Oh boy, another VA synth. This time from Waves!

[ariston]

To be fair, I wonder how much can possibly be said about a fairly limited VA. How many more examples of smooth pads, blazing lead lines, phatt basses and vintage brass do we really need? Anyone who wants to hear it can try the demo (7 days unlimited is a pretty good idea). Some of this discussion is pretty pointless, but I find it immensely entertaining (except for that name stuff, that was tedious). All of it adds up to 40+ pages though. It would never have gotten this far without the witty banter. YMMV greatly on that.

I surprised myself by actually getting it (sweet intro offer), thus ruining my new year's resolution and completely going against my initial naysaying. I've had great fun making patches yesterday. It's what I said before: the low to mid range of this synth is nice. The EQ is very powerful and not to be underestimated - although only offering four fixed bands, it can really sculpt the tone. It's very easy to dial in moving sounds, and the DCO/VCO option is a cool idea (although the VCO can be very unstable, a dial for this would be nice).

For posterity, here are the areas that badly need fixing/updating IMO:

- Aliasing. This synth can't handle audio rate modulation, and that's kind of a poor showing in 2013. Thankfully, the EQ has a LPF/HPF - the LPF is in constant use over here!
- Detailed unison features.
- Revise that bitcrusher effect - it's the most unconvincing bitcrusher I have ever heard. Given that, it's not even a good distortion, it just sounds yucky.
- Distortion only really sounds good when placed before the filter.
- Some degree of tweaking to chorus and reverb would be nice.
- I can't really place it, but the cutoff and resonance behave rather strangely. It's almost like there's some kind of "intelligent" algorithm in the background that enhances certain areas while leaving others untouched.
- The envelopes are nice, but again, they sometimes behave rather strangely. And sometimes, using the "punch" button on the VCA env distorts the sound (!). I'm pretty sure that's a bug, not a feature.
- More mod slots! Seriously, 6 are kind of ridiculous.
- More options for the arpeggiator/sequencer: something like "tie" and "repeat" would make it very powerful.

[Ingonator]

Just tried to reprogramm that Brass sound (audio demo posted here) with some other synths i own (e.g. Saurus, Diva, Oxium etc.) but somehow Element seems to sound really different and i was not able to nail the preset exactly with those other synths. Could also be based on the envelope shape setting in Element which could make the envelope work/sound quite unique.
As mentioned some pages before also the waveforms of element seem to be quite different to other synths. I had created several single cycles of different synths for Rayblaster and now also from Element and more or less could confirm that. I also find that e.g. the Resonace behavior of the 12dB and 24dB LPF seem to be quite different.

So it seems to be a combination of waveforms/oscillators, filters and adjustable envelope shapes could lead to some quite unique results.

I am not talking/comparing about quality here, just about different sound. Some people don't seem to get the difference (!!).


Ingo

[Acrobat]

- Aliasing. This synth can't handle audio rate modulation, and that's kind of a poor showing in 2013.

- Distortion only really sounds good when placed before the filter.

those two factors can suggest the oversampling is not working as it should.

[vurt]

How many more examples of smooth pads, blazing lead lines, phatt basses and vintage brass do we really need?

exactly, and nothing ive heard yet hasnt been possible quality wise for the past 5 years at least. also none of the sound examples posted so far have even been that good, nothing worth getting excited about

[Numanoid]

Ooops, this thread is about to fall out of page 1, I guess it needs a bump

[JJ_Jettflow]

Just tried to reprogramm that Brass sound (audio demo posted here) with some other synths i own (e.g. Saurus, Diva, Oxium etc.) but somehow Element seems to sound really different and i was not able to nail the preset exactly with those other synths. Could also be based on the envelope shape setting in Element which could make the envelope work/sound quite unique.
As mentioned some pages before also the waveforms of element seem to be quite different to other synths. I had created several single cycles of different synths for Rayblaster and now also from Element and more or less could confirm that. I also find that e.g. the Resonace behavior of the 12dB and 24dB LPF seem to be quite different.

