Omnisphere 2.5 Released

[zvenx]

Got ya....then the diagram from their manual that i posted before seems very misleading.

Also is it the layer in Filter A it uses? I had put different filters in each layer after selecting Shared, I would imagine it should prevent me from doing that too.



rsp

[dreamkeeper]

Got ya....then the diagram from their manual that i posted before seems very misleading.

Also is it the layer in Filter A it uses? I had put different filters in each layer after selecting Shared, I would imagine it should prevent me from doing that too

No matter what layer you're in - everything you do only affects the one shared filter. Whatever you select or adjust in layer B to D, will always be reflected in A. Just changes in A won't be shown in B to D.

As I said, it would be clearer, if selecting B, C or D filter wouldn't be possible at all in shared mode. The same goes for shared envelopes etc.

Edit: It seems even more dodgy with the envelopes. ADSR controls work the same as filter - but on the env zoom page, changes in B to D won't be reflected in A. sigh...

[zvenx]

Got ya....then the diagram from their manual that i posted before seems very misleading.

Also is it the layer in Filter A it uses? I had put different filters in each layer after selecting Shared, I would imagine it should prevent me from doing that too

No matter what layer you're in - everything you do only affects the one shared filter. Whatever you select or adjust in layer B to D, will always be reflected in A. Just changes in A won't be shown in B to D.

As I said, it would be clearer, if selecting B, C or D filter wouldn't be possible at all in shared mode. The same goes for shared envelopes etc.

Edit: It seems even more dodgy with the envelopes. ADSR controls work the same as filter - but on the env zoom page, changes in B to D won't be reflected in A. sigh...

Right, but which of the layers houses the shared filter was my question (not that you may know )
rsp

[dreamkeeper]

Well, I guess it's best to look at it so that the layers are irrelevant for the shared elements. For now, best practice may be to forget about the layers B to D in this context and only look at A. But Spectrasonics should improve their design there to avoid the confusion.

[acYm]

just watched the presentation video, found their little hardware ploy interesting. so here's what they did. first they added a lot of behind-the-scenes midi cc wiring for things such as browsing, menus, device selection, modulation routings and such. then there's a distinct midi remote control script included for each specific hardware synth. these scripts are also paired with patches, including init, in which omnisphere's internals are setup as close to the selected synth as possible. so that when using the synth's panel, every control does in omnisphere the action that you'd expect.

it's a clever concept; where it will fall short is that hardware synth panels send coarse 0-127 midi cc which isn't suitable for all parameters. also the fact that non-endless encoders and software are a horrible match. a bunch of good analog emulations with well made templates in Kore is still a better experience than this imo.

[Julien Unison]

From what I've seen, each filter knob can control the "master filter" aka shared filter.
It can be confusing because of the different positioning of the 4 filter rotary knobs but I think it works like that.

[jbraner]

just watched the presentation video, found their little hardware ploy interesting. so here's what they did. first they added a lot of behind-the-scenes midi cc wiring for things such as browsing, menus, device selection, modulation routings and such. then there's a distinct midi remote control script included for each specific hardware synth. these scripts are also paired with patches, including init, in which omnisphere's internals are setup as close to the selected synth as possible. so that when using the synth's panel, every control does in omnisphere the action that you'd expect.

it's a clever concept; where it will fall short is that hardware synth panels send coarse 0-127 midi cc which isn't suitable for all parameters. also the fact that non-endless encoders and software are a horrible match. a bunch of good analog emulations with well made templates in Kore is still a better experience than this imo.

I don't have any of the hardware, but I'm still confused about why you would actually do this.
Are they trying to make omnisphere sound like the hardware that's "driving" it? why would you do that? You've already got your hardware, with it's physical outputs. don't you want Omnisphere to sound like Omnisphere?
I get why you'd want the controls to map to Omnisphere - but why add wavetables and filters to Omnisphere (to make it more like the hardware)?

I'm sure it's just something that I'm missing

[aMUSEd]

I don't really get it either, but hey, new bank From a control perspective it makes very little sense to me. I guess it may be good for people with the muscle memory of one particular hardware layout firmly embedded in their brains but it's not going to enable control of that much of Omnisphere, just the bits that the hardware itself can do already.

[jbraner]

Well, I'm glad it's not just me, who doesn't get it!

[aMUSEd]

it's a clever concept; where it will fall short is that hardware synth panels send coarse 0-127 midi cc which isn't suitable for all parameters.

afaik it uses NRPN - is that higher res?

[Cinebient]

it's a clever concept; where it will fall short is that hardware synth panels send coarse 0-127 midi cc which isn't suitable for all parameters.

afaik it uses NRPN - is that higher res?

Yes, Omnisphere supports now 14bit midi.

[noiseboyuk]

Spectrasonics will point out that working through Omni will reduce some of the limitations of the hardware eg polyphony. In some cases, such as the Prophet X, they've gone a slightly different route for specific features - in the video they demo that instead of one control looping a sample, that button enables granular instead, which opens up a whole new world (and arguably, this sort of take on it is more interesting that 1:1 mapping). And then of course, in general its a cinch to program the core patch from hardware then further tweak a sound in Omni if you need it to do anything that the hardware doesn't provide.

