HALion 7

[mothra]

Then move on to another piece of software if you don't like the way it works, or learn to make your own 'perfect' machine.

Problem solved, no more endless whining in threads about something that is obviously just not to YOUR personal liking that is not going to be changed because a handful of users don't like it.

[IvyBirds]

There are many plugins that I love the sound of but hate the interface and you can't change it

Dude, you are literally implying that simple WINDOW organizing is the same as "changing the UI". What on earth are you smoking?

There is absolutely no way to actually change the UI of Halion. You simply organize a bunch of WINDOWS of different parts of Halion and decide where they are or if they are visible or not. THAT'S IT!

And you call that "changing the UI"? What a load of absolute bollocks.

Its actually far more customizable than just organizing windows

But you obviously have already made up your mind and dug in your heels

If you don't like it awesome, you don't like it what's absolute bollocks however is how badly you are misrepresenting the actual customizations of the actual UI and want to dumb it down to just organizing some random windows

Nothing could be further from the truth

Like everything else in life and every other software synthesizer on the market you may or may not personally like HALion. You might not personally gel with the workflow

I don't like the workflow and layout of UVI Falcon, other people do

I didn't like the workflow and layout of HALion7 as it came and was presented from Steinberg.

HALion and other similar software tools are far more than just a single instrument. They are a large ecosystem of sound design, with multiple synthesis types, and multiple ways to use those engines together. With HALion7 you get a very deep and very powerful sampler. That alone would be a deep and powerful instrument all by itself. That requires lots of menus and tools to create samples and to manage the sample library on your computer.

Once you have the samples you want you then have the sample playback engine. Again you get a ton of ton of options and controls here to use them. That means more menus and more tools

But let's say you don't want to use the Sample and Synthesis engine and instead want to load that sample into the granular engine. The granular engine is very different and will give you different results but again it requires a different menu and different tools

But maybe you don't want to do either Sample and Synthesis or Granular, maybe you want to turn that sample into a Wavetable. HALion7 will allow you to do that but then of course that requires new menus and new tools

But maybe you don't want to use samples at all, maybe you just want to use the kick ass FM synth known as FM-X. Well that's an entirely different set of tools and requires an entirely different set of menus

But maybe you don't want to use samples, or Granular, or FM, or Wavetables. Maybe you want to use VA. Well the good news is that there is a really nice VA engine inside of HALion7, but again that comes with different tools and different menus

But maybe you don't want to use a traditional sample and Synthesis engine, or a VA, or FM, or Wavetables, or granular? Maybe you want to take a single recording of a sound and resynthesize that into a playable timbre. Well the good news is that you can use the spectral engine to do that, but again that requires different tools and different menus

Then maybe you want to create a layered patch with multiple timbres, well the good news of course is you can but once again that is a different tool with different menu

Then let's say you want to add some effects, well of course you can, but again more menus are needed to manage the myriad of options across dozens of different effects

The default settings gives you all of those options and more all together in one setting. I don't like that default user interface. It's to cluttered and presents to many options

So I customized it to work exactly how I wanted it to work and yes that was significantly more than just organizing a few windows.

Now when I use HALion7 I have the windows, tabs, and tools displayed that allow me to do the things I want to do. I have a dozen or so of such setups that simply kick ass

Now you might not like the way any of the tools, menus, and options that HALion7 has work or how you interact with them, and that's awesome, just use something different

But let's drop the BS that all you can do is organize some windows, it's so much more than that

HALion is a very deep, very powerful ecosystem with multiple deep and powerful options. It's not a single instrument it's multiple instruments. In order to have that complexity in sound design options you are going to have to have a complex menu tree.

The engineers and programmers at Steinberg have done an admirable job trying to manage all of that in a flexible customizable UI. That either works for you or it doesn't

[kritikon]

Yeah, have to say I don't get where the GUI is customisable. Went back and checked and I must be missing something glaringly obvious to you two. Where TF do I customize the actual GUI? Serious question here...where do I customize the GUI?

[bjm4tt]

Yeah, have to say I don't get where the GUI is customisable. Went back and checked and I must be missing something glaringly obvious to you two. Where TF do I customize the actual GUI? Serious question here...where do I customize the GUI?

