[Joe Hanley]

Try this:

Oscillator: Saw

LFO 1: Reeeeally SLOW triangle wave with a LARGE mod amount that will do the big dramatic up and down pitch movement.

LFO 2: Reeeally FAST triangle wave with a TINY mod amount to create an aggressive vibrato

Delay: Fast and long delay with decent amount of mix so that delays overlap the original sound in a way that creates more flutter

Reverb: Really heavy and big to push the sound way back in the mix and envelop it in verb.

[Joe Hanley]

You can tell each Oscillator which filter (1 or 2) to go through. You’ll see this option at the bottom left of each oscillator. By default, as you’ll see in your patch, Osc 1 is routed through Filter 1, and Osc 2 is routed through Filter 2. So Osc 2 is not affected by the Filter 1 Envelope movement. Change Osc 2 to “Filter 1” and it should sound right.

1 user thanked author for this post.

bungalow bill

[Joe Hanley]

Can you zip the vital patch and upload it? The forum denied the .vital file.

1 user thanked author for this post.

bungalow bill

[Joe Hanley]

Hi Markus

Are you running Diva in a DAW? If so, I recommend downloading Primer as a plug-in from your online account and loading it on a separate track in your DAW. Then you can go back and forth between the Diva and Primer tracks.

1 user thanked author for this post.

Markus Betz

[Joe Hanley]

Part of me thinks it’s a sampled instrument like Piano or E Piano, part of me thinks it’s a synth. For the synth you could try:

Oscillators: Two of them, Medium Pulse Waves, one octave apart.

Filter: LP 24 dB, turned down a little above midway, with the Res turned way up. That will give it the really “shaped” sound

Effects: Several “swirling” effects like Chorus, Flanger, and Phaser. You could try any or all 3 and really play around with the settings.

[Joe Hanley]

That is a little trickier than it seemed. For the timbre:

Oscillator: I think it’s a Pulse wave, but you have to set the Pulse Width just right. Somewhere between Square and Medium. I also think it’s two oscillators very slightly detuned from each other just to create a subtle smearing shine on it.

Filter: Take a bit off the highs with a LP filter.

LFO: Very subtle and slow pitch modulation to make it sound just a little out of tune

[Joe Hanley]

Ankit Taneja wrote:

Jon, what do you think about PWM Malevolent as a beginner synth.

Looks like a cool synth. The modular capabilities are nice, allows for a lot of exploration.

It has less parameter overlap with Syntorial though. In particular, no effects, though you could use guitar pedals. And a few less parameter options here and there. But it would still work.

So it really boils down to whether you want the more-overlapping-parameters of the Minilogue for ~$150 more, or the modular capabilities of Malevolent.

[Joe Hanley]

I think you’re better off taking a sample approach there. It has a very organic quality to it that you might be able to replicate on a synth, but will get much closer with a sample. To me that sounds like a bowed eastern string instrument. Maybe not even processed that much. Look at “world” or “eastern” libraries and you’ll probably find something close.

[Joe Hanley]

Benedikt Baumgarten wrote:

If you find a good offer for Minilogue why not…Pro-800 might also be an interesting choice, if you have a MIDI keyboard. And you pay equal or less for a new one than you would probably pay for a used Minilogue (yet I don’t know if it has all the features required to follow along the complete Syntorial content).

The Minilogue XD is one of the closest hardware synths to Syntorial, in terms of features. I have it myself and they are closely aligned in design (plus you get the expandability in the 3rd oscillator which gives room to grow).

[Joe Hanley]

John Dillinger wrote:

On this same subject Ive been trying to figure out the Buzzy/Humming/Whirring Synth in VNV Nation’s “Chrome” got slightly close with Osc sync.. but not close enough. Starts at around 2:50 and the then the filter opens .. but then it morphs through the rest of the song..

Hmmm this one is tough. I think it requires two separate layers:

LAYER 1 – Main sound

Oscillator: Medium Pulse Width

Filter: Band Pass, heavily driven, and slowly modulating upward via an Envelope Attack, but only just a little

Voice: Legato with noticeable portamento

Distortion: Grit

Chorus: Subtle but widens, smears, and moves

Phaser: Whirring sound

LAYER 2 – Noise

White Noise

Filter: Band Pass, but it didn’t sound right going through the same filter as the other layer. The cutoff needs to be higher to remove lows, and way less drive so it doesn’t break up

Distortion: Way less drive. Again we don’t want it to crackle. Just be a little dirty

Chorus/Phaser: Same as other layer

[Joe Hanley]

Colin Lawrence wrote:

I don’t know what version Primer is as I deleted the plugin from my DAW.

Got it. Well if you ever decide to use Primer again, download and installing the latest version may fix the issue. If it doesn’t we can do some deeper debugging to figure out what’s happening.

[Joe Hanley]

If you click “Primer” in the center, what version does it show?

[Joe Hanley]

Colin Lawrence wrote:

Primer crashes in Logic Pro.

Sorry to hear that. Does it crash immediately after opening it? Or after performing an action in it (clicking a control, playing a note, etc)?

[Joe Hanley]

Two things:

1. Change the filter from LP12 to LP24
2. With the filter selected, in the center black section, at the bottom middle under the “Freq Mod” line, change “Env” to 0.

Now it should be much closer. You can also boost Analaog’s Res a bit to match the filter’s character a bit more.

[Joe Hanley]

Try it with Analog, save the preset, zip it, and upload it here. I’ll take a look.