But I do get the confusion. Its very clever and a great advert for Omni's synthesis, but inherent in the concept is this oddity that in order to use the feature properly you need the hardware - which you already own. Hardware controlling the sound of an OB6 is far more of an compelling proposition if you don't already own it. The idea of buying hardware just to use as a controller is also pretty bizarre - never even plugging in the audio jacks is kinda wastefully weird. (Incidentally, I think that behind the scenes some of the reason for this feature is for Spectrasonics to continue to build strong relationships with synth developers - everything currently is based around you buying their hardware)

That's why I think of this as something of an intermediate step on the road to something far more exciting, which would be to use it with a proper dynamic synth controller, which doesn't yet exist. The real potential of Hardware Integration would only be unlocked with such a controller imo - physical controls in a synth-like configuration laid onto a screen which is used for clear labelling and graphical representation. Hardware controls for 30 synths all in a proper synth-like layout, changeable at the touch of a button - now that's REALLY interesting.

Someone else on the thread also suggested that having the specific hardware soft controls on a tab in Omni, a la Trilian, would also be a good move, so anyone can tweak a sound consistent with the original synth's architecture. In the meantime, using a purely touchscreen midi controller such as Lemur or Midi Designer Pro 2 would be the only way to achieve anything like this (imo a standard midi controller is so unlike a synth control-wise that this is currently a non-starter.)

[Cinebient]

I don't really get it either, but hey, new bank From a control perspective it makes very little sense to me. I guess it may be good for people with the muscle memory of one particular hardware layout firmly embedded in their brains but it's not going to enable control of that much of Omnisphere, just the bits that the hardware itself can do already.

All explained in the videos. F.e. it gets you the same character (not an exact 1:1 emulation) but also polyphony, more FX and much more but with the same workflow as the hardware tweaking.
What i personally would like would be an dedicated app which can transform in any of these hardwares. I hate Lemur.
However, it‘s another great free update and i have nothing to complain really.
I‘ve gone trough the new presets and they sound really good.
Omnisphere still doesn‘t have the raw analog power like P900, Repro or even the Model D app but that was not the goal anyway.
Omnisphere is still the best multi-timbral synth to perform for me which offers microtuning.

[beely]

I don't have any of the hardware, but I'm still confused about why you would actually do this.

If it's not for you, that's fine. You don't *have* to use any particular feature that exists, it's there for the people that want to use it.

Are they trying to make omnisphere sound like the hardware that's "driving" it? why would you do that? You've already got your hardware, with it's physical outputs. don't you want Omnisphere to sound like Omnisphere?
I get why you'd want the controls to map to Omnisphere - but why add wavetables and filters to Omnisphere (to make it more like the hardware)?

I'm sure it's just something that I'm missing

The point of it is to use synths you may already have, with their nice physical layouts, to control the software in a useful, predictable way using the features the synth has. A knob that has four waveform positions is going to select those four waveforms in Omni, not some random samples in some weird order. The controls tell you what to expect.

In HW profile mode, Omni basically mirrors the architecture of the controlling synth, so it's controls will be predictable. This means when you use a Moog Voyager, with it's three oscillator controls, you get three oscillators, with the same features as the synth, so you know what the knobs will do without having to remember some arbitrary mapping, or do any mapping procedures yourself.

Except you get additional advantages with the Omni engine - eg, when using a monosynth controller, you still have polyphony. When using synths with limited modulation (eg Korg Prologue with it's 1 LFO) you can do more modulations.

They've set it up not to have Omnisphere emulate the hardware, but behave predictably based on it, using similar waveforms, effects, filters etc from the source synth, and give it a flavour of the source synth. There's nothing to stop you using additional features in Omni, features the controlling synth doesn't have physical controls for, and you can always use these as a starting point and develop further.

And it doesn't mean you shouldn't use the hardware as a synth in it's own right either, or "replace" it with Omni - this is an additional feature that, if you use Omnisphere, now gives you something you couldn't easily do before to make your Omni experience nicer and more immediate.

It's about combining the good, predictable, physical control of dedicated hardware control surface to the advantages of software.

If you guys are happy mousing around one parameter at a time, that's great, but nothing beats hands on tactile programming with a dedicated custom-designed control surface for feel and immediacy. With Omni and a supported synth or two, you can do both.

I'm sure many people have never even used a "real" synth, so mousing around is the only way they're ever programmed anything. Heck, it seems a lot of synthy people don't even play the things with keyboards, and just paint notes into the grid with the mouse, or qwerty keyboard or something. It's not how *I* like to make music, but whatever works for them...

Synth control of software is, and has always been, terrible, and *any* efforts made to push the paradigm forward is hugely welcome in my boog.

So when people say they "don't get it", I don't know whether they mean they don't understand what the feature is (it's explained in all the videos perfectly well), or they mean "This isn't something I'd use and therefore I can't see why anyone else would", which is, eh, rather short-sighted.

I also really like the hardware library too - a bunch of synth patches with the flavour/architecture/features of the source synth - some of those are really nice...

[beely]

Its very clever and a great advert for Omni's synthesis, but inherent in the concept is this oddity that in order to use the feature properly you need the hardware - which you already own.

Sure. It's a feature that lets you make better use of stuff you already have, rather than motivating you to buy something else. I really like those kinds of features...

And if people want to get a synth to do this, then you get even more advantages...

never even plugging in the audio jacks is kinda wastefully weird.

That's purely a communication thing - ie they are trying to make clear in the marketing that these synths are no making sound, they are controlling Omnisphere. Given the confusion people seem to have, I understand why they did this. They are not saying you shouldn't use the great synth for what it is (in fact, Eric always points this out when talking about the feature.)

That's why I think of this as something of an intermediate step on the road to something far more exciting, which would be to use it with a proper dynamic synth controller, which doesn't yet exist.

Back to our hobbyhorse!