sonic charge synplant is out!

[Doug B]

There's a wall between performer and sound designer?

Self imposed by some, maybe!

Personally, I don't see one. Guess you have to be into compartmentalizing everything and everyone into a neat little cubby hole with a pretty little label.

[Doug B]

Have fun with your synth-oh,sorry-GARDEN sounds!

Maybe you could actually use it before making up your mind?

YOU have already made up your closed little mind that I haven't. Must be nice to have ESP!

Good Bye.

[Doug B]

...did you look into the gene manipualtion ?
cloning branches ?

Yes I did to both questions. My opinion stands. Glad you found a new synth that you like-have fun with it.

Cheers

[Jazz Franco]

a) this is the first ever VSTi with a washing machine GUI
b) it is capable of producing the sound of an old washing machine full-speed
c) it can even produce the sound of a dishwasher floating in streams of acetone
d) regarding all of the above and the kind of music I'm fond of making bought this after app. 10 minutes.

Thankyouthankyou Sonic Charge -- and for the discount for us proud MicroTonic owners, too!

NB: It can also do phatt basses and analouge leads, I'm just not that interested in those

But it does, check the presets!

[future-bit]

It is unusual and good synth! I did not wish to buy again a software, but I could not resist again! I have bought it and is very happy with purchase!

[PulseAngel]

o.k..need your help eveyone, beings I am always bitching at my wife about
her frivolous spending habits..

can anyone give me some ideas on how I can convince my wife to agree to let me have this..I was thinking about " hun, it'll be an early Chrstmas present from you to me "

or do you all think that's too cheezy and played out ?

I have the money, but it's convincing the missus that's the hard part.

or perhapse 12 very kind people would buy my album ?

( I know, I'm shameless, but it's an act of desperation..my wife won;t know about any CD sales )

[dougsyo]

I'm impressed without even listening, after seeing at least three other devs praise it. Gotta have a listen and download the demo tonight.

Doug

[zerocrossing]

You know, a little while ago we were all talking about "the future of instruments" and here's something that's a step in the right direction. Very nice! Reminds me of a graphics tool called Kai's Power Tools. They're a suite of plug ins for Photoshop that had a mutation matrix that let you find a result by playing with random and not so random mutations in your "gene pool." Fun. I'd love to see more of this in modern instruments.

Synplant also sounds good and is fun to look at. Might be good to create music to play Spore with. My only critisism is that the seed editor is horrible. Cool looking DNA looks good on a logo if you're a biotech firm, but it doesn't really work here. I'd like to see a more traditional UI for the seed editing with maybe a small DNA graphic for eye candy.

I also loves that it starts out with a little tutorial. I wish all instruments had a mode like this that could be evoked.

[kuniklo]

The "AZ Sack Of Tubes" patch is absolutely stunning, a class of its own - came down on me just when I thought that every useful lead sound has already been found... A potential future classic, sort of Enigma's "panflute" of 21 century....

Yep. This is *exactly* the point of Synplant. There are all kinds of patches lurking around in the nooks and crannies of even fairly simple synths but the manual labor it takes to dig them up means a lot of them get missed.

[kuniklo]

My only critisism is that the seed editor is horrible. Cool looking DNA looks good on a logo if you're a biotech firm, but it doesn't really work here. I'd like to see a more traditional UI for the seed editing with maybe a small DNA graphic for eye candy.

I don't like it either but I think Magnus wanted to make sure people didn't miss the point and fall back on old habits. I'd say just leave that page alone entirely for the first week you try to use Synplant and see how little you really need it most of the time.

Hopefully we'll see V2 of this baby some time. This is just a start.

[Motion]

Congratulations on the release.

From a beta tester perspective....light on cpu...multiple instances are a hoot....in my case Live feeding clip automation to many sliders/handles/branches etc across a small gardens worth of plants (6-12)...as well as a lot of fun with using midi cc (via clip) simultaneously on undo/redo, planting a new seed, changing presets and all while you still play with the plant GUI and sliders (they also all have a variable min or max offset depending where you leave the slider)....great for all manner of controlled/uncontrolled anarchy and variation, it's also fast at uploading/changing to new sounds....throw in a bit of solo automation and chill out and relax for some ambient entertainment or mad glitched out craziness and its equally adept at bass, pads and the rest if that's what you want to do.

For me its the simplicity and speed that noises and tunes can be made... in my case I'm a sucker for percussiony, minimalistic weirdy noises, glitches, drones, distortions and fx...and its quality noises, Synplant can chuck them out at an alarming rate of knots, but it's also the way Synplant moves and shifts with you, there is a certain fluidity to Synplant that I like, yes that's all subjective but again for me I have found that Synplant is productive, absorbing, fun and entertaining all at the same time...oh and its tough as old boots and doesn't choke and fall over when intensely gardening.

If you want to go deeper then there is considerable control in the conventional sense from the DNA editor and the synths main control blocks are grouped in an organised way for easy navigation and tweaking.....spend some time and this is a synth that you very quickly get a good feel and sense of control over in terms of the whole design when you want/need it or conversely just fiddle around and while away the hours like some gardeners do...just pottering around.....ever look around a garden and notice that flower you never seen before....its a nice surprise...just like Synplant can be at times.

Unconventional, different, the implementation imho is clever enough to fuse traditional conventions and non conventions without it becoming too alien to the user....once I personally got used to Synplants GUI I don't even think about that aspect anymore...I mean the way I'm interacting with it seems very natural and I barely give it a second thought because you get sucked in, a part of which is that you can also get very focused since there is enough but not overload in terms of parameters that you don't get lost.

Of course no matter how good I think it is for me it won't be for everyone.

I have only ever had one major complaint and that is that I can't smoke it.

[TristezaOrange]

It rules! Going down to the molecular level makes me feel like a CSI or something! And the sound - that sound!!

[RPH]

Damn nice toy..

When manipulating the genes, can those controls be automated?

[kuniklo]

When manipulating the genes, can those controls be automated?

No, but you can get a ton of movement out of the mod wheel and velocity.

Again I'd suggest that if you're doing anything but a bit of polish on the DNA page you're swimming upstream with this thing.

[putte]

.. wow, didn't think that i'd ever do a review in a synth-thread after a new synth was released. but well, here it goes ..

first off, i am impressed that it led me to tweak it, to explore it. (like i said, i'm usually not interested in synths at all.) i love the idea of leaving these old structures of how to control a soundmaking thingie. and even manipulating the genes in Synplant is fun to me. magnus, top approach and very well done!

so i sit here and and make music, and so far it's just Synplant being in use.

though, i have some different remarks. the sound:

it doesn't sound bad in itself at all to me, but at the same time i can't seem to hear that 'warm' and 'expensive' sound i know from the synths i mostly make use of when i'm doing my jobs. (imposcar, omnisphere, zebra.)

sure, that's highly subjective .. it's just my ears! ..

anyway, not sure yet, but chances are that i'll buy this thingie.

cheers,
putte