# General thoughts and opinions about Omnisphere?



## Fever Phoenix

Hello everyone,

I realize the vague nature of my question and I merely try to collect some opinions and thoughts about Omnisphere. 

My project templates are 90% made of Kontakt instances. My GoTo Synths for some time were the Air Hybrid 2 and Spire and of course a lot of 3rd party Kontakt libraries (which technically aren't synths, yes?). I recently bought U-He Zebra 2, Dark Zebra and Hive and started slowly (as time allows) to learn more about Synth Sound and technology. I used to and still have hardware synths, but was mostly a preset user. Now I am trying to expand my knowledge and skills in sound design and come to ask myself again and again:

Should I get Omnisphere as well? The age and the GUI of the software are a tad intimidating (looks kinda old).. Then when I read user opinions and reviews, the main response seems to be "why didn't I get it earlier?!" Spectrasonics seems to update it time and time again and the sample import seems like a sweet feature as well. I love creating with my own sound sources. My first tracks were produced with a hardware sampler and effects, knobs and faders.. 

So if you got some spare time to write a few lines I thank you for your thoughts and insight.


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## ThomasNL

Yes in my opinion, but mostly for quick, inspirational and usable presets. Whenever I'm on a tight deadline or looking for a place to start I always go back to Omnisphere.

Also, addons like Keyscape and Trillian are just lovely


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## peladio

Absolutely yes..it's a masterpiece

A few of world-class sound designers also create for Omnisphere so you won't ever run out of inspiration..

Value is subjective but I find funny when people complain about $500 price tag but are happy to drop more than $700 on another string library only to leave it behind in a few weeks/months when new shiny library comes out

I have many synths and Omnisphere offers timeless value..still my go to after all these years..


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## LudovicVDP

I made the jump not so long ago and I must say my first impression was a bit 50/50.
I first felt like there were soooo many presets I would simply never use (not my style or too specific or too complex and therefore too recognizable or...)

There are a lot of bread and butter sounds however, and if you like to get your hands dirty, possibilities are limitless. I haven't got the chance to use it very much yet though... I guess my opinion can only evolve in a positive way.

I'm also looking at some third party preset banks with envy (The Unfinished amongst them)


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## Fever Phoenix

peladio said:


> Absolutely yes..it's a masterpiece
> 
> A few of world-class sound designers also create for Omnisphere so you won't ever run out of inspiration..
> 
> Value is subjective but I find funny when people complain about $500 price tag but are to drop more than $700 on a string library only to leave it behind in a few weeks/months when new shiny library comes out
> 
> I have many synths and Omnisphere offers timeless value..still my go to after all these years..


agree on the value, the price seems totally fair for the amount of features and content.. 

funny though, official website price for download 499$, then there is a retailer here in Europe, selling the boxed version for 386 CHF (=433$)


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## Markrs

Fever Phoenix said:


> agree on the value, the price seems totally fair for the amount of features and content..
> 
> funny though, official website price for download 499$, then there is a retailer here in Europe, selling the boxed version for 386 CHF (=433$)


Yep it is cheaper in Europe than US even when you factor in sales tax. In the UK it is £339 but occasionally can be got for just over £270 (via eBay discount codes)


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## AudioLoco

The only reason why I don't have it is... because EVERYONE has it. 
My thinking was I don't want to sound like everyone else. 
But it's super programmable and there are new "patch packs" being sold all the time so I guess it is malleable and can churn basically any sound.

Never been "attracted" to it, especially at the price. I have so many instruments, especially infinite synths and sound design tools... (I'm also fine in the piano/keyboard department)

Looking forward to reading opinions of people who own it.


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## ReleaseCandidate

If you don't want to sell Omnisphere patches, you don't need it. I'd say demo it, but there is no demo available.
You've got Kontakt, Zebra and Hive, before you run out of possibilities to generate sounds Omnisphere is long out of support.


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## Fever Phoenix

AudioLoco said:


> The only reason why I don't have it is... because EVERYONE has it.
> My thinking was I don't want to sound like everyone else.
> But it's super programmable and there are new "patch packs" being sold all the time so I guess it is malleable and can churn basically any sound.
> 
> Never been "attracted" to it, especially at the price. I have so many instruments, especially infinite synths and sound design tools... (I'm also fine in the piano/keyboard department)
> 
> Looking forward to reading opinions of people who own it.


well, we all have Kontakt  .. I


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## AudioLoco

Fever Phoenix said:


> well, we all have Kontakt  .. I


We also all have a MIDI master keyboard


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## ReleaseCandidate

Fever Phoenix said:


> well, we all have Kontakt  .. I





AudioLoco said:


> We also all have a MIDI master keyboard


And we all would like to have better hard- and software interfaces for playing instruments (other than pianos).


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## AudioLoco

ReleaseCandidate said:


> And we all would like to have better hard- and software interfaces for playing instruments (other than pianos).


I have been waiting for the Brain-to-MIDI (BTM) device any day now for 10 years!


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## Fever Phoenix

AudioLoco said:


> We also all have a MIDI master keyboard


I meant that having Omnisphere does not mean sounding the same as everybody else that has it. Just like Kontakt being a standard format for sample libraries does not mean everyone that owns Kontakt sounds the same.


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## Fever Phoenix

AudioLoco said:


> I have been waiting for the Brain-to-MIDI (BTM) device any day now for 10 years!


Imagine being a therapist and hooking your patients up to the thing..


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## AudioLoco

Fever Phoenix said:


> I meant that having Omnisphere does not mean sounding the same as everybody else that has it. Just like Kontakt being a standard format for sample libraries does not mean everyone that owns Kontakt sounds the same.


Yeah, got it. I think it's a different thing these two do (I also mentioned it in my post Omnisphere is malleable and can be a lot of things at once etc contraditicting my own "instinct" about it)

Kontakt is a blank slate that controls "stuff" ideally, that's why I equated it to a MIDI master keyboard


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## el-bo

Omnisphere was my 'desert-island' synth over a decade ago, and it still is.


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## Ned Bouhalassa

Yes


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## TiagoG

I'm glad you asked because I've been wondering the same myself. My worry is quickly becoming overwhelmed with the complexity, seeing as I'm a beginner in the sound design department. 

Creating my own sounds is absolutely a goal of mine, but I wonder if there are cheaper and less complex alternatives. Just to get a feel for the process, parameters etc.

Would free ones like Helm or Surge be a good place to start? Any other recommendations? 

Thanks


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## JohnG

Fever Phoenix said:


> well, we all have Kontakt  .. I


Yes. And everyone uses those old-fashioned orchestral instruments too! Some of those are hundreds of years old!

If you have the time to really learn what you are doing, ZebraHZ and Hive etc. are just dynamite. Diva is my personal favourite but those others are great too.

Omnisphere is fantastically easy to customise -- a few clicks / edits and you have something that is truly different-sounding. Moreover, it has tons of oscillators, thousands of sounds sources; it's almost infinitely variable. Swap a sound source, add an arpeggiation (many presets for that too) and voila!

Especially if you have limited time, Omnisphere is excellent, but even if you have all day, Omnisphere is still superb.


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## chillbot

Fever Phoenix said:


> Should I get Omnisphere as well?



Here are the questions I see consistently and repeatedly asked the most times over the last 15 years and it's not close:

Do I have to learn music theory? *Yes.*

Should I learn to play the piano? *Yes.*

Do I need to move to Los Angeles (or London, etc)? *Yes.*

Should I buy Omnisphere? *Yes.*

What these questions all have in common is that normally what the person asking the question really wants to hear is *NO.* Due to laziness or finances or whatever it is, they want to be told that their current course of action of watching an occasional Verta video and submitting a soundcloud link here and there is somehow going to vault them into The Big Time. Sorry I'm not at all saying this applies in your case but these questions always amaze me... obviously the answer to all of them could be *NO* but if you really want to give yourself the best chance in a hyper-competitive industry then you need to do everything you can to be competitive.

Somewhere, somebody is living in the mountains of Montana who doesn't own Omnisphere, knows shit about theory and piano, and is making a great living proving me 100% wrong. But if you're not that guy/gal you should definitely insta-buy Omnisphere.


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## Fever Phoenix

chillbot said:


> Here are the questions I see consistently and repeatedly asked the most times over the last 15 years and it's not close:
> 
> Do I have to learn music theory? *Yes.*
> 
> Should I learn to play the piano? *Yes.*
> 
> Do I need to move to Los Angeles (or London, etc)? *Yes.*
> 
> Should I buy Omnisphere? *Yes.*
> 
> What these questions all have in common is that normally what the person asking the question really wants to hear is *NO.* Due to laziness or finances or whatever it is, they want to be told that their current course of action of watching an occasional Verta video and submitting a soundcloud link here and there is somehow going to vault them into The Big Time. Sorry I'm not at all saying this applies in your case but these questions always amaze me... obviously the answer to all of them could be *NO* but if you really want to give yourself the best chance in a hyper-competitive industry then you need to do everything you can to be competitive.
> 
> Somewhere, somebody is living in the mountains of Montana who doesn't own Omnisphere, knows shit about theory and piano, and is making a great living proving me 100% wrong. But if you're not that guy/gal you should definitely insta-buy Omnisphere.




Chill, Bot! 

Yes, the forum and the web are full of questions like this. I hesitated to ask, cause I was sure to get at least one response in that manner. I tend to react similar at times. But at the end of the day, I came to appreciate this forum to gather takes and approaches, thoughts and oppinions. 

I haven't seen or heard Omnisphere in action, except on videos.

I am a working composer for years, I used to do a lot of work without any midi at all. 🤷‍♂️

What makes Omnisphere so special is what I am trying to ask, I guess? As it seems to be a synth as well as a sampler.

My clients don't care how I created the sounds and the music they hear.


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## Fever Phoenix

@chillbot 

..and I would say asking about Omnisphere is different from asking if one should know Music Theory, playing the piano or read and write notation, no?

It's like asking you about a guitar that you own, while I've never tried it before.


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## chillbot

Fever Phoenix said:


> What makes Omnisphere so special is what I am trying to ask, I guess?



Guitars make guitar noises and depend on the skill of the player. Bad analogies are like ducks.

Omnisphere is an industry standard and by far the best bang-for-your-buck ever created (just my opinion, re: price). If you don't want to spend $400 or whatever it is to be on a level playing field as everyone else, that puts you at a disadvantage, in my book. In a field where every advantage you can get is uber-important. If I could spend $400 bucks to gain a 0.5% advantage over the field I wouldn't hesitate. And I would disagree that your clients don't care how you create the music they hear, but that would be a really long and lengthy tangent. Your clients may know shit about music but they react to certain things nonetheless.

There are so many stock sounds in Omnisphere that have become industry standards and overused like mad, it's almost become it's own little mini-orchestra. (Shit analogy.) OK so clearly you don't want to be using overused stock sounds at this point, but not having access to those sounds might be be considered even worse.

This is just my opinion clearly. You want to know "what makes omnisphere so special" and I don't know how to answer that because going into specifics would take all day and I'd end up making a bunch of terrible analogies. Anyway my little tangent/rant is not about you specifically it's about every single person that asks about Omnisphere so many times on this forum, the answer is always Yes. Hopefully someone else will answer your question better.


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## pmountford

Yes.


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## SupremeFist

chillbot said:


> There are so many stock sounds in Omnisphere that have become industry standards and overused like mad, it's almost become it's own little mini-orchestra. (Shit analogy.) OK so clearly you don't want to be using overused stock sounds at this point, but not having access to those sounds might be be considered even worse.


What are some examples of such sounds?


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## ed buller

Learn how to use ZebraHZ. It can do almost everything you need and sounds fabulous. I find Omnisphere kinda Bland TBH. 

best

ed


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## artomatic

That's a 10-4!


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## chillbot

SupremeFist said:


> What are some examples of such sounds?


Just off the top of my head I would love to go a day without hearing "Eternal Changeling" or "Electric Ebow".

Others I hear everywhere:

Chaos Bowls
Grooveorganica
Cheerfully Crushed Vibes
Ode to Mr. Newman
Chasing the Evil
Magma Chaos Gate
Tibetian Meditation

This is a good caveat to mention about Omnisphere if you're just getting into it now. Make your own stuff, tweak stuff, use the newest patches (for me they are at the top of the unsorted list, not sure if this is same for everyone), buy 3rd party sounds. Beware of using old presets if you don't want to sound old.

Yes this is a big drawback/concern but it only takes off one star and for me Omnisphere was 12 out of 10 stars to begin with so it can stand to lose a couple stars and still be 100% worth it.

Or just avoid the stock arps completely, they are the most recognizable. Also avoid anything that says it was originally in "Distorted Reality" and/or "Bizarre Guitars" that stuff is everywhere.


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## SupremeFist

chillbot said:


> Just off the top of my head I would love to go a day without hearing "Eternal Changeling" or "Electric Ebow".
> 
> Others I hear everywhere:
> 
> Chaos Bowls
> Grooveorganica
> Cheerfully Crushed Vibes
> Ode to Mr. Newman
> Chasing the Evil
> Magma Chaos Gate
> Tibetian Meditation
> 
> This is a good caveat to mention about Omnisphere if you're just getting into it now. Make your own stuff, tweak stuff, use the newest patches (for me they are at the top of the unsorted list, not sure if this is same for everyone), buy 3rd party sounds. Beware of using old presets if you don't want to sound old.
> 
> Yes this is a big drawback/concern but it only takes off one star and for me Omnisphere was 12 out of 10 stars to begin with so it can stand to lose a couple stars and still be 100% worth it.
> 
> Or just avoid the stock arps completely, they are the most recognizable. Also avoid anything that says it was originally in "Distorted Reality" and/or "Bizarre Guitars" that stuff is everywhere.


Thanks for taking the time to reply but I don't own omnisphere so these preset names mean nothing to me?


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## chillbot

SupremeFist said:


> Thanks for taking the time to reply but I don't own omnisphere so these preset names mean nothing to me?


Can I just hum them then?


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## Fever Phoenix

chillbot said:


> Guitars make guitar noises and depend on the skill of the player. Bad analogies are like ducks.
> 
> Omnisphere is an industry standard and by far the best bang-for-your-buck ever created (just my opinion, re: price). If you don't want to spend $400 or whatever it is to be on a level playing field as everyone else, that puts you at a disadvantage, in my book. In a field where every advantage you can get is uber-important. If I could spend $400 bucks to gain a 0.5% advantage over the field I wouldn't hesitate.


Thank you, a great answer. I still think the guitar analogy works great, like you say "Guitars make guitar noises and depend on the skill of the player". I do think VIs also generate sound and depend on the skill of the player. 



chillbot said:


> And I would disagree that your clients don't care how you create the music they hear, but that would be a really long and lengthy tangent. Your clients may know shit about music but they react to certain things nonetheless


Well, of course they want something original, something never heard before, while also giving the ppl what they want. And of course they like to think that I recorded every single instrument myself. But what it boils down to is A) the quality of sound (not composition, but sound) and B) the dramaturgical context and use of expectation and subversion. But how it was produced is really secondary. 

So, really, thank you for input and apologies to add a voice to the choir of repetitive questions. I searched through the forum and I've found many side discussions about Omnisphere, but no dedicated thread. 

I will probably get it either way, as said before, I think the price seems marvelous for amount of features and content. If the world wouldn't be in lockdown I could just go to the music store and check it out hands on.


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## Fever Phoenix

chillbot said:


> Can I just hum them then?


please do


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## el-bo

chillbot said:


> Or just avoid the stock arps completely, they are the most recognizable. Also avoid anything that says it was originally in "Distorted Reality" and/or "Bizarre Guitars" that stuff is everywhere.


Avoiding certain arps is probably good advice as they can tend to steer the composition in a certain direction, which might end up sounding very similar to others' actual full works, but I don't understand the need to avoid certain sounds just because they are recognisable. 
AS much as it's a cliche, we don't avoid pianos because of their ubiquity.

Context is key


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## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> Thanks for taking the time to reply but I don't own omnisphere so these preset names mean nothing to me?


Allow me to elaborate: An example of an Omnisphere sound that one hears all over action game soundtracks and TV shows would be the one that goes, "*Guh-guh guh duun, guh-guh guh-guh guh...DUUUN!!*". That'll often be layered with, "*Ti-ti ke-ting, tiki tiki tik...TiiiNNG!*". Then there's, "*SssssssssssssssssssssssssssTIIINNGG!!*", and, "*VVVVVOOOOOOSSSSSHHHHH!!*". Lot of percussive "*Klung!*", "*Klang!*" and bowed things that kinda go "*FFFVVVViiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnngggg*".

