GHOST (beta) - New 6 osc wavetable FM synth

[gentleclockdivider]

AM I missing , seems that all operators are assigned to envelope 1 ?
Searched long to find the other 3 envelopes , no luck

[fmr]

AM I missing , seems that all operators are assigned to envelope 1 ?
Searched long to find the other 3 envelopes , no luck

Yes, I already requested to the developer to remove that assignment and leave to the user to assign envelopes to whichever oscillator one wants. The solution currently implemented is worse, IMO.

BTW - there are 6 envelopes, not 4, although what seems like a big prevents Env 5-6 to show (but I have a preset programmed in version 0.2 where I can see all six envelopes).

[gentleclockdivider]

Yeah I know there are 6 envelopes , I just can’t find the remaining 3 on the gui( so env 4,5,6).
And somehow every operator amp is assigned to env 1 .
Oh well , I’ll revisit it when it’s implemented , d0n’t really need another fm synth but curiosity got the most of me .

[rafa1981]

How does it fare with old CPUs, like a AMD Phenom II X4? Does it work, or does it require more modern instruction sets?

Nah I'm not doing anything too fancy with instruction sets (yet). I looked up your processor and it saw that it supports things like SSE-SSE4. This is good, I don't think you should ever have problems with future updates

Phenom II has no SSE4. Only SSE4a which is AMD specific, predating Intel's SSE 4.1. No Intel processor has it. No compiler targets SSE4a unless explicitly told so, definitely not with the -msse4.1 flag.

[exacoustics]

Been testing this one this morning.
I must say I'm pretty impressed so far. It's deep and fun to use, a gazillion modulations and sounding great !
Do you plan support for aftertouch, polyaftertouch or mpe ?

Glad you're having fun. Yes supporting MPE and aftertouch is high on my to-do list at the moment.

I really don't understand why developers just copy other plugins gui layout , to me it comes over as cheap solution .

You could say the same about the designs of cars, operating systems, web browsers etc. There are certain designs and features that users expect, and when they don't get them, they will ask you for them.

Also , it seems that you have implemented the feedback parameter wrong , iow NOT like most yamaha based Phase modulation synths.
The other fm synth I know that got this wrong is OXE FM .
When you have a feedback enabled operator , the envelope of the operator should also define the amount of feedback that goes back to the operator , iow the feedback should be post operator amp*env .
Example , a single operator straight to output with feedback enabled and a decaying amp envelope , should go from saw to sine because the decaying amp stage is also attenuating the feedback content ( or noise to sine when feedabck is 100 pct).
This is not the case with your plugin , it just lowers in amplitude but not the harmonic content of the operator, iow your feedback implementaton is done before the amp*env stage
Please consider changing this , it makes a world of difference .

GHOST is not a yamaha dx-7 emulation. The feedback algorithm is my own. If you want a decaying effect of noise > saw > sine like you described, try modulating the feedback amount with ENV1. You will create the same effect. This is how GHOST was intended to be used.

I think you should detach ENV 1 from all the oscillators. I cannot mute oscillators this way.

I'm not sure what you mean. You have the option to turn oscillators off, and also to add modulation so that the modulation amount or volume will reach 0% at the time you want it. Does this solve your problem?

Also, I think I found a bug. I instantiate Ghost in REAPER, and I cannot see more than 4 envelopes. Env 5-6 remain hidden, even after being assigned in the Mod Matrix

It's a bug. Thanks mate, I've been able to recreate the problem. Easy fix, the bug will be gone in the next update.

Indeed that seems to do the trick .
Assign the operator envelope to operator feedback amount in modmatrix , and leave feedback amount in matrix to zero.
Still think it's a waste of modslots .

There's 64 mod slots. I can always increase the cap if you run out.

[fmr]

I think you should detach ENV 1 from all the oscillators. I cannot mute oscillators this way.

I'm not sure what you mean. You have the option to turn oscillators off, and also to add modulation so that the modulation amount or volume will reach 0% at the time you want it. Does this solve your problem?

I mean that I want each oscillator to behave differently. If I have three oscillators going to the output, I don't want the volume contour of ALL of them to be controlled by Env 1. I want to have an independent volume for each. For example. If I want Oscillator A to be FM modulated by Oscillator B, both with a fast decay (/for the attack transient part of the sound), and then Oscillator C free,with a high sustain level, to remain the only one sounding, I cannot do that, because,m since ENV 1 is hardwaired to all oscillators, oscillator C will fade, following the countour of Envelope 1, not matter if I have the Volume of that oscillator controlled by Env 3.