So it seems to be a combination of waveforms/oscillators, filters and adjustable envelope shapes could lead to some quite unique results.

I am not talking/comparing about quality here, just about different sound. Some people don't seem to get the difference (!!).


Ingo

I found the same thing. I was not able to get Element to sound like my other synths nor could I get the others to sound like Element. Like you, I found the sounds Element made pleasing. It reminds me of Korg's stuff....like the DW8000 era.

[ariston]

Having raised the question "how many more examples of VA sounds do we really need?" myself, I decided to answer it by posting a little demo I whipped up in two hours.

There's about 12 instances of Element in here; they're all my own sounds, except for the drums, which I just tweaked a little (I can't be bothered to synthesize yet another 808 kick). One reverb and one delay used as a short transitional effect, otherwise, it's all Element.

http://soundcloud.com/ariston/element-of-surprise

edit: there were some curious drop-outs in the file, so I uploaded it again.

[himalaya]

There! just there at 1:24 min...it's perfect! Love that high frequency quantized pluck. That pad is very good too. Very 'textured'. Good sounds all around.

[ariston]

There! just there at 1:24 min...it's perfect! Love that high frequency quantized pluck. That pad is very good too. Very 'textured'. Good sounds all around.

Thanks! I think that plucks are one thing at which Element really excels. In fact, it always steers me towards plucks. Big huge warm cosy pads are not really its forte, though.

[WOK]

I am beginning to think this thread was started by an employee of Waves to gain interest and put the name in everyones head.  
45,000 views speak for themselves     - maybe I should do "another VA synth" too.....  

[Ingonator]

http://soundcloud.com/ariston/element-of-surprise

Very nice track and sounds indeed.

Big huge warm cosy pads are not really its forte, though.

Element - BP PWM Strings 1

Element - Influx Pad

Element - Rez Sweep Pad 1

Element - FM Mod Pad 1

Those were already posted at this thread (page 38 ). All of those are one Element instance without external FXs.



Element - Synth Brass 01

Theoretically such Brass sounds look simple but it's the details that are important sometimes:

- the low end of this in Element is quite pleasing, like in real analog polysynths. The EQ helps with that too but just slight amounts are necessary.
- the envelope shape knob has been used to make the attack and decay more "punchy"
- with some synths too much phasing isgoing on when detuning to sawtooth waveforms. In this case for OSC1 a DCO and for OSC2 a VCO were used to add a bit unstability. Using two VCOs did not work really well for this specific presets.

I found that this kind of sounds seems to be nice to test a few things like e.g. low end, envelope behavior and detune phasing in a new synth so for me this kind of sounds is still relevant besides the fact i like them myself.



Ingo

[tibah]

This thread is going insanely huge for such a "standard" VA synth

I would prefer Retrologue over it (price, CPU, name it) any time.

[ariston]

Very nice track and sounds indeed.

Big huge warm cosy pads are not really its forte, though.

Element - BP PWM Strings 1

Element - Influx Pad

Element - Rez Sweep Pad 1

Element - FM Mod Pad 1



Ingo

Thanks for listening, Ingo! The pads you posted are nice, I especially like the Influx Pad, but these are not what I'd call big huge warm and cosy. Imposcar 2 is good for those in my opinion.

[Ingonator]

Thanks for listening, Ingo! The pads you posted are nice, I especially like the Influx Pad, but these are not what I'd call big huge warm and cosy. Imposcar 2 is good for those in my opinion.

Those are some first examples. Anyway there are also some nice pads in the factory sounds.

UPDATE:

Here is the Influx Pad preset with some additional FXs like Arts Acoustic Big Stone Phase Shifter, ERS Dimension D Chorus and ValhallaVintageVerb (internal Reverb + Chorus of Element turned off):

Element - Influx Pad + FXs 1

That preset uses a single OSC with PWM and unison.
The Dry/wet value of the Phaser is at 50%.


Ingo

[Acrobat]

posting a little demo I whipped up in two hours.

Needless to say, "element of surprise" is the name of another VA!