Now you know them, you'll start to notice them everywhere. True story


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## AudioLoco

el-bo said:


> Allow me to elaborate: An example of an Omnisphere sound that one hears all over action game soundtracks and TV shows would be the one that goes, "guh-guh guh duun, guh-guh guh-guh guh...DUUUN!!". That'll often be layered with, "Ti-ti ke-ting, tiki tiki tik...TiiiNNG!". Then there's, "SssssssssssssssssssssssssssTIIINNGG!!", and, "VVVVVOOOOOOSSSSSHHHHH!!". Lot of percussive "Klungs", "Klangs" and bowed things that kinda go "FFFVVVViiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnngggg".
> 
> Now you know them, you'll start to notice them everywhere. True story


Composers are having very hard times. Please adopt this composer. With only two cookies a month he will manage to recover and get better one day.
Donate now.


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## Bman70

I attached some of the aforementioned over-used patches. (I can only attach five files at a time.)
Interesting, I don't find them all that compelling.

I prefer to mix / edit my own, using my own samples plus some default Omni patches. Here's one where I recorded the neighbor's incessantly barking dog, then mixed some granular barks with strings to make a subtly chaotic dystopian pad.



To the OP's question, I'd say yes, I don't know of any other synth that is this fun and doesn't bog you down with learning curves like the U-he ones can.


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## Bman70

Here's the last two of the oft-used patches mentioned. Apparently arps and BPM are popular, I'll have to remember that if I decide to sell some.

Edit: oops messed up Tibetan, re-uploaded


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## kgdrum

@Fever Phoenix

Have you noticed the consistency of people saying Omnisphere 👍❤️

How often do you see actual Omnisphere users that have buyers remorse?
From my experience it’s between rare and never.
My initial reaction when I bought Omnisphere was shit how much 💰 did I piss away getting 2nd rate “bargains” that I never use.
Beyond the vast amount of great stock presets there’s a plethora of amazing 3rd party soundsets available from the usual suspects.
Besides Omni being awesome Spectrasonics continually gives users free major updates and offers great support 👍❤️
I suspect if you go for it you will have the same reaction as most Omnisphere users ❤️
FWIW if you’re in the USA MF & GC usually include Omni in there 15% -20% sales(that’s how I bought it)
I think they’re having a Presidents Day sale this week.


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## proxima

chillbot said:


> What these questions all have in common is that normally what the person asking the question really wants to hear is *NO.*


I actually think with purchases what many people look for is encouragement. Buyers remorse sucks, and people like to hear that a purchase is nearly universally loved.

And to the OP: Omnisphere is incredible. It really is a jack of all trades kind of synth, and if the built-in presets have a low ratio of things you like, the quality and variety of add-ons are amazing.


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## mgnoatto

oh yes!


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## dgburns

chillbot said:


> Here are the questions I see consistently and repeatedly asked the most times over the last 15 years and it's not close:
> 
> Do I have to learn music theory? *Yes.*
> 
> Should I learn to play the piano? *Yes.*
> 
> Do I need to move to Los Angeles (or London, etc)? *Yes.*
> 
> Should I buy Omnisphere? *Yes.*
> 
> What these questions all have in common is that normally what the person asking the question really wants to hear is *NO.* Due to laziness or finances or whatever it is, they want to be told that their current course of action of watching an occasional Verta video and submitting a soundcloud link here and there is somehow going to vault them into The Big Time. Sorry I'm not at all saying this applies in your case but these questions always amaze me... obviously the answer to all of them could be *NO* but if you really want to give yourself the best chance in a hyper-competitive industry then you need to do everything you can to be competitive.
> 
> Somewhere, somebody is living in the mountains of Montana who doesn't own Omnisphere, knows shit about theory and piano, and is making a great living proving me 100% wrong. But if you're not that guy/gal you should definitely insta-buy Omnisphere.


Should I learn music theory - Yes ( and learn to read contracts )
Should I learn to play the Piano - Yes ( and other things )
Should I but Ominsphere- Yes 

Should I move to LA- NOOOOOOO !!!!! ( I’ll go live in etc )


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## vitocorleone123

Only if you want it and rely on presets in a pinch OR have a lot of time to craft your own.

I’m finding myself in neither camp, and Omni is collecting virtual dust.


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## sostenuto

3rd Pty Libs are extensive, wide-ranging, and mostly high quality. Next step is Keyscape and its Creative _ 1200 Patch addition.


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## SupremeFist

Bman70 said:


> I attached some of the aforementioned over-used patches. (I can only attach five files at a time.)
> Interesting, I don't find them all that compelling.


Thanks, me neither!


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## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> Thanks, me neither!


They might not be compelling in 2021, but they were when Omnisphere was released in 2008. There are still developers making Kontakt libraries that tread the same ground as Omnisphere (Nay, even Atmosphere) all these years later. It's a bit like the 'Simpsons Already Did It' South Park episode. Not saying that these newer libraries don't have there own raison d'être, and many do come with fantastic quality source material, but every time i go back to noodling with Omnisphere's presets, I realise how much of the later libraries I never needed to buy.

With Omnisphere, it's not so much a case (at least, maybe not now) of finding mind-bending, never hear before sounds; rather, it's that so much of the content is so playable and musical. The guitars in Omnisphere are never going to replace current dedicated libraries in terms of realism, but I've yet to find a guitar patch more joyous to play than 'Glorious Guitars'. This attention to performance, musicality and playability is what makes their instruments ('Trilian' is no different, imo, in this sense) so compelling to so many.

The presets shown above? I bet there are many thousands of users just like myself who have not found any interest in any of these; at least, not in the form in which they are presented i.e arpeggiated/sequenced. But they clearly got the job done, and for many who work in the industry.


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## Fidelity

Omnisphere is great though I find myself going to it less now that I have Zebra. If the GUI intimidates you, get a plugin wrapper like Komplete Kontrol and you'll never know as long as you're just tweaking presets. 

In general, I feel like the "should I buy more gear" question has two answers at least in my personal experience: my wallet says no, but my head says "nobody will ever know you buy too much gear if it's all software!"

Coincidentally, my bedroom studio looks very modest and my wallet does too.


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## Bman70

el-bo said:


> They might not be compelling in 2021, but they were when Omnisphere was released in 2008. There are still developers making Kontakt libraries that tread the same ground as Omnisphere (Nay, even Atmosphere) all these years later. It's a bit like the 'Simpsons Already Did It' South Park episode. Not saying that these newer libraries don't have there own raison d'être, and many do come with fantastic quality source material, but every time i go back to noodling with Omnisphere's presets, I realise how much of the later libraries I never needed to buy.
> 
> With Omnisphere, it's not so much a case (at least, maybe not now) of finding mind-bending, never hear before sounds; rather, it's that so much of the content is so playable and musical. The guitars in Omnisphere are never going to replace current dedicated libraries in terms of realism, but I've yet to find a guitar patch more joyous to play than 'Glorious Guitars'. This attention to performance, musicality and playability is what makes their instruments ('Trilian' is no different, imo, in this sense) so compelling to so many.
> 
> The presets shown above? I bet there are many thousands of users just like myself who have not found any interest in any of these; at least, not in the form in which they are presented i.e arpeggiated/sequenced. But they clearly got the job done, and for many who work in the industry.



Even today, if you take one of those classic patches, then open the main sample layer and start replacing the sample with random choices from the bank.... that can be mind bending. Taking a preset and messing with the samples used, the envelopes and / or arp, is what I would recommend to any new user. I mean you'll physically understand what the phrase "jaw dropped" means.


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## hessproject

I don't find the interface as non-intuitive as others seem to (maybe that's just due to familiarity though). While it's true not all of the synthesis options are presented in one page like something like say Serum, I think it's pretty well laid out and shouldn't take more than a day or two making patches to get very familiar with it. 

Overall IMO, yes, Omnisphere is 100% as worth it as it always has been. It's updated frequently, has a ton of synthesis options, a ton of samples, a great sequencer, excellent effects, hardware integration, third party support, etc.


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## el-bo

Bman70 said:


> Even today, if you take one of those classic patches, then open the main sample layer and start replacing the sample with random choices from the bank.... that can be mind bending. Taking a preset and messing with the samples used, the envelopes and / or arp, is what I would recommend to any new user. I mean you'll physically understand what the phrase "jaw dropped" means.


I do that, f'sure. And I still think that Omnisphere has such a huge amount of beautiful sounds. That I don't get the mind-bending or jaw-dropping(ness) of it all might just be my general jaded-ness or that I kinda feel that there's nothing new under the sun, with regard to sounds. Either way, neither of those things is Omni-specific.


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## ed buller

el-bo said:


> I do that, f'sure. And I still think that Omnisphere has such a huge amount of beautiful sounds. That I don't get the mind-bending or jaw-dropping(ness) of it all might just be my general jaded-ness or that I kinda feel that there's nothing new under the sun, with regard to sounds. Either way, neither of those things is Omni-specific.


I'm with you. Sounds like I'm trapped in a Phil collins album

e


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## SupremeFist

el-bo said:


> The presets shown above? I bet there are many thousands of users just like myself who have not found any interest in any of these; at least, not in the form in which they are presented i.e arpeggiated/sequenced. But they clearly got the job done, and for many who work in the industry.


No doubt! I'm just not hearing anything one couldn't do as well or better with other products eg Zebra etc etc. I totally understand if people love it primarily for workflow, eg, which is quite an underrated criterion I think.


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## el-bo

ed buller said:


> I'm with you. Sounds like I'm trapped in a Phil collins album
> 
> e


Haha! It's entirely possible to navigate a path through 13,000 presets where that doesn't happen 

But I dedicate this one to you


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## Bman70

ed buller said:


> I'm with you. Sounds like I'm trapped in a Phil collins album
> 
> e



Naturally, with a sound library so vast, there are seemingly endless "useless" patches. I scroll past so many synthy squeaks, burps, oinks, and whistles that I just can't imagine anyone having a use for. Why so many of those? But I guess some electronica composers swoon over that. 

For me, coming from an acoustic and performance background, I look to Omnisphere and most VIs for the more cinematic, soundtrack side of things. And for that it's wonderful. I don't know if I'd want to write songs, per se, with digital instruments. For that I'd use my acoustic guitar, piano, etc.


----------



## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> No doubt! I'm just not hearing anything one couldn't do as well or better with other products eg Zebra etc etc. I totally understand if people love it primarily for workflow, eg, which is quite an underrated criterion I think.


Workflow is great, of course. But there's a universe/Omniverse that Zebra can't match, on account of the 40-or-so gigs of samples that come with Omnisphere, each available as oscillators.
It has some really great strings patches, full choirs, boys choirs, gospel choirs, sampled guitars, a ton of ethnic and hybrid stuff all available in well-crafted patches or available as starting points for your own sound-design. If none of that interests you, fair enough. But I don't really understand the comparison to Zebra.

Here're are some different examples:


----------



## SupremeFist

el-bo said:


> Workflow is great, of course. But there's a universe/Omniverse that Zebra can't match, on account of the 40-or-so gigs of samples that come with Omnisphere, each available as oscillators.
> It has some really great strings patches, full choirs, boys choirs, gospel choirs, sampled guitars, a ton of ethnic and hybrid stuff all available in well-crafted patches or available as starting points for your own sound-design. If none of that interests you, fair enough. But I don't really understand the comparison to Zebra.


Well a lot of people have dedicated libraries for those sorts of sampled things if they are interested in them, and/or some version of Komplete. And those demos of the most famous patches were all synthy things that Zebra or many other things (Massive, Alchemy, Repro, Massive X, Elysion etc etc) could do. So this comes back to recommending Omni basically as a rompler, which is great (I loved my Proteus 2000 back in the day), but I still haven't heard any persuasive reasons why this is a must-have for everyone in 2021. But it's all cool, we all like what we like! ✌🏻


----------



## kgdrum

SupremeFist said:


> Well a lot of people have dedicated libraries for those sorts of sampled things if they are interested in them. So this comes back to recommending Omni basically as a rompler, which is great (I loved my Proteus 2000 back in the day), but I still haven't heard any reasons why this is a must-have for everyone in 2021. But it's all cool, we all like what we like! ✌🏻


Anyone that actually has and uses Omnisphere knows it is not a rompler.
Omnisphere is a full fledged synth that also has a ton of samples and thousands of presets. 

to paraphrase a famous quote;

I had and know a Proteus and Omnisphere is not a Proteus in anyway.


----------



## el-bo

Might as well add a couple more:


----------



## SupremeFist

kgdrum said:


> Anyone that actually has and uses Omnisphere knows it is not a rompler.
> Omnisphere is a full fledged synth that also has a ton of samples and thousands of presets.
> 
> to paraphrase a famous quote;
> 
> I had and know a Proteus and Omnisphere is not a Proteus in anyway.


Sure it's not "just a rompler" but I was responding to praise of it for basically being a cool rompler. See, I _already_ have a ton of sample libraries and several top-flight full-fledged synths so my interest is in the question "do I need Omni as well?" I'm sincerely ready to be persuaded that I do but no one has managed it yet.


----------



## SupremeFist

PS I just checked out the famous "glorious guitars" patch and... I don't like it? It's cheesy af? 

But it's okay! Horses for courses!


----------



## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> Well a lot of people have dedicated libraries for those sorts of sampled things if they are interested in them, and/or some version of Komplete. And those demos of the most famous patches were all synthy things that Zebra or many other things (Massive, Alchemy, Repro, Massive X, Elysion etc etc) could do. So this comes back to recommending Omni basically as a rompler, which is great (I loved my Proteus 2000 back in the day), but I still haven't heard any persuasive reasons why this is a must-have for everyone in 2021. But it's all cool, we all like what we like! ✌🏻


A lot of people do have dedicated libraries for those things, but likely amounting to investments many times the size. Besides, I linked to that video in response to your claim that Zebra would be able to match Omnisphere. As a pure synth, yes. And having thousands of presets covering many genres doesn't negate the instruments ability as a pure synth, which can use any of those samples as primary oscillators.

And I don't think it's a must-have, but for those who have yet to fall down a huge Kontakt rabbit-hole, dropping $400 on Omnisphere makes a whole lot of sense.


----------



## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> I _already_ have a ton of sample libraries and several top-flight full-fledged synths so my interest is in the question "do I need Omni as well?"


I thought I'd made that part clear, already. IF you've already got tons of dedicated libraries, why are you even looking to be persuaded by anything else? I'm just trying to share my perspective from the other end i.e that I thought owning Kontakt would open up a whole new universe, when in many cases I had much of the stuff covered by Omnisphere (And to be clear, I'm still using version 1).

Im not saying that Omnisphere's choirs or guitars would beat a dedicated library (I already acknowledged it, earlier in the thread), but I posted a guitar patch play-through in response to your contention that Zebra has all this stuff covered, and the only thing you have to say is how cheesy a certain patch sounds, and how Omnisphere is just a rompler, then I'm not sure you have a genuine interest at all.

It's not going to be for everyone, and I'm cautious to recommend it as such. My calling it a desert-island instrument isn't to suggest that it's the best of the best, but to say that for me, personally, it is the one self-contained instrument that would get me closest to all the music I'd want to make.


----------



## kgdrum

@SupremeFist

Unfortunately I don’t think anyone can truly grasp Omnisphere without actually having it & using it for a while and taking a deep dive into the Omnisphere universe.

I have noticed for the most part the only people arguing against Omnisphere are people that don’t already have it? Generally the motivating factor is Omnispheres price of entry.
How often do you see people selling Omnisphere? Yes Spectrasonics actually allows resale.
I’d say probably between 90% and 95% of Omni users ❤️Omnisphere and adore Spectrasonics.
Show me another developer with that level of adoration.


----------



## ed buller

SupremeFist said:


> PS I just checked out the famous "glorious guitars" patch and... I don't like it? It's cheesy af?


Cheesy is the word. It's very vanilla and saccharin sounding to me. And I really don't think the samples are that great. It sorta reminds of the M1. Everyone loved it for about 6 months...On everything, then it sorta faded. It pulled focus in the wrong way.

best

e


----------



## peladio

Spectrasonics - Film and Television



Enough said..it's no.1 choice of pros for a reason

I love Zebra, Diva and others but if I could choose one synth it would be Omnisphere without any doubt..it's much more versatile than any other synth available..

BTW there are dated presets in Omnisphere mostly because it includes all Atmosphere as well..but I use third party libraries almost exclusively cause that way I'm not wasting time browsing and know that almost everything will be usable for my needs as I don't need EDM or dubstep patches..

Also there are some special samples in Omnisphere that aren't available in any Kontakt library..Both from Spectrasonics and other developers..


----------



## Living Fossil

peladio said:


> I love Zebra, Diva and others but if I could choose one synth it would be Omnisphere without any doubt..it's much more versatile than any other synth available..