Watch the 2nd video from this playlist:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... _qAiWJDrkI

[bjm4tt]

And on an even deeper level you can create macros:

[IvyBirds]

Yeah, have to say I don't get where the GUI is customisable. Went back and checked and I must be missing something glaringly obvious to you two. Where TF do I customize the actual GUI? Serious question here...where do I customize the GUI?

GUI means graphical user interface

That's a vast generic term, that includes everything you see on the screen

What exactly do you want to customize, that you find so egregious

[twal]

This is a wonderful tutorial on Halion 7 by Anthony. He's a gem in the space for tutorials, especially Steinberg products. In Tutorial 2 he describes a fantastic way to setup the user interface. Halion is tough, but if you approach it a little by little it starts to make sense; although I barely know much of it. I can play with wavetables and the spectral synth, analog but nothing too complex. I think people are mistaking what "customizable" and "changing the UI" means. You can custom the interface and select parts to integrate into said interface to suit what you are doing like IvyBirds mentioned, and then you can create a skin from scratch called a Macro to command what you engineered under the hood utilizing the corrosponding Layers in the Program Tree. I think I explained it pretty right here. Check out the video:

EDIT: bjm4tt posted the same video above. Check it out.

Hope this what people were trying to figure out...

[IvyBirds]

This is a wonderful tutorial on Halion 7 by Anthony. He's a gem in the space for tutorials, especially Steinberg products. In Tutorial 2 he describes a fantastic way to setup the user interface. Halion is tough, but if you approach it a little by little it starts to make sense; although I barely know much of it. I can play with wavetables and the spectral synth, analog but nothing too complex. I think people are mistaking what "customizable" and "changing the UI" means. You can custom the interface and select parts to integrate into said interface to suit what you are doing like IvyBirds mentioned, and then you can create a skin from scratch called a Macro to command what you engineered under the hood utilizing the corrosponding Layers in the Program Tree. I think I explained it pretty right here. Check out the video:

EDIT: bjm4tt posted the same video above. Check it out.

Hope this what people were trying to figure out...

Good points and even beyond that, you can create your own unique instruments using the HALion engines including having custom menus

[Dirtgrain]

However you alter it, it is still a complicated GUI with hard-to-read icons/text. Stuff is tiny. That has to do with all its features--it's a trade-off. I compare it and Falcon to Photoshop. There are classes on Photoshop and advanced users. Halion is a bit like that. I got into it for a while. But then I went other directions. When I try to get back into it, it's a repeat of learning some unintuitive things about it. But if you are an advanced user, who regularly uses it, it is probably just fine.

[IvyBirds]

However you alter it, it is still a complicated GUI with hard-to-read icons/text. Stuff is tiny.

If you are using a high resolution monitor like 4k or higher go to the Options Page then Global Settings and turn on "High DPI Mode" that will allow nice sharp and clear text while you are scaling the windows at 150% or more

At lower resolutions than 4k like 1080p it shouldn't be an issue

I am in my late 50s and don't have the best eyesight by any stretch of the imagination doing that makes the text easy to read on all my monitors

[twal]

The thing is Halion is awesome but if you are thinking of getting it I would suggest getting Absolute 6.

I hadn't previously used many samples as I use RSK5 in Reaper; it's sufficient. I make my own drum machines. I went and tried Luna and it has no sampler and no drum machine. I was confused to what to do and then I thought, "Oh! I have Absoulte 6!".
So, I opened up Halion to use as my sampler and Grove Agent to use as my drum machine...

That's just a sidenote. If you are concerned with wasting money getting Halion just to never design with it, getting Absolute 6 is a great choice. It has all of the virtual instruments. It's a collection of instruments like Kontakt with all sorts of stuff in it at a very cheap price if bought on KVR. I know many people on here already know, have Halion, or have a plethora of bread and butter instruments, but might as well show around a new audience or the new person. Then, you got your sampler, drum machine, pianos, world instruments, world percussions, Voices, Brass, Strings... It's also pretty dang lightweight although Halion with certain patches are pretty heavy. Quality is also especially very high on some of the newer integrations like FM Lab which is the best sounding FM synth I've heard and superb, and Tales the worldy acoustic guitar instrument is very, very nice... Ok, done praising Halion again.. Really impressed with the quality...

