Anthony Marinelli channel

[BluMunk]

5 hours ago, Jim Alfredson said:

Marinelli briefly touched on the interface aspect. That's the big problem. Yes, softsynths are amazing. Pigments by Arturia is one of the best sounding synths of all time, hardware or software, imo. And it can basically do anything. BUT... it simply isn't as fun to use as a big old knobby synth. The interface of analog synths inspires you to mess around, experiment, and play! Until the issue of tactile inspiration can be solved, I don't think digital will replace analog.

 

Isn't it solved though? Is there anything about digital that prevents it from having the same tactile knobby goodness as a favorite analog? 

It seems to me that the issue is a different one that they touch on in the video: digital technology has so many more possibilities that it has potential for no limitations. But without limitations, where does the thrill of discovery and refinement of concepts come from? Want digital that's just as inspirational and fun as analog? Slap a knobby interface on it, and resist the urge to design in features more complicated than the interface can handle. Refuse to add any features behind a 'shift' button.

 

[Floyd Tatum]

1 hour ago, BluMunk said:

Isn't it solved though? Is there anything about digital that prevents it from having the same tactile knobby goodness as a favorite analog? 
It seems to me that the issue is a different one that they touch on in the video: digital technology has so many more possibilities that it has potential for no limitations. But without limitations, where does the thrill of discovery and refinement of concepts come from? Want digital that's just as inspirational and fun as analog? Slap a knobby interface on it, and resist the urge to design in features more complicated than the interface can handle. Refuse to add any features behind a 'shift' button.

Marinelli was talking about vst (and other computer-based) synths, not hardware digital synths, so, apples and oranges.

[Tusker]

8 minutes ago, Floyd Tatum said:

Marinelli was talking about vst (and other computer-based) synths, not hardware digital synths, so, apples and oranges.

 

There are so many different use cases and preferences. I admit at the outset, digital tools can't solve every problem. Do you think a Fader Fox PC12 would address most of the need for knobs?

 

 

 

And could one of the controllers from Soundforce address the need for a more precisely emulated interface?

 

 

I admit I personally don't see a need for either. Just wondering, since these products seem to meet the needs of some folks who like their soft synths with knobs.

 

 

 

[Floyd Tatum]

Those are aftermarket knob interfaces.   The first one is probably too generic to be really useful.   The second less so.

But, again, knob interfaces, whether built-in or aftermarket, are not what Marinelli was discussing with the other guy (can't remember name right now).    They were discussing vst-style softsynths, using a mouse interface.   Apples and oranges.

[CyberGene]

I think it was @konaboy who had the idea of having a big hardware knob (encoder) connected to your computer and then use it to control software synths by turning it when hovering the cursor over the various on-screen controls. I think it’s a great idea, not sure why nobody has implemented it yet. 

[Tusker]

28 minutes ago, CyberGene said:

I think it was @konaboy who had the idea of having a big hardware knob (encoder) connected to your computer and then use it to control software synths by turning it when hovering the cursor over the various on-screen controls. I think it’s a great idea, not sure why nobody implemented it yet. 

 

That's a fantastically ergonomic idea. I've sometimes found it hard to reach a hardware knob or slider once you have a few hardware synths around you. Interface re-usability would solve that problem.

 

In some DAW controllers the hardware sliders and knobs remap to different channel strips as your area of focus changes from one channel strip to another. Something like that would be cool for parameters like ADSRs, which might appear 2-3- times on an interface.

 

Maybe MIDI 2.0 (or CLAP) would allow soft synths to communicate these parameters to the controller hardware? 

[jazzpiano88]

Anthony has a video on this  

 

[Floyd Tatum]

1 hour ago, CyberGene said:

I think it was @konaboy who had the idea of having a big hardware knob (encoder) connected to your computer and then use it to control software synths by turning it when hovering the cursor over the various on-screen controls. I think it’s a great idea, not sure why nobody has implemented it yet. 