What i don't like about Omni are its filters. To my ears they aren't even in a similar league as the usual suspects in Synth land (Zebra, Diva etc.). Specially the Resonance sounds cheap when exposed.
However, as it is with filters, sometimes in context they don't even need to be good in order to get the job done. But if i need sounds that rely on Filter with some Resonance, Omni is not among my top 10.

I have quite a "cold" relationship to Omni. I've used it a lot (since Atmosphere) and still use it for certain stuff, but it's not (and never was) an emotional relationship as to my favorite synths.
For me, it's somehow the JV-1080 of the past one and a half decade.


----------



## rardier

Hello, the question is which library do you have in kontakt ?i have a strange relationship with omnisphere because i don't really use it now (i used omnisphere 1 on every project when it first came out more than 10 years ago i think) but if i was forced to use only one virtual instrument i'll choose omnisphere without any hesitation (kontakt or other sampler needs to be fed with sample library and the other vsti aren't enough versatile or don't sound good to my taste - i'm thinking about halionsonic or sampletank kind of vst - )


----------



## Fever Phoenix

Very valuable thoughts and infos and the conversation I was looking for. Maybe the title of the thread is formulated a tad unfortunate. Thanks for chiming in, everyone.


----------



## SupremeFist

kgdrum said:


> Have to noticed for the most part the only people arguing against Omnisphere are people that don’t already have it? Generally the motivating factor is Omnispheres price of entry.


I'm not arguing against it at all, though. I'm genuinely interested in why some people say it's a must-have, because I'm interested in acquiring anything that lets me make cool sounds I can't already make. But the examples and reasons given so far just don't do it for me.


----------



## kgdrum

SupremeFist said:


> I'm not arguing against it at all, though. I'm genuinely interested in why some people say it's a must-have, because I'm interested in acquiring anything that lets me make cool sounds I can't already make. But the examples and reasons given so far just don't do it for me.


Have you listened to 3rd party soundsets from people like the Unfinished,Luftrum,Sound Dust,Plugin Guru etc......?
There’s hundreds of great 3rd party soundsets.


----------



## SupremeFist

kgdrum said:


> Have you listened to 3rd party soundsets from people like the Unfinished,Luftrum,Sound Dust,Plugin Guru etc......?
> There’s hundreds of great 3rd party soundsets.


Sure and there are 100s of great third-party soundsets for Kontakt, Zebra, etc etc etc.


----------



## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> I'm interested in acquiring anything that lets me make cool sounds I can't already make.


If you have either Falcon or Alchemy and a ton of diverse sample material then you're all set. You miss out on some workflow bonuses, but it's probably not a huge issue if you're designing your own sounds.


----------



## kgdrum

@SupremeFist
Yeah and Kontakt is a sampler with limited synth capabilities and Zebra is a synth with no sample capabilities.
Omnisphere is a full fledged synth with some sample based capabilities,they’re all different and all have different strengths and weaknesses.
Besides GAS there’s reasons many users like myself have,use and love them all.


----------



## givemenoughrope

Hans Zimmer: Omnisphere will buy you a house

Also Hans Zimmer: I use Zebra, etc bc I need to make my own sounds

I'd say that if you need this or that sound in a hurry, sure, get it.

But if you need to make your own sounds or at least make the sounds "your own" that's not a question of using something like Omnisphere or not.


----------



## el-bo

SupremeFist said:


> Sure and there are 100s of great third-party soundsets for Kontakt, Zebra, etc etc etc.


At this point you seem to be talking out of both sides of your face. You claim interest in a particular aspect, and someone goes to the effort of answering, at which point you retort with how everything else already does that.

The key point to listening to examples of these 3rd-party sound-sets is more often than not they show what can be done with the internal sample-sets, and therefore how powerful the synth can be when you actually roll up your sleeves and start designing from scratch.

I'll leave you to it


----------



## el-bo

givemenoughrope said:


> But if you need to make your own sounds or at least make the sounds "your own" that's not a question of using something like Omnisphere or not.


Can you explain which part of Omnisphere's architecture stops you from making sounds "Your own"?


----------



## SupremeFist

el-bo said:


> At this point you seem to be talking out of both sides of your face. You claim interest in a particular aspect, and someone goes to the effort of answering, at which point you retort with how everything else already does that.


Not retorting at all, just honestly reacting. But you do you! ✌🏻


----------



## jononotbono

chillbot said:


> they want to be told that their current course of action of watching an occasional Verta video and submitting a soundcloud link here and there is somehow going to vault them into The Big Time.


😂


----------



## Bman70

SupremeFist said:


> Sure it's not "just a rompler" but I was responding to praise of it for basically being a cool rompler. See, I _already_ have a ton of sample libraries and several top-flight full-fledged synths so my interest is in the question "do I need Omni as well?" I'm sincerely ready to be persuaded that I do but no one has managed it yet.



What's your go-to when you want to take a sample from all those libraries, and combine it with other samples plus synth components it into a brand new instrument / sample / arp / pad? It can't be Zebra since those don't import samples. 

I think a lot of people might look at their huge collection of libraries and assume "I'm sure I have the equivalent of Omnisphere in there." But when it comes to practical use, getting the unlimited potential from those sounds in a single, fast, intuitive interface... I don't know if anything comes close. And that can have huge cumulative effects on inspiration, productivity, etc. 

To me there doesn't seem to be any pressing reason _not _to have it... especially when many will buy additional string libraries at the drop of a hat, even if some remain unused.


----------



## Bman70

el-bo said:


> If you have either Falcon or Alchemy and a ton of diverse sample material then you're all set. You miss out on some workflow bonuses, but it's probably not a huge issue if you're designing your own sounds.


Falcon is one I have my eye on now.. it looks like another Omni! I wonder if it ever goes on sale.


----------



## ReleaseCandidate

Bman70 said:


> I wonder if it ever goes on sale.


Had been on sale recently.


----------



## Fever Phoenix

What is super interesting about Falcon is the Multisample Support, with Round Robins and Velocity Layers from what I just read. Geeez, get both then?


----------



## Nick Batzdorf

chillbot said:


> Just off the top of my head I would love to go a day without hearing "Eternal Changeling" or "Electric Ebow".
> 
> Others I hear everywhere:
> 
> Chaos Bowls
> Grooveorganica
> Cheerfully Crushed Vibes
> Ode to Mr. Newman
> Chasing the Evil
> Magma Chaos Gate
> Tibetian Meditation
> 
> This is a good caveat to mention about Omnisphere if you're just getting into it now. Make your own stuff, tweak stuff, use the newest patches (for me they are at the top of the unsorted list, not sure if this is same for everyone), buy 3rd party sounds. Beware of using old presets if you don't want to sound old.
> 
> Yes this is a big drawback/concern but it only takes off one star and for me Omnisphere was 12 out of 10 stars to begin with so it can stand to lose a couple stars and still be 100% worth it.
> 
> Or just avoid the stock arps completely, they are the most recognizable. Also avoid anything that says it was originally in "Distorted Reality" and/or "Bizarre Guitars" that stuff is everywhere.


Thank goodness I haven't used any of those!

But before going on another tangent, I want to say what I like best about Omnisphere: you don't forget how it works every time you don't use it for a few weeks. Its interface is totally clear and straightforward.

Okay, the tangent: does it really matter if someone recognizes that you're using Omnisphere? If your music is derivative (my ASCAP publishing co. is named Derivativemusic), then it matters. But does anyone care that... I dunno, "Nightshift" had the fretless DX-7 bass sound back in the '80s?

Now, using the same loops someone else uses, that's different. But instrument sounds are as unique as the music they're playing, no?

And as John G said, orchestral instruments are from way back.

By the way, I'm definitely stealing your "bad analogies are like ducks" line. It's not an Omnisphere patch, so I'm safe.


----------



## Fever Phoenix

Nick Batzdorf said:


> By the way, I'm definitely stealing your "bad analogies are like ducks" line. It's not an Omnisphere patch, so I'm safe.


great exit!


----------



## NekujaK

Omnisphere is one of the most valuable tools in my musical toolchest. It's versatile, inspiring, and familiar... all critical attributes that help me get sh*t done when I need to deliver.

Is it the only tool? Heavens no.

Is it the best tool? Well, the best tool is the one that works best for you for the current task at hand. Sometimes it's Omnisphere, sometimes it's a rubber band plucked with a chopstick. But I find Omnisphere is quite useful in most situations, and that definitely counts for something.


----------



## SupremeFist

Nick Batzdorf said:


> But before going on another tangent, I want to say what I like best about Omnisphere: you don't forget how it works every time you don't use it for a few weeks. Its interface is totally clear and straightforward.


That sounds good and important!


----------



## SupremeFist

Bman70 said:


> What's your go-to when you want to take a sample from all those libraries, and combine it with other samples plus synth components it into a brand new instrument / sample / arp / pad? It can't be Zebra since those don't import samples.
> 
> I think a lot of people might look at their huge collection of libraries and assume "I'm sure I have the equivalent of Omnisphere in there." But when it comes to practical use, getting the unlimited potential from those sounds in a single, fast, intuitive interface... I don't know if anything comes close. And that can have huge cumulative effects on inspiration, productivity, etc.


OK that does sound cool! I guess I could do that with Alchemy? But as yet I've never bothered...


----------



## el-bo

Bman70 said:


> Falcon is one I have my eye on now.. it looks like another Omni! I wonder if it ever goes on sale.


I was definitely interested in it when it was first released, but it just seems far too unwieldy for my tastes. Besides, I already have Alchemy via LPX and at some point will surely update Omnisphere (Will probably wait till version 3, though). Other than than that, I'd like to update to Equator 2. That'll also have to wait.

And I'm pretty sure I've seen Falcon discounted, on multiple occasions.


----------



## Bereckis

Omnisphere from Spectraconics is always worthwhile and is downright inexpensive in comparison to the string libraries.

The search for sounds is well organized.

In addition to the very good existing sounds, I use many of the Unfinished and Luftrum.

Keyscape from Spectraconics is a useful addition to Omnisphere. Before I could play bass, I also liked to use Trilian.

Omnisphere also gives the opportunity to work on many levels:

1. Efficient use of existing and external sounds

2. Adaptation of the sounds to your own needs

3. Create your own sounds

Omnisphere can also be used excellently for live performances.

From my point of view, the biggest advantage of Omniphere is that you can really create any sound with it if necessary and still only learn to use it once.

I also use a lot of other virtual synths to get inspiration. When things have to be done quickly, I almost always end up at Omnisphere.

The uncreative use of factory sounds was already an issue in the days of hardware synths.

But is it that bad when sounds are recognizable? And who, besides the experts, hears that?


----------



## Bereckis

SupremeFist said:


> OK that does sound cool! I guess I could do that with Alchemy? But as yet I've never bothered...


The Alchemy, which I used a lot in the past, is a good synth and can be compared to the Omnisphere. In contrast to Omnisphere, this one has not really been modernized.


----------



## Bereckis

el-bo said:


> I was definitely interested in it when it was first released, but it just seems far too unwieldy for my tastes. Besides, I already have Alchemy via LPX and at some point will surely update Omnisphere (Will probably wait till version 3, though). Other than than that, I'd like to update to Equator 2. That'll also have to wait.
> 
> And I'm pretty sure I've seen Falcon discounted, on multiple occasions.


Upgrading the Omniphere to Omnisphere 2 is definitely worth it; because it has really gained a lot of functions, simplification of operation and sound options.


----------



## Bereckis

Fever Phoenix said:


> What is super interesting about Falcon is the Multisample Support, with Round Robins and Velocity Layers from what I just read. Geeez, get both then?


Soll so sein, aber der Falcon hat sich nicht durchgesetzt und ist recht komplex in der Bedienung.


----------



## el-bo

Bereckis said:


> Upgrading the Omniphere to Omnisphere 2 is definitely worth it; because it has really gained a lot of functions, simplification of operation and sound options.


Actually, it isn't worth it for me. I would happily have paid $80-100 for sample import, sound lock/match, the super-duper convolution 'InnerSpace' thingy and the more functional GUI. What I had zero interest in is another 3-5000 presets, especially when most were supposedly focused on EDM.

It's been six years since V2 dropped and three years since 2.5. I'd b e surprised if V3 was too far off. if it arrives with native MPE support, that'd likely be my impetus to jump


----------



## wst3

a few more random thought, most of which you've already heard...

Omnisphere is a really flexible synthesizer/sample player, the only VST plugin that I've used that compares favorably is the now lamented Alchemy (no longer available for Windows).

Omnisphere is a different animal, at least it is different than all the synthesizer plugins I use. Don't misunderstand, I love emulations, I love new ideas, and there are a lot of plugins out there that check off some, or even most of the boxes. Onmi comes close to checking them all, some will say it does.

Once you get over the sheer shock, Omni is really easy to use, and as someone pointed out, there is not a lot you will forget between sessions.

It sounds great, and the presets sound great, even the overused presets. Many years ago I stopped using factory presets except as learning tools. I felt it was somehow cheating. Since purchasing (and using) Omnisphere I've decided that was a little silly.

Not all presets are brilliant, but some are, and I now spend time becoming familiar with presets with an eye to using them. And then I use some of them. I still like to create my own sounds, but I no longer feel that is the only way. And I credit the vast preset collection that comes with Omnisphere.

Did I mention it sounds great?

Now I didn't make the leap until a couple months before V2.5 was released, so I can't speak to version 1, or really even version 2, but I can tell you that I have no regrets whatsoever about my purchase of 2.5.

I also own Trillian (even though I do play bass, and have a Chapman Stick, there are just so many cool bass sounds in Trillian. And they are great fodder for Omnisphere.

I am considering Keyscape as well, at least partly because it will integrate with Omnisphere. But also for a couple of the Rhodes and Wurli models, and the MKS-20! I love the MKS-20! I wish I had kept my MKS-20! I don't think it sounds terribly like a piano, but it sits in the mix so nicely, and then it can sound like a piano.

I still have my MK-80, mostly I use it as a controller, I like the feel, although I wish it would reach velocity=127 without me using a mallet<G>. I'm actually curious to compare them.

While I have been remarkably stingy with my purchases I still have a couple libraries or plugins I could have done without. Can't really call it regret, more a nagging feeling that I could have used the funds more efficiently, if that makes sense. Of course being "frugal" means (a) I seldom make the purchase with time to learn the tool, and (b) I almost always suffer a moment or two of buyers remorse. That did not happen with either Omnisphere or Trillian.

(example - I bought Spitfire Audio Contemporary Drama Toolkit, the deal was just too tempting, and I enjoy using the British Drama Toolkit. For the first couple of tries I felt really stupid, like I had been taken. A few days later now, and I realize it was just me being me, and that I will make good use of the library. My blood pressure would benefit from me skipping the panic step after a purchase!)

And finally - I trust Spectrasonics, and I trust Eric. They earned my trust by delivering superior value in both Omnisphere and Trillian. I have no doubts that Keyscape will deliver. For me it is all about having a use for it. Which will happen!

Go for it!


----------



## Bman70

SupremeFist said:


> OK that does sound cool! I guess I could do that with Alchemy? But as yet I've never bothered...



Yeah it's also a matter of your workflow and what kind of music you mostly compose. Personally, I do a lot of sample manipulating and preset designing, so it's hard to imagine being as productive without Omnisphere. But someone writing more traditional / orchestral music might not find it as useful, and might even be better served by buying a Spitfire library. 

Tangent... As much as I tout Omnisphere, I really don't think buying more libraries automatically enhances creativity. There's something about having to think deeply about the sound you want, and then experimenting to get as close as you can, with what you have... even if the exploration takes you in different directions... that I think leads to better results than having an unlimited amount of presets to "pick" from.


----------



## Fever Phoenix

wst3 said:


> a few more random thought, most of which you've already heard...



Thank you for that very detailed reply. Indeed, thank you! Aside from your thoughts on Spectrasonics and Omnisphere you also expressed that "almost buyer's remorse process and later re-appreciating the purchase" very well 

(just bought Alternative Solo Strings and felt a bit meh after.. had the violin for years and the upgrade discount in combo with Thunderbolt tempted me into it.. I am sure it will be useful  )


----------



## devonmyles

Omnisphere is my most used VSTi Synth. It has so much under the hood to customise that in the early days,
a lot of it passed me by. The new features in the Arpeggiator (arrived in version 2.6) are quite in depth with a ton of options.
If you are willing to really get stuck into it, rather than just use it as a Preset playback unit, it's a real beast.
Of course, the Presets are terrific but, the Synth really has so much to offer that the price is really good value in my opinion.

