Fathom Synth Development Thread

[Triplefox]

I've been watching Fathom since its early releases and occasionally tried demoing it, but never purchased it. I am happy to hear about the change in direction. Some of the things that stopped me from buying in the past:

• The off-putting web site(the pages are too tall, with too much empty space, and it feels more challenging than it should be to do some common things like "find out how much it costs")
• The mental overhead inherent to a modular-style workflow. The problem with sheer programming power is the diminishing returns, the increase in "why is it not making a sound now" or "that didn't change it" and decrease in "that sounds cool and look at what happens if I sweep it". It quickly inverts into "I would be better off using a development tool instead of a plugin" - and I have this suspicion that sustained interest in classic analog semi-modulars is largely because they hit a sweet spot of sounds/programmability. But I should add that the approach Fathom takes is one of the best implementations I've seen.
• Presets, or lack thereof. If I have enough presets in the style I want and they're well organized, I stop caring about the programming model. Getting the enthusiast sound designers on board actually puts you in a great position.
• General "branding" stuff. Low price can hurt a brand and lead to you supporting more and worse customers. The GUI has a good organization and workflow, but the looks are a bit dated to early-2000's fashions with the heavy gradients and rounded corners everywhere. However, you're building a good brand just by updating so frequently and I always see the Fathom thread when I'm visiting KVR.

Will demo again tonight.

[ENV1]

Had some time so i finally got around to giving this a try.

As much as i hate to say it, but i tried to do 3 things and all 3 failed, so heres the report.

Win7/32, VSTHost, Fathom 2.11.0 Mono 32

Assume Fathoms default settings for everything unless stated otherwise.


- Added an Impulse Osc, set Pitch Octave to -2
- Attached an LFO (not Draw LFO) to Impulse Period
- Problem: LFO intensity is hard-linked to the Impulse Period knob

Details: Moving the Impulse Period knob clockwise adds and increases modulation amount even if the LFOs intensity knob in the modmatrix is set to zero. (The intensity meter simply follows the knob indicator.) So when the Impulse Period knob is at center position you get 50% mod intensity in any case, i.e. even if the LFO intensity knob itself is at zero. It is therefore impossible to have the Impulse Period knob at a high position and still just a low amount of modulation.


Next:
- Attached the same LFO to Pan (still the same Impulse Osc)
- Problem: LFO intensity is again hard-linked to the Pan knob

Details: Same problem as above, only here its bipolar because the Pan knob is bipolar. This makes a standard side-to-side panning impossible because no matter how you balance the knobs 'hard-linked' intensity against the LFOs intensity knob, the best you can achieve is that one side will be twice as loud as the other side (and everything inbetween) but never a real side-to-side panning.

(Note: Later i checked some other knobs (4 or 5) and they all exhibited the same problem.)


Next:
- Saved the whole thing as a .fxp preset to see if it reloads properly
- Problem: The sound itself was reloaded just fine but all modules had vanished from the UI

Details: See attached animation. As you can see the osc is playing but its module is not in the window. I found no way to get it back. The LFO that was in the modmatrix was gone too, though it was still modulating the osc. (Couldnt capture the whole UI or the clipsize would have exceeded the 256KB limit for attachments.)

Fathom_PostPresetload.gif

[onerob]

Don't know how it is on Windows but I'd like to see a full Mac installer that handled preset updates so that I didn't have to manually merge them each time.

[FathomSynth]

Thanks SM. Yes the init should now work on the Bezier.

This applies to both the Wave Draw and Wave Table oscillators if you go into the Expanded view and throw the Wave Type toggle to Bezier. Then if you hit the Initialize Waveform button it will cycle through five very simple Bezier states, Flat Line, Sin Positive, Sin Negetive, Saw Down, Saw Up. The initialized free hand draw state will also mirror the Bezier waves as you would expect.

Unfortunately I did not do this yet for ADSR and Envelope graphs since I ran out of space on those panels for an Init button, but I have that on the list to work out somehow.

Also a reminder, 2.11 also adds the ability to load a folder full of WAV files into the 16 wave positions in the Wave Table oscillator using the new "Load All" button. If there are less than 16 WAV files in the folder it will fill the first N positions.

The new "Phase Drift" dial on the Distortion page is also worth checking out.

[FathomSynth]

ENV1, There is very little chance you will be able to use Fathom's modulation system unless you take a quick look at the manual.

The reason the modulation amount is following the dial position in a way that you don't want is that you have the modulation type set to Multiply.

There are 8 different types of modulation ranges which provide every possible behavior of modulation in relation the dial position that you would ever want.

