In praise of Rhino.

[x_bruce]

After using Rhino for awhile it is interesting to me that initially I enjoyed using Rhino 1 for industrial noise scapes, soundscapes in general, hard sounds, pads and leads.

With Rhino 2 I now feel like I'm using the ghost of the Ronald D-50 and many of it's pads from romplers like the XP series. I quit using Ronald products after that.

Of course it sounds like a DX-7 on steroids, or to put a finer point to it, it sounds a lot like what I hoped Native Instruments would have done with FM7 2.0. I forgot to mention the 1.9 analog filters which make almost everything sound organic and this is what I think is the breakthough is for Rhino in general.

Yes, it's a big synth and it has a learning curve and some people are frightened by learning curves but like the extrodrinary patches available (which are quite a few!) But hearing Moog like sounds? This was not something I expected but was greatfull to see in 1.9 and especially now with Daniel's presets.

The ability to add sample based waveforms is nice and gives it that capability to match a lot of older synths from the '90s which were good sounding. Not everything from the '90s sucked. In fact, I'd say Rhino 2 adds an "additive" style sound when programmed properly. Perhaps it's because I've been using Rhino from it's first beta I love the thing. The knock on programming Rhino is how hard it is and I'm going to argue that it's wrong. I think a lot of people want to see analog format screens and expect digital to sound analog. This is not a negative towards Sytrus, but this is exactly what Gol did when programming it. Many knobs, no need to go beyond them for those who don't want to. However, once you get to the FM in Sytrus it is HARD to work with. Capable in it's own way, yes. But hard to work with and vastly more digital sounding imo.

If users look at Rhino and forget for a minute that the interface isn't 'analog' and are willing to put an hour of their life into learning the interface, in fact Rhino is a simple synth to create useful sounds. To master? Ok, that's different. But what doesn't take time to master? Factually, the interface is quite simple. All the things you expect of analog are in the display for each channel. No one makes a user do complex envelopes! Just because they are there doesn't mean they must be used. In fact, there are simple envelopes available too. As for controls. They too are quite simple and laid out intuitively.

I understand those that have decided they don't want to learn a big interface and that's what romplers are for. But I'd recommend this synth to any level of user that wants to make their own sounds and have a wide variety. I was amazed when I did the additive synth reviews http://www.musicfaq.net.

These synths are not as difficult to use either. The things that amazed me were the killer analog synth sounds I got on all of them! Yet Rhino is the only serious contender imo to the additives. It's also much more mature and honestly, it's sound is at times quite close to what additive synths do best yet can also do many things additive synths can't, and I'm a big fan of them.

But Rhino still gets used more. I put it in the same catagory as z3ta and VirSyn TERA, also on my top 10. It's hard to write tutorials. I'm in the middle of another one for another "difficult" synth, and I know that if I sat down with you you'd be able to learn Rhino 2 at a fully functional level. You won't be as good as Daniel or 'Tick at first, but you'll be able to make your own syth sounds, something greatly hampered by simple synths.

I think the two areas that get to people are the matrix, and most people that don't like complex synths don't like matrixes imo. The other part is understanding how routing works. It's simple but people love to complexify things they are phobic towards, and that's the thing. I think most people who haven't tried or spent time with the mighty Rhino don't get it because it seems too hard and they don't try. There are gobs of places to change sound. If you can't do it in Rhino you simply don't want to learn which is cool. But design wise and quality wise I can't think of anything that's outright "better".

[kuniklo]

I think the two areas that get to people are the matrix, and most people that don't like complex synths don't like matrixes imo. The other part is understanding how routing works.

I like Rhino a lot too. The thing that's been holding me back with it recently is that the modulation seems pretty rigid. I like z3ta's open ended modulation system and Rhino's seems much more rigid. Perhaps I'm just not grokking it fully yet.

[daniel]

Many of Rhino's modulation possibilites are done with super flexible envelopes that can be programmed to do about anything. Even the amount of waveshaping has an envelope! Save your favorite shapes and load them into different envelopes. It's really the best.

[x_bruce]

Excellent suggestion on envelopes Daniel. I'm guilty of not doing this and wishing I had.

I'm almost positive z3ta has more routings but as daniel explained, the work with envelopes helpes enormously.

re: envelope designing. I wish that a double click were possible rather than right clicking to add points. I work much faster double clicking.

I've mentioned this before but one thing I think Sytrus (which I mention as they are exceptionally close in design and to a degree, sound) is the use of an "easy mode" style screen which is weighted imo with patches that sound analog. I think if there were an easy mode and a actual control for a customized, weighted - the customized version in the regular GUI - random mode that lots of people would be more willing to try.

While I applaud and agree it's time to change GUIs and how a synth looks on a computer monitor, it is going to be a while before users accept anything not percieved as normal. The irony of users having never touched or programmed on a analog synth is almost funny, but it points to the first several years of VSTi making. I have been a fan of easy modes that actually keep the concept of the synth alive rather than make you feel you are accomplished only to throw FM synthesis in your face.

Lastly, I think it would be a good thing to start refining what a synth actually is. Rhino was one of the first large scale hydrid synths. Rainbow 2 (another interesting Big Tick product, was also hybrid, however nothing like Rhino.

The key is getting people to understand that a different way of working does not equal difficult. If Rene were reading this now I'm sure he'd agree with me; z3ta, while being a very powerful synth is has a very high learning curve. I prefer Pentagon 1 to z3ta although I know it can do substantally more, but with a somewhat similar GUI approach to Rhino I often get lost in z3ta. Worse, I often end up having to warm up the sounds for my tastes.

That a balls to the walls digital synth can sound as organic as z3ta is special to me. otoh we all know that z3ta can do incredible things as well, but you have to work for it in z3ta. It is not a simple synth and when programming I spend far more time on it.

Does it do more than Rhino 2? It's somewhat moot to me. I like Rhino's sound and interestingly every human who has ever heard a demo I've done has asked what hardware synth I used...always. I'm not trying to make a huge argument as I basically agree with you in regards to z3ta but as for sound out of the synth I am more efficient in Rhino.