​


----------



## Jaap

For me Omnisphere is my most used synth as composer as I can go there for some pure synth sounds, some good ARP's and of course it's heaven for pads, textures, soundscapes and all that kind of stuff.
I never use any factory patches to be honest and always create my own (not just for Triple Spiral Audio) but also always for my projects I am working on. I personally find it a breeze to work with as you can go as deep as you want.


----------



## jcrosby

Jaap said:


> For me Omnisphere is my most used synth as composer as I can go there for some pure synth sounds, some good ARP's and of course it's heaven for pads, textures, soundscapes and all that kind of stuff.
> I never use any factory patches to be honest and always create my own (not just for Triple Spiral Audio) but also always for my projects I am working on. I personally find it a breeze to work with as you can go as deep as you want.


Same here by a mile... For me Omnisphere is the ultimate workhorse synth in my entire arsenal. It's the only thing I reach for as frequently as Kontakt.


----------



## gzapper

Just finished one project where I built a really cool reel to reel sound off a sample I loaded that could be played into a show for sound designy stuff. It wasy to load the sample and get it to do what you want. Workshopping an opera based on a 1910 sci fi story where it'll be one mainstage rig with Omni and singers, mostly just using stacked sounds and programs I built. Everything that comes out of it seems very playable and adjustable, and mainly just nice and big sounding.

There are lots of other synths with cool sounds, but not so many with such a broad palette. Its not like you identify every sound as omni, more like you can get what you want out of it without too much work and make it musical.


----------



## givemenoughrope

el-bo said:


> Can you explain which part of Omnisphere's architecture stops you from making sounds "Your own"?


I think you answered that on your own


----------



## givemenoughrope

You could always just familiarize yourself with what Omni is/does and "build your own" with what you already have.

You have loads of Kontakt libraries already and presumably some really good fx plugins (Soundtoys), reverbs, etc, comp/limiter, a granular synth or two, good filter (like Zebrify), an arp plugin in your daw (or even just a midi track itself). Done. Now you have "Omnisphere" kinda...and possibly much more that that.


----------



## el-bo

givemenoughrope said:


> I think you answered that on your own


ok


----------



## bill5

I admit that while it is extremely unlikely I would ever buy it, I am curious about it. Too bad they don't have a demo or trial version.


----------



## bill5

chillbot said:


> Here are the questions I see consistently and repeatedly asked the most times over the last 15 years and it's not close:
> 
> Do I have to learn music theory? *Yes.*
> 
> Should I learn to play the piano? *Yes.*
> 
> Do I need to move to Los Angeles (or London, etc)? *Yes.*
> 
> Should I buy Omnisphere? *Yes.*


IF one has hopes of "making it" commercially, I'm with you. Otherwise the answers are:

No
Yes
No
Depends


----------



## Fever Phoenix

bill5 said:


> IF one has hopes of "making it" commercially, I'm with you. Otherwise the answers are:
> 
> No
> Yes
> No
> Depends


yes
yes
optional
optional


----------



## SteveK

I have played hardware synths since I was 11 years old and I was very lucky to get an EDP Wasp for Xmas.

I’ve owned some nice hardware over the years and still have quite a few including a Kronos 88, MoDX 7, a couple of Mini Moogs and a Prophet 6.

I had thought about Omnisphere for years but knew my 10 year old iMac couldn’t cope. When I decided to replace that I got Omnisphere in summer 2020 and I’m staggered by it. It sounds beautiful, has a superb preset library and third party sounds by experts such as the Unfinished are just mind blowing.

I could get lost for hours every time I use it. Endless fun to be had with nearly every patch. And I want to start a new piece every time I play it as well. It’s so inspiring. I just discovered the absolute joy of the Omni-TR app and the ability remotely control layering in Live Mode and that is a whole new world of fun. Just incredible.

Using the hardware mode with the Prophet is also such a clever and inspiring innovation.

It has me wondering about much of the hardware I have and whether I could do without most of it now.

At Xmas I took advantage of the sale for Zebra and Dark Zebra. Also amazing but at the moment I find Omnisphere more accessible and inspiring but I need to spend more time on Zebra.

The technology we have now is so deep and versatile. It’s a great time to make music and play with sounds. I’m just too short on time to enjoy it as much as I want, plus I’ve also got into Spitfire and the whole orchestral thing as well which is another universe of fun as well.

I don’t think you’ll be disappointed with Omnisphere...

All the best
Steve


----------



## Pier

SteveK said:


> At Xmas I took advantage of the sale for Zebra and Dark Zebra. Also amazing but at the moment I find Omnisphere more accessible and inspiring but I need to spend more time on Zebra.


Have you bought third party Zebra presets?

Eg: The Unfinished, etc.


----------



## el-bo

SteveK said:


> It sounds beautiful, has a superb preset library and third party sounds by experts such as the Unfinished are just mind blowing.


Also, worth checking out Stephen Baer's sounds @ sonicunderworld. Definitely in a similar vein to TheUnfinished:



Store – Sonic Underworld


----------



## Arbee

Apologies for not reading every post in this thread but in summary, Omnisphere is my invaluable all round "swiss army knife" but I much prefer Zebra and Serum for dedicated synth work.


----------



## GtrString

I would rate Spectrasonics as the unrivaled best VI developer on the planet, and Omnisphere as the no. 1 virtual instrument.

.. and I would ditch anything else for next gen. Stylus RMX!


----------



## kgdrum

Agreed some 3rd party presets for Zebra can be a great way to see Zebra's potential. Yeah I love the Unfinished as well as Sonic Underworld and all of the other talented preset-creators.
One that often gets overlooked because his focus is on his own VI creations is Pendle aka Sound Dust,this is a great soundset imo.










CLUSTER for ZEBRA 2 | sound-dust


Menacing but beautiful sounds for U-He Zebra 2 VST




www.sound-dust.com


----------



## SteveK

Pier said:


> Have you bought third party Zebra presets?
> 
> Eg: The Unfinished, etc.


Yes I have. I asked Matt which set he would recommend and they are great. I got the Lazarus Vol 1 Dark Edition set. I’ve only had it since just before Xmas and been busy with work since (I’m an accountant/auditor) but will dig into some of the presets and see how they are built up. Zebra does sound great as well but I just found Omnisphere a bit quicker to get used to navigating.


----------



## Arbee

kgdrum said:


> Agreed some 3rd party presets for Zebra can be a great way to see Zebra's potential. Yeah I love the Unfinished as well as Sonic Unerworld and all of the other talented preset-creators.
> One that often gets overlooked because his focus is on his own VI creations is Pendle aka Sound Dust,this is a great soundset imo.


This is one I particularly like. https://www.aiynzahev-sounds.com/products/sphere-for-zebra2

I wish he would do some for Omnisphere, his Serum presets are also great.


----------



## Pier

Arbee said:


> This is one I particularly like. https://www.aiynzahev-sounds.com/products/sphere-for-zebra2
> 
> I wish he would do some for Omnisphere, his Serum presets are also great.


Sami is a brilliant sound designer. I wish he did more cinematic stuff instead of so much EDM.


----------



## Crossroads

Fever Phoenix said:


> yes
> yes
> optional
> optional


No
No
No
Yes. Not because it's necessary but because just the most awesome synth on the planet.


----------



## SupremeFist

kgdrum said:


> Agreed some 3rd party presets for Zebra can be a great way to see Zebra's potential. Yeah I love the Unfinished as well as Sonic Underworld and all of the other talented preset-creators.
> One that often gets overlooked because his focus is on his own VI creations is Pendle aka Sound Dust,this is a great soundset imo.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> CLUSTER for ZEBRA 2 | sound-dust
> 
> 
> Menacing but beautiful sounds for U-He Zebra 2 VST
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.sound-dust.com


I just bought Cluster and it is extraordinary, dazzling, silly, amazing, inspiring, and ridiculously good. Anyone who got Zebra in the recent NI sale and still hasn't quite grokked what you can do with it needs this one.


----------



## kgdrum

SupremeFist said:


> I just bought Cluster and it is extraordinary, dazzling, silly, amazing, inspiring, and ridiculously good. Anyone who got Zebra in the recent NI sale and still hasn't quite grokked what you can do with it needs this one.


As I am a confirmed Sound Dust/Pendle fanboy its nice to see my fanatical adoration is somewhat justified! lol
Besides Cluster for Zebra2,Friction for Diva,Untopia for Omni and Lost and Found for Omni that Pendle and Matt aka Unfinished created as a collaboration are also stunning achievements in preset craftsmanship.
If you like Cluster I think you will like these others as well.

Since this is a Omni thread I think it’s worth mentioning that Pendle recently said that he’s currently finishing up a new Omni soundset :

“The next thing out is likely to be a cunning Omnisphere library I've been working on for a while. Can't say for sure when it will be ready - these things take time you know.”

I do think besides Pendle obvious talent he somehow gets overlooked in the preset department,I have nagged him quite a few time to make more damn presets!


----------



## Dewdman42

Omnispheres is brilliant and very easy to program.


----------



## kgdrum

Dewdman42 said:


> Omnispheres is brilliant and very easy to program.


So says the madman that takes his cheesegrater to OS territory’s where few people will tread! lol 😱


----------



## Dewdman42

hehe.


----------



## Dewdman42

kgdrum said:


> So says the madman that takes his cheesegrater To OS territory’s where few people will tread! lol 😱


I even flashed it with a custom BootROM recently....whahoo


----------



## kgdrum

Dewdman42 said:


> I even flashed it with a custom BootROM recently....whahoo


Please give us some of the juicy details 😘


----------



## Dewdman42

see here: https://vi-control.net/community/th...hat-to-do-with-it.101057/page-10#post-4777706


----------



## TonalDynamics

JohnG said:


> Yes. And everyone uses those old-fashioned orchestral instruments too! Some of those are hundreds of years old!
> 
> If you have the time to really learn what you are doing, ZebraHZ and Hive etc. are just dynamite. Diva is my personal favourite but those others are great too.
> 
> Omnisphere is fantastically easy to customise -- a few clicks / edits and you have something that is truly different-sounding. Moreover, it has tons of oscillators, thousands of sounds sources; it's almost infinitely variable. Swap a sound source, add an arpeggiation (many presets for that too) and voila!
> 
> Especially if you have limited time, Omnisphere is excellent, but even if you have all day, Omnisphere is still superb.


Hear Hear... I wish to echo this sentiment:

There are no 'old' or 'new' sounds, only good ones (or _not_ so good ones)

Context is everything.


----------



## TonalDynamics

chillbot said:


> Just off the top of my head I would love to go a day without hearing "Eternal Changeling" or "Electric Ebow".
> 
> Others I hear everywhere:
> 
> Chaos Bowls
> Grooveorganica
> Cheerfully Crushed Vibes
> Ode to Mr. Newman
> Chasing the Evil
> Magma Chaos Gate
> Tibetian Meditation
> 
> This is a good caveat to mention about Omnisphere if you're just getting into it now. Make your own stuff, tweak stuff, use the newest patches (for me they are at the top of the unsorted list, not sure if this is same for everyone), buy 3rd party sounds. Beware of using old presets if you don't want to sound old.
> 
> Yes this is a big drawback/concern but it only takes off one star and for me Omnisphere was 12 out of 10 stars to begin with so it can stand to lose a couple stars and still be 100% worth it.
> 
> Or just avoid the stock arps completely, they are the most recognizable. Also avoid anything that says it was originally in "Distorted Reality" and/or "Bizarre Guitars" that stuff is everywhere.


Indeed!

The same is true about a lot of kontakt libraries as well...

My solution to this, in the same vein as what you mentioned is:

1. Buy craploads of 3rd party presets from good sound designers
2. Listen to lots of current material (TV, film, trailers, EM/Trance/House, etc.), copy and store the sounds I'm hearing into my brain's RAM so I'm aware of what's out in the wild currently (Is this sample piracy? :O)
3. Curate presets from said libraries, *rating them by stars* (Wish all Synths had this feature!) until I've gleaned all the stuff I really like, and downvoted the stuff I hate (which is sadly often more than half the library - even the pros have to resort to 'fillers'!)
4. Use curated presets as starting point for recording an idea, and once the tracks are in place for something I've written, loop playback and tweak the sound until I make it my own and I'm confident there is enough of my own musical DNA to make the sounds either highly obscured or virtually indiscernible to the original patches.

As a composer, I highly recommend this workflow when dealing with any of the great modern virtual synths.

The listening/curating itself is actually the most time-consuming part of the whole process, but it pays dividends in the end by giving you a quick and present way to connect with your musical ideas without getting 'lost in the sauce' of endless preset bloat.

I won't even use a synth anymore if it's not good enough for 3rd party sound designers to make packs for it. I COULD make a bunch of custom patches to use as a starting point - but as a writer/producer, why would I?

The guys making these packs have good ears, great technical skills, and design these sounds all day, for a living. I would much rather spend my time piecing together a composition and arranging to get something finished, and benefit from their expertise by using their work to give me a head-start.

As for OP's question, yes, buy omnisphere when you can manage it. You won't regret it...

Cheers


----------



## jcrosby

TonalDynamics said:


> Indeed!
> 
> The same is true about a lot of kontakt libraries as well...
> 
> My solution to this, in the same vein as what you mentioned is:
> 
> 1. Buy craploads of 3rd party presets from good sound designers
> 2. Listen to lots of current material (TV, film, trailers, EM/Trance/House, etc.), copy and store the sounds I'm hearing into my brain's RAM so I'm aware of what's out in the wild currently (Is this sample piracy? :O)
> 3. Curate presets from said libraries, *rating them by stars* (Wish all Synths had this feature!) until I've gleaned all the stuff I really like, and downvoted the stuff I hate (which is sadly often more than half the library - even the pros have to resort to 'fillers'!)
> 4. Use curated presets as starting point for recording an idea, and once the tracks are in place for something I've written, loop playback and tweak the sound until I make it my own and I'm confident there is enough of my own musical DNA to make the sounds either highly obscured or virtually indiscernible to the original patches.
> 
> As a composer, I highly recommend this workflow when dealing with any of the great modern virtual synths.
> 
> The listening/curating itself is actually the most time-consuming part of the whole process, but it pays dividends in the end by giving you a quick and present way to connect with your musical ideas without getting 'lost in the sauce' of endless preset bloat.
> 
> I won't even use a synth anymore if it's not good enough for 3rd party sound designers to make packs for it. I COULD make a bunch of custom patches to use as a starting point - but as a writer/producer, why would I?
> 
> The guys making these packs have good ears, great technical skills, and design these sounds all day, for a living. I would much rather spend my time piecing together a composition and arranging to get something finished, and benefit from their expertise by using their work to give me a head-start.
> 
> As for OP's question, yes, buy omnisphere when you can manage it. You won't regret it...
> 
> Cheers


Indeed... I spend a few odd days every month or so going though, hunting for undiscovered stuff, and curating as needed... While it does take time, the flip side is that no other synth allows you to 'collect' stuff for a project (or genre, or _whatever_...) ahead of time, then come back to it later with essentially no extra effort other than pick what patch(es) work best on the spot...

Kontakt on the other hand is a royal pain in the ass in some circumstances... God-save-you if you're dealing with a Quickload collection with tens of thousands of patches... Quickload becomes slow-load while you wait for it to re-scan all of your patches all over again - (why not scan for changes only?!!! FFS!)... More often than not I find Omnisphere's organization is preferable and quicker...

No it isn't Kontakt, but for all of the kontakt content out there you'd think they would have figured out a way to organize all of your content just as quickly by now...


----------



## KEM

Only one of the greatest things to ever exist!! I owe my life to Omnisphere


----------



## el-bo

KEM said:


> Only one of the greatest things to ever exist!! I owe my life to Omnisphere


Quite an endorsement. Would be interested to know why this synth in particular has had such a profound effect on you.


----------



## Pier

jcrosby said:


> No it isn't Kontakt, but for all of the kontakt content out there you'd think they would have figured out a way to organize all of your content just as quickly by now...


The UI hasn't had a big change in like 10? years.

Hopefully NI is working on the next version of Kontakt which will improve all this.


----------



## KEM

el-bo said:


> Quite an endorsement. Would be interested to know why this synth in particular has had such a profound effect on you.



Omnisphere basically just does everything, almost any genre, almost any type of sound you could want. You could make huge arrangements with just Omnisphere presets, and you’d only be using .01% of what’s available within it. Everything in it is extremely high quality, and it’s the one thing that literally ends up on everything I make


----------



## el-bo

KEM said:


> Omnisphere basically just does everything, almost any genre, almost any type of sound you could want. You could make huge arrangements with just Omnisphere presets, and you’d only be using .01% of what’s available within it. Everything in it is extremely high quality, and it’s the one thing that literally ends up on everything I make


Ah, gotcha! Understood...and agreed. 

