Synth / sampler to compliment the stable

[kinglouis]

Hi all,

I'm about to start a new writing project, mostly synth based, moody detective underscores. I have done dozens of these over the years relying almost exclusively on Omnisphere and a bit of the Komplete synths (probably not explored them enough). And I think its about time I broadened my horizons a bit. I've not run out of patches in Omnisphere, but I think it would be no bad thing to take a look at some other synths on the market.

I'm looking for prepared and flexible sounds rather than building them from the ground up. I've heard Rob Papen has some good products - any suggestions as to where else to look? To be more specific, I'm after interesting pads, arp'd patterns, more for tv underscore than electro pop.

Any suggestions much appreciated!

Alex

[IAA]

Arturia analog lab 4 has some very nice sounds, contemporary and analog classics (as they say). Anyhow if you get it with v collection 7 you can edit till the cows come home. If you’re really bored you can roll some of your own samples in the fairlight or synclavier or even the mellotron.

I’ve got quite a few things in the studio to use, but I’m enjoying v collection a lot....

The others I’d check out are the spitfire audio Phobos and Orbis instruments. Very nice. There Labs downloads are cool to great sounds that can add atmosphere and they’re free.

Ian

[kinglouis]

I have the Arturia Analogue Lab and V Collection which I love but aren't that suitable for this style of writing - or at least if they are I haven't found a relatively time efficient way of working with them.

Thanks for the Spitfire heads up, BT Phobos seems exactly what I'm after! Thank you.

[Dave B]

If you are running Logic, then you already have Alchemy for free and that is incredibly powerful and flexible tool with an incredibly broad palette...

[kinglouis]

I return to alchemy from time to time - I really like the flexibility of sonic control, much more intuitive than most synths I have! I find the actual sounds themselves hard to place within my tracks. My shortcoming I'm sure, I'll wrestle with it a bit more and see if I can do something with it.

[DavyP]

I know you mentioned Komplete, here's a video with various cinematic samples mentioned, I linked it to start at the cinematics part.

https://youtu.be/v00gglkIAPQ?t=788

Arturia Pigments might be worth a look, loads of modulation options, easy to use and you can demo it for 3 days with no limitations. Give you time to record the sounds you might want without having to buy it .

https://www.arturia.com/products/analog ... verview#en

I bought it and think it's great.

[kinglouis]

Pigments looks superb! I'll demo it and see how it goes, thanks!

[Martin Walker]

I return to alchemy from time to time - I really like the flexibility of sonic control, much more intuitive than most synths I have! I find the actual sounds themselves hard to place within my tracks. My shortcoming I'm sure, I'll wrestle with it a bit more and see if I can do something with it.

I'm still using Alchemy a lot in my own music, largely because in my sound designer capacity I created several hundred of the presets in the (pre-Apple takeover) Alchemy libraries

One thing I've found very helpful in placing its sounds within a track is by deactivating one of more of the multi-effects. For instance, unless it's a special effect I always remove Alchemy reverbs, so I can use a global project reverb that's also utilised by other tracks in the song - this tends to help Alchemy sounds blend in more.

Echo and chorus effects can also be more usefully applied externally in my experience. The core sounds still tend to be wonderful though, as are the performance morphs, so do make sure you can record such movements.

Hope this helps!

Martin

[The Elf]

Only software?

[kinglouis]

I return to alchemy from time to time - I really like the flexibility of sonic control, much more intuitive than most synths I have! I find the actual sounds themselves hard to place within my tracks. My shortcoming I'm sure, I'll wrestle with it a bit more and see if I can do something with it.

I'm still using Alchemy a lot in my own music, largely because in my sound designer capacity I created several hundred of the presets in the (pre-Apple takeover) Alchemy libraries

One thing I've found very helpful in placing its sounds within a track is by deactivating one of more of the multi-effects. For instance, unless it's a special effect I always remove Alchemy reverbs, so I can use a global project reverb that's also utilised by other tracks in the song - this tends to help Alchemy sounds blend in more.

Echo and chorus effects can also be more usefully applied externally in my experience. The core sounds still tend to be wonderful though, as are the performance morphs, so do make sure you can record such movements.

Hope this helps!

Martin

That is really helpful, I'll have a look at doing that.

Elf - most likely only soft - I don't think I'm ready to enter the realm of hardware synths yet. Although my ever lengthening beard might indicate otherwise!

[OneWorld]

Try as I might, softsynths just don't do it for me and am going back to hardware, and I am looking at the Arturia Matrix Brute. Does anyone have any experience/thoughts regarding this synth?

[fatbenelton]

Big fan of Rob Papen Blue 2.....excellent moving pads, ambient and great arp.

I think it’s still current? Works on my mac with Mojave anyway!