Creamware Osiris subharmonic

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Peter Drake
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Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Peter Drake »

This is a real shot in the dark, but those of you that have been with Creamware and then Sonic Core for a long time remember TripleDat. There was a plugin pack for audio restoration in TripleDat or TDAT16 called Osiris. I never used it to restore old recordings, but it was really good at eliminating hiss, hum, buzz, air conditioner noise... I have much better tools for that now, but Osiris had a subharmonic generator that was a real moneymaker for my studio way back when.

I remember when I got Osiris I almost immediately sold my dbx subharmonic hardware (120X?) to a DJ for almost what I paid for Osiris.

I have a lot more ways to do that sort of thing now, several of them within Scope, but nothing else has ever felt and sounded quite like the Osiris subharmonic.

This may be just some rosy nostalgia affecting my memories, but I sure don't miss ISA cards, DAT tapes, 1GB hard drives for $1400 USD...

Does anyone here know what Osiris was actually doing in generating subharmonics? How it worked? I'd like to mess around with duplicating it, or maybe even contract a developer to do something. I know it was a long time ago, but I figure it's worth putting feelers out here.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by garyb »

i think Celmo had a subharmonic plugin. originally, it was a dBx process.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Liquid EDGE »

What’s this all about? Does PsyQ not do something similar?

Really like your other plug ins you have shared with us, so look forward to this if you do make or commission it yourself and decide to share it. 😊
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by borg »

should you not find a scope alternative, PluginAlliance have a device, the bx_SubSynth, that is based on that 120XP. there's also a free version, the bx_Subfilter.

https://www.plugin-alliance.com/en/prod ... synth.html
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Peter Drake »

Thanks for offering help, but I have the low end covered already. PsyQ and the Celmo plug are amazing, and PsyQ in combination with G.O.S.T. harmonic tools can create a seismic low end that isn't muddy at all.
The Dasgost ConvolveQ seems to have some of the "flavor" and characteristics I'm looking to recapture, especially when it's at or near being overdriven.
Again, I may just be remembering things as better than they really were, I'm pretty sure it's been at least 18 years since I last used TripleDat/Osiris.
This is just one of those hard to define audio things, like the boost/cut trick on an old Pultec EQ. No other EQ really does whatever that is, and most of the virtual emulations seem to take great care to make replicating that effect possible.
Thanks for indulging this old recording nerd, maybe our next ancient topic can be about how we used to overdrive Urei filter banks waaaay back in the last century, or not 😄
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by valis »

There's a few people who resurrected VDAT, I'll let GaryB discuss what might be necessary there but it seems you need an older install matching VDAT version & XP 32bit or etc, if memory serves.

Ie, perhaps doing some tests and comparisons between the various subharmonic generators will reveal the differences? Sweeps, Impulse responses, test tones, complex tones, various white/brown/grey noise etc...
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Liquid EDGE »

Peter Drake wrote: Thu Jul 30, 2020 8:49 am Thanks for offering help, but I have the low end covered already. PsyQ and the Celmo plug are amazing, and PsyQ in combination with G.O.S.T. harmonic tools can create a seismic low end that isn't muddy at all.
The Dasgost ConvolveQ seems to have some of the "flavor" and characteristics I'm looking to recapture, especially when it's at or near being overdriven.
For me this is great to know, may just get the g.o.s.t harmonic tools soon, i make drum and bass, so of course always on the look out for heavy sub.

I have ConvolveQ but only ever used to cut/dip down unwanted frequencies in the final mix/mastering stage if its easier to do than go back to the mixdown.
How is it that you use it? ( for sub enhancement that is)

Also do you use the tools just on the final mix or sometimes on the sub/bass track itself in mixdown?
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Peter Drake »

I would think the g.o.s.t. tools would be essential for d-n-b, especially with the Saw wave cutter module used on its own and as an insert on Harmonic. They're very powerful and often subtle tools that I think I'm still learning my way around. Definitely unique and special.

I only ever had a trial key for ConvolveQ. I have a weird bias against graphic EQ's, which I should probably get over. I have an upcoming project that might require and pay for a key.
As I recall, I was sending a signal with a lot of the top end lopped off to the ConvolveQ, driving it as hot as possible, and doing some stuff with sample delays to try to mitigate phase problems. I also did some things with octaver/frequency-divider effects run through it, which took that kind of thing from "gritty" to "throb". ConvolveQ is very cool.