I bought Atmosphere (Omni's predecessor) around 2006, then upgraded as soon as it became Omni. But I'm still using version 1. Despite that, and for similar reasons as you gave, it's my desert-island instrument.


----------



## jcrosby

Pier said:


> The UI hasn't had a big change in like 10? years.
> 
> Hopefully NI is working on the next version of Kontakt which will improve all this.


Yeah it must be around a decade by now. It would be great if they implemented a global favorites or rating system. The database also has so much potential, but no practical way to make use of any of it... I've never understood why they never implemented a way to select a bunch of patches shown in the database and add some custom tags or keywords...


----------



## CT

Love Omnisphere, should have bought it years before I finally did. So much of what I tried to do with other software synths (great in their own right) was what Omnisphere was made for.


----------



## dcoscina

Flipping fantastic. I used it a ton on the advertisements I worked on and also on an RGP game score.


----------



## Bman70

One time when I was unable to drive home due to intoxication, Omnisphere kindly offered to drive, and then made me warm cocoa with ginger to help with the hangover. It really is unlimited.


----------



## Zanshin

I must be feeling foolish because this thread is pretty big circle jerk (I might not make it out of here alive, tell my family I love them!).

I bought it based on opinions expressed here on VI-Control.

I found Omnisphere to be largely a waste of money, storage space, and time. There's 10000+ presets, but I found like 1 in every couple of hundred good or potentially useful to me, and far less than that inspiring. Auditioning and finding useful presets was a chore. Clunky interface from 1942.

Synth engine: serviceable, but not one synth feature really stands out (it's all been done, and done better). I will say this, at the time I bought it, I owned a Moog Subsequent 37 (in fact a selling point for me was I could control Omni with the Moog) and a Virus Ti2. These are two great synths that cost more than like 7 Omnis so a bum comparison? But the Uhe synths crush Omni as well IMO.

The sound design stuff: If you own nothing from Heavyocity, or Keepforest, etc.... or I guess if you are looking for some drab beige sound design for underscore, Omni is your tool! But again I give you - I didn't buy any 3rd part Omni stuff, and the sound design libraries I own were not super cheap (but neither is Omni).

I didn't write this to try to convince any of the Omni fans in this thread (or start a blood feud haha), but consider it a minority report/dissenting opinion. If you are considering buying Omnisphere, think about where it would sit in your tools very carefully.


----------



## Bman70

Zanshin said:


> I must be feeling foolish because this thread is pretty big circle jerk (I might not make it out of here alive, tell my family I love them!).
> 
> I bought it based on opinions expressed here on VI-Control.
> 
> I found Omnisphere to be largely a waste of money, storage space, and time. There's 10000+ presets, but I found like 1 in every couple of hundred good or potentially useful to me, and far less than that inspiring. Auditioning and finding useful presets was a chore. Clunky interface from 1942.
> 
> Synth engine: serviceable, but not one synth feature really stands out (it's all been done, and done better). I will say this, at the time I bought it, I owned a Moog Subsequent 37 (in fact a selling point for me was I could control Omni with the Moog) and a Virus Ti2. These are two great synths that cost more than like 7 Omnis so a bum comparison? But the Uhe synths crush Omni as well IMO.
> 
> The sound design stuff: If you own nothing from Heavyocity, or Keepforest, etc.... or I guess if you are looking for some drab beige sound design for underscore, Omni is your tool! But again I give you - I didn't buy any 3rd part Omni stuff, and the sound design libraries I own were not super cheap (but neither is Omni).
> 
> I didn't write this to try to convince any of the Omni fans in this thread (or start a blood feud haha), but consider it a minority report/dissenting opinion. If you are considering buying Omnisphere, think about where it would sit in your tools very carefully.



Interesting, and I can sort of relate to some parts. A vast amount of patches are crap (to me). However, I don't do dubstep or music that needs certain noises. Maybe it's just because it's so vast that it ends up including lots of material a given musician won't like. I also admit the GUI feels a little dated. In a bad way? Not sure really, since plenty of cool things are dated (maybe those hardwares you mentioned?). Clicking and shaping envelopes could be more sleek, easy, and advanced.

The sound sources at times can feel like just a grab-bag, or effort to fill space. Like, did they really need that many "electric toothbrush" experiments? And when I find a sample I love, I wish there were more like that instead of dozens of versions of electric toothbrush.

But, for designing my own presets, I love what it does. That doesn't mean I'm not eager to try other synths too, this is just my first one. But, can you please be more specific about the ways in which the U-he synths crush Omni? It would be hard to agree, if those synths don't have features like:

-Layers (Omni has 4 per part, each can have its own independent sample or synth sound with independent adjustments). Most of my patches are only 1 part, but they can be up to 8 for a Multi.
-Importing samples
-Granular (for each layer independently)
-Actual FX like delay, distortion, tube compression etc.

Lastly, it's highly unfortunate that Omnisphere can't be demoed. That would just save so much confusion.


----------



## Zanshin

Bman70 said:


> But, for designing my own presets, I love what it does. That doesn't mean I'm not eager to try other synths too, this is just my first one. But, can you please be more specific about the ways in which the U-he synths crush Omni? It would be hard to agree, if those synths don't have features like:
> 
> -Layers (Omni has 4 per part, each can have its own independent sample or synth sound with independent adjustments). Most of my patches are only 1 part, but they can be up to 8 for a Multi.
> -Importing samples
> -Granular (for each layer independently)
> -Actual FX like delay, distortion, tube compression etc.


Crush was hyperbole haha. To my ears, the Uhe synths sound "better", it's subjective. I really don't want to go down the rabbit hole - but to address your other points...

Layers: How hard is it to layer things, even disparate things, in a DAW? In fact you mention "independent", i.e. unconnected. I have multitrack presets in Ableton that have say a soft synth, Kontakt instrument, and a VSL instrument. I can drop the preset in my project and BOOM - layered hijinks ensue. Not to mention - Unify (I still need to pick this up haha).

Samples/Granular: I just don't see this as a big selling point. There's lots of Kontakt "synths" that do this, The Light trilogy from NI, and Haunted Spaces from Soniccouture are two stand out examples (although Haunted Spaces might not be technically granular).

FX: I'm betting you have better FX VSTs than what's on offer in Omni. Truth? I get that it might be convenient that it's all encapsulated as part of the Omni preset, but everyone else is doing this, not just Omni. The Light trilogy I mentioned above also has an effect chain. Even 8dio does. Etc. They might be more or less flexible, sound more or less "better", but it's kind of par for the course now days. The example multi-track preset I mentioned above? Each has it's own effect chain (or can share sends).


----------



## jcrosby

Zanshin said:


> FX: I'm betting you have better FX VSTs than what's on offer in Omni. Truth? I get that it might be convenient that it's all encapsulated as part of the Omni preset, but everyone else is doing this, not just Omni. The Light trilogy I mentioned above also has an effect chain. Even 8dio does. Etc. They might be more or less flexible, sound more or less "better", but it's kind of par for the course now days. The example multi-track preset I mentioned above? Each has it's own effect chain (or can share sends).



I realize you're not here for a scrap and I'm not looking for one either, but it does sound to me like you've barely explored Omnisphere, and/or are relying heavily on presets alone... I just finished a few hundred pieces of custom trailer sound design for a gritty/gruesome tent-pole sci-fi series. A lot of the source audio material started in Omnisphere using factory sounds.

My point is that while there's clearly things about it you don't like, which is totally fair, the factory library alone is capable or pretty much any genre if you put in the time and go deep into its sample library, and start making things your own... 

Just wanted to add an alternate perspective specifically in regards to its capability for designing SFX. It's true the presets alone may not get you very far, but getting under the hood absolutely will...


----------



## jtnyc

I own Omni. I like it ok. I’ve purchased a lot of Unfinished, Midisonance and other 3rd party presets. While those preset makers are good, I should have stopped at buying just 1 maybe 2 sets of presets from each as there is so much redundancy it just becomes too much of the same. There’s something about it that just always sounds like Omni. Often there is too much bottom end and things are just too clean, compressed and polished, and the amount of delay and reverb on patches becomes annoying. Don’t get me wrong, I love many of the sounds in Omni. It’s just doesn‘t meet the holy grail status for me that many give it. It has a lot of good atmospheric stuff, but IDK... it’s all a bit rompleresk. The BPM presets have the same delay on them 90% of the presets, including the 3rd party stuff. It is a huge library of sound sources and there are many cool atmospheres and other diverse sounds. I guess I’m glad I have it, but for synth sounds I much prefer Diva, Repro and Hive. For atmos stuff I have quite a bit of stuff I run in Kontakt that I prefer most of the time. It gets some use, but not as much as I thought it would when I first bought it years ago. It’s one of those things... it’s great, I just don’t use it that much..


----------



## CT

I'm not even using any third-party soundsets and I feel like every other patch is something that gives me an idea, well except for some of the really niche/dated sounds. My only complaint is Spectrasonics' whole download/installation/update process feels extremely archaic.


----------



## Pier

Zanshin said:


> Layers: How hard is it to layer things, even disparate things, in a DAW?


As a composer I agree with you. Specially with Bitwig and Live it's super easy to create an instrument rack and layer anything you can dream of.

As a sound designer, it is super convenient to be able to have a single tool with effects, layers, samples, etc. Either to sell those sounds, or to be able to use the sounds on any DAW.

(I don't own Omni btw)


----------



## Zanshin

jcrosby said:


> I realize you're not here for a scrap and I'm not looking for one either, but it does sound to me like you've barely explored Omnisphere, and/or are relying heavily on presets alone... I just finished a ton of custom trailer sound design for a gritty/gruesome tent-pole sci-fi series. A lot of the source audio material started in Omnisphere using factory sounds. My point is that while there's clearly things about it you don't like, which is totally fair, the factory library alone is capable or pretty much any genre if you put in the time and go deep inside its sample library...


Congrats on the trailer! 

I did try to get on it with it and I'm not brain dead. Given how much praise it gets I was wondering wtf was wrong with me haha. I think, yes, you put in the time with Omni, are a great sound designer, and can make Omni sing for you. I'd bet you could do it with out Omni too. 

For the record, I know I am the outlier, I respect you, and MikeT, etc. However, I don't think Omni is for everyone, beginner or no, and I think that needs to be said.


----------



## Bman70

jtnyc said:


> There’s something about it that just always sounds like Omni.


True, as I like to say "it sounds like the TV."


----------



## Bman70

Bman70 said:


> True, as I like to say "it sounds like the TV."


Which just goes to show it's an industry standard and a first choice for professionals, to get on so many soundtracks.


----------



## José Herring

Whenever I consider Omnisphere I'm like meh, I'm not into it. I've done that for years since its release at NAMM. 

I did the same thing with Zebra and ZebraHZ. I thought meh, not my thing. Then I got Zebra and then Zebra HZ now I'm like it's the best synth mankind ever invented.

I'm sure someday I'll do the same for Omnisphere but for me it's still in the Meh, not for me category.


----------



## TonalDynamics

jcrosby said:


> Indeed... I spend a few odd days every month or so going though, hunting for undiscovered stuff, and curating as needed... While it does take time, the flip side is that no other synth allows you to 'collect' stuff for a project (or genre, or _whatever_...) ahead of time, then come back to it later with essentially no extra effort other than pick what patch(es) work best on the spot...
> 
> Kontakt on the other hand is a royal pain in the ass in some circumstances... God-save-you if you're dealing with a Quickload collection with tens of thousands of patches... Quickload becomes slow-load while you wait for it to re-scan all of your patches all over again - (why not scan for changes only?!!! FFS!)... More often than not I find Omnisphere's organization is preferable and quicker...
> 
> No it isn't Kontakt, but for all of the kontakt content out there you'd think they would have figured out a way to organize all of your content just as quickly by now...


I am truly disappointed with Native Instruments, frankly.

Don't get me wrong, I think they are GOOD at making money with their target market, which is essentially EDM and hip hop these days.

But with all that success, you would think they could put a little budget together to refresh a 15 year-old code base with Kontakt.

Same U.I./scaling issues, patch organization/saving issues, lack of load-order and performance options, etc

I am disappointed because they know full well that the composer segment of their userbase is a niche market, compared to most of their modern userbase - they know we have no options, having hordes of libraries that are kontakt-only, and more or less choose to take us for granted and ignore us.

Yet another shining example of why a lack of competition/monopolies in _any_ market are nearly always harmful to the end-users.


----------



## Pier

TonalDynamics said:


> I am truly disappointed with Native Instruments, frankly.
> 
> Don't get me wrong, I think they are GOOD at making money with their target market, which is essentially EDM and hip hop these days.
> 
> But with all that success, you would think they could put a little budget together to refresh a 15 year-old code base with Kontakt.
> 
> Same U.I./scaling issues, patch organization/saving issues, lack of load-order and performance options, etc
> 
> I am disappointed because they know full well that the composer segment of their userbase is a niche market, compared to most of their modern userbase - they know we have no options, having hordes of libraries that are kontakt-only, and more or less choose to take us for granted and ignore us.
> 
> Yet another shining example of why a lack of competition/monopolies in _any_ market are nearly always harmful to the end-users.


I agree, but I'm hopeful NI is working on a new version of Kontakt with a new UI. Maybe adding more synth stuff so that it can be more like an Omni on steroids.

Why? Well Massive X was rewritten from scratch and other products like Guitar Rig were also recently refreshed. I think it makes sense NI would invest in Kontakt next but it's not an easy product to tackle.

Of course their core user has always been the electronic/hip hop producer, but I don't think Kontakt is niche. NI has been heavily investing on Kontakt libraries in the past years for media composers.

My consipracy theory is that there have been massive tectonic changes at NI regarding product direction, but I feel they are finally now on the right track after a decade of darkness.


----------



## TonalDynamics

Pier said:


> I agree, but I'm hopeful NI is working on a new version of Kontakt with a new UI. Maybe adding more synth stuff so that it can be more like an Omni on steroids.
> 
> Why? Well Massive X was rewritten from scratch and other products like Guitar Rig were also recently refreshed. I think it makes sense NI would invest in Kontakt next but it's not an easy product to tackle.
> 
> Of course their core user has always been the electronic/hip hop producer, but I don't think Kontakt is niche. NI has been heavily investing on Kontakt libraries in the past years for media composers.
> 
> My consipracy theory is that there have been massive tectonic changes at NI regarding product direction, but I feel they are finally now on the right track after a decade of darkness.


I'll grant you their direction has shifted (in a good way), particularly in the last 5 years, vis a vis their collaborations with O.T. and other developers to make better Kontakt libs than they ever have, but I'm unconvinced they'll do anything revolutionary with Kontakt anytime soon :(

In the Guitar Rig department however, it's a similar story to what's going on with Kontakt (based off of what I've heard from those who have tried it, I own 5 but never bought 6) the amps are essentially unchanged despite their claims to have all this new circuit modeling tech or whatever.

The interface is improved apparently, but the core sound (the thing that matters most) is still more or less the same - and that's in a world with _huge_ competition in the amp-sim VST market over the last few years, NeuralDSP and Nembrini among others.

One thing Guitar Rig DOES have is some very sweet FX, which go wonderfully as POST FX for synths as well (I have not tried the new ones in 6, but this is coming from my previous experience with the ones in 5)


----------



## MegaPixel

Well I've just got my hands on Omni 2.8 and been tinkering with it for the past 3 weeks...

For me... it's shait... 10,000+ presets 200 if that are of use, a lot do sound nice, but are just not usable. I do get a good quality vibe from many of the sounds, it's stereo field etc. It's interface is about as complicated as using the microwave, with hidden buttons here and there, and often doesn't know what it's doing or if it should be doing it 1 way or another way... Then it just gets worse from there, it's lacking in many areas. You got a billion 1 key presets, again many sound great but are just not usable. I think it's mostly usable for atmospheres / pads etc but the rest I can't get behind, there are a few vox/vocals and guitars that are nice etc... But 200 is really pushing it. 10,000 channels and nothing is on...

*So here's my my advice to anyone thinking of getting it (each to their own):
1. If your thinking about buying it, watch a lot, and I mean a LOT of youtube videos on it before you do...
2. *If you got Zebra / Zebra HZ, Dune 2, Pigments 3, Analogue Lab 5, Phaseplant, Vital, Anna 2, Hive 2, Serum (or combinations of them) then you already got all you need with far more capabilities than Omnisphere v2.whatever or probably v3 will ever give you.
It's slow, it crashes, it lacks many features, the wav import takes about 3 years and can often crash the plugin, the list goes on. For what it does offer it sounds great but 99% of the time I turn away from it, for what I've listed above. The other also offer far cheaper and better ranges of presets, far more of them available out there and from much wider range of sources...

