First impressions

midi sentinel's picture
Submitted by midi sentinel on

Forums:

Found a bit of time to play with this today, and it is quite interesting.

Some of the issues I've encountered are already mentioned in post by mtyas, so I shall not repeat them.

Also, problem with license key 'location' is now fixed, with 1.0.1 hotfix, so that's a good thing too.

So, some small issues I've noticed:

1. DETUBE knob acts strange. You can set it fully to 0, then (while listening to a sound) make a very slight move (as if you will move it to 1), and although knob will move and sound will change (obviously and audibly), knob will still show value 0. Probably easy thing to fix, but worth mentioning anyway.

2. I have an issue with ARP, where synth goes completely silent if I choose 'sync' option. I am using latest Studio One 2 (x64), so I am not sure if it might be causing some issues (and plugin not being able to determine host tempo or something similar).

3. I am not sure whether this is intended bahavior, but ARP poly mode will always miss first note, when multiple keys are pressed. For example, if I play C and E together, first arp 'hit' will play only one note, and all other ARP plays will play both notes. Maybe this is how it is supposed to work, I am still fairly new to synths :)

I really like the sounds it can quickly create. Oscillators sound amazing and with detuning/spread/exciter/etc everything can really go crazy and beautiful.

Distortion effect is probably my favorite, since it seems to generate some completely crazy and very low 'brooms' when keys in higher octaves are played (sometimes also low tones are requires for this effect to shine fully). Not sure how to explain it, but it was unexpected and pretty amusing (in a positive way :)).

Would it be possible, in the future, to also let users add their own ARP/SEQ patterns?

When Vaporizer is in demo mode, it really goes into 'quiet' mode too quickly, it is nearly impossible to even start testing features before being forced to unload/reload plugin, which might be a big issue for people wishing to properly test it.

Also, mod matrix with 5 slots might not be enough. I presume it's not possible to modulate WAVES parameter, otherwise you would have added it. But that could give some really interesting result (and/or crashes ;)).

It's been mentioned already, but this thing is really CPU heavy :) I have ~3 years old i5 and it's having hard time running Vaporizer when I start going wild and crazy. Oversampling just adds a final blow. Is Vaporizer created with purpose to turn CPUs into vapor? ;)

P.S: This 'mollom' captcha thing is one of the most retarded things I've seen in recent history, it marked like 90% of my answers as wrong although they were right. I am a persistant bastard so I kept on going, but maybe some people tried posting and gave up because this captcha thing wouldn't let them. Just a heads up.

midi sentinel's picture

Submitted by midi sentinel on Tue, 01/27/2015 - 21:03.

Also, when switching octave of the oscillator downwards, while keeping a key pressed, it jumps 16 semitones downwards and if key is released then pressed again, it will play correct note (12 semitones downwards).

Minor issue (similar to one reported by mtyas).

admin's picture

Submitted by admin on Wed, 01/28/2015 - 01:31.

Hi there and thank you for the valuable test results.
We will have a look into the issues you reported soon. I have added some topics to the backlog of the next versions.
Tobias

admin's picture

Submitted by admin on Wed, 01/28/2015 - 01:33.

Ah and: Yes, engine is already prepared for user-defined ARP patterns. Unfortuantely we did not yet figure out where to place the editor on the GUI ... let's see. Definitely something for upcoming versions.

edteneyck's picture

Submitted by edteneyck on Wed, 01/28/2015 - 09:08.

First, congratulations on your first creation!I thought I'd add my first impressions / feedback / suggestions here to help keep the forum clean.

I like the sound very much. One thing I think is unique about it is the ability to easily use all four filter types at the same time.

The green GUI values show too dark here and are unreadable, but have been able to guess to tweak things. Maybe a lighter green light used in the Vaporizer logo?
The GUI layout is interesting, but I would suggest a horizontal layout twice as wide or so with knobs at least 1/3 larger. I think the small knobs, or any rotatable knob should be the larger size.
It would also help prepare for 4k screens.

For the poly modes, I would recommend Mono, Mono Legato, Poly 4, and Poly 16. Mono would be "retrigger", while Mono Legato would be similar to the current Mono mode.
I notice the current Mono mode doesn't sustain the note as it should when changing notes while the first note is held.

The range/scaling of some knobs feels a bit weird. Meaning, the most usable area is a small area of the knob range.
For example, the Low Pass Filter Cutoff. While it sounds good, it's difficult do dial in. As it is now, the values 100-4324 equate to about 0-23% knob rotation.
I think 100-4324 should be 0-50% knob rotation so it's easier to dial in. The same type of thing applies to other values such as Resonance, Portamento, LFO Frequency.

I like the ARP very much. It would be even better if there was another "page" for creating, editing arp/sequences, & loading MIDI, but I do like it as it is.

< > arrows would be a nice addition for selecting presets. Also, when the preset list becomes large, it would be good to display them in columns to there is minimal scrolling needed.

A Compressor/Limiter at the end of the signal would be quite useful.

Great job guys! Thanks for making the awesome new Vaporizer synthI look forward to the evolution of this synth! :)

Best,
Ed

riihi's picture

Submitted by riihi on Wed, 01/28/2015 - 16:07.

I'll add to this, regarding the arpeggiator and its sync switch .. If the host sequencer is stopped, but I'm playing some notes with the arpeggiator on, and at the same time switch the sync on, the note gets stuck (and it's not arpeggiating). The sync mode works only if the sequencer is playing, I don't know if that's a technical demand, but it would be nice if it worked without the host sequencer playing -- it would allow rehearsing/playing around before recording.

Another small niggle I noticed is that some of the faders get stuck in their highest position. Not all, but some. For example, the ATK and DEC on the VCA module do that, but not the SUS and REL. Drag them to the top position, release mouse; the fader is stuck, I can't drag them down anymore (mouse scroll wheel does lower them and so does setting their numerical values or clicking on the darker slide area --- just the fader knob itself is stuck). Now that I test it further it seems only the VCA does that (and on that side, would be nice if the decay could go much longer..).