This includes adding a modulated amount to the current dial position, subtracting from it, modulating bipolar around the dial position to any degree, modulating through the dial range with a multiply of which there are two types, a multiply with the ability to add more to the dial position and a multiply mode which modulates from a floor value up to the dial position.

This is all explained in the manual.

Also, you can only save Fathom presets using the Fathom Preset Browser or by simply saving the entire host project of course in any host. There is absolutely no feature currently in the product to use any external preset saving systems such as .fxp, and attempting that should not under any circumstances work correctly. The months it would take me to conform to the preset saving systems of other vendors is better spent improving the sound of the synth while it is playing.

Having the objects disappear from the main view sounds like a bug. But if it resulted after attempting the FXP thing then I'm not surprised. Please include steps to recreate the problem and I will fix it. Also if the screen shot included the entire interface that would be helpful. This is a serious bug and I'll make it a priority to fix it for you with a little more detail on how it got in that state.

Fathom is not a simple synth designed to get easy sounds quickly. There are a hundred other synths that are much better at that than Fathom. Fathom provides very deep control but takes some knowledge achieve it. I realize this is one of the factors that could be effecting sales, but it is simply not possible to function in both worlds, at least not under the current development time.

I'm not saying this in a defensive way, only to be honest about what you should expect from the product and the knowledge necessary to use it.

Triplefox, good points.

I agree about the web site. Consensus has been that it is quite bad and needs to be improved (I don't like it much either) and that will be a priority over the next month. I will actually be changing web hosts completely.

I understand your point about the modulation system which can be complex due to the power.

I do often implement suggestions in that domain frequently, so if there are a few operations that you find particularly confusing or annoying, and give more detail and what you want to see I will see what I can do.

Presets are important, We have several sound designers and well over 500 presets now.

Solidtrax from the Netherlands did our primary factory bank and they are actually a full time professional sound design team, so I'm hoping that is no longer a weakness, but of course presets are extremely subjective.

Good point about the GUI. Very dated I admit. I will be working on that as a high priority
this next month.

[Frostline]

Had some time so i finally got around to giving this a try.

Which type of LFO are you using of the 8 available? It is indicated by the icon on the right side of the modulation slat.
By default a new LFO is on multiply(indicated by a X icon on the right side of the slat), but like for you pan example I would suggest bipolar since you seem to be wanting it to modulate to both sides of the pan set point.
Not sure what you are trying to do on the impulse period example to recommend a type of LFO for that but I imagine one of the eight will behave like you are wanting.

[Triplefox]

Presets are important, We have several sound designers and well over 500 presets now.

Solidtrax from the Netherlands did our primary factory bank and they are actually a full time professional sound design team, so I'm hoping that is no longer a weakness, but of course presets are extremely subjective.

I was able to take a spin through the presets tonight and the sounds are pretty good, I have to admit, but there is one thing I'm noticing about them...and this is kind of a statement on the character of Fathom...the sound always reads as "uncolored". The timbre is a good quality, but it rarely fills the whole frequency spectrum, and as a result the sound is far on the side of "dull/polite" right out of the box. This is perfect if you're ready to break out your other plugs and properly shape it in a mix, but bad if you're like me and also want to indulge yourself like an impatient 16-year-old with a hyped, overprocessed sound right away.

Fathom does have an EQ, of course, but it's not the right tool for this kind of broad sound sculpting. What I'm looking for is a single knob or button that squashes everything with multiband compression to instantly give it that aggressive modern "edge". When I DIY it and setup a chain with e.g. a GMulti instance, it instantly becomes easier to fall in love with the rest of the synth.

[Tj Shredder]

Too bad Fathom doesn't head off like a rocket. Everett deserves it for sure, never seen such a responsive developer...
My thoughts:
Is Fathom my first go to synth? No.
Would it have the potential? Yes, absolutely...
What would it need to get there? MPE and a better way to analyze and understand how existing sounds create their beauty.

For example BlackWinny showed us his love for organs and did not realize, that everything what he demands is already there, including paraphonic structures, but its hard to see. I had this question where you go from a polyphonic connection to a monophonic connection. At that point you can go also to paraphonic (place the filter behind). A simple color code could help there.
Its hard to see what modulates what, you have to dig in deep...

The monophonic version should remain free, but evetually a bit less... Several options:
1. no updates.
2. Play all sounds, but have a limited number of modules you can use.
3. Have a special, a bit more open version for CM or Beat...
4. Think about how Ardour is doing it, its open source and free as in freedom, but if you want to download the newest compiled version, you have to donate. 1$ is enough or you have to compile and build it yourself. This lead me to donate monthly one dollar. But it might be more a concept for an open source project.