IMO, the VSTs with the most capabilities which go above and beyond and sound great are :
1. UVI - Falcon (not for people looking for a simple vst, but very powerful)
2. Halion 6 (with Sonic) - If you dig deep into it and it's shait interface you will get some really amazing results out of it.
3. Kontakt Full (Clunky, a bit shit but has the libraries out there to make up for that and many of them are super cheap and have a great sound, you don't have to do a full NI Komplete purchase etc)

Omni, you don't impress me... Not at all...


----------



## AmbientMile

MegaPixel said:


> .....It's slow, it crashes, it lacks many features, the wav import takes about 3 years and can often crash the plugin, the list goes on. For what it does offer it sounds great but 99% of the time I turn away from it, for what I've listed above. The other also offer far cheaper and better ranges of presets, far more of them available out there and from much wider range of sources...


I have been using Omni since it was Atmosphere and I have never had any performance issues or crashing at all. I am genuinely curious what you mean by "it lacks many features". After YEARS of using it, I am still discovering ways to pull new sounds from it. You call it shit after three weeks? I will agree that it is not for everyone, but I think your comments are a bit harsh with your limited experience using it.


----------



## Pier

MegaPixel said:


> Well I've just got my hands on Omni 2.8 and been tinkering with it for the past 3 weeks...
> 
> For me... it's shait... 10,000+ presets 200 if that are of use, a lot do sound nice, but are just not usable. I do get a good quality vibe from many of the sounds, it's stereo field etc. It's interface is about as complicated as using the microwave, with hidden buttons here and there, and often doesn't know what it's doing or if it should be doing it 1 way or another way... Then it just gets worse from there, it's lacking in many areas. You got a billion 1 key presets, again many sound great but are just not usable. I think it's mostly usable for atmospheres / pads etc but the rest I can't get behind, there are a few vox/vocals and guitars that are nice etc... But 200 is really pushing it. 10,000 channels and nothing is on...
> 
> *So here's my my advice to anyone thinking of getting it (each to their own):
> 1. If your thinking about buying it, watch a lot, and I mean a LOT of youtube videos on it before you do...
> 2. *If you got Zebra / Zebra HZ, Dune 2, Pigments 3, Analogue Lab 5, Phaseplant, Vital, Anna 2, Hive 2, Serum (or combinations of them) then you already got all you need with far more capabilities than Omnisphere v2.whatever or probably v3 will ever give you.
> It's slow, it crashes, it lacks many features, the wav import takes about 3 years and can often crash the plugin, the list goes on. For what it does offer it sounds great but 99% of the time I turn away from it, for what I've listed above. The other also offer far cheaper and better ranges of presets, far more of them available out there and from much wider range of sources...
> 
> IMO, the VSTs with the most capabilities which go above and beyond and sound great are :
> 1. UVI - Falcon (not for people looking for a simple vst, but very powerful)
> 2. Halion 6 (with Sonic) - If you dig deep into it and it's shait interface you will get some really amazing results out of it.
> 3. Kontakt Full (Clunky, a bit shit but has the libraries out there to make up for that and many of them are super cheap and have a great sound, you don't have to do a full NI Komplete purchase etc)
> 
> Omni, you don't impress me... Not at all...


I've never used Omni, but what you describe is exactly the impression I got from watching youtube videos.


----------



## Bereckis

MegaPixel said:


> Well I've just got my hands on Omni 2.8 and been tinkering with it for the past 3 weeks...
> 
> For me... it's shait... 10,000+ presets 200 if that are of use, a lot do sound nice, but are just not usable. I do get a good quality vibe from many of the sounds, it's stereo field etc. It's interface is about as complicated as using the microwave, with hidden buttons here and there, and often doesn't know what it's doing or if it should be doing it 1 way or another way... Then it just gets worse from there, it's lacking in many areas. You got a billion 1 key presets, again many sound great but are just not usable. I think it's mostly usable for atmospheres / pads etc but the rest I can't get behind, there are a few vox/vocals and guitars that are nice etc... But 200 is really pushing it. 10,000 channels and nothing is on...
> 
> *So here's my my advice to anyone thinking of getting it (each to their own):
> 1. If your thinking about buying it, watch a lot, and I mean a LOT of youtube videos on it before you do...
> 2. *If you got Zebra / Zebra HZ, Dune 2, Pigments 3, Analogue Lab 5, Phaseplant, Vital, Anna 2, Hive 2, Serum (or combinations of them) then you already got all you need with far more capabilities than Omnisphere v2.whatever or probably v3 will ever give you.
> It's slow, it crashes, it lacks many features, the wav import takes about 3 years and can often crash the plugin, the list goes on. For what it does offer it sounds great but 99% of the time I turn away from it, for what I've listed above. The other also offer far cheaper and better ranges of presets, far more of them available out there and from much wider range of sources...
> 
> IMO, the VSTs with the most capabilities which go above and beyond and sound great are :
> 1. UVI - Falcon (not for people looking for a simple vst, but very powerful)
> 2. Halion 6 (with Sonic) - If you dig deep into it and it's shait interface you will get some really amazing results out of it.
> 3. Kontakt Full (Clunky, a bit shit but has the libraries out there to make up for that and many of them are super cheap and have a great sound, you don't have to do a full NI Komplete purchase etc)
> 
> Omni, you don't impress me... Not at all...


I have been using Omniphere for years and cannot confirm this statement.

When I need to produce music quickly, Omniphere is the fastest tool for me and the first choice.

UVI Falcon I have now for a few months and I like it.


----------



## Zanshin

Pier said:


> I've never used Omni, but what you describe is exactly the impression I got from watching youtube videos.


It was my experience too. But I'm sure everyone will now chime in to let @MegaPixel know why he is wrong.


----------



## Bereckis

Pier said:


> I've never used Omni, but what you describe is exactly the impression I got from watching youtube videos.


In my opinion, the impression is wrong.

It is not for nothing that Omniphere has the most excellent third-party sound providers.


----------



## MegaPixel

AmbientMile said:


> I have been using Omni since it was Atmosphere and I have never had any performance issues or crashing at all. I am genuinely curious what you mean by "it lacks many features". After YEARS of using it, I am still discovering ways to pull new sounds from it. You call it shit after three weeks? I will agree that it is not for everyone, but I think your comments are a bit harsh with you limited experience using it.


I'm a very technically oriented person so something like Falcon & Halion wont scare me off, but in comparison of what they are capable of, for me, Omni doesn't stand a chance, that's like comparing a toy car to a Bugatti Veyron. I would even put Arturia's Pigments 3 up against Omni in a 1 v 1 battle and if you have Analogue Lab 5 also, game set match. Then just take your pick from Zebra, Dune, Anna2, Phaseplant, Serum etc and your back in the Bugatti Veyron again.

RE: Crashing
- Sample import
50% of a chance, don't be using the vst when its doing the import, or is it doing the import? Is that a progress bar, or has it just hung? No it can play sounds? Glitch, crackle, pop... Plugin crash lol... Happens often (i9900k OC'd all cores to 4.75 (stable for years), 16GB DDR4 XMP2 profile 3600, RTX3080.
- Open various panel crashes
Interface catching up, click close to get back to main, oh there it goes again...
- Granular / Grain editor
Ok lets see, adjust this, ok that was working just now... Hmm position does nothing now. Ok, something strange is going on here.. Close, re-open. Nope. Close DAW re-open DAW.

I'm not going to go looking for crash logs or debug it with Visual Studio and watch its memory addresses in ram while it falls over to find out why, it just does...


----------



## SupremeFist

Bereckis said:


> It is not for nothing that Omniphere has the most excellent third-party sound providers.


*cough* Zebra


----------



## Bereckis

Zanshin said:


> It was my experience too. But I'm sure everyone will now chime in to let @MegaPixel know why he is wrong.


Having worked with Omniphere for a long time, can you come to a different opinion?

I do not know any crashes with Omniphere.

I love to work with different synths, but Omniphere usually helps me when I have problems and need good sounds quickly.


----------



## sostenuto

_Different strokes _......... Used Omni (Trilian StlusRMX) for decades, and continue adding top 3rd Pty expansions regularly. Almost unmatched video tutorials & livestreams to go as deep as desired _ or NOT. Pluginguru.com is strong example _ huge set of videos + livestreams.
Pigments 3, Spire, Repro 1-5, Vital, NI K13U CE synths as well.

_OBTW_ _ (2) Desktop PC DAW(s), Win11 Pro, Reaper v6.46. No crashes, speed issues _ ever. Top components _ audio/video _ now years old _ rock solid. Pleased with regular (no-cost) updates since initial purchase. Sad to hear other users have lesser results. 

Many great softsynths out there _ would consider if unable to accomplish desired /needed tasks.


----------



## KEM

Omnisphere slander will not be tolerated!!  

But seriously, everyone is entitled to their own opinion of course but I’d be willing to bet most bad experiences people have with Omnisphere are most likely user errors and not Omnisphere itself, Omnisphere is capable of so much and while it’s layout or workflow might not be for everyone I can confidently say it’s definitely not how it sounds, it can do pretty much any sound you can think of and I’d encourage everyone to keep exploring it as they’ll inevitably land on something within it that they really like


----------



## Bereckis

SupremeFist said:


> *cough* Zebra


Yes, zebra is also very well represented!


----------



## Zanshin

Bereckis said:


> Having worked with Omniphere for a long time, can you come to a different opinion?
> 
> I do not know any crashes with Omniphere.


Below is what I was agreeing with. Omnisphere was stable for me.


MegaPixel said:


> Well I've just got my hands on Omni 2.8 and been tinkering with it for the past 3 weeks...
> 
> For me... it's shait... 10,000+ presets 200 if that are of use


I respect that you like it and find it useful


----------



## kilgurt

AudioLoco said:


> The only reason why I don't have it is... because EVERYONE has it.
> ...


I'm not gonna buy a hammer - everyone has it!


----------



## Tralen

MegaPixel said:


> It's interface is about as complicated as using the microwave, with hidden buttons here and there, and often doesn't know what it's doing or if it should be doing it 1 way or another way...


I'm befuddled by this analogy. Using a microwave is supposed to be easy or hard?


----------



## el-bo

Tralen said:


> I'm befuddled by this analogy. Using a microwave is supposed to be easy or hard?


Not just me then?


----------



## gzapper

kilgurt said:


> I'm not gonna buy a hammer - everyone has it!


Yeah! You can buy a rock and use that instead.

Ok, of the criticisms of omni, its granular engine is fair. Its not very useful in my experience. Same with some of the fx, they are a bit tired sounding. But there are a ton of good sounding waveforms and flexibility to build your own sounds quick. Sample import works fine, if you use it within its limits.

Pigments has some brighter, more modern sounds and its granular engine is way good. But its also fussier to get basic usable stuff. 

Omni excels at pads and atmospheres, but also does the analog sound well.

You do need to rate patches to save time searching but its powerful and pretty easy to get sounds you want either from presets or building from scratch.


----------



## vitocorleone123

I've had a few crashes (but have stopped using Omni for going on a year now with one brief exception), slowness, glitches. In both standalone and VST (in more than one DAW).

The UI was designed quite well for 2010 when screens were smaller on average, but is sub-optimal now and shows - those of you who fly with it have done so in spite of the shortcomings and that's OK, too, but it's not surprising that it's a downside to new users in 2022. That said, the design is still internally consistent and CAN be learned and used efficiently (albeit with lots of clicks and mouse movement), so it's not like it's a hack job. But it does look and feel outdated compared to modern design.

The hardware integration also has a major design mistake, in that it takes control away from the users, violating a generally good UX rule to follow of "put the user in control". Talk about a major disappointment for me when I learned that! The built-in effects are also somewhat lacking, some more than others, compared to where the rest of the industry is for delays, reverbs, compressors, etc.

I disagree about something like Pigments being comparable (don't get me started on that one! hehe).

I still think, for better and some worse, Omnisphere is unique. It's not necessarily the pinnacle anymore, depending on what you're looking for, but there are some things it does that are exceptional, like the design and layering of so many sounds in so many ways in a relatively easy (overall) manner - to create unique sounds and soundscapes. I don't have a problem with expert Omnisphere users continuing to use it to create amazing sounds and music I hear on TV and in movies, or even music - but it's not for me to use for much longer, either. I'm glad to have tried it and learned that.


----------



## AmbientMile

MegaPixel said:


> I'm a very technically oriented person so something like Falcon & Halion wont scare me off, but in comparison of what they are capable of, for me, Omni doesn't stand a chance, that's like comparing a toy car to a Bugatti Veyron. I would even put Arturia's Pigments 3 up against Omni in a 1 v 1 battle and if you have Analogue Lab 5 also, game set match. Then just take your pick from Zebra, Dune, Anna2, Phaseplant, Serum etc and your back in the Bugatti Veyron again.
> 
> RE: Crashing
> - Sample import
> 50% of a chance, don't be using the vst when its doing the import, or is it doing the import? Is that a progress bar, or has it just hung? No it can play sounds? Glitch, crackle, pop... Plugin crash lol... Happens often (i9900k OC'd all cores to 4.75 (stable for years), 16GB DDR4 XMP2 profile 3600, RTX3080.
> - Open various panel crashes
> Interface catching up, click close to get back to main, oh there it goes again...
> - Granular / Grain editor
> Ok lets see, adjust this, ok that was working just now... Hmm position does nothing now. Ok, something strange is going on here.. Close, re-open. Nope. Close DAW re-open DAW.
> 
> I'm not going to go looking for crash logs or debug it with Visual Studio and watch its memory addresses in ram while it falls over to find out why, it just does...


That's a shame you have had so many issues. I have a less powerful system than you and have had near zero issues for years. I wouldn't call Omnisphere a "toy car" in any way, but we all have our opinion. It's funny how a lot of people prefer Zebra over Omni. I tried Zebra and just didn't get along with it. It's a powerful synth for sure, but I am so used to the Omni interface that I know how to do exactly what I want.


----------



## AmbientMile

Zanshin said:


> It was my experience too. But I'm sure everyone will now chime in to let @MegaPixel know why he is wrong.


Not a chance. Its all subjective to each user. I never tell people that their opinion is wrong. I just like a good discussion.


----------



## dunamisstudio

I've used it since it was called Atmosphere. Does what I need it to do.


----------



## MegaPixel

This is why I can't get on the omni train, and not just because of Zebra / Zebra HZ, literally got 2 emails for some spire & serum presets this morning, took a listen and instantly thought, "omni if not better and you would get all the features of spire and/or serum (aka a lot more control)".




and




Many of which you can quite easily re-create in massive, massive x, phaseplant, dune 3 etc, throw bitwig into the mix and your sound design capabilities double again.

Omni IMO, is a soundscape, pad and guitar (ish) machine (I own all of the shreddage series) with an effects engine that is best avoided for other 3rd party vst's or even the ones built into many DAWs.

There's no wrong instrument, it's whatever works for you. I might keep it just for a few of the guitar, vocal and orchestral pad synth presets (expensive buy just for them) but I will be hunting down everything with a 1 star and finding the file for it and removing it so I can strip the thing down (really wish its preset manager had DELETE on right click and if no sounds left from that library it would clean the whole folder out)... Maybe I can access the omni database file and write a program to do this automatically for me once I've finished going through every preset and rating them (done it for serum).


----------



## el-bo

MegaPixel said:


> Maybe I can access the omni database file and write a program to do this automatically for me once I've finished going through every preset and rating them (done it for serum).


Why not just create a 'project' within the presets and save the ones you like? Much easier.


----------



## el-bo

MegaPixel said:


> Well I've just got my hands on Omni 2.8 and been tinkering with it for the past 3 weeks...
> 
> For me... it's shait... 10,000+ presets 200 if that are of use, a lot do sound nice, but are just not usable. I do get a good quality vibe from many of the sounds, it's stereo field etc. It's interface is about as complicated as using the microwave, with hidden buttons here and there, and often doesn't know what it's doing or if it should be doing it 1 way or another way... Then it just gets worse from there, it's lacking in many areas. You got a billion 1 key presets, again many sound great but are just not usable. I think it's mostly usable for atmospheres / pads etc but the rest I can't get behind, there are a few vox/vocals and guitars that are nice etc... But 200 is really pushing it. 10,000 channels and nothing is on...
> 
> *So here's my my advice to anyone thinking of getting it (each to their own):
> 1. If your thinking about buying it, watch a lot, and I mean a LOT of youtube videos on it before you do...
> 2. *If you got Zebra / Zebra HZ, Dune 2, Pigments 3, Analogue Lab 5, Phaseplant, Vital, Anna 2, Hive 2, Serum (or combinations of them) then you already got all you need with far more capabilities than Omnisphere v2.whatever or probably v3 will ever give you.
> It's slow, it crashes, it lacks many features, the wav import takes about 3 years and can often crash the plugin, the list goes on. For what it does offer it sounds great but 99% of the time I turn away from it, for what I've listed above. The other also offer far cheaper and better ranges of presets, far more of them available out there and from much wider range of sources...
> 
> IMO, the VSTs with the most capabilities which go above and beyond and sound great are :
> 1. UVI - Falcon (not for people looking for a simple vst, but very powerful)
> 2. Halion 6 (with Sonic) - If you dig deep into it and it's shait interface you will get some really amazing results out of it.
> 3. Kontakt Full (Clunky, a bit shit but has the libraries out there to make up for that and many of them are super cheap and have a great sound, you don't have to do a full NI Komplete purchase etc)
> 
> Omni, you don't impress me... Not at all...


