# Synchron Player with Time-Stretching now available :)



## Ben (Mar 6, 2020)

Great news: The time-stretching feature is now available in the latest available update of the Synchron Player!



While you download the update, please read the notes on how to use this feature here: https://www.vsl.info/manuals/synchron-player/edit-tab#stretch






Also, there are library updates available for the Big Bang Orchestra Series, adding presets optimized for use of the stretch feature. Make sure to also download and install these.

_Be creative!_ With this cool new feature there is so much you can do, for example: Make staccatos shorter, pizzecatos longer, change the duration of the pre-recorded runs, dynamically change the tempo of trills with CC-automation, or go to the extreme and create new sounds (don't forget: you have a ton of fx-plugins included in the Synchron Player Mixer!).

I'm already excited to see and hear what you think about it and what you will create with it, so feel free to share!

Best, Ben


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## Rob (Mar 6, 2020)

Awesome, that's what I call listening to users' opinions


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## Oliver (Mar 6, 2020)

unbelievable good!
Have to test that immediatley!


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## donbodin (Mar 6, 2020)

This was my one big complaint with the latest big bang release and I am so excited to download and test it out. Thanks for listening VSL!


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## Jimmy Hellfire (Mar 6, 2020)

It's awesome. VSL has been really bringing it lately!


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## Geomir (Mar 6, 2020)

I am not even surprised! You expect nothing less from such a company!


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## FabioA (Mar 7, 2020)

Game changer!


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## ProfoundSilence (Mar 7, 2020)

nice to see this addition


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## devonmyles (Mar 7, 2020)

Great stuff and, something I was hoping would happen soon. And it has happened sooner!!


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## Oliver (Mar 7, 2020)

and the best...it works flawlessly and opens up a million new possibilities.
i especially like the possibility now to change staccato -> spiccato with this!


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## Dr.Quest (Mar 7, 2020)

This is super!


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## Ben (Mar 7, 2020)

Oliver said:


> and the best...it works flawlessly and opens up a million new possibilities.
> i especially like the possibility now to change staccato -> spiccato with this!


Yes, this is so awesome! You should also try stretching pizzicatos, so they sound longer. Also, one of my favorites: stretch the falls articulation of BBO: Andromeda! 

One tip if you want to stretch something even more: Set the source bpm to max value and the destination bpm to 30.


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 7, 2020)

It does really add a lot of cpu use though I do have to say. Turning stretching on made the instrument unusable on my cheesegrater. Why does it need to be real time stretching?


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## Zero&One (Mar 7, 2020)

Dewdman42 said:


> It does really add a lot of cpu use though I do have to say. Turning stretching on made the instrument unusable on my cheesegrater. Why does it need to be real time stretching?



Did you turn the extra channels off in the mixer as per the video? My cheesegrater had some issues on repeated notes tightened on Black Eye, but when I dropped them to the room mix it drastically reduced.


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## Ben (Mar 7, 2020)

Also, offline stretching would need huge amounts of cache storage and result in long project loading times, especially for the multi mic libraries. 
We would loose features like DAW syncing, and dynamic stretch factors. And you would have to wait after each change for stretch processing before you can listen to the result.

As @Zero&One said, reduce the amount of mics and or split voices to multiple instances.


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## Geomir (Mar 7, 2020)

Zero&One said:


> Did you turn the extra channels off in the mixer as per the video? My cheesegrater had some issues on repeated notes tightened on Black Eye, but when I dropped them to the room mix it drastically reduced.


I did the same and it worked!


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 7, 2020)

Zero&One said:


> Did you turn the extra channels off in the mixer as per the video? My cheesegrater had some issues on repeated notes tightened on Black Eye, but when I dropped them to the room mix it drastically reduced.



I’m not really sure. Just tried out synchronized dimension strings with large read buffer size. Turned on real time stretch and can’t use it. Will look closer at whatever you are suggesting tomorrow.


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 7, 2020)

Ben said:


> Also, offline stretching would need huge amounts of cache storage and result in long project loading times, especially for the multi mic libraries.
> We would loose features like DAW syncing, and dynamic stretch factors. And you would have to wait after each change for stretch processing before you can listen to the result.
> 
> As @Zero&One said, reduce the amount of mics and or split voices to multiple instances.



my developer suggestion to vsl would be to dynamically stretch (and save to temporary cache) any stretched material, either during load or on first playback so that it’s not saved later taking up extra space other then temp cache space. My initial impression is that it’s taking way too much cpu to do that every time I hit play.