Apropos open source, did you think about opening an API for 3rd party modules? That would spread the workload a bit and could create enough attraction to keep you going as well...

How did I get into buying it?
I could see the potential and it was dead cheap. Got it before the OSC started...

Thoughts about the target audience and their different needs/demands.
There are parts of an elsewise saturated synth market which are not covered well.
There are not enough expressive MPE compatible synths out there, I just bought one which I regreted as it doesn't do it well. All LinnStrument and Seaboard users will jump on it if it would do at least voice per channel. For those Midi is more important than lfos. (First thing I have to do with factory presets is, to get rid of vibrato because I want to play it...)

You should have a signature sound which is difficult to obtain with other synths. Fathom has the potential for that, but needs to be more developed.

Does it have potential for sound designers who sell sounds? Yes, but you have to get them going. Ask Simon Stockhausen if he would be interested...

I think the first target audience are musicians who like to tweak sounds. If they are happy, the preset junkies will follow, but that needs time. I bet the standard selling curve for a good product is a big peak in the beginning, then a sudden drop, as its not known yet in the whole world and the early adopters have it already, followed by a slow increase depending on the overall quality of the product. Fathom is not made for the mass market, but should easily be able to survive in its own niche...

[fmr]

[*]General "branding" stuff. Low price can hurt a brand and lead to you supporting more and worse customers. The GUI has a good organization and workflow, but the looks are a bit dated to early-2000's fashions with the heavy gradients and rounded corners everywhere. However, you're building a good brand just by updating so frequently and I always see the Fathom thread when I'm visiting KVR.

I like the "old style" of "heavy gradients and rounded corners everywhere", and I find the current "flat" trend disgusting. Hope that this style will be kept, at least as an alternative.

I agree with the "Low price can hurt a brand and lead to you supporting more and worse customers"

And I'm glad about the last roadmap, although I am interested in a sampler of this kind (but I still think that it should be a different product, a "spin-off" of the current Fathom.

I join me to those that want some kind of ket file, instead of the current password protected file. It's much more convenient, and I think it is a better copy protection than the current choice which is annoying and forces us to constantly look in the archives for the password.

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

possible ways to limit a free mono version.

only 2 oscillators at a time
only one filter at a time.
one fx only
3 modulations only
no preset saving

[ENV1]

The reason the modulation amount is following the dial position in a way that you don't want is that you have the modulation type set to Multiply.

I see.

The reason i didnt see these options was because the button is an X by default, which i took to be the button thats supposed to delete the module from the matrix. (So i didnt click it.)

Thanks for responding, and yes, next time i will check the manual first.

Also, you can only save Fathom presets using the Fathom Preset Browser or by simply saving the entire host project of course in any host. There is absolutely no feature currently in the product to use any external preset saving systems such as .fxp, and attempting that should not under any circumstances work correctly.

Got it.

Good to know.

Having the objects disappear from the main view sounds like a bug. But if it resulted after attempting the FXP thing then I'm not surprised. Please include steps to recreate the problem and I will fix it. Also if the screen shot included the entire interface that would be helpful. This is a serious bug and I'll make it a priority to fix it for you with a little more detail on how it got in that state.

I put the events in chronological order so you just need to follow the steps preceeded by a dash in the order i listed them. As to what the UI looked like after loading the .fxp; it didnt change at all, i.e. it continued to look exactly like it looked after startup, i.e. the initial state after instanciation. Sound itself, like i said, was recalled properly. In case youd like to take a look i have attached the .fxb for you, see bottom of post. (Looks pretty normal to me in a hex editor (i.e. not corrupted or anything) but maybe it helps to pinpoint the issue.)

I'm not saying this in a defensive way, only to be honest about what you should expect from the product and the knowledge necessary to use it.

No sweat. Im very comfortable with modulars, its just that i didnt see the crucial options in this case so i thought maybe theres something wrong somewhere since the standard way of applying modulation intensity is via modulator amplitude only, i.e. regardless of the knob/slider position of the modulated parameter. So if its not a bug, all the better and im glad to hear it, i just thought i should mention it because i always think if it IS a bug then the dev would surely like to know about it.


Heres the archive with the .fxp

(Had to be zipped because the forum (still) doesnt allow the .fxp extension.)

If you want me to test/try anything specific regarding the missing modules thing, just let me know.

Preset.zip

[ENV1]

Which type of LFO are you using of the 8 available? It is indicated by the icon on the right side of the modulation slat.
By default a new LFO is on multiply(indicated by a X icon on the right side of the slat), but like for you pan example I would suggest bipolar since you seem to be wanting it to modulate to both sides of the pan set point.
Not sure what you are trying to do on the impulse period example to recommend a type of LFO for that but I imagine one of the eight will behave like you are wanting.