What a weird take. Perhaps you should've taken your own advice


----------



## MegaPixel

el-bo said:


> Why not just create a 'project' within the presets and save the ones you like? Much easier.


I'm a clean freak , will strip everything out of it, will bring it down to minimal file size, load times, stress on plugin and save some space etc.


----------



## el-bo

MegaPixel said:


> I'm a clean freak , will strip everything out of it, will bring it down to minimal file size, load times, stress on plugin and save some space etc.


Why not just sell it? The idea the you'd keep a $500 instrument, for the sake of 200 presets and especially given your distaste with it, seems a waste.

Gift it to me, if you like. I'm still on version 1.6. Happy to pay the xfer fee


----------



## MegaPixel

el-bo said:


> What a weird take. Perhaps you should've taken your own advice


I do my R&D on everything before I buy it, whether it be a VST, a scented candle or a lamp from amazon 

I watched a fair few videos, and just bit the bullet, even though its GUI looked about as complicated as a childs block toy (which shape goes in the hole, in comparison to Falcon +++), appealing to some. Just didn't expect it to be... That shait, *for me*... Maybe not others... Each to their own.

I will keep on experimenting with it, I will give it the usual 3 month (ish) run... It certainly isn't as deep or as complicated as falcon and many others...

But hey lets take the positive, I got about 50 to 100 presets I gave at least 3 stars too, it just cost a lot for them ... I could always re-create them in some other VST, maybe throw a bit of sampling in there if needed (probably not) and sell the thing on... Who knows...

Anyway... Tune in next week for the next episode of, spending too much money for 50 presets...


----------



## MegaPixel

el-bo said:


> Gift it to me, if you like. I'm still on version 1.6. Happy to pay the xfer fee


It will probably end up on here or KVR in a month or so, just at 75% the price I paid for it.


----------



## el-bo

MegaPixel said:


> I do my R&D on everything before I buy it, whether it be a VST, a scented candle or a lamp from amazon
> 
> I watched a fair few videos, and just bit the bullet, even though its GUI looked about as complicated as a childs block toy (which shape goes in the hole, in comparison to Falcon +++), appealing to some. Just didn't expect it to be... That shait, *for me*... Maybe not others... Each to their own.
> 
> I will keep on experimenting with it, I will give it the usual 3 month (ish) run... It certainly isn't as deep or as complicated as falcon and many others...
> 
> But hey lets take the positive, I got about 50 to 100 presets I gave at least 3 stars too, it just cost a lot for them ... I could always re-create them in some other VST, maybe throw a bit of sampling in there if needed (probably not) and sell the thing on... Who knows...
> 
> Anyway... Tune in next week for the next episode of, spending too much money for 50 presets...


Well...what started as a weird take now seems to be just a pretty bad take


----------



## MegaPixel

el-bo said:


> Well...what started as a weird take now seems to be just a pretty bad take


We all make bad decisions one time or another...
Looks like it was my turn... I think I was sucked in by the hype... Live and learn eh...


----------



## Pier

Bereckis said:


> It is not for nothing that Omniphere has the most excellent third-party sound providers.


That could be just because it's a popular platform among presets surfers (I don't mean that in a negative way).

A sound designer will probably not invest months working on a library for a synth that is not popular in a certain market.


----------



## Kony

MegaPixel said:


> Maybe I can access the omni database file and write a program to do this automatically for me once I've finished going through every preset and rating them


Charlie Clouser wrote a post about how he reduces the Omnisphere footprint - did a quick search and here it is:



charlieclouser said:


> For hybrid libraries, like for instance Omnisphere banks that have both sample content and patches that may refer to those samples, this is what I do:
> 
> 1 - Make a safety copy.
> 
> 2 - Install the ".omnisphere" file, or drag the patches into a new subfolder in the appropriate location in the STEAM folder.
> 
> 3 - Open the STEAM folder on the desktop so I can see and manipulate the contents as I go. View in List mode.
> 
> 4 - Using the standalone version of Omnisphere, audition every single multi, patch, and sample file, flipping over to the desktop to delete each one I don't like as I go - but NOT deleting the sample content as the same samples may be used by multiple patches. Multis are self-contained, so you can freely delete single patches without wrecking Multis.
> 
> 5 - For patches I keep, I flip over to the desktop and rename them as I go.
> 
> 6 - Once the multis and patches have been culled, I go into an Init Patch and audition all of the sample content. For any that I want to keep, I save a patch that refers to that sample content, and give it a name that refers to that sample content's name.
> 
> 7 - I mostly leave the original category folders as-is, and I rename patches in the following format:
> 
> [Three-letter category abbreviation] - [two-letter manufacturer code] - [patch name]
> 
> This results in patch names like "ARP BAS - TS - Badonk" and "AMB - RD - Megasweep". This way every list will show patches sorted by type, then developer, then name.
> 
> 8 - Once things are reduced and renamed, I re-export / "share" the library to a new .omnisphere document. This includes only the multis and patches that I haven't deleted, but most importantly, it will NOT include any sample content that is not needed by those few patches that were kept. I give this exported file a tidy name that refers to the original developer and library title.
> 
> 9 - Manually delete from the STEAM folder all of the folders containing the multis, patches, and sample content from the original import.
> 
> 10 - Import the "smallified" .omnisphere document that I just saved. Now I have a tidy, compact set of multis, patches, and samples that only contain the stuff I wanted to keep - and most importantly the sample content has been reduced in size to only contain those samples which are used by the patches I kept.
> 
> Now I can view each collection all by itself from Omnisphere's browser pull-downs, or view every patch across all collections in one huge list, but everything will be sorted by Category, then Developer/Library, and finally Preset Name. This lets me scroll through all the ARP BAS patches, developer by developer and library by library, without things getting all mixed together too badly.
> 
> While working I also create "Projects" in the Omnisphere browser and use the "star" rating system to mark favorites and collect them into project-specific bricks.


----------



## MegaPixel

Kony said:


> Charlie Clouser wrote a post about how he reduces the Omnisphere footprint - did a quick search and here it is:



I found the ratings in text based files in xml format (prt_omn.index), so it wont be hard to parse that at all. Serum for example uses a .db file which is actual sqlite, again not hard to parse.



XML:


<ATTR NAME="Rtng" Value="2"/>


Tag your looking for is Rtng, will be simple to just loop through all entries look for anything with no rating or a rating of less than 2 and then hunt the file name down and delete it automatically for the relevant locations. Will clean up the library a bit and speed up it's windows.

It's not the speed of my computer that's the issue, it's omnisphere, it's just sluggish. It's browser seems to go speedy one moment then very slow the next, so stripping things out I would never use will speed it up a bit. I tested it with a manual delete of 50% of its content and it ran super speedy.

There is the possibility of even parsing the .db files as they are just a mashup of xml and audio data, the xml defines the start and end points of the samples to be pulled from the db, but this looks to be encoded in some way other than .wav which could be a problem so I will probably leave the .db files alone, but I'm sure someone out there has worked out how to strip even the audio out of them also, but there's no need for that. Would have been nice for a right click delete preset and it would take the xml entries, associated files and the .db entry and embedded sound data out with it though...

So, I'm now in the progress of rating every preset, modify my serum preset remover program for omni paths and job done.

Thanks for the information and effort in assisting me though.


----------



## charlieclouser

Kony said:


> Charlie Clouser wrote a post about how he reduces the Omnisphere footprint - did a quick search and here it is:


Yes, my method is definitely not automatic! But it is thorough, and once it's done, the footprint of a "smallified" Omnisphere library is usually much smaller than the original, as it doesn't contain any of the sample content that is not needed by any of the patches I've kept.

Of course, this means that if there were some hidden gems in the sample content, they are now gone. So a possible additional step would be to audition the sample content separately from the patches, and take measures to keep those items as well. I sometimes do this as well, although I've found that in most cases the patches I kept covered all of the sample content I'd like to keep, so for me that extra step was usually not needed. In short:

samples used by patches I kept ≥ samples I might want to use in other patches.

But if I did want to browse+mark+keep the sample content so I could keep some of the items that were NOT being used by any patches I was keeping, I'd make an INIT patch with one sample oscillator, use that to preview the sample content, and every time I found a sample set that I wanted to keep, I'd save the INIT patch into the same location as that bank's presets, and give it the same name as the sample bank. Then, when doing the reduce-export-delete-import process, those patches and that "extra" sample content would be included.


----------



## MegaPixel

charlieclouser said:


> Yes, my method is definitely not automatic! But it is thorough, and once it's done, the footprint of a "smallified" Omnisphere library is usually much smaller than the original, as it doesn't contain any of the sample content that is not needed by any of the patches I've kept.
> 
> Of course, this means that if there were some hidden gems in the sample content, they are now gone. So a possible additional step would be to audition the sample content separately from the patches, and take measures to keep those items as well. I sometimes do this as well, although I've found that in most cases the patches I kept covered all of the sample content I'd like to keep, so for me that extra step was usually not needed. In short:
> 
> samples used by patches I kept ≥ samples I might want to use in other patches.
> 
> But if I did want to browse+mark+keep the sample content so I could keep some of the items that were NOT being used by any patches I was keeping, I'd make an INIT patch with one sample oscillator, use that to preview the sample content, and every time I found a sample set that I wanted to keep, I'd save the INIT patch into the same location as that bank's presets, and give it the same name as the sample bank. Then, when doing the reduce-export-delete-import process, those patches and that "extra" sample content would be included.


I was thinking, I would 2 star the presets I like with sounds I might like to keep, have potential or could possibly be useful in the future then my ratings of actually how much I like them start.

But I could write the program to once it's done to lower all the ratings so 1 star could be the potentials but meh but keep ones. Yep, that sounds good to me, wouldn't have to go back and rate things either.

Serum for example, done a full db re-scan and lost all the ratings #facepalm


----------



## charlieclouser

MegaPixel said:


> Serum for example, done a full db re-scan and lost all the ratings #facepalm


Yeah, this kind of issue is why I've never really trusted in-app preset rating or sorting systems, and prefer to deal with it on my own using tricky naming schemes so that things sort and alphabetize correctly in the computer's filing system / desktop / folders / etc.

I trust only Folders and The Finder!

I take this approach with everything, samples, sampler instruments, random 2gb WAV packs, synth presets, etc. I figure, if everything goes to shit in some major upgrade, at least I can trust the computer's filing system to work correctly and alphabetically sort my files.

The only exception is Kontakt's QuickLoad, which I resisted using for years until I needed to just make a small QL list of instruments for a specific project, and then found that they're not stored in some dedicated format, but are just aliases / symlinks to the original .NKI files. Once I realized that I could move, rename, and manipulate them from the desktop, I became more confident and now I use it quite a bit. This lets me create a "super-sorted" version of just my favorite NKI files, in a manner the mirrors how I like to name and sort my EXS instruments, while leaving the original NKI files in their respective locations. So, sort of the best of both worlds I guess.

But maybe even that is trusting too much....


----------



## MegaPixel

charlieclouser said:


> Yeah, this kind of issue is why I've never really trusted in-app preset rating or sorting systems, and prefer to deal with it on my own using tricky naming schemes so that things sort and alphabetize correctly in the computer's filing system / desktop / folders / etc.
> 
> I trust only Folders and The Finder!
> 
> I take this approach with everything, samples, sampler instruments, random 2gb WAV packs, synth presets, etc. I figure, if everything goes to shit in some major upgrade, at least I can trust the computer's filing system to work correctly and alphabetically sort my files.
> 
> The only exception is Kontakt's QuickLoad, which I resisted using for years until I needed to just make a small QL list of instruments for a specific project, and then found that they're not stored in some dedicated format, but are just aliases / symlinks to the original .NKI files. Once I realized that I could move, rename, and manipulate them from the desktop, I became more confident and now I use it quite a bit. This lets me create a "super-sorted" version of just my favorite NKI files, in a manner the mirrors how I like to name and sort my EXS instruments, while leaving the original NKI files in their respective locations. So, sort of the best of both worlds I guess.
> 
> But maybe even that is trusting too much....


There is another 

I'm still amazed by how dark ages preset managers are and their capabilities when something can be so easily organised by just good old foldering and sorting. I too organise all my samples manually (by ear and hand). So many are named wrong. But I do this for everything, samples, presets for every vst, software, images, video, texutres, 3d models etc etc...

I've written programs to batch insert names and number increment append to the end of them if names collide and folderise with a specified limit, so you end up with 001, 002, 003 etc which contain a fixed amount of presets or samples (nice for serums to ensure things fit in screen in the fly out menus etc without scroll, or killing many other vsts by not displaying too much in 1 scroll window wich many cant handle). I've used this for serum, massive, u-he etc etc.

I also integrated a crc check for presets and samples to remove duplicates. I bought a few sample libraries a while back claiming x amount of unique samples and ran the CRC check through just the purchase and over 50% were duplicates, a few youtube videos later and contacting support they gave me some more of my own choice for free, but they still sell it with the BS product specs. I also created a ffmpeg python/nodejs program to trim samples of silence en bulk.

I'm tempted to work on some ML program to detect type but this would only be good for certain types of samples, which I've already organised, so probably not.

As for kontakt, I too find that thing annoying, it's either 1 massive list which is plugged in from NI themselves or their partner program or the file browser which is just super shait. That right click popup menu helps a bit but is still rubbish. I didn't know they were sim links, interesting... I might ditch sifting through omni for a bit and see if I can get some sort of sim link generator for all nki files into a win32 manager or something to generate the file it loads up on application start (something to look into). Visual Studio desktop application components are pretty easy to use and manipulate, drag and drop, style it a bit and a little bit of coding and you can cook up a useful utility quite quickly. Or even an electron application (pulse downloader, izotope, waves etc are some which I think are electron applications, nodejs and web page tech, as simple as it gets).

I just spent 2+ hours going through omni presets, close to the end it was lagging out my DAW with no cpu increase, the previous preset was re-selecting itself and then re-selecting the new one I selected but not actually changing the preset, but then this lag started to be pushed back into the daw and I found hitting buttons in that were starting to lag and catch up. CPU load less than 10%, DSP load graph was low... But having monster XML files which contain binary data and naming them .db (etc) is just begging for trouble. Little wonder its slow parsing.

Take massive for example, try and add about 2000 presets to that after what it's scanned from a full install of Komplete 13CE, you will be lucky to change a preset without waiting 5 minutes... I got a folder of presets which I cant add to massive for this reason, not a fan of dragging it in or loading 1 up manually all the time though. And massive x, doesn't even have a rating system lol... I still need to look into folder categorising presets for that too. Might be able to create folders for ratings with sub category folders and then general population folders with sub categories for the non chosen ones.

Back to Omni... There are some great sounds in omni but yeeesh... I really want to get on with it but it's pushing my patience and I'm the type of person that can spend 4 to 6 hours straight each day just going through all the presets and then really getting into the guts of an instruments inner workings...


----------



## proxima

MegaPixel said:


> Back to Omni... There are some great sounds in omni but yeeesh... I really want to get on with it but it's pushing my patience and I'm the type of person that can spend 4 to 6 hours straight each day just going through all the presets and then really getting into the guts of an instruments inner workings...


I guess I don't understand this impulse. Their preset browser is definitely one of the best I've used. I only go looking for the kinds of sounds I want, rather than auditioning yet another EDM preset I won't likely use.

To me, Omnisphere's beauty is in the sound sources and the 3rd party presets. The sound sources are deep enough to make someone like me with only novice to intermediate programming skills able to produce something really interesting and unique. It's able to generate a lot of the fun of sampling real world stuff yourself and manipulating it, you're just jumping to the manipulation part. And the sound sources also are pretty easy to navigate with well-tagged samples.

And then finding 3rd party presets that fit your style dramatically narrows your searching. Buying a soundset from The Unfinished that sounds inspiring will give you variety but only take a short while to audition all of it.


----------



## AmbientMile

MegaPixel said:


> ...Back to Omni... There are some great sounds in omni but yeeesh... I really want to get on with it but it's pushing my patience and I'm the type of person that can spend 4 to 6 hours straight each day just going through all the presets and then really getting into the guts of an instruments inner workings...