I don't see that as being much of an improvement over using a mouse.   You're just using a knob instead of a mouse.   The thing being discussed was the idea of adjusting one parameter at a time, whether it be by a mouse or a knob.

The other guy (still can't remember his name - let's call him MG (Mouse Guy 🙂), may know synthesizers so well that he has a map of the whole thing in his mind, so that controlling one thing at a time is not a problem, for him.   But I think there are lots of people that don't have that deep an understanding of what they're doing.

For beginners, learning is probably superior on a knob-based hardware synth.   Then again, there might be a whole new generation of kids growing up on vst-style synths.

[JoJoB3]

14 hours ago, AROIOS said:

It's part nostalgia, part snobbism, and part simple human nature.

I look at film snobs and their "wine critic" style language with cringe, as I do most self-claimed audiophiles. But what they see and hear, are often more than just imagined fair dust.

A key aesthetic of films is their luminance response curve, which elevates the darkest pixels and compresses the brightest ones.

My hypothesis of why that's pleasing is simple: extreme darkness or brightness reduce our ancestors' chances of survival.

 

It's not usually 'snobbery' but artistic decision to work within the medium (to meet the intention, whatever it may be. That's up to the artist). There are techniques and decisions to be made in working with film medium. This usually affords unique results when in the right hands/mind.

 

* That and it's fun. CGI will never scare me, there's no weight. Practical fx will always reign supreme!!! 

Also, 16:9 anamorphic film is a powerful force...like a fine McIntosh with matched quad 6550 paired with quality vinyl!  We need more Rob Bottins in the world!

 

[Tusker]

46 minutes ago, Floyd Tatum said:

The other guy (still can't remember his name - let's call him MG (Mouse Guy 🙂)

 

Let's not. His name is Mark Barton. 🙂

 

"Mark Barton is a brilliant audio engineer, with a list of accomplishments a mile long. In the 1970s, Mark designed the Pollard Industries Syndrum, which defined the sound of electronic drums for the disco generation. He's also done groundbreaking work in speech synthesis, including writing the MacInTalk text-to-speech system for the first Apple Macintosh computer, and designed the innovative Zeroscillator hardware synthesizer module for Cyndustries. For the past five years, Mark has been bringing his talents to Cherry Audio with modules and bundles for Voltage Modular under the MRB Labs and Cherry Audio/MRB brands, and has contributed to the wildly popular instruments Miniverse, Novachord + Solovox, GX-80, Lowdown, Eight Voice, Rackmode Signal Processors, and, most recently, Synthesizer Expander Module and Pro Soloist."

[BluMunk]

2 hours ago, Floyd Tatum said:

Marinelli was talking about vst (and other computer-based) synths, not hardware digital synths, so, apples and oranges.

I don't know if that's as clear as you make it out to be. In the interview, Mark asks something like "if we could replace the guts of that synth over there with a digital recreation, but keep all the interface the same, how would you feel?"... and Anthony says something along the lines of "well, probably, I'd be fine with it," but kind of struggled with the concept.

And, I think @Jim Alfredson was referring to digital in general, not VSTs specifically (though am happy to be corrected). There's a discussion to be had about mouse/keyboard/screen interfaces vs. knobby/slider-y interfaces that has nothing to do with the words analog and digital.

[konaboy]

1 hour ago, Floyd Tatum said:

I don't see that as being much of an improvement over using a mouse.   You're just using a knob instead of a mouse.   The thing being discussed was the idea of adjusting one parameter at a time, whether it be by a mouse or a knob.

because pointing, clicking and then dragging the mouse up and dow with wrist is fatiguing, inaccurate and tedious compared with pointing and turning a knob.

[Floyd Tatum]

1 hour ago, Tusker said:

Let's not. His name is Mark Barton. 🙂

"Mark Barton is a brilliant audio engineer, with a list of accomplishments a mile long. In the 1970s, Mark designed the Pollard Industries Syndrum, which defined the sound of electronic drums for the disco generation. He's also done groundbreaking work in speech synthesis, including writing the MacInTalk text-to-speech system for the first Apple Macintosh computer, and designed the innovative Zeroscillator hardware synthesizer module for Cyndustries. For the past five years, Mark has been bringing his talents to Cherry Audio with modules and bundles for Voltage Modular under the MRB Labs and Cherry Audio/MRB brands, and has contributed to the wildly popular instruments Miniverse, Novachord + Solovox, GX-80, Lowdown, Eight Voice, Rackmode Signal Processors, and, most recently, Synthesizer Expander Module and Pro Soloist."

