No, for real. Enjoy. Feel free to post your getting started questions here, or as always email us at support@madronalabs.com. And thanks in advance for your patience while we handle a larger than usual volume of support emails.
Thanks for the update, i like the sound quality overall very much but i'd like to point out the filter sounds harsh with high q and in general its better bypassed , eg. the preset "pads/gentle drift" sounds harsh, it's much better with filter res turned down , output mod at 3 o' clock (turned down) and clipper on... With that in mind & the cpu consumption , maybe it's a good idea for some modules like the filter and space fx to be able to turn off and disable completely to save cpu?
Also it seems gain staging affects the sound even with the final clipper off , from what i read its the filter section that also adds non-linearity , after that the output graph is far from clipping the edges , is it calibrated to show digital peaks clipping (and the filter should be driven using your ears)...?
Thanks for the comments—what's harsh is very subjective, and another person might want to make sounds that you think are harsh. So my job is to leave room for all these possibilities!
When the filter is in "thru" mode, it doesn't take up CPU. Disabling space also is a reasonable idea. I'll take a look thanks.
Yes the filter section is very non-linear so turning up the gain 2x pre-filter will not result in 2x after. The output volume dial is post-filter and this is part of the reason for that. If you want more precise metering I recommend YouLean's loudness meter.
Yea it's subjective... maybe i sound harsh!
Regarding metering i mean the internal peaks before the final clipper, looks unintuitive because the waveform looks low vol but the clipper affects the sound a bunch, that's why i ask if it's working as intended , but anyway a bit on the trivial side of things, i'd actually like more gain in the output, it's rather silent.
About the filter non-linearity imho it would be a good addition to have on/off option like most modern softsynths and plenty of hw also! Just my feedback.
Also do you have a rough estimate of how many early access versions are planned?
Really unique synth especially in the sw realm and even more so in PC, thanks for creating this!
Thanks for the good words.
I'm planning to do an update of Early Access every few weeks until it's done, with 1.0 being in another 8 weeks or so.
Hi Randy, not having read the whole thread I may have missed it .... but will there be a "final call" for the early access discount?
I'm finding it hard to justify the spend at the moment, both to my self and the financial controller :) Not that Sumu isn't worth the price of admission!
@randy - sounds really nice... really enjoy it.
but... do you know when MPE and OSC will be added?
it's a pretty important part of ML plugins for me ;)
issues here in Live 12, Macbook M3 Pro, 14.1 with the latest release:
I am encountering a new bug where patches will just start pulsing, while the particles in the Space module randomly disperse in whichever way they see fit, even when nothing is patched into the module / there is no modulation. It is really frustrating... I've also noticed that the scale dial in Space also tends to generate audio artifacts when modulated, and the modulation itself is very... sequenced or stuttery, for lack of a better term. There is no smoothness to the modulation like I would expect. Is that intentional?
It affects the sound of the partials module (more harsh artifacts) when patched into the 2nd gate.
The last thing I am able to note today is that there appears to be value scaling issues when automating different parameters in Ableton, and in general Sumu currently doesn't play very nice with external modulators such as LFOs.
Maybe I am pushing it too hard, I don't know. I hope I can figure this out soon. There is one patch in particular that I'd really like to use for a track, but with the current issues I think it is better to wait. :(
but will there be a "final call" for the early access discount?
yes, I'll let people know via the email list and offer 1.0 for at least a few days before the price goes up to full.
but... do you know when MPE and OSC will be added?
MPE will be added for 1.0.
OSC... I'm not sure if I should keep that feature around. There are only a handful of people using it in Aalto etc, and now that MPE exists I see less of a need for it. If OSC is working better for anyone than MPE (as I feel it does, sometimes), it's more of a reason to make MPE better than work on OSC, this way more people will benefit from the work.
I am encountering a new bug where patches will just start pulsing...
I don't know what you mean by this pulsing, can you capture audio or better yet video? Or if you think a specific patch will reproduce it, send me the patch with instructions.
