resizing" for about 2-3 seconds . As short as this time span is: it is quite annoying if you are in the middle of sound design and open and close the GUI often to also change things in the arrangement. And there are very few other vst synths which do the same, Acustika Audio´s synth have the same problem for example. But I have 100 synths and that behaviour is rare. Room for improvement... Otherwise: Ultra is still has become one of my gotos and favorite synths. Bought some new sounds lately but still would welcome some more in the basic version.♥

The GUI takes a couple of seconds to build on launch, but on hide and relaunch should be fast.
There is an issue that's been reported where the GUI is being resized every time.
We are going to fix that and introduce a GUI size lock in an update soon.

[ultra_audio]

We are building our MPE implementation currently, as a lot of people here have asked for it.


This is the current design:

MPE-1.jpg

mpe-2.jpg

• You'd launch the MPE panel from the small button
• There would be Mod sources for XYZ which can be dragged to any dest
• The panel can be dragged around the screen and locked on screen so it doesn't close if you're making lots of connections
• By default polyphonic pitch bend is connected to X, Aftertouch to Z and Macro 1 to Y
• X could have options for Pitch Bend, Macro 2, or both
• Y could have options for Macro 1, Mod Wheel, or both
• Z could have options for Aftertouch, Macro 3, or both
• If connected to a macro, the macro knob disappears and becomes an indicator screen

I think this is a nice design, but have some questions:

• In some other synths, you can connect XYZ etc to macros. In this mode it seems like X pan is also connected to pitch. Would it be better to be able to connect it to a macro and disconnect it from the pitch?
• Does anyone really need Pitch Bend + Macro as an option? Seems like it would be better to be mutually exclusive.
• Should there be an option to disconnect X etc so that it only controls the dedicated MPE X mod source, and not also pitch or Macro?
• If so, the dropdown option for X might contain:
  - Pitch Bend
  - Pitch Bend + Macro 2
  - Macro 2
  - MPE X only
• Synths seem to have a semitone range for the Pitch bend, but this seems to be overriden by the patch pitch bend ranges. Should there be an option to ignore the Patch PB range?

It would be great to get feedback from anyone who uses MPE on all of the above, and any other ideas. Thanks for the feedback!

[Tj Shredder]

First of all, thanks for doing it.
I usually want always the pitch being controlled. Its natural for my playing. To let it modulate other parameters as well is certainly helpful. For me the combination of key plus pitch bend is the pitch. The pitch bend alone I would use rarely. But the combination is crucial. With MPE you can easily make a bend of 2 octaves.
To be able to disconnect it can be interesting, but I would rarely do it, if at all.
The MPE spec has two PB ranges. One for the common channel (1) and one for the per voice PB. That can actually be fixed to the standard of 48. That way the setting for non-MPE PB is just that for the common channel…
I’d be happy to beta test the MPE implementation…

[vscorpio]

Hi,
Really god job!

[SLiC]

We are building our MPE implementation currently, as a lot of people here have asked for it.

Suggestion- work with the Expressive e (Osmose) guys to do an MPE pre-set pack! They have done with Synapse, UHE, AAS, Dawsome, Kilohearts etc...do a bundle synths + MPE pre-sets as well, may be good business for you.... here is an example of what they do https://www.expressivee.com/116-hive-2-expressive-suite

[ultra_audio]

thanks for the tip

[simmo75]

Are you going to add a granular osc?

[Cyforce]

Somehow this synth had passed me by until now, I downloaded the demo today and wow... some really nice features.

[SLiC]

Just noticed that the 'use Ableton Live track colour in header' option, that very cool-nice touch! I also like the way the look/controls for filter change with the selected option, feels quite 'modular' - definitely one of the better GUIs I have used.

[SLiC]

Are you going to add a granular osc?

You can get some quite granular/smeared effects with the sampler module and an LFO on playback/loop start and unison, detune, start offset etc. Its a pretty fun sampler (and could easily be tweaked to make it a bit more granular, half the work is done!)

[SLiC]

Ever hear a single pre-set that made you want to buy a synth?

[simmo75]

Ever hear a single pre-set that made you want to buy a synth?

lol! Yes… Simon’s work often has that effect on me!

[Alchemedia]

Ever hear a single pre-set that made you want to buy a synth?

Simon has a knack for that!

[ultra_audio]

Are you going to add a granular osc?

Absolutely! What kind of granular synths do you like?

[Alchemedia]

Are you going to add a granular osc?

Absolutely! What kind of granular synths do you like?

Crusher-X set the bar.