Excuuuse me.  🙂

 

[jazzpiano88]

2 hours ago, JoJoB3 said:

Also, 16:9 anamorphic film is a powerful force..

That reminds me…. At the tail end of CRT television technology I owned a massive Sony that would perform the 16x9 anamorphic squeeze in analog, vertically compressing (squeezing) an encoded source dvd into 16x9 on the CRT. I thought that was the cat’s meow at the time.  Always had to make sure the DVD was 16x9 anamorphic when purchasing.   

[AROIOS]

19 hours ago, Tusker said:

...The most intuitive interface I have ever seen is for a recently released beta version of a free synth. For me it's better than knobs, because you can actually see sound and shape it. On an analog synth (and I love analog synths!) I have to imagine things...

It gets exponentially more complicated and unintuitive when we bring in envelope_depth, key/velocity_dependent_cutoff/resonance, LFO_destinations...

And then let's add two more layers... 😃

I love the possibilities offered by the infinite amount of combinations with these controls, but often find myself on a journey driven by serendipity rather than intention. Well, there's a good reason I'm not John "Skippy" Lehmkuhl, Howard Scarr or Eric Persing.

[AROIOS]

12 hours ago, JoJoB3 said:

 

It's not usually 'snobbery' but artistic decision to work within the medium (to meet the intention, whatever it may be. That's up to the artist). There are techniques and decisions to be made in working with film medium. This usually affords unique results when in the right hands/mind.

 

* That and it's fun. CGI will never scare me, there's no weight. Practical fx will always reign supreme!!! 

Also, 16:9 anamorphic film is a powerful force...like a fine McIntosh with matched quad 6550 paired with quality vinyl!  We need more Rob Bottins in the world!

 

All the power to you, brother, if you know what you are after.

[AROIOS]

14 hours ago, CyberGene said:

I think it was @konaboy who had the idea of having a big hardware knob (encoder) connected to your computer and then use it to control software synths by turning it when hovering the cursor over the various on-screen controls. I think it’s a great idea, not sure why nobody has implemented it yet. 

11 hours ago, konaboy said:

because pointing, clicking and then dragging the mouse up and dow with wrist is fatiguing, inaccurate and tedious compared with pointing and turning a knob.

A lot of synths support "hover and scroll" with mouse wheels. So clicking and dragging aren't really necessary.

What we really need, BADLY, are mouse wheels with finer increments (more clicks per inch). And better yet, UI code libraries that incorporate good mouse wheel acceleration algorithms (similar to what Microsoft does in Windows for low-res mouse movements).

Logitech's Infinite-Scroll is a nice design, but it only solved the problem of scrolling through long documents, and don't work well with sliders and knobs in apps like Photoshop, DAWs, VSTs etc.

[AROIOS]

<Merged with post above>

[Tusker]

3 hours ago, AROIOS said:

It gets exponentially more complicated and unintuitive when we bring in envelope_depth, key/velocity_dependent_cutoff/resonance, LFO_destinations...

And then let's add two more layers... 😃

I love the possibilities offered by the infinite amount of combinations with these controls, but often find myself on a journey driven by serendipity rather than intention. Well, there's a good reason I'm not John "Skippy" Lehmkuhl, Howard Scarr or Eric Persing.

 

Yes for sure, one Zebrallete 3 oscillator is a whole universe. You don't have to mess with the other stuff if you don't want to. It's like a Moog. No velocity. No aftertouch. Just great sound. I totally get it's not for everyone. 👍

 

 

 

[konaboy]

4 hours ago, AROIOS said:

A lot of synths support "hover and scroll" with mouse wheels. So clicking and dragging aren't really necessary.

