John Bowen Synth Design

by **nachtsmeer** » Fri Apr 23, 2010 4:31 am

I love the formant filter on the Solaris plugin, so I'm REALLII looking forward to trying out some ideas when the keyboard arrives

Just imangine what you can do with a big sack full of modulators, a sprinkling of formants and the ribbon controller

by **scope4live** » Wed Apr 21, 2010 10:59 am

Or do King Of Pain by Sting, or Africa by Porcaro fron Toto.
When it first came out the biggest plus was it was polyphonic and the ribbon controller.
The Part I liked was semi PAT implementation that allowed voice leading in chords with a little pressure.
But at the end of the day the Oberheim gave it a beating and put production out of business.
Thankfully they were built really well. Back then Yamaha made gear that lasted.
I still have the DMP7 & QX-1 that work flawlessley.
Good thing too, because I never met a single tech who could work on it.
They didn't even have a manual............
It really was a pleasure to play though when you had a crew to carry it.
I was really quite buffed as a kid from sports and Tae Kwon Do, but I would put the CS80 on the Rhodes with help and watch it's steel legs tremble. 200lbs. it seemed like.
I found a jpeg of myself on Google playing it live.
http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl= ... s%3Disch:1

edit: you know you're old when internet links about you are dead......
http://forums.planetz.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=25039
Here's a copy of it on an old thread in a synth forum I pasted it to. I don't know how to use the img. features here.
The B3 Yamaha CP70 Moog and Oberheim aren't pictured.
But it was a nice rig for a kid....

by **marzzz** » Tue Apr 20, 2010 7:41 pm

Well, I think the relatively few of us who would like to see a CS-80 filter think it can wait until after the Solaris is in production. Besides, they aren't in a any rush to film "BladeRunner II!"

by **scope4live** » Tue Apr 20, 2010 12:40 pm

I beg to differ about the CS-80.
I Bought mine in '78 and paid a hefty 6800 USD for it.
I was a kid and knew nothing except how to perform. But after studying the layout I learned how to get what I want out of it.
But as soon as the Oberheim OBX and Prophet V were released I ditched the CS-80 because it was not capable of cutting through the mix of 4 Guitars.
It sounded cool no doubt, but it's best sound was a polyphonic pad made of Saws and the FIlter everyone likes to rave about was basically a Super BPF which I can emulate in Prowave or Solaris plugs effortlessley.
I really hope we don't add any more production time just to have another variation of a Band Pass Filter.
Zarg's ProOne has BP Filter variations that can do what the CS80 did, so I imagine using a BPF/Envelope Combination can get any CS80 sound ever made.
I am sure if the Formant Filters and a 12db BPF comes in Solaris that would be plenty of Waspy sounds.

by **John Bowen** » Fri Apr 09, 2010 8:03 pm

O.K., thanks to Tom, I can see that the CS-80 and CS-60 filter is a state variable 12 dB filter module. Both of these synths have 2 of these modules, with one set to Highpass (which is first in the signal chain) and the other to Lowpass (so, 2nd in series). I'll have my coder look at it, and see if there's anything in the schematics that is sufficiently different from the 12 dB filters we currently have....and also get his estimate as to what additional time and work would be needed to emulate other aspects of the design if needed.
-John B.

by **marzzz** » Fri Apr 09, 2010 9:53 am

galaxiesmerge wrote: One of the secrets to the CS80 sound is the Sine Wave sub-oscillators that feed with the sound into the filters (something almost everyone forgets to mention as a key part of the deep sound).

On the CS-80 it is not actually a sub-oscillator (in Yamaha-speak that is what they called the LFO on the CS-80) but the sine wave output of the Oscillator itself that is fed back in post-filter. This should be very easy to do with either a second oscillator or perhaps driving a filter to self-oscillate and mixing it back in? The CS-80 itself is (mutliwave)VCO->HPF->LPF->VCA(where sine is added back in), two of these in parallel (CS-60 is just one). This should be very easy to do on the Solaris.

by **marzzz** » Fri Apr 09, 2010 9:45 am

tmoravan wrote:as most folks know, with old analogs the filter is only 1 part of the equation. The CS-80 sounds so big and present when you play it and that presence cannot be easily emulated. The ribbon and polyaftertouch (and chorus and ring mod and ...) also contribute to a unique playing experience.

This is certainly true, and on the Solaris a lot of this can be approximated (especially if you have a PolyAT controller and if the ribbon can be programmed to be zero touch-point in function). The Solaris itself sounds big enough (listen to the "Ober Time" patch live) to carry off that CS-80 weight.

That being said, the addition of a CS-80 like filter to the Solaris would be welcomed at some point afer version 1.0 is out the door.

I concur, when the time is right I hope JB will be able to pursue this.

by **tmoravan** » Fri Apr 09, 2010 7:33 am

as most folks know, with old analogs the filter is only 1 part of the equation. The CS-80 sounds so big and present when you play it and that presence cannot be easily emulated. The ribbon and polyaftertouch (and chorus and ring mod and ...) also contribute to a unique playing experience.

