Solaris keyboard - specifications

Discuss John Bowen Synths - Solaris
epoxy2600
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Post by epoxy2600 »

It looks beautiful. For some reason I really like the appearance of those angled accent lines that frame the different sections. Makes the panel look very futuristic, yet still clear and not flashy/obnoxious. Hope those graphics are kept! Seeing this mockup of the light color panel makes me reconsider my original choice of wanting the dark one...this picture just looks sooooo cool. :)
seamonkey
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Post by seamonkey »

Beautiful!! Great job, congrats to you John and the entire development team.:)
Fidgit
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Post by Fidgit »

these "angled accent lines" do not add any value from my perspective. they don't make the panel easier to read, don't give much additional structure.
they just fill it with more stuff for its own sake. shouldn't design follow functionality? :roll:

besides of that: excellent.
scope4live
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Post by scope4live »

Marvellous JB.

I take pride in knowing this will soon be mine. :lol:

One more idiotic question though.

The idea of the ribbon on the left side, closet to other controllers is conveient and well chosen. I was wondering though if the ribbon would be capable of inverted glides, i.e. going left to right is the normal glide up option, but it does take you away from the other controllers. Is it possible to invert the glide so that one could go right to left and have it act as a glide up? It would be nice to have the vector / pitch / ModWhl's close to my pinky for tweaking the end of the glides with.
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John Bowen
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Post by John Bowen »

Buddha says, 'All things are possible.'
:-)

OK, joking aside - I see you are thinking using the ribbon as a pitch control only? It is just another source in the Modulation List, and can be assigned anywhere (and as in the plug-in, all mod amounts are bi-polar).

-john b.

p.s. we did have that version with the ribbon spreading over to the joystick/left side, but felt that (1) it might impede use of the joystick for 'lazy hands', and (2) it would be nice to have it above the keyboard - I like to be playing a chord (right hand) and bass (left hand), and to be able to reach up with a left finger to mess with the ribbon.
stardust
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Post by stardust »

well placed as it is. lefthand for modulating. Similar to the modwheel and joystick .
scope4live
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Post by scope4live »

Bi-Polar of course. :idea:

Thanks JB.
Great idea for pushing Bass also. :lol:
Actually I use the Ribbon for many tricks, but I think I will keep my Expressionmate for Solaris only. The additional Ribbon is an extra Bonus.

JV
drxcm
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Post by drxcm »

I like the new features for the layout. If I may chime in, and please do not take this the wrong way... I think you have done a wonderful job.

In my opinion, some of the layout is a bit 'busy' and could be easily cleaned up.. Personally I don't like the angled lines.

For example, the buttons above the displays should start no more to the left than the display itself. Also the spacing of the buttons above the touch strip seems a bit messy - constant spacing would be better perhaps?

see my quick photoshop job...

Image
Carbon111
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Post by Carbon111 »

I like the look of that too...as long as all the vertical lines and angled lines are removed. :wink:
Best Regards, James
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B787
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Post by B787 »

Question to JB,

As it concerns the sample playback (??), will there be wave tables or single cycle waveforms of varying -bits, like dirty 12-bit single cycle stuff, old atari type 8-bit ? Thinking about psycho-acoustic stuff, i am not 100% sure if the effect can be replicated on the solaris, understanding that the Solaris is not s sampler/rompler will we have the ability to play with frequencies at the percetive level ? since it's processing at 96khz. I hope it can be done or added as an option. 8)
"Enough silence can make good music great"
John Bowen
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Post by John Bowen »

There is an 'Insert FX' section where you can route the signals through such processes as Bit Reduction or Sample Frequency Decimation. The wavetables that are included are taken from the original Waldorf tables that were made for the Scope platform back in 1998, and the Prophet VS waveshapes are directly converted from the original 12-bit data files. Any other user waveshapes or samples will be at whatever bit depth they are - we are not including any 'factory installed' sample files.

-john b.
B787
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Post by B787 »

JB

About the rotors, is it possible to have the waves/sounds in the rotors modulated and auto panned within the 5.1 or 7.1 field ? so that sounds which were in the say left ch modulate say the resonance of a sound on the right or centre ch ? can aftertouch send signals to pan/modulate (adding snyced delays) in various amounts to each rotor sound within the surround field ? I hopw i'm not asking to much, this is of great interest to me, would be great if it could.

cheers.
B787
"Enough silence can make good music great"
seamonkey
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Post by seamonkey »

John Bowen wrote: The wavetables that are included are taken from the original Waldorf tables that were made for the Scope platform back in 1998-john b.
This is great information John, I knew the VS wavetables would be included but was unaware of the Waldorf ones.
I've been very seriously considering picking up a Waldorf Microwave 1 because of it's sound but will probably pass on that now. :D
John Bowen
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Post by John Bowen »

B787 wrote:About the rotors, is it possible to have the waves/sounds in the rotors modulated and auto panned within the 5.1 or 7.1 field ? so that sounds which were in the say left ch modulate say the resonance of a sound on the right or centre ch ? can aftertouch send signals to pan/modulate (adding snyced delays) in various amounts to each rotor sound within the surround field ? I hope i'm not asking to much, this is of great interest to me, would be great if it could.

cheers.
B787
Hmmmm....well, first, there's no 5.1 or 7.1 output, of course...just the stereo field. The panning module follows the Filter/VCA, and the filter can take any Audio input. A pre-panned output is also available as a Mod Source. I guess what you would have to do is:
1) route desired signal into Filter/VCA
2) Pan as desired.
3) Take the Filter/VCA output desired pre-panning and use it as a modulation for whatever on the other panned output signal

Not sure what you're trying to accomplish here....

re: Aftertouch - yes, it's routable to the Pan as a modulation source, but since AT is uni-polar, you can only move the signal from center to left or center to right, depending on the Mod Amount polarity.

cheers,
john b.
B787
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Post by B787 »

Helpful info JB Will make a note of it for when the Solaris is in the studio. Well for me what usually happens is that a modulated (VCA/filtered/panned) synth output is recorded in stereo, but then we have to code the sound so there's movement in the 5.1/7.1 field, copying and pasting the waveform in PT waves or some other surround plug-in in post production. What I was looking for was a way to have a continuously changing modulation of the output so that when we record it moves continuously so when placed into the field present......not sure if i explained it right. Since the rotor cycles through 4 wave forms / sound sources I was wondering if even with only 4 outputs it can be routed to each output, simulating a virtual multichannel bus system, each channel becomes a surround channel with the sub-bass added additionally. The thing is, each channel feels the effects of the modulation routing on each rotor sound source. a bit long, but maybe i could get a diagram for you.

Thanks JB
cheers
"Enough silence can make good music great"
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