OTOH, if I leave Env 1 with a high sustain, ALL oscillators will remain sounding, no matter what I modulate them with. Unless I'm missing something. Which reminds me:

Why not create an hardwired envelope for each oscillator, labelling them ENV A, ENV B, etc. and then add two more envelopes, one for the global volume contour (amplitude envelope) and another for the filter (FILTER ENVELOPE)? You may even just harwire each of the already existant envelopes to the oscillator, and simply add another one to allow filter modulation (this one could even be in the filter section).

BTW: We don't have any filter parameter available as a modulation destination. This is really BAD.

If you do this, we would already have one envelope controlling the volume of each of the oscillators, like it happens in all FM synths, and we would just need to define the FM modulation alunt in the FM matrix.

[fmr]

Yeah I know there are 6 envelopes , I just can’t find the remaining 3 on the gui( so env 4,5,6).
And somehow every operator amp is assigned to env 1 .
Oh well , I’ll revisit it when it’s implemented , d0n’t really need another fm synth but curiosity got the most of me .

It's a bug. You should be ablke to see al six envelopes. The developer already said it will be fixed in the next release.

Regarding the hardwiring of Envelope 1, I already agreed (and requested) that it should be detached from the oscillators, and leave to the user to choose which envelope will control each oscillator.

[fmr]

DELETED

[SeBaer]

Is it really the case, that Envelope 1 is hard wired to each oscillator individually, or rather to the output of the whole oscillator section?

[fmr]

Is it really the case, that Envelope 1 is hard wired to each oscillator individually, or rather to the output of the whole oscillator section?

I'm not sure how it is implemented, but it's the same thing, IMO. We cannot control each oscillator output individually (and we should and definitely NEED TO).

[SeBaer]

But you can control each oscillator individually, if you assign an envelope. It's implemented the same way in Vital. You assign the envelope when you need it, and don't if you don't. Dexed is implemented with individual envelopes per oscillator, but if you want two oscillator to follow the same envelope, you would have to recreate the settings instead of just assigning the same envelope to two oscillators. I prefer the design of Ghost and Vital. But I have to admit, for a synth with 6 oscillators, a total amount of 6 envelopes seems to little.
But I find it rather interesting, that each oscillator has its individual filter. Maybe it would be a nice addition to have a global filter (or at least I haven't found it yet).

[fmr]

You can't. Just try it. Assign another envelope (for example ENV 2) to the volume of oscillator A, and give it a very slow attack. You will notice that you will get sound immediately, despite the fact that you should hear a very slow volume crescendo. Now do the opposite: configure ENV 1 for a very slow attack, and give a very fast attack to ENV 2. This time you will get a very slow crescende. despite the fact that ENV 2 has a vey fast attack. Don't know about you, but this isn't the way I want the envelopes to behave. This will prevent to take the most out of the FM engine.

In Vital, each oscillator has the envelope you choose to assign to it, and it is summed to the effect of envelope 1. That way, although you start to get sound immediately (and that's smething I don0t like, to be honest) you can still hgear the other envelope effect in the sound. That's not the case in Ghost. And Vital is a plain wavetable synth, as is Serum, with three oscillators. Ghost is quite different, and was thought with FM in mind, I think.

I just tried it.

[fmr]

But I find it rather interesting, that each oscillator has its individual filter. Maybe it would be a nice addition to have a global filter (or at least I haven't found it yet).

Yes, I just found also that each oscillator has it's own filter. May be nice, but I'm not sure. Seems overkill to me. I would rather have a more flexible modulation section, instead of a filter per oscillator. And the way it is implemented is weird. Up to today, I though the filter was global. Only after looking for a way to modulate it did I find that the filter is attached to the oscillator.

[SeBaer]

Assign another envelope (for example ENV 2) to the volume of oscillator A, and give it a very slow attack. You will notice that you will get sound immediately, despite the fact that you should hear a very slow volume crescendo.

I have to try that tonight. I would classify that kind of behaviour as a bug or design flaw.

[fmr]

Another thing. The GUI is too small for a 4K display (even in a regular 1K display it should be bigger). It desperately needs options to resize it.