That being said, the addition of a CS-80 like filter to the Solaris would be welcomed at some point afer version 1.0 is out the door.

by **marzzz** » Fri Apr 09, 2010 6:54 am

John Bowen wrote:I got to play with a CS-60 today - the filters sounded very smooth.

Since a CS-60 is just basically 1/2 of a CS-80, that would be a great synth to borrow and try to emulate- the Solaris would turn it into a CS-80 in no time. I would just love it if you can get the coders to work on that sometime in the future, and I can't imagine that enhanced CS-80 emulation wouldn't attract a lot of additional interest to the Solaris.

by **tmoravan** » Fri Apr 09, 2010 5:59 am

John Bowen wrote:I got to play with a CS-60 today - the filters sounded very smooth.
Does anyone know the technical details of these (being lazy and not searching the Web yet)?
-John B.

John - I'm sending you what I have on it to your bigplanet email address.

Tom

by **John Bowen** » Thu Apr 08, 2010 5:28 pm

ThreeFingersOfLove wrote:Yeah, adding sinewaves to a signal is a typical trick in the CSxx synths. I would love to see this implemented, too.

Of course, you can use a couple of the oscillators to do this...have a 2 osc patch doubled up with sine waves.
JB

by **John Bowen** » Thu Apr 08, 2010 5:18 pm

I got to play with a CS-60 today - the filters sounded very smooth.
Does anyone know the technical details of these (being lazy and not searching the Web yet)?
-John B.

by **ThreeFingersOfLove** » Thu Apr 08, 2010 3:33 am

galaxiesmerge wrote:
marzzz wrote:Voyager? Andromeda? Hey Seamonkey, have you been sneaking into my studio?????

LOVE LOVE LUUURVVE the new ribbon- had no idea that this would happen, it is one of my favorite things on the A6 and allows you to get "really physical" with playing the synth. I agree the current prototype looks a bit ugly- may I suggest making the ribbon fairly dark, and perhaps minimizing (or even eliminating) any markings on it? Maybe just some subtle "fret marks" on the synth itself, and leave the ribbon plain?

First time I have seen the colored wheels. Might have to add that to my preorder. Love that it is controllable, my Voyager has the red "Fire" wheels which look great in the dark, I never did like the harsh blue.

Oh yeah, the controllable vocal filter- that is going to be fun. I assume it will be controllable from the ribbon and wheels (simultaneously even?) also? And while we're at it, maybe we can see some other filters in the future, like perhaps CS-80/GX-1 style filters?
I second the vote for the GX1/CS80 filters. One of the secrets to the CS80 sound is the Sine Wave sub-oscillators that feed with the sound into the filters (something almost everyone forgets to mention as a key part of the deep sound).

Yeah, adding sinewaves to a signal is a typical trick in the CSxx synths. I would love to see this implemented, too.

by **galaxiesmerge** » Mon Apr 05, 2010 8:58 am

marzzz wrote:Voyager? Andromeda? Hey Seamonkey, have you been sneaking into my studio?????

LOVE LOVE LUUURVVE the new ribbon- had no idea that this would happen, it is one of my favorite things on the A6 and allows you to get "really physical" with playing the synth. I agree the current prototype looks a bit ugly- may I suggest making the ribbon fairly dark, and perhaps minimizing (or even eliminating) any markings on it? Maybe just some subtle "fret marks" on the synth itself, and leave the ribbon plain?

First time I have seen the colored wheels. Might have to add that to my preorder. Love that it is controllable, my Voyager has the red "Fire" wheels which look great in the dark, I never did like the harsh blue.

Oh yeah, the controllable vocal filter- that is going to be fun. I assume it will be controllable from the ribbon and wheels (simultaneously even?) also? And while we're at it, maybe we can see some other filters in the future, like perhaps CS-80/GX-1 style filters?

I second the vote for the GX1/CS80 filters. One of the secrets to the CS80 sound is the Sine Wave sub-oscillators that feed with the sound into the filters (something almost everyone forgets to mention as a key part of the deep sound).

by **John Bowen** » Wed Mar 31, 2010 3:23 pm

Hi Everybody!
I'm back home now...really nice of Delamar.tv to post such long videos! I sort of expected they would just edit it down to a few minutes. We were having problems getting the 2 cameras in a good position, where you could see both the interviewer and myself plus what I was doing with the synth, and what the displays showed, so we kept trying different angles. That's one of the reasons it jumps around a bit.

Overall, a really good response to Solaris again at the show! Of course, it was helpful to be in the same booth as Moog Music instruments, which occurred because we agreed to a deal with the same distributor (who will handle dealer sales in Germany & Austria). This company (EMC) are all a great group of guys who know synthesizers inside and out. One of the members, Kurt Ader, is also a major sound designer (as KARO Sound Development) for many other companies, and I expect he & his team will be making some wonderful sounds for Solaris as well.

Looking forward to finally getting production going once we receive all of the needed parts, hopefully by end of May.

Cheers,
John Bowen

John Bowen Synth Design

video from Messe 2010

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