Pigments 3.5 vs Dune 3.5

[Biome_Digital]

Dune VS Pigments huh?

Well, I use Pigments extensively every month, creating an average of 30 presets for Arturia. It has the best modulation of any synth and is second to none for programming sounds. Granular, analog, wavetable, harmonic, multi-samples with round-robin ect… Pitch-shifting delay, multi-band compressor, juno chorus - all great. It is an absolute powerhouse. Anyone claiming it sounds weak needs their ears checked.

Dune is also one of my favourite synths. Not as quick to program as pigments, and less to experiment with, but the sound of Dune is fabulous! One of the best sounding synths ever made. It also has some great features pigments does not, midi sequences, better reverbs - shimmer. The unison engine is also amazing. Wavetable editor too! New genetics feature!!

Really, they both offer just enough difference to justify owning and using both.

[chk071]

Anyone claiming it sounds weak needs their ears checked.

Imagine how much better it could be if it had Waldorf filters, and some bottom end.

Anyway. I won't argue about taste. Even though I really do believe this is non-subjective.

You're absolutely right though, it IS a powerhouse. And, it even makes "powerhousing" extremely efficient, and easy. That's where it absolutely shines. I think it's no coincidence that Nick Batt, who is a hardware guy mostly, said in his review that Pigments is very visual, and that he prefers the programming to other VSTi's.

[zvenx]

Sign me up for my ears to be checked . It sounds 'ok', 'alright' to my tastes.
It's like buying a Ferrari and finding out it only goes up to 90 mph.
Feature wise it is great though.

rsp

[pdxindy]

Here is a quick sound I made this morning in Pigments... sounds good and with some low end

https://dandelionaudio.com/sound/Pigments-1.mp3

[pdxindy]

Wavetable editor too!

Dune's Wavetable editor is fairly rudimentary. Serum's editor is far more capable. Even Vital has a much more useful Wavetable editor and it is free.

[teilo]

Dune sounds more analog than Pigments though, if that's what you're after.

[CrystalWizard]

Had to happen.

[briefcasemanx]

Dune sounds more analog than Pigments though, if that's what you're after.

Lets get into a really meaningless semantics argument about the word "analog", shall we?

[DJErmac]

Just a small addition, but Dune gives a feeling of instant gratification for fat sounds (think EDM, etc), whereas Pigments excels at evoluting pads and synths. Of course I'm only talking about what you get when you purchase the synth, meaning presets.
You can program them as you feel like. They are simply slightly not exactly for the same audience at first I'd say.
This can sound stupid, but when I open Dune 3, I think about fat basses and leads (well... never heard a convincing fat lead so far made with Pigments, sorry), and when I open Pigments, I think about crazy sounding pads and keys (yes they sound superb). This is only the "base" spirit as I feel it. If you're programming your own presets, of course you don't care.

[LFO8]

It’s not the tool.. it’s the sound designer.

[LoveEnigma18]

It’s not the tool.. it’s the sound designer.

FWIW, not everyone can or wants to be a sound designer.

[SamDi]

It’s not the tool.. it’s the sound designer.

FWIW, not everyone can or wants to be a sound designer.

That‘s an argument, I never regarded from my perspective. Because, yes - if you just want to use presets or dial in basic sounds easily, then Dune might be the better sounding synth. But when you regard all the opportunities in Pigments: sample-, granular- and additive oscillators, 3 FX chains, where you can put the same effect several times, multiband-compression, EQs which can be partly modulated now, etc., etc. - then Dune is the animal and Pigments is the beast.

[LFO8]

It’s not the tool.. it’s the sound designer.

FWIW, not everyone can or wants to be a sound designer.

That does not negate the 'false logic' I hear often in such threads where claims are being made that synth X is more for pads and soft sounds and synth Y for stabs etc.

[recursive one]

It’s not the tool.. it’s the sound designer.

FWIW, not everyone can or wants to be a sound designer.

That does not negate the 'false logic' I hear often in such threads where claims are being made that synth X is more for pads and soft sounds and synth Y for stabs etc.

Which is not necessarily false.

E.g. the core sound and the feature set of synth X may be perfect for pads and soft sounds but the stabs made with synth X just won't sound as good as the stabs made with synth Y, at least without a lot more effort and extra processing.

[mcnoone]

I bought Pigments2 after demoing for 20 minutes. I ended up hating it as a digital scratch machine that sounds rough and noisy. I realized that I don't like grainy effects and rough moving wavetables.
I sold it as soon as I could.

Dune3? I immediately went to making 65 sounds for it, of which some of them were of the best sounds I've ever done. Synapse Audio also has a good community there. I tried all the Arturia demos, but couldn't find one I liked.