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## Ben (Mar 7, 2020)

You do not need to increase preload size, if you enable stretching the preload size for the selected articulation(s) will be set temporally to maximum value.
As I mentioned with precalculated stretch - > no DAW sync. Also imagine the size of the cache... 

On my workstation, an Intel i5 8600k I can play 80 stretched voices in one instance at the same time, or ~400 voices split between 6 Synchron Player instances. Sure, not everyone has access to a fast CPU, but if you reduce the number of mics and do not use use velocity crossfade, you should be able to use stretching even on a regular notebook.


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## Ben (Mar 7, 2020)

As mentioned in the initial post, please read the notes in the manual, where we collected a few tips on how to work with this feature, in case you experience any problems:




__





Edit Tab | VSL - Software Manuals







www.vsl.info


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## Zedcars (Mar 7, 2020)

I’ve read this sentence about 5 times, and I still don’t understand what it means. Any ideas? Maybe I’m just dense...


*



Legato

Click to expand...

*


> For technical reason, time-stretching currently applicable to legato articulation (in a musically correct way).


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 7, 2020)

I will try all the suggestions tomorrow. The problem is live tracks can’t handle real time stretching. I’m pretty sure non live tracks will be ok. I already had to set preload larger because synchron player was taking too much cpu even without stretch.

yes I still suggest caching. Will try your suggestions tomorrow


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## Ben (Mar 7, 2020)

Zedcars said:


> I’ve read this sentence about 5 times, and I still don’t understand what it means. Any ideas?


I will fix it, thanks for the hint. 

For technical reason, time-stretching currently is not applicable to legato / portamento articulation (in a musically correct way).


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## Adrian Stavian (Mar 7, 2020)

Hi , considering this new info should i go for synchronized products or vi's ? I'm interested in buying some instruments and i'm quite confused with all this types of products.


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## Ben (Mar 8, 2020)

(imo) In general I always would recommend the SYNCHRON-ized instruments, if available. But with the current sale go for the VI version and upgrade to the SYNCHRON-ized version (you can upgrade at any time).


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## Guy Bacos (Mar 8, 2020)

It really is a super tool.


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## Olfirf (Mar 8, 2020)

Awesome! Is the on/off switch for stretching midi learnable? I suppose not, as it is independent for every articulation. What is the tradeoff leaving it on fo a lot of articulations? More CPU use? More memory spent? Both?


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## Ben (Mar 8, 2020)

First it will increase the preload buffer for the selected articulation temporarily to the maximum value and reload the samples. - > higher RAM usage
Second, it will always run through the stretch algorithm, so you can change the speed after the note started - > higher CPU usage, different sound

Therefore we recommend to only activate it for the articulations you need / parts of the dimension. 
If you want to disable stretching for all articulations, you can select the root node in the dimension view and click on "off"


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## garylionelli (Mar 8, 2020)

Ben said:


> I will fix it, thanks for the hint.
> 
> For technical reason, time-stretching currently is not applicable to legato / portamento articulation (in a musically correct way).



But are there plans to make this work? This is what's needed with some of the legato transitions. Thanks--


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## Ben (Mar 8, 2020)

garylionelli said:


> But are there plans to make this work? This is what's needed with some of the legato transitions. Thanks--


We have it in the backlog, but no promises or ETA. 
This requires some extensions of the current implementation and a lot of testing.


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## AndyP (Mar 8, 2020)

Great Update! Is there a chance that CC1 will be default for dynamics in all Synchron Libraries?


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## AndyP (Mar 8, 2020)

Capricorn is now mine too. 
First tested the time stretch function with my other libraries and it works very well.
This was the door opener. I am a bit annoyed that I didn't license Black Eye for the intro price.


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## jamwerks (Mar 8, 2020)

Didn't time-stretching in VIP allow us to save that as a new art?


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## Ben (Mar 8, 2020)

jamwerks said:


> Didn't time-stretching in VIP allow us to save that as a new art?


In an on drive cache. But it has to be calculated during project loading and it is static, so no dynamic and continuous tempo changes, also not too many.
But with multi mic library do the math... It's simply not a practical solution, and with less features.