The problem was the mode, see post above.

[BlackWinny]

possible ways to limit a free mono version.

only 2 oscillators at a time
only one filter at a time.
one fx only
3 modulations only
no preset saving

And, very important to protect your business Everett, a silence of 1 second every 45 seconds or every minute to avoid all attempt of sampling, transforming to a nightmare that attempt of violation of the rights (without being irritating in a normal use) when the user is informed by the license text that he is not allowed to sample the synth.


EDIT: Hmm... When I wrote that a few minutes ago, I was thinking of the mono version as a "try" version. So forget it.

[ENV1]

possible ways to limit a free mono version.

only 2 oscillators at a time
only one filter at a time.
one fx only
3 modulations only
no preset saving

Sounds like a surefire way to ruin every last bit of fun and usefulness one might have gotten out of the synth.

Of course i cant speak for others, but with limitations like that, in a synth thats already limited to monophonic only, i wouldnt even bother downloading it because there are tons of synths both free and commercial that can do a lot more than that. And if i then cant even save any presets, what incentive could i possibly have to use this? It would be just a complete waste of time.


A time restricted demo or something, OK, thats something a lot of software devs do. Let the user check everything out in detail so they can make an informed decision as to whether it is something they really want. But to neuter the software until it is pretty much useless doesnt do anyone a favor, especially if the intent is to really provide something for free that everyone can use, which i thought the monophonic version was supposed to be.

[FathomSynth]

Triplefox

Thanks for taking time for a Fathom test drive. I agree with you on the lack of an aggressive “edge”. Some of the sound designers like Solidtrax, SM, and RPH have managed to achieve it but only with considerable tweaking.

This is a fundamental issue for me as I know exactly what you are talking about, but it takes some DSP magic which I have not yet been able to find a paper on.

Another problem is that the actual sound is rare even amoung other synths and it is tough to find a good example of it even to point at and ask another developer.

It is a type of very crunchy bit reduction of some kind.

I’m always on the lookout for a song that has it, so I can at least refer to it and ask someone how to do it, but unfortunately I didn’t write down the songs.

The song “Satisfaction” by Benny Benassi is close to it. But the rudamentary sound is also combined here with a falling high pass filter and everyone thinks that is how it is achieved. But the HPF only hides the real trick he is using underneath. No one to my knowledge has ever been able to really duplicate it. My suspicion is that he may actually be using a hardware synth.

I do have a couple chaotic math funcitons I will be implementing within Fathom in the noise and distortion domain soon, which will help but I have not had a chance to do it yet.

TJ, Thanks for comments. I’ve recorded your suggestions for the sound and sales issue and will be refering to them along with the others.

ENV1

It’s great to have you aboard. Sorry I was a bit blunt in my last comments. I admit the modulation is a bit intimidating to start with. But I went that direction from the begginning due to my own frustrations with other synths that are easy when you start and then you find out that you can’t really do anything complex.

Scrubbing Monkeys has some great tutorial videos which are an excellent way to dive in without drowning.

Yes, I actually followed your steps, but the objects did not disappear. But I’m on Win 7 64 so it may be a 32 bit thing.

Is the problem continuing or was it just that one time?

MONO VERSION

Everyone, I think I have the Mono version thing pretty much figured out. It will be mono obviously, and there will be a limit of 4 oscillators, and 8 modulations. Also the Filter list will only have the basic HP, LP and BP filters and none of the fancy ones, and also only the basic presets. Also the new GUI will only be available for the Pro version.

That should be sufficient to motivate people to buy the pro version, if not, they would probably not be in the market for it anyway.

WEB HOST

Also, If anyone knows anything about web hosts I need your advice. I’m looking for a new web host like Wix or GoDaddy that has a horizontal scroll template, but none of the major ones seem to have it.

An example of this is the Parawave web site, one of the best web sites I’ve ever seen.

https://parawave-audio.com/

But I can’t find a web host that has this in one of their templates, they are all just the annoying vertical scroll.

LICENSING

Also I’m looking for a good but very basic and easy licensing system. All the major companies that do this are expensive and an exteme overkill. I just need a basic system for extracting someone’s machine name and mixing it with a password and then creating a machine specific password.

If anyone knows an out of the box solution let me know.

Otherwise I will have to implement it myself with C++ sockets.

Another options is to write a program that can automatically answer gmails and create the passwords automatically and then send it back to the user. So if any one knows a way to do this let me know. It is an extremely simple solution since people could just send in their machine name and I can write a program that would generate a machine specific password.

No system is completely hack proof and it does not need to be, I only need something tough enough so that most people will buy the .