Full mix vs track really depends. Sometimes things work better one way or the other, and it's often hard to tell why. I do a LOT of mix automation to keep my options open. Sometimes dynamics are too tricky with a full mix, and sometimes what sounded good individually vanishes or goes all "pillowy" in the mix. Low end is hard, thanks for asking.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by dante »

I've used this on occasion - purpose built - but only if you have Reason :

https://youtu.be/b5VvpgC4uyo
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Liquid EDGE »

Peter Drake wrote: Thu Jul 30, 2020 11:15 am I would think the g.o.s.t. tools would be essential for d-n-b, especially with the Saw wave cutter module used on its own and as an insert on Harmonic. They're very powerful and often subtle tools that I think I'm still learning my way around. Definitely unique and special.

I only ever had a trial key for ConvolveQ. I have a weird bias against graphic EQ's, which I should probably get over. I have an upcoming project that might require and pay for a key.
As I recall, I was sending a signal with a lot of the top end lopped off to the ConvolveQ, driving it as hot as possible, and doing some stuff with sample delays to try to mitigate phase problems. I also did some things with octaver/frequency-divider effects run through it, which took that kind of thing from "gritty" to "throb". ConvolveQ is very cool.

Full mix vs track really depends. Sometimes things work better one way or the other, and it's often hard to tell why. I do a LOT of mix automation to keep my options open. Sometimes dynamics are too tricky with a full mix, and sometimes what sounded good individually vanishes or goes all "pillowy" in the mix. Low end is hard, thanks for asking.
Thanks for such a detailed response. Yeah low end is hard to maintain and keep in the mix while still having headroom for the rest of a mix. And getting it to transfer as best as possible on speakers that don’t go very low is annoying 😀.

Think it’s partly why I’m obsessed with making dnb, it’s a challenge for sure.

Hope you find the answer to thatbsound you are trying to get. 👍
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by valis »

I do a lot of dnb, I actually just mix sine waves on the low end for sub, I can layer for harmonics if it's going to be 808 style sub (ie, no additional synth patch/sound audibly on top). Part of this is because Logic's sampler (EXS24) will output sine if you don't load a sample, so it's incredibly easy to do with little to no cpu load. If I want 40/80/160 I just use 3 and balance them manually, send to a bus and trigger a sidechained compressor to duck it a bit on the initial attack of kick & snare, but VERY fast not 'pumping' style.

When I do use bass management tools, it's usually just to balance between the 3 octaves around the kick effectively when I'm not mixing with sine waves for my sub, which does happen sometimes. However I find I rarely extract subbass from a bassline played with a higher fundamental (or stronger harmonic than the fundamental).

It's so easy to do this now in our digital era, it's ridiculous.

Btw I own Psy-Q, most of the waves/izotope/SPL/etcetcetc plugins and have lots of options to do this as well, but I am curious what was available in Osiris, so that we can learn from whatever you remember hearing and see if we can apply similar techniques with other tools we have now.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Liquid EDGE »

valis wrote: Thu Jul 30, 2020 1:22 pm I do a lot of dnb, I actually just mix sine waves on the low end for sub, I can layer for harmonics if it's going to be 808 style sub (ie, no additional synth patch/sound audibly on top). Part of this is because Logic's sampler (EXS24) will output sine if you don't load a sample, so it's incredibly easy to do with little to no cpu load. If I want <a href="tel:40/80/160">40/80/160</a> I just use 3 and balance them manually, send to a bus and trigger a sidechained compressor to duck it a bit on the initial attack of kick & snare, but VERY fast not 'pumping' style.

When I do use bass management tools, it's usually just to balance between the 3 octaves around the kick effectively when I'm not mixing with sine waves for my sub, which does happen sometimes. However I find I rarely extract subbass from a bassline played with a higher fundamental (or stronger harmonic than the fundamental).

It's so easy to do this now in our digital era, it's ridiculous.

Btw I own Psy-Q, most of the waves/izotope/SPL/etcetcetc plugins and have lots of options to do this as well, but I am curious what was available in Osiris, so that we can learn from whatever you remember hearing and see if we can apply similar techniques with other tools we have now.
Cool!. I never have done that, thanks for sharing, I often just use dubsub/dubsub2 for Sub. Or some other synth etc.

And then often use PsyQ on a master chain to beef the whole mix a little if needed. (And the high end shimmer if needed, etc)

Also I saw someone say they just use 2 sine waves, one the main sub and another an octave and 7 notes/semitones up and lower the volume on that a little and mix to taste, yet to try it out myself.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by valis »

When I say 3, realize that the one that's nearest the kick is the one attenuated the most, and that kicks are typically layered ON the subbass for dnb and many genres that followed. In the house/trance/etc era the kick was the dominant fundamental so you had to 'fit' subbass between the 50-60hz oeak from the 909 (or 808) kick, then the bassline played 'on top' which is why 'funky' house and disco etc sounds were all the rage. It was easy to just highpass a full sample that you chop from a classic song on top of a 909 pattern and call it Daft...

