written by: Zygurt
Synth1 works, I just haven't dug deep into it as I've been playing with U-he's ACE and Zebralette. I'll have a play when I get some time.I have noticed that most of the "cool" sounds that Geert and others who have posted their performances on the web use are kind of expensive AUs like Omnisphere and Kontact ($470 for Omnisphere) Are there any more affordable sounds that work well with the Alpha??
Or-- can Eigen Labs make some deals with these companies to offer their products at a discount for Eigenharp owners??
Any AU or VST works with the EIgenharp, even free ones, there are a lot to choose from!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Audio_Units
The external links section includes some free and demo stuff
Camel Audio has a sale on at the moment
http://www.camelaudio.com/
I also like Zebra which is not too expensive, download the demo and try it out.
If you like old school synths, there is the TyrellN6 which was made by the Amazona magazin from Germany, based on readers wishes, it is free, the site should be manageable even if you do not understand German.
By the way Reaktor has a Player (free) and you can download some bundles for it (free). The Reaktor demo lets you play around for 30 Minutes, if you don't do concerts and don't want to save new stuff, this is quite fun to test the capabilities of the Eigenharp.
Last for the more technically minded people out there, you can make a AU of Supercollider synths on Mac or they claim. Not much docu around, will post tutorial, as soon as I have figured it out.
And this site kvraudio has a gigantic, overwhelming list of AUs free and non-free.
My hope in the mid term future is on the workbench and the modular components that come (and will come) with EigenD to be able to act as a modular "out of the box" synthesizer. (Hopefully there will come more components that you expect (or even never dreamed of) for a modular system soon).
So we can build and share self containing EigenD-only setups so those who want to tune can do that and the others can have a load and play experience based on a set of prepared setups from a library.
The current default setups are already a step into the right direction, we just need some more setups to increase the probability to find what individuals might be looking for (Imho too many sounds of the default setups are too much tailored towards "easy access" - only few key dimensions mapped etc. and many try to imitate existing instruments. I personally hope for some really controlable sounds that can be used for playing melody lines and chords (no ambient things etc.) that make full use of the expressive capabilites of the Eigenharp in the future - things that are not possible with a keyboard.)
Currently using the internal sounds with alternative keyboard layouts can also be hard as there is no abstraction between key dimensions and sound shaping capabilities (e.g. we have a pitch to keyyaw, volume to keyroll, filter to keypress mapping instead of pitch to pitchmod1, volume to volumemod1, filter to timbremod1 mapping in the sound and a separate pitchmod1 to keyyaw, volumemod to keyroll, timbremod1 to pressure mapping for the key layout, so you don't have to turn all sounds upside down individually if you change the layout)
Some recognizable "signature sounds" would also be important for Eigenharp compositions. Many people want to play existing pieces, composing for a platform that is only defined by the way how you play it does not lend itself to interpretations from others.
Sometimes having too many choices can be paralyzing especially if you have no really satisfying fallback that you can use if you are not in the mood to tweak and "just want to play". (As it is the case with the piano sound on keyboards - which is nice on the Eigenharp but doesn't do it justice)
To be at least slightly on topic :P :
Geert mentioned somewhere (was it his twitter summary on eigenzone?) that he thinks about adding multitimbral support for any AU - that would be very helpful as long as we have to live with external plugins so we can at least spare the additional complexity of in between subhosts. Having a multitimbral sound source is essential for the Eigenharp and unfortunately most AUs are not multitimbral.
Or couldn't you try to convince the Camelaudio guys to add further Eigenharep support to Alchemy? It would be good if the one plugin that comes with EigenD would support all expressive features - or would be at least multitimbral...
Then we could at least use this synth to share setups as we can expect that every Eigenharp player has the plugin (at least for the "big" instruments where there might be room to think about shipping it with a full version of the synth).
Greetings,
NothanUmber
The KVRaudio (link above) is a good database to search for AUs. You can define your search very well and find lots of stuff for either Mac or PC. Many are free and others cost from $19 to $1900. Next step is to find out which are best at least in the lower price range.
Also, once I get my Midi out working (a bit down lower on my priorities list) I have lots of fantastic Ableton live setups that will be fun to control with Alpha. Of course it still will have Midi's limitations (wonder if Ableton will add Eigen compatible features like Cubase seems to be doing??
Here's a list of Free VST plug-ins
keyman
Free gems from the past?
Steinberg VB-1 and Model-E
Ones that haven't been mentioned.
1: Green Oak - Crystal
2: u-he - Zebralette (Set pressure to Modwheel to change through the waveform as you play. http://youtu.be/JUCKq_hiy4E)
3: Synth1
4: Linplug - FreeAlpha
5: Yellow Tools - Independence Free
I also spend a lot of time with stuff from Computer Music Magazine, which isn't free, but there are a ton of plugins, and depending on which issue you get, multisamples that are just begging to be turned into soundfonts.
Togu Audio Line has a few more than just the bassline. Noisemaker, U-no-62, Elek7ro-II all work fine and are free. Not bad on CPU either.
I got the Reaktor player, which is also free.
Also Automat1 from Alphakanal. Quite functional 3 oscillator with many options. Also quite free. Not very much eye candy but it works.
Not free, but I also recommend Madrona Labs Aalto.
Free gems from the past II
Steinberg Neon and Karlette
Anybody thinking about trying this one out?
http://www.sonic-lab.com/software/cosmos-f/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wex4jAvEjdg&feature=player_embedded
89 Euros. So while not free, it's almost in the same range as u-he's ACE.
Interesting little blog post about free plugins:
http://liquido.dk/index.php/11-music-production/72-gear-recommendation-8-free-plugins
I've no idea how well any of these play with the Eigenharp - it would be great is anyone who tries them could report back..
Synth1 works, I just haven't dug deep into it as I've been playing with U-he's ACE and Zebralette. I'll have a play when I get some time.
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