PlanetZ forums - scopeusers.com

Hello,

As a prospective buyer I am trying to find stuff made with scope, like songs where it is specified which synths were used etc. I have found a few where it is specified in the music forum but I´m looking for more. Thanks!

Robert

90% of the sounds used in my CD are made with the Modular Synth very often filled of FleXor modules. Other synths used are the Prodyssey and the Six -String ( used as a weird pad machine, the guitars are are true).

You'll find audio demos for John Bowen's Scope synths on his Zarg Music website.

You'll find audio demos for SpaceF's Scope synths on his SpaceF devices website.

You'll find some Sonic Core synth audio demos on their website over at soniccore.com.

Thanks for the pointers!

One question: How do you integrate the synths and stuff into a sequencer like Cubase (4.1)? Do you have to route the signals out of the scope outs and then into my main ASIO soundcard? Or can you route it directly from Scope into the tracks of Cubase? I am no techy so I hope to understand how to use the synths etc within Cubase.

from the main menus you load 'modules' (squares with ins and outs to be cabled to) which are a graphical representation of the physical ins and outs of the card, but also of the software connections Midi and ASIO in and out.
Cubase will 'see' those loaded ports and list them.

hence you can build your own autoload project representing exactly what connections you use, be it Z-link, ADAT, ASIO or etc.
Plus your preferred mixer, synths, whatever.
You have to connect 'cables' to ins and outs. Clicking on the modules opens the GUI of the mixer, synth or midi module.
Most of us (?) route the midi first to the sequencer, and use the track midi out indicator to forward the signal to SFP (Scope).

Thanks,

Is this statement correct:

"The best synths like Minimax and Pro-1 stand apart from the other Scope synths because they also have custom atom"

many of the synths not mentioned above can sound very same-ish because they're made from the same building blocks as one another (it's sort of like how all the NI synths are made from Reaktor building blocks, though the Scope synths sound much better than that"

Are there any more unique synths apart from minimaz and pro-1?

casar, your informations are correct.

Basically the synths/effects and all scope stuff is based on atoms, like reaktor/synthedit/synthmaker uses.

So basically the outcome and quality of a scope synth raises and falls with the atoms it is based on.

IMO the quality of the scope atoms is very high and they all are carfully designed.
So the soundquality of a scope synth or modular patch is at its worst "good" and at its best "very good".
IMO the scope atoms quality is well above all the other modulars synth constructors mentioned above.

The better class creamware synth (imo these are Minimax, Pro-12 and Prodyssey) have customitzed specially coded atoms to deliver exact copy of the hardware modules:
f.e.
-antialiased non-bandlimited(?) oscillators with typical waveform for the simulated hardware analog synth , for example a saw waveform doesn`t look the same on all harwadre snyth
- customized high quality filter emulations for each synth that model the different behaviour of analog filters.
without resonance the difference is smaller, the more resonance you are using the better the new designed filter atoms sound.


The sad point andthe only downside is that these high class atoms are not distributed with the sdk soiccore is delivering to developers.
I understand that this is a political question: someone could easily rebuild a minimax emulation with these atoms and release it as a free device on planetz. So this would hurt their own sales.

So its clear that they will never release these atoms and I have no problem with this.

The downside is that the standard filters all have a similar sound (there sound is not bad at all) Since the flavour is the same on most filters the whole platform has its sound. Some people here claim its the sound of the SHARC dsp chips, but IMO its just that all filter atoms are based on a similar internal coding structure. I think the DSPs that run the code have a smaller influence on the sound than the math atoms running on them....

So sdk developers are a bit limited regarding these aspects.

So my biggest wish for the SFP5 platform is that soniccore does release some new flavoured filters and better/other oscillators for modular3 (they could even sell it as a modular filter pack and make some cash)and also as atoms for the sdk pack. (now that they have Piehl back in the boat they could do this with ease)
They could even distribute these new atoms to sdk developers with a contract that the developer has to sign something that he may only be allowed to distribute the new devices creations through soniccore and they could make some extra cash.

They don`t have to hurt themselfes and release the moog ladder filter or the Pro-12 CEM filter, but some sort of standard high class filter would be awesome for developers, the whole platform, the modular sound possibilities count would multiply with every additional filter style. Heck, the whole plaform sound options would raise enormiously with such a small tweak.

The only 3rd party devloper I know that has access to the better atom stuff is John Bowen which seems to have some kind of hardwired connection to the soniccore guys, for sure.

---

At least for modular there are some variations of filters available as Flexor pack.
But as all creamware filters have a similar sound, so the flexor filters have there own similar style too.

For sdk tasks you still have the option to build your own filters from basic math atoms (multiply,divide,add and subtract and some other stuff).
Being a free sdk owner myself, I can say I`ve already started to build some own filter designs from basic math atoms, but I still have problems getting my self-created modules work in polyphonic synth creations.(I especially have problems with the resonance on polyphonic patches)
You really have to go down to math level, as nearly all basic soniccore filter blocks without resonance seem to have an interpolated frequency input, which makes them useless for quick envelope modulations.
Meaning the filter will react much too slowly to follow the fast envelope.

a filter build from standard math atoms and non-interpolated freq-input reacts on audiorate to the envelope amount.

maybe a bit to much into the tech-side.
But you asked.

Well, I decided to get a board and it was quite expensive, but it did have a large chunk of plugins coming with it. Time will tell if this was a good decision.
I don´t like the idea of adding PCI cards considering the CPU evolution but I decided to bite the bullet. Thanks!