One Synth Challenge #143: Any Hardware or Emulation (Taron Wins!)

[RichardSemper]

x - is a variable which changes monthly. This month it represents a number of different values depending on the challenger

Happy New Year @ontrackp and all OSCers!

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

I think I'm done with my track.

https://soundcloud.com/anotherbenjamin/all-grown-up

I dug out our Bleep Labs Nebulophone, hooked it up through my Zoom H4N as an interface, and started jamming. Four days later I have this song.

For those of you who have not experienced the joy of the Nebulophone, it's a small kit-built synthesizer that runs on a 9v battery. It has 3 knobs, 2 buttons, a photocell and a monophonic stylus keyboard. From that interface you can get a surprising variety of sounds.
I'm pretty sure we got ours around 2013. It's been mostly collecting dust since then... Now that I know what it can do I will probably use it significantly more.

I ended up with 128 recordings (325 MB in total), from which 119 audio clips made the final cut. These sit on 47 tracks in Reaper, each with some panning, volume, and fade-ins/fade-outs as needed.

No other processing or effects were used. Everything was played by hand. The synth doesn't have any built-in tempo sync functionality and I don't have a clock to sync it to so anything that seems to line up with the tempo was achieved by a very precise knob twist.


Best of luck to everyone with finding a synth they can enjoy using as much as I enjoyed making this!

Leonard Bowman, you are my hero.

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

https://soundcloud.com/gorgorgathgorgor ... wav-tagged

This is my entry into the KVR One Synth Challenge for January 2020.
I used 6 instances of Full Bucket's Fury 800, an emulation of the Korg Poly 800. Effects used were Variety of Sound Nasty DLA (without modulation features) and TAL Dub Delay. I also used Loudmax by Thomas Mundt and Tokyo Dawn Labs Feedback Compressor II on the master during mixdown. Composed in Reaper and mixed in Harrison Mixbus.

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

This is my entry into the KVR One Synth Challenge for January 2020.
I used 6 instances of Full Bucket's Fury 800, an emulation of the Korg Poly 800. Effects used were Variety of Sound Nasty DLA (without modulation features) and TAL Dub Delay. I also used Loudmax by Thomas Mundt and Tokyo Dawn Labs Feedback Compressor II on the master during mixdown. Composed in Reaper and mixed in Harrison Mixbus.

Oops, forgot to mention EpicVerb, also by Variety of Sound.

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

That was fun... I wanna do another...

[IV!]

That was fun... I wanna do another...

A very beautiful track with the zeitgeist of analog synths! I like the musical component, there is something from the early Depeche Mode.
If you want more, then there is time to develop this track further or... Take another tool from your favorites and repeat the cycle of fun!)

[DJBzzy]

HIGHLANDS

Where wind blows
Where thistle grows
Where peat underneath
pads wherever you go

Used 12 instances of NI’s Monark, a software emulation of MiniMoog.
DAW was Logicandlogicaleffects:
limiter 2, compressor 1, reverb 3

https://soundcloud.com/user-750462329/highlands

[TheNeverScene]

Composed in Reaper and mixed in Harrison Mixbus.

Not to be a party pooper, but I don't think DAW jumping is allowed, even for mixdown. I know this month is different as far as bouncing audio, but that is necessary if you are using a single hardware synth and want to multitrack. I could be wrong, and usually am, but software emulations should probably follow the usual guidelines since one can just load as many instances as needed. Reaper is just as capable, if not more, as Mixbus at mixdown.

Depeche Mode was mentioned, but I'm getting more of a hint of New Order meets Type O Negative vibe, which I'm liking!

[L-EctroBit]

Composed in Reaper and mixed in Harrison Mixbus.

Not to be a party pooper, but I don't think DAW jumping is allowed, even for mixdown. I know this month is different as far as bouncing audio, but that is necessary if you are using a single hardware synth and want to multitrack. I could be wrong, and usually am, but software emulations should probably follow the usual guidelines since one can just load as many instances as needed. Reaper is just as capable, if not more, as Mixbus at mixdown.