[kritikon]

Watched a few of those vids. Nah, life's too short. It's customisable and still needs shitloads of tabs, pages, god knows how many different elements many of which are still standardised Halion confusion. TBH those vids just confirmed to me how awful I find Halion to use. Byzantine is a good word for Halion. Yeah, it's powerful. Some of the presets are quite stunning IMO and that's what I'll mostly use Halion for - with some very light tweaking. But spending hours dicking around in a byzantine GUI though....just no. I'd rather stick forks in my eyeballs, and just thinking about the hours needed for in-depth programming make my wrists hurt. It's a RSI nightmare - part of the reason I've gone back to hw synths. I know those vids are supposed to help with how to use Halion and he does them quite well, but it makes it less appealing, not more. . I rarely use wavetables and mostly dislike the metallic sound, spectral nonsense doesn't appeal, I've got better FM options and the VA stuff is bog standard filters with not much character. It's a fkn great sampler though.

And before any eejit says it's only my opinion - DUH of fkn course it is! So is yours. I get that the nerds love it and we all have some nerd in us. Mine is elsewhere though. That vid guy has 20 tabs on his customised macro or whatever. Instant unappeal.

[bjm4tt]

Some of the presets are quite stunning IMO and that's what I'll mostly use Halion for - with some very light tweaking.

I think that's how it should be used by "end users", the deep customization is for library editors and sound designers (nerds). Just like most of us don't write Kontakt or Falcon scripts on a daily basis.

But I'm glad that others create fantastic instruments and macros for us. I cannot praise enough for example Sampleconstruct's . I love evolving digital wavetable pads and Halion's WT engine with the right samples is top notch for this.

[kraster]

Watched a few of those vids. Nah, life's too short. It's customisable and still needs shitloads of tabs, pages, god knows how many different elements many of which are still standardised Halion confusion. TBH those vids just confirmed to me how awful I find Halion to use. Byzantine is a good word for Halion. Yeah, it's powerful. Some of the presets are quite stunning IMO and that's what I'll mostly use Halion for - with some very light tweaking. But spending hours dicking around in a byzantine GUI though....just no. I'd rather stick forks in my eyeballs, and just thinking about the hours needed for in-depth programming make my wrists hurt. It's a RSI nightmare - part of the reason I've gone back to hw synths. I know those vids are supposed to help with how to use Halion and he does them quite well, but it makes it less appealing, not more. . I rarely use wavetables and mostly dislike the metallic sound, spectral nonsense doesn't appeal, I've got better FM options and the VA stuff is bog standard filters with not much character. It's a fkn great sampler though.

And before any eejit says it's only my opinion - DUH of fkn course it is! So is yours. I get that the nerds love it and we all have some nerd in us. Mine is elsewhere though. That vid guy has 20 tabs on his customised macro or whatever. Instant unappeal.

I doubt you have better FM options than Halion. Some of the best FM synthesis I've come across is in Halion and given the pedigree of the people behind it that's not surprising.

But we're back to the whole argument of customising.

As they say in gaming, "you control the buttons you press".

The thing about Halion is that you can have it as spartan as you want. Anthony is showing the full on Battle station setup. With Halion there is absolutely nothing stopping you from having as few elements as you need.

And you can have multiple simpler setups all accessible from a menu. So you can have a setup that is literally just oscillators, envelopes and filters on one page and nothing else if that's what you want.

[kritikon]

I doubt you have better FM options than Halion. Some of the best FM synthesis I've come across is in Halion and given the pedigree of the people behind it that's not surprising.

No, I really have (and cost a bit less). I can think of things that Opsix does that FM lab just does not do, with a more intuitive GUI, though actually Halion FM is better than some of the other Halion GUIs. They seem to have made more effort with that one. I suspect they took quite a few cues from Korg when they designed it. For straight down the middle classic FM, I'm sure Halion is more than adequate. It seems to have a reasonable amount of modulation etc and user algos, so definitely capable. I didn't see much that Halion does that things like F'em doesn't, as another example.