What we really need, BADLY, are mouse wheels with finer increments (more clicks per inch). And better yet, UI code libraries that incorporate good mouse wheel acceleration algorithms (similar to what Microsoft does in Windows for low-res mouse movements).

Logitech's Infinite-Scroll is a nice design, but it only solved the problem of scrolling through long documents, and don't work well with sliders and knobs in apps like Photoshop, DAWs, VSTs etc.

Indeed, the mousewheel never works great in my experience for plugin control.  for some synths the knob moves too much for each wheel increment, and for others it's painfully slow so you have to spin the mousewheel for ages just to get a small parameter change. and the software vendors of the plugins have yet to make that a preference setting.

 

and let's be honest, rolling a mouse wheel is not the same satisfying experience as turning a quality knob. That's how we are used to editing synths, hence my original proposal for the Woody "Hover Knob" .

[Thethirdapple]

I use the various controls surfaces differently based on the creative flow. A mouse, knob, slider, key-bed etc are all just control surfaces.

 

Sitting in front of a DAW working with tracks with time to pause and adjust parameters is different than a live performance or jam in which the access to modulation control needs to be fluid. Using a mouse is great for certain focused tasks but a physical slider works better in a performance. And menu diving sucks no matter what size the screen is...

 

This is perhaps the sense that making music and playing an instrument is distinct by how we interact with the "tool".

 

And IMHE, a big difference between "analog" and "digital" is the unavoidable reality that digital makes use of integers which are by nature: steps... Using  purely analog gear with voltage sliders creates all sorts of in-betweens and "not quite" positions which simply are not possible with integers.

 

When sliding a fader on the Juno-6, I get all sorts of in-betweens and as the age of the fader increases its dynamic nature changes and as with voltage changes with outlet variations. This makes analog gear much more inline with "acoustic" instruments which age well or not.

 

So sure we have increased digital resolution to mimic the continuous sweeping nature of electricity. but...

 

 

Side-note: How is this not a thing ?

Why aren’t there any foot faders as a control surface?  While there are a few known custom builds with mostly switches I can’t find any historical trace of any commercially available… Not even an expression pedal board with more than two pedals! Has anybody ever tried?

 

luckily I don’t have fat toes! 🤪

 

 

Steve Howe custom build "QUARK" from yester-year but otherwise, nothing ?!?!

 

 

 

PEACE

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[Tusker]

1 hour ago, Thethirdapple said:

Side-note: How is this not a thing ?

Why aren’t there any foot faders as a control surface?  While there are a few known custom builds with mostly switches I can’t find any historical trace of any commercially available… Not even an expression pedal board with more than two pedals! Has anybody ever tried?

 

luckily I don’t have fat toes! 🤪

 

 

 

Love this!! 💪  What do you control with it?

[Tusker]

17 hours ago, Floyd Tatum said:

Excuuuse me.  🙂

 

 

No offence taken. None intended bro. 👍 👍 Mark's a terrifically helpful guy and he's been posting here. When we did a team review of his GX80, he was kind enough to dive into the weeds with us.

 

So I thought it would help if he was introduced a bit. 🙂

[stoken6]

4 hours ago, Thethirdapple said:

Why aren’t there any foot faders as a control surface?

A USB expression pedal would be a simple starting point for this project, combined with @konaboy Woody's idea. The "gap" is the software that maps it to the on-screen UI element. (If it could emulate a high-resolution mouse wheel, that would be a meaningful start). 

 

Then we can all start complaining about the "action/feel" of the one pedal.

 

Cheers, Mike

[kpl1228]

On 3/5/2024 at 2:38 PM, Old No7 said:

 

Plus, after 9 to 11 hours spent on a work computer every day, the very LAST thing I want to do is to start up yet another computer...................  Ugh...

THIS is beyond accurate! 