In OSC142 there was a little talk about this topic:

Am i allowed to start the song with Maschine then bounce my long tracks to audio then finish the song with Bitwig?

I believe this is explicitly disallowed, much like exporting a render and mastering in other software (from the rules):
Audio must not be touched at all once it leaves the DAW (i.e. after bouncing a track or a stem). For example: One cannot master the audio in another software or service.

I must say in this regard that I have a distant memory that someone has been allowed to use two different DAWs in the past.

gorgorgathgorgorgor, have you done this before?
Because if it's not you, I'm pretty sure someone else has competed in the past using two DAWs. I know that you have been participating in OSC for many years and probably is not the first time you have worked your track in this way, right?

Anyway, could you please tell us what part of the work you did in Reaper and what part in Harrison Mixbus? I think this is important to know if there is something that is outside the rules.

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

Composed in Reaper and mixed in Harrison Mixbus.

Not to be a party pooper, but I don't think DAW jumping is allowed, even for mixdown. I know this month is different as far as bouncing audio, but that is necessary if you are using a single hardware synth and want to multitrack. I could be wrong, and usually am, but software emulations should probably follow the usual guidelines since one can just load as many instances as needed. Reaper is just as capable, if not more, as Mixbus at mixdown.

In OSC142 there was a little talk about this topic:

Am i allowed to start the song with Maschine then bounce my long tracks to audio then finish the song with Bitwig?

I believe this is explicitly disallowed, much like exporting a render and mastering in other software (from the rules):
Audio must not be touched at all once it leaves the DAW (i.e. after bouncing a track or a stem). For example: One cannot master the audio in another software or service.

I must say in this regard that I have a distant memory that someone has been allowed to use two different DAWs in the past.

gorgorgathgorgorgor, have you done this before?
Because if it's not you, I'm pretty sure someone else has competed in the past using two DAWs. I know that you have been participating in OSC for many years and probably is not the first time you have worked your track in this way, right?

Anyway, could you please tell us what part of the work you did in Reaper and what part in Harrison Mixbus? I think this is important to know if there is something that is outside the rules.

It is the first time, I just recently got Mixbus and really just wanted to try it out a bit. I'm not comfortable enough with it yet to compose in it, so I relegated it to mixdown this time. I guess I should have read the rules again before I did it! No big deal, the mix was not a complicated one, I can do it again. It will be a good opportunity to compare the sound of the two DAWs directly, if I can match the settings properly (I know the two have very different architectures, so this may be a challenge...).

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

To be clear, I composed the entire tune, including adding delays and reverb, in Reaper. I then rendered all the tracks and imported them into Mixbus, where I added Loudmax and Feedback Compressor on the master bus. Now that I think about it I think I did some very light channel compression on two channels with the in-line channel compressor built into the UI. Really the tune was pre-mixed in Reaper.

[L-EctroBit]

It is the first time, I just recently got Mixbus and really just wanted to try it out a bit.

Well, I'm pretty sure someone else did something like that a long time ago. For my part, I am not against it in cases where it is justified. But it's just my opinion.

No big deal, the mix was not a complicated one, I can do it again. It will be a good opportunity to compare the sound of the two DAWs directly...

Maybe it's for the best and so you play safe.

[L-EctroBit]

nvm

[doctorbob]

They do say that Harrison does give a particular colour to the mix which people really like. My friend who decided to mix on a big Harrison desk in Oslo said it was just what he wanted.

But, maybe do the whole track in Mixbus next time?

dB

[gorgorgathgorgorgor]

OK, here we go again... By the way, it's good to be back!

https://soundcloud.com/gorgorgathgorgor ... forge-fury

This is my entry into the KVR One Synth Challenge for January 2020.
I used 6 instances of Full Bucket's Fury 800, an emulation of the Korg Poly 800. Effects used were Variety of Sound Nasty DLA (without modulation features) Tokyo Dawn Labs Kotelnikov and TAL Dub Delay. I also used Loudmax by Thomas Mundt, TesslaPro MkII by Variety of Sound and Tokyo Dawn Labs Feedback Compressor II on the master during mixdown. The DAW was Reaper.