I've also noticed that the scale dial in Space also tends to generate audio artifacts when modulated
The scale dial will send all the partials back to the home position whenever its value changes. These home positions are where the partials go when a reset pulse is received for that partial, or when the partial goes outside the bounds and "far" is set to "home." So, modulating scale will definitely be jumpy, depending on how often your DAW feels like sending dial movements to a plugin.
I did this "auto-jump" so people could see/hear the size of the home configuration when they turn the dial. Maybe there's an argument for not doing it, I'll think this one over a bit.
there appears to be value scaling issues when automating different parameters in Ableton,
This is not enough info for me to investigate, can you send me more detail with what you expected to have happen (the parameter should go to 1.0) and what happened instead (the parameter went to 99) ?
Please send any files / additional info to support@madronalabs.com - thanks!
If OSC is working better for anyone than MPE
I've always felt OSC works better (in Aalto in particular) , feels noticeably more responsive and smoother.
main disadvantage is you cannot record, but I mostly want to play, and often just record audio anyway.
you could have a look at MPE+ as used by Haken Audio (Continuum), this would give you higher resolution.
note : be aware, of Lippold's comments about ensuring more throughput during attack transient (basically, only use 7 bit during this phase).
Hey Randy!
Hope everything is going well with your release plan!
Would you say it's relatively "safe" to start using Sumu pre-release 1.0.0b15 in projects? I mean, should they (projects/presets) sound the same with the release?
Hi @aejonel,
This is a good question. I would say it's relatively safe. A patch should sound like itself going forward. But this is where it gets fuzzy- i might make minor changes that I feel are improvements to sound quality, and if you're very detail-oriented, you might not think these are as minor!
An example of the kind of change I will make is reducing aliasing when FM is used. So a patch might get a little less harsh.
Randy is it possible at some point to add a "settings/patch randomizer and mutater" feature.
Like in absynth/syne/loom as well as locking any parameters we like and continuing to roll the dice on the unlocked parameters for the others until we get a very interesting patch. That is something I would like to see in the future if possible. Great plugin I Get very interesting sounds.
Hi Randy,
Any news on any updates for Sumu or even the full release?
I'm working to finish Early Access 3 right now. 1.0 will be out later this summer.
Randy is it possible at some point to add a "settings/patch randomizer and mutater" feature.
Parameter locking and randomizing are two things people have asked for multiple times, I'll see about adding them after 1.0.
Such an amazing instrument :-)
Two minor questions about the Gates module:
– Are the two inputs identical?
– Switching on the lopass in Aalto is instantly recognizable. In Sumu it seems to be much more subtle, to the point that I can barely hear the difference. Is the lopass implementation in Sumu that much more subtle, or is this the result of the source material (more "full-on" in Aalto, for lack of a better word, versus more subtle in Sumu) leading to a less noticeable lopass-gate effect?
Edit: oh and a very minor thing: muscle memory from Aalto, where clicking the preset title in the menu bar allows me to save preset, has erased my work in Sumu on a few occasions; in Sumu, clicking the preset title in the menu bar switches the preset. Not a big deal but perhaps good to be aware of that 'inconsistency', if that's what you want to call it.
Good feedback, thank you very much.
First, sorry to hear you had some work erased due to the weird UI—if it's any consolation that happened to me a bunch. By popular demand I've replaced it with a popup as default, which will give you one more click to go "whoa, hey!" You could still erase your current patch by clicking on the left or right brackets (or scrolling) but I plan to add a dialog if you have unsaved changes.
The two Gates inputs are identical. It's just an opportunity to have two inputs scaled differently, which I was finding I needed a lot.
The lopass is obvious on some patches and not on others. What's happening is that the release time for each partial depends on its frequency, when it's turned on. But depending on the partial freqs., you might not hear much.
No problem at all about the lost patches. It's great to read that you already have something in the works for that, and thanks for the explanation!