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## Dewdman42 (Mar 8, 2020)

a caching mechanism does not need to calculate all possibilities. It only needs to cache things as they are used so that the second time they are needed they don't have to be calculated again. It also can be cached to memory, it doesn't have to be permanently saved anywhere. Still strongly recommend VSL to investigate caching more on this point.


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## EgM (Mar 8, 2020)

That's what VIPro does with its stretch data folder isn't it?


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## JEPA (Mar 8, 2020)

It's a shame Black Eye was not longer on sale to the point of the Synchron Player Time-Stretching update, I was still deciding but this update is a big game changer now!


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## Dr.Quest (Mar 8, 2020)

Does this mean it syncs the time stretch to the host DAW?


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## C-Wave (Mar 8, 2020)

Dr.Quest said:


> Does this mean it syncs the time stretch to the host DAW?


Yes. 

BTW, anyone interested in vi libraries, check out my VSL post on Classifieds.. thanks.


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## FabioA (Mar 8, 2020)

Dr.Quest said:


> Does this mean it syncs the time stretch to the host DAW?


It does. Plus you can sync it half or double the host DAW tempo. Also, you can have it not in sync with the DAW to set the tempo you like to experiment, and you can even adjusts the tempo with tempo-ramps.


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## mobileavatar (Mar 8, 2020)

@Ben with the new Synchron Player feature, would "riff" libraries like Capricorn support tempo-sync feature with the DAW? I want to take advantage of the intro price but want to make sure that tempo-sync will be supported.


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## Ben (Mar 9, 2020)

mobileavatar said:


> @Ben with the new Synchron Player feature, would "riff" libraries like Capricorn support tempo-sync feature with the DAW? I want to take advantage of the intro price but want to make sure that tempo-sync will be supported.


It already is. That's the main feature of the time-stretching functionality


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## jamwerks (Mar 9, 2020)

Ben said:


> I will fix it, thanks for the hint.
> 
> For technical reason, time-stretching currently is not applicable to legato / portamento articulation (in a musically correct way).


I'd word that a little differently:

For technical reasons, time-stretching is currently not-applicable to the legato/portamento articulations...


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## mobileavatar (Mar 9, 2020)

Ben said:


> It already is. That's the main feature of the time-stretching functionality


Thanks for the reply, Ben!
But on the Capricorn page, it only says "All phrases are available in 120, 130 and 140 bpm on all root notes over up to two octaves..."; it does not mention tempo sync anywhere.
If the feature is already supported, does it mean Synchron player automatically selects the appropriate phrase (120, 130, or 140 bmp) based on the DAW tempo?


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## Ben (Mar 9, 2020)

mobileavatar said:


> If the feature is already supported, does it mean Synchron player automatically selects the appropriate phrase (120, 130, or 140 bmp) based on the DAW tempo?


The riffs are available (without stretching) in 120, 130 and 140. You can choose one of these three tempi as starting point and activate stretching + DAW sync. This will stretch the riffs to the exact tempo of your DAW.


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## Nick Batzdorf (Mar 9, 2020)

Someone really close by is shouting something about wishing that VE Pro had that reverb as a plug-in, available to external audio like all the others that come with it.

Man, I wish he'd shut up.


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## SomeGuy (Mar 12, 2020)

Watching the tutorial videos, this sounds very good! However when you shorten or lengthen anything with the hall baked in, the attack, but especially the hall tails sound very weird to me. I can hear the hall getting shorter. If I remember correctly, VI pro allowed you choose what part of the sample you wanted to stretch, so you could keep natural attacks and releases. Is this possible?


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## SomeGuy (Mar 12, 2020)

Wish I knew this was in the pipeline, as I passed on Black Eye during the intro period because of the lack of tempo adjusting. That library just became much more usable, and of course its no longer on sale...


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## JEPA (Mar 12, 2020)

SomeGuy said:


> Wish I knew this was in the pipeline, as I passed on Black Eye during the intro period because of the lack of tempo adjusting. That library just became much more usable, and of course its no longer on sale...


same here


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## mscp (Oct 11, 2021)

I was wondering if there has been any update in the Synchron player that prevents CPU spikes when the stretching tool is on, on windows devices.


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## Ben (Oct 11, 2021)

mscp said:


> I was wondering if there has been any update in the Synchron player that prevents CPU spikes when the stretching tool is on, on windows devices.


Real-time stretching is very CPU heavy by nature. We recommend to limit the mic selection to a minimum (for example RoomMix) for programming, then loading the mixer preset you like, and freeze the track.


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