My kicks are NORMALLY peaking between 75-100hz, and my preference is to take a 909 kick for the clarity of the transition from initial transient to fundamental tone and highpass that so I can layer my sampled break's kick (or kicks) on top (using EQ/filter judiciously of course, sometimes just nudging in an extra sample to give a touch of the right crunch or bounce in the upper midbass etc...)
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by valis »

Anyway I'm curious what's going on with this inquiry from Peter, as I do have and know how to use bass management tools and like new tricks.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Peter Drake »

Some screenshots from Osiris. Maybe it was doing some harmonic resynthesis? The high end tended to sound artificial at anything beyond minimal levels. The low end really had a resonant kind of tone that felt more meaty than boomy. I recall that exclusively odd or even numbered harmonics would often be best, but no way to tell which without trialing some settings.

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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Peter Drake »

valis and Liquid Edge, I do envy you guys a little bit, kick can be a little less troublesome than some of the things I deal with like very deep drones and soundbeds. Also, typically I don't really get to tweak the instruments or other sources at all. Sometimes it's simple, other times it's pretty difficult turd-polishing.
My favorite bass-enhancing tricks are really just less of everything else, like side-chaining a compressor off the kick drum to lower the rest of the instruments slightly with each instance. Slow down the release until it's only on the threshold of pumping, move ratio until you can't tell that it's doing something, but you want it back if you turn it off. Another thing I like to do is find a way to boost lower midrange to sort of "imply" that the lower frequencies are there. This seems to be common in contemporary pop, where the use case is probably streaming over a small portable speaker or Beats headphones. I think the coolest example of this I heard was some sound design in a science fiction movie, the scene had a bunch of disastrous mayhem with some kind of powerful alien beam weapon sweeping the area. When the weapon was active, the sound mix dropped all upper frequencies and just had some "puffy" sounding midrange and a little bit of ~50Hz rumble, but not loud. It seemed like one was standing near a very deep very loud foghorn that was drowning every other sound out, but it did it rather quietly. Very clever.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Xite Knight v2.0 »

Peter Drake wrote: Wed Jul 29, 2020 10:48 pm There was a plugin pack for audio restoration in TripleDat or TDAT16 called Osiris. I never used it to restore old recordings, but it was really good at eliminating hiss, hum, buzz, air conditioner noise... I have much better tools for that now
Could you let me know if any of those tools work in real time like Osiris?
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by nebelfuerst »

I have a TrippeDat with Osiris restauration bundle still working under Win98. The X-citer doesn't seem to be on my plugin list.
Was it correlated with a special bundle/license ?

Although trippledat is quite old, the sync to midiclock is better then all DAW I tried.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by Peter Drake »

nebelfurst, maybe that was part of the Firewalkers suite? it's been a long time. I may ask you to run some impulse responses through your system at some point, if you would be so kind.

Xite Knight v2.0, Sadly no. The only thing I'm aware of that worked in real time was the CEDAR system. I just looked, and CEDAR is still around at cedar-audio.com I have no idea what their equipment is like now, but back in the 90s it wasn't much different or better than Osiris but also incredibly more expensive. I once spent two days in a CEDAR equipped suite removing rain noise from some location movie audio, which is very difficult/tedious. CEDAR seemed a bit better at it for some reason than anything else I threw at the problem.
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Re: Creamware Osiris subharmonic

Post by valis »

If I recall, CEDAR had the ability to select the range to process, which Izotope RX has now. Ie, you could band select not just the time but also the frequency range on the spectral plot and the processing only affected that area.

For denoising these days, I find a mixture of iZotope and Waves most recent stuff like NS1/WNS Noise Suppressor (NS1 is a single band control version of WNS) and Z-Noise to be effective. Ie, I'll dial one in by 'overcranking' the process to refine it and clearly hear what's being affected, then reduce the processing down further than I'd like, disable, adjust the next plugin (usually stack izotope first, then WNS) and adjust that one the same way, and turn it down. The two together seem to complement each other in a way that kills more noise than I can with either without as much audible impact on source.

This is of course offline, sadly, though there are realtime versions they are native and so have the usual caveats of native processing (round trip latency overhead + internal delay).

WNS Noise is very cheap atm btw.
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