Anybody ever toy with the idea of using one with single-cycle waveforms as their main synth??

I was playing around with TAL Sampler and I was loading some single cycle waveforms and I ended up playing with it for hours. It was just so much fun. Tweaking a knobby synth is fun as well but I've realized I much prefer having a bunch of different synths waveforms at my disposal with the different DAC flavors.

The ease with which it imports sfz/sf2 is so wonderful too.

 

I had this as a "restrictions is good for creativity" for a short essay at univerity. Ofc it works. It's just a matter of how you use it. There is a bunch of single cycle packs out there. Like this one:
https://www.adventurekid.se/akrt/waveforms/

 

I totally agree @Bump I use Adobe Audition to create single cycles. You can make one with any recording, just open a sample in your audio editor and select a "cycle sized" area, then cut, paste, save, and throw it in your favorite instrument. You can find some pretty unique frequencies, and It's good fun!

 

One may find (save (bank) waves to folder) this useful.

 

I like using wavetables and short samples better than single-cycle waveforms with samplers [both sw and hw], because it sounds more organic, but in all three cases the results can be very interesting, especially when you layer multiple samples. It can sound very rich.

Thank you so much for the WaveEditor link dtmd! Really neat editor.

I often use Audio-Term for editing wavetables. Here.

 

IMO it works great if you are trying for that old-school VCO->VCF->VCA architecture. I used to do this in hardware on my A4000. On a computer there is really no difference between synthesis and sampling, a soundbuffer is a soundbuffer. But in practice dedicated samplers often have more limited modulation and routing options.

 

I had ever tried to do cut a sample in Kontakt and keep only one single cycle waveform but it doesn't sound good as soon as you're a bit distant from your root note.
Samplers are not wavetable synthesizers.

 

It's true most of the time. You should stick to about one octave up-down. However, especially the far deep notes can many times sound really interesting despite the artefacts. That depends on the sampler, though. Emulator II and III were well known for their great sounding sampling algorithms, and their great sounding analog filter. I really enjoy working with TAL-Sampler because it does emulate their sound rather nicely. Have you tried it?

 

I used to get so much out of my ASR-10, but that floppy drive is a total nuh uh.

 

If single-cycle waveforms work for you, that's great.
I've just finished creating sounds for a PCM expansion in AnalogKit D1 (iPad) and none of the sounds would have been remotely possible with single-cycle waveforms.
IMHO it's good to have the choice as long as you know what you want.

 

I knew about WaveEditor, but wow Audio-Term, that's new to me, and looks awesome. I'm going to give that a go. Thanks!

 

You should install an emulator, like HxC into your ASR. It was Ensoniq's best sampler, and ahead of it's time. It has the capability of creating Transwave's like the Fizmo, which would really be worth reviving.

http://hxc2001.free.fr/floppy_drive_emulator/

 

Check out the old "Galbanum" waveform collections. There are 10,000+ useful and very clean single cycle waveforms in those, in nice categories/folders that actually help when trying to design sounds.

 

Oh man, that takes me back to 1996. I used to love diving into the menu and cutting up sounds and really screwing around with source material. Kontakt has made me lazy. Look out ebay, I'm coming for an ASR-10.
Just checked. Around $1,000 in Australia. And they all look like they've been used as an ashtray.

 

Last edited by a moderator: Mar 8, 2019

thats 100% correct, it doesn't sound good - it sounds better. works especially nice with Emulator II and III (or Emax I for grittiness), also ASR-10 is good with transwave function, it actually becomes a wavetable synthesizer

also, Kontakt is not a sampler, it doesn't sample

 

I remember when I used the Emu plugin,Emulator X.I 've never played with their hardware samplers.
You often talk about the TAL sampler,and personnally I tried it quickly in the past,but i'm not a fan of samplers so I rarely play with them.Maybe I need to try it again...

But when I tried to sample a single cycle waveform in Kontakt,I had sampled a pure simple saw wave of Hive;and finally when you play some notes in kontakt and the same notes in hive it's totally different,and I didn't found anything beautiful,it sounded thin,ugly to my ears.

 

Last edited: Mar 6, 2019

Ok Kontakt is not a sampler,it's a sample player.Thanks,I did knew that.

(Hardware) samplers are nice to playback samples,but not single cycle waveforms.Here we're talking about playing SINGLE CYCLE WAVEFORMS.

Try to sample one of your synths,sample with your sampler of your choice one single cycle waveform and play some notes.Play this same midi event with the synth you have sampled,and bounce these 2 tracks and post it here.
No it won't sound better with your EMU sampler or whatever you want.

 

Last edited: Mar 6, 2019

That's what I did,I didn't know how to explain it in English.

 

IDK...to each their own...but I loaded some single cycle waveforms in TAL Sampler and they sounded great along the entire key range.