It's like all the people that ask me why I haven't seen Breaking Bad, a show about a balding aging middle aged public high school teacher in New Mexico, when I, a balding aging middle aged public high school teacher in New Mexico, lives it every day. Well, maybe not the cooking meth part. (Maybe I should just so I can finally get an OB-X8.)

Sometimes you want a break from the tools you work with at your job and in your life all day.

"But I can have all the sounds I want from my iPhone!"

My God........can't we ever just walk away from VSTs and software and iPhones and tablets and just plug in cool hardware keyboard stuff and twist real knobs and rock out!??!!!

It's like this forum: it's a break from the everyday for a lot of us. Separation of tools of daily life from the tools we use for music is refreshing and healing.

[Tusker]

Speaking of pedals, why do I feel a need to post a picture of Joe Zawinul's feet?

 

 

.. and Vangelis' feet? 😄

 

[Jim Alfredson]

3 hours ago, Tusker said:

 

No offence taken. None intended bro. 👍 👍 Mark's a terrifically helpful guy and he's been posting here. When we did a team review of his GX80, he was kind enough to dive into the weeds with us.

 

So I thought it would help if he was introduced a bit. 🙂

Mark's cool. But your link to that thread reminded me of the perfect example of what I and others are talking about in regards to the software / digital vs hardware / analog debate. 

This picture says it all:

Just looking at that gives me anxiety and fills me with dread. I have absolutely no interest in tweaking those tiny skeuomorphic controls or trying to decipher the miniscule text. Yes, the interface can be resized but it's a prime example of why accurately depicting the panel and controls of analog synths in the digital / plugin world is fraught with ergonomic issues.

To solve this, developers should offer both the skeuomorphic interface but also a modern skin with tabs for different sections, optimized controls, more easily readable text, etc. Take advantage of the digital realm instead of trying to shoehorn the analog into it. For example, yes of course the original CS80 had a ribbon but why take up space with a 'virtual one' in the interface? Are you really going to rock out on that tiny ribbon with your mouse?

This same line of thinking can be applied to many things that have been fully digitized. Why is album art still square? Why aren't labels and artists using the full capabilities of the smartphone format, since that's how the vast majority of people listen to music now? Why isn't album art interactive, moving, with different sections for 'artist notes', credits, photos from the sessions, etc? 

Technology has advanced so far and I feel like we're still stuck in a 1980s mindset when it comes to interacting with it.

 

 

 

[Thethirdapple]

5 hours ago, Tusker said:

 

Love this!! 💪  What do you control with it?

1 hour ago, stoken6 said:

A USB expression pedal would be a simple starting point for this project, combined with @konaboy Woody's idea. The "gap" is the software that maps it to the on-screen UI element. (If it could emulate a high-resolution mouse wheel, that would be a meaningful start). 

 

Then we can all start complaining about the "action/feel" of the one pedal.

 

Cheers, Mike

 

@TuskerThank you, I have been controlling a bunch of soft synths and older midi enabled processing units, with an aspiration to blend non-midi gear with contemporary gear. There's a certain frustration playing on non-one-to-one physical control surface due to the latching conundrum. Motorized faders do a nice job, but this is only one side of the equation with soft synths: depth of screens. Changing parameters or "screen navigation" does not always send corresponding cc data to update a fader. 

 

@stoken6 Indeed, we have an ever growing number of different pedals from both vintage gear as well as fully midi enable etc. current solutions... more, must have more

 

So I have been making some visual/translator solutions with Ctrlr. This allows for the various screen diving scenarios from hell to be visualized however I choose to represent the signal chain. This example happens to be for a recent fascination with the KARMA platform for programming midi events and realtime performance modeling.

 

There are a number of scenarios in which my feet aren't doing much. So, put them to work and makes for hands free modulations which don't have to be automated or triggered.

 

PEACE

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[CyberGene]

37 minutes ago, Jim Alfredson said:

Why isn't album art interactive, moving

I’ve started seeing some animated album art on Apple Music streaming, sometimes even for vintage albums and wondered whether it’s made by Apple in-house artists or the labels are slowly adopting 21st century capabilities. 

[CyberGene]