Try playing with the tags, search and Sound Match options. Honestly, in all the years I've owned it, I'm quite sure I haven't heard all the presets yet. To be fair, I mostly make my own though. But when I first got Omni, I started with the first patch and just started to go through them one after the other. Horrible idea for sure. But as dated as the interface is, the Sound Match function is amazing to me. Find a sound you like, use sound match to lock what you like about it, and then select other presets. It's pretty amazing and you might find a lot more that you like.



MegaPixel said:


> It's not the speed of my computer that's the issue, it's omnisphere, it's just sluggish...


It's interesting that you have this issue. So many of us here do not see this, so I'm not sure how you can say it is definitely Omni.


----------



## Bman70

MegaPixel said:


> I'm a very technically oriented person so something like Falcon & Halion wont scare me off, but in comparison of what they are capable of, for me, Omni doesn't stand a chance, that's like comparing a toy car to a Bugatti Veyron. I would even put Arturia's Pigments 3 up against Omni in a 1 v 1 battle and if you have Analogue Lab 5 also, game set match. Then just take your pick from Zebra, Dune, Anna2, Phaseplant, Serum etc and your back in the Bugatti Veyron again.
> 
> RE: Crashing
> - Sample import
> 50% of a chance, don't be using the vst when its doing the import, or is it doing the import? Is that a progress bar, or has it just hung? No it can play sounds? Glitch, crackle, pop... Plugin crash lol... Happens often (i9900k OC'd all cores to 4.75 (stable for years), 16GB DDR4 XMP2 profile 3600, RTX3080.
> - Open various panel crashes
> Interface catching up, click close to get back to main, oh there it goes again...
> - Granular / Grain editor
> Ok lets see, adjust this, ok that was working just now... Hmm position does nothing now. Ok, something strange is going on here.. Close, re-open. Nope. Close DAW re-open DAW.
> 
> I'm not going to go looking for crash logs or debug it with Visual Studio and watch its memory addresses in ram while it falls over to find out why, it just does...



Honestly it sounds like you got a cracked version from a drug dealer. Crashes? I've sat for 6 hour stretches designing sounds and it never crashed. What kind of samples are you importing? I've also never had a glitch there. 50% chance of working sounds... well, either your hardware is bad or the software is, somehow.


----------



## charlieclouser

MegaPixel said:


> Back to Omni... There are some great sounds in omni but yeeesh... I really want to get on with it but it's pushing my patience and I'm the type of person that can spend 4 to 6 hours straight each day just going through all the presets and then really getting into the guts of an instruments inner workings...


I have a compulsion to "get to the end of the list" when browsing stuff, just so I can satisfy myself that there isn't something even better located just a few more clicks down the list. 

So that's why I "smallify" incoming third-party banks right at the start. Brutally and without remorse. After so many decades I don't really need to be listening in context with a half-finished cue on the screen, I can just fire up Omni standalone and start deleting. Thing about Omni is that it is capable of making really useful, unusual, and up-to-the-minute stuff, but its arpeggiator and certain other features are so tempting and provide such instant gratification that many preset devs wind up (perhaps unintentionally) filling up their banks with stuff I don't like and would never use.

That actually makes it easier to go cruising through thousands of presets right after installation, deleting as I go, and sometimes I wind up keeping as few as 30 presets out of a few hundred - but what gets kept is what I truly like. And the fact that the culled banks are so small means I may actually use some of them, since I can actually get to the bottom of the list before losing patience. 

Reasons for which I unconditionally delete patches:

• Sounds like FM (any sound with a bell-like spectrum)
• Sounds like an organ (any sound with that multi-octave tone wheel sound)
• Sounds like "The Fifth Element" (any sound with that eighties workstation "fantasy glisten" thing going on)
• Sounds like plastic (it's too easy to get Omni to sound like this, and many devs accidentally do)
• Cheesy arpeggios (again, that eighties workstation corny pulsing "one finger suspense cue" thing)
• Reverby harp/piano/pluck with a pad behind it (instantly banished to the pits of hell)
• Corny "bad-ass" distorted "industrial" patches (they just don't know)

... and more. At one point when I had an assistant, someone who'd worked with us on NIN records for years, I was trying to show him why I delete patches, in hopes that I could outsource some of the process, but even with his years of experience in the kinds of sounds we liked, he thought I was deleting too much and not keeping sounds he liked. So I realized with a sigh that I'd have to just keep doing it myself, because only I could make those decisions.

Meh, I don't mind too much.


----------



## KEM

charlieclouser said:


> I have a compulsion to "get to the end of the list" when browsing stuff, just so I can satisfy myself that there isn't something even better located just a few more clicks down the list.
> 
> So that's why I "smallify" incoming third-party banks right at the start. Brutally and without remorse. After so many decades I don't really need to be listening in context with a half-finished cue on the screen, I can just fire up Omni standalone and start deleting. Thing about Omni is that it is capable of making really useful, unusual, and up-to-the-minute stuff, but its arpeggiator and certain other features are so tempting and provide such instant gratification that many preset devs wind up (perhaps unintentionally) filling up their banks with stuff I don't like and would never use.
> 
> That actually makes it easier to go cruising through thousands of presets right after installation, deleting as I go, and sometimes I wind up keeping as few as 30 presets out of a few hundred - but what gets kept is what I truly like. And the fact that the culled banks are so small means I may actually use some of them, since I can actually get to the bottom of the list before losing patience.
> 
> Reasons for which I unconditionally delete patches:
> 
> • Sounds like FM (any sound with a bell-like spectrum)
> • Sounds like an organ (any sound with that multi-octave tone wheel sound)
> • Sounds like "The Fifth Element" (any sound with that eighties workstation "fantasy glisten" thing going on)
> • Sounds like plastic (it's too easy to get Omni to sound like this, and many devs accidentally do)
> • Cheesy arpeggios (again, that eighties workstation corny pulsing "one finger suspense cue" thing)
> • Reverby harp/piano/pluck with a pad behind it (instantly banished to the pits of hell)
> • Corny "bad-ass" distorted "industrial" patches (they just don't know)
> 
> ... and more. At one point when I had an assistant, someone who'd worked with us on NIN records for years, I was trying to show him why I delete patches, in hopes that I could outsource some of the process, but even with his years of experience in the kinds of sounds we liked, he thought I was deleting too much and not keeping sounds he liked. So I realized with a sigh that I'd have to just keep doing it myself, because only I could make those decisions.
> 
> Meh, I don't mind too much.



What are some preset banks you find particularly good across the board? Distorted Reality or any of the Noisescapes if I had to guess?


----------



## charlieclouser

KEM said:


> What are some preset banks you find particularly good across the board? Distorted Reality or any of the Noisescapes if I had to guess?


The ones that I've kept some patches from include:

• Ashen Audio - Hestia (31 patches kept)
• Audiority - complete Omnisphere bundle (350 patches kept, but I think there were lots of banks)
• Audiority - Darkscapes (101 patches kept)
• Hidden Path - Arcta (31 patches kept)
• Ilio - (can't remember what the bank was, but only kept 9 patches)
• Midissonance - complete Omnisphere bundle (115 patches kept)
• Plughugger - Dirt (69 patches kept)
• Pulsesetter - Disruptor (27 patches kept)
• Richard Devine - (can't remember the bank or bundle, but I kept 109 patches)
• SampleHero - (I think I have all of their titles, and kept 691 patches)
• Sound Dust - (can't remember which banks, but I only kept 23 patches)
• String Audio - Lightless + Darkless + Infrared (171 patches kept)
• The Unfinished - total Omnisphere bundle (655 patches kept)
• Tom Wolfe - total Omnisphere collection (93 patches kept)
• Triple Spiral Audio - some bundle, not everything they make (53 patches kept)
• The Very Loud Indeed Co. - Omnisphere bundle (79 patches kept)

So it looks like Audiority, SampleHero, String Audio, and The Unfinished were the big winners here, but a big "kept" number like SampleHero's 691 may have been out of 10,000 patches, who knows. I don't keep the original downloaded banks, so they don't tempt me to go through the whole process again. Import, reduce, export, delete, re-import, and move on. 

High marks in general to PulseSetter, SampleHero, and String Audio for their non-Omnisphere stuff like Kontakt and Zebra libraries. PulseSetter has some bonkers Kontakt banks that I love, SampleHero has lots of great "crime scoring" samples and synth patches (you can tell they really do score crime shows!), and I've long been a fan of String Audio who also has amazing Kontakt libraries.


----------



## KEM

charlieclouser said:


> The ones that I've kept some patches from include:
> 
> • Ashen Audio - Hestia (31 patches kept)
> • Audiority - complete Omnisphere bundle (350 patches kept, but I think there were lots of banks)
> • Audiority - Darkscapes (101 patches kept)
> • Hidden Path - Arcta (31 patches kept)
> • Ilio - (can't remember what the bank was, but only kept 9 patches)
> • Midissonance - complete Omnisphere bundle (115 patches kept)
> • Plughugger - Dirt (69 patches kept)
> • Pulsesetter - Disruptor (27 patches kept)
> • Richard Devine - (can't remember the bank or bundle, but I kept 109 patches)
> • SampleHero - (I think I have all of their titles, and kept 691 patches)
> • Sound Dust - (can't remember which banks, but I only kept 23 patches)
> • String Audio - Lightless + Darkless + Infrared (171 patches kept)
> • The Unfinished - total Omnisphere bundle (655 patches kept)
> • Tom Wolfe - total Omnisphere collection (93 patches kept)
> • Triple Spiral Audio - some bundle, not everything they make (53 patches kept)
> • The Very Loud Indeed Co. - Omnisphere bundle (79 patches kept)
> 
> So it looks like Audiority, SampleHero, String Audio, and The Unfinished were the big winners here, but a big "kept" number like SampleHero's 691 may have been out of 10,000 patches, who knows. I don't keep the original downloaded banks, so they don't tempt me to go through the whole process again. Import, reduce, export, delete, re-import, and move on.
> 
> High marks in general to PulseSetter, SampleHero, and String Audio for their non-Omnisphere stuff like Kontakt and Zebra libraries. PulseSetter has some bonkers Kontakt banks that I love, SampleHero has lots of great "crime scoring" samples and synth patches (you can tell they really do score crime shows!), and I've long been a fan of String Audio who also has amazing Kontakt libraries.



I have a few soundsets from some of these companies and they’re all very high quality for sure, that’s interesting to hear that you don’t keep the original stuff, I can imagine that’s a bit of a hassle to get rid of all of it but you also run less of a risk of running into a sound that tons of other people have already used and sounding like you just grabbed a preset from Omnisphere (which happens often, I’ve heard it in a few game scores and stock Omni presets are ALL over most hip-hop records these days)


----------



## AudioLoco

kilgurt said:


> I'm not gonna buy a hammer - everyone has it!


I'm going to buy a hammer for my next recording - I consider a tool to bang on nails and a musical instrument to be the same thing!


----------



## el-bo

charlieclouser said:


> Reasons for which I unconditionally delete patches:
> 
> • Sounds like FM (any sound with a bell-like spectrum)
> • Sounds like an organ (any sound with that multi-octave tone wheel sound)
> • Sounds like "The Fifth Element" (any sound with that eighties workstation "fantasy glisten" thing going on)
> • Sounds like plastic (it's too easy to get Omni to sound like this, and many devs accidentally do)
> • Cheesy arpeggios (again, that eighties workstation corny pulsing "one finger suspense cue" thing)
> • Reverby harp/piano/pluck with a pad behind it (instantly banished to the pits of hell)
> • Corny "bad-ass" distorted "industrial" patches (they just don't know)


But the 30 presets you're left with are real crackers, right?


----------



## jbuhler

charlieclouser said:


> I have a compulsion to "get to the end of the list" when browsing stuff, just so I can satisfy myself that there isn't something even better located just a few more clicks down the list.
> 
> So that's why I "smallify" incoming third-party banks right at the start. Brutally and without remorse. After so many decades I don't really need to be listening in context with a half-finished cue on the screen, I can just fire up Omni standalone and start deleting. Thing about Omni is that it is capable of making really useful, unusual, and up-to-the-minute stuff, but its arpeggiator and certain other features are so tempting and provide such instant gratification that many preset devs wind up (perhaps unintentionally) filling up their banks with stuff I don't like and would never use.
> 
> That actually makes it easier to go cruising through thousands of presets right after installation, deleting as I go, and sometimes I wind up keeping as few as 30 presets out of a few hundred - but what gets kept is what I truly like. And the fact that the culled banks are so small means I may actually use some of them, since I can actually get to the bottom of the list before losing patience.
> 
> Reasons for which I unconditionally delete patches:
> 
> • Sounds like FM (any sound with a bell-like spectrum)
> • Sounds like an organ (any sound with that multi-octave tone wheel sound)
> • Sounds like "The Fifth Element" (any sound with that eighties workstation "fantasy glisten" thing going on)
> • Sounds like plastic (it's too easy to get Omni to sound like this, and many devs accidentally do)
> • Cheesy arpeggios (again, that eighties workstation corny pulsing "one finger suspense cue" thing)
> • Reverby harp/piano/pluck with a pad behind it (instantly banished to the pits of hell)
> • Corny "bad-ass" distorted "industrial" patches (they just don't know)
> 
> ... and more. At one point when I had an assistant, someone who'd worked with us on NIN records for years, I was trying to show him why I delete patches, in hopes that I could outsource some of the process, but even with his years of experience in the kinds of sounds we liked, he thought I was deleting too much and not keeping sounds he liked. So I realized with a sigh that I'd have to just keep doing it myself, because only I could make those decisions.
> 
> Meh, I don't mind too much.


I love your posts like this, because they really focus in on your artistic priorities, which I imagine is also why you find you can't outsource the culling even to someone else who is steeped in that world.


----------



## el-bo

MegaPixel said:


> We all make bad decisions one time or another...
> Looks like it was my turn... I think I was sucked in by the hype... Live and learn eh...


There is indeed a lot of hype. Some certainly justified, but not all.

But I'm surprised you didn't get an obvious sense of the type of aesthetic this was going for, from the videos you watched. I think many refer to it as a 'sheen' over everything. I'm not sure I could detect it in isolation, but there's definitely a sense of it being one huge extended D-50 bank. Also, a lot of the reputation Omni has goes back to a time when it really was one of a few instruments doing what it does. Go back even further, to Atmosphere and their cd-ROMs, and it's clear how big of a part they played in informing much of the pad/cinematic underscore scene, and how many years it's taken for everyone to catch up.

But yeah, they did catch up. And it's true that in the last few years Omni has lost some if its 'edge' to Kontakt libraries, other 'even-the-kitchen-sink' synths and the best of the dedicated analog emulations. 

But it evidently still has a place, due to preference and workflow

Firstly, preference is 'king'. If you'd said you preferred the sound of Synth1, Neon and/or One-Ping-Only, I might have thought you a bit odd, but accepted that as your preference. Instead you started your rant by calling Omnisphere shit. That's not a preference issue, but an objectively untrue (imo) statement. 

And regards the workflow benefits: Not just a solid browser (Even more so, apparently, with 3rd-party software developed by one of VI-C's members), but a range of functions that allow very easy modification of existing presets. Soundmatch and lock (also Orb randomisation) can easily give variations on sounds that get close. Removing 'that' single layer that ruins a good patch is really easy, also. And that's before substituting out soundsources for the many thousands of alternatives, or using them to start from scratch (They already do most of the heavy-lifting in getting interesting but not over-done sounds that are more typical of the stock presets)

Spending $500 and ending up having to write programs to cut the thing down to nothing more than the size of a large soundset just doesn't make any sense to me.

Perhaps experiment with the modification/randomisation features, and look for soundsources that fit more with your preferences. And perhaps check out the preset demos of 3rd-party designers (The Unfinished, Sonic Underworld etc.). Especially check out the earlier sets that were programmed before Omni had sample import (Up to version 1.6). This will give you an idea of the potential of the included soundsources and synthesis that it comes with.


----------



## David Kudell

charlieclouser said:


> Reasons for which I unconditionally delete patches:
> 
> • Sounds like FM (any sound with a bell-like spectrum)
> • Sounds like an organ (any sound with that multi-octave tone wheel sound)
> • Sounds like "The Fifth Element" (any sound with that eighties workstation "fantasy glisten" thing going on)
> • Sounds like plastic (it's too easy to get Omni to sound like this, and many devs accidentally do)
> • Cheesy arpeggios (again, that eighties workstation corny pulsing "one finger suspense cue" thing)
> • Reverby harp/piano/pluck with a pad behind it (instantly banished to the pits of hell)
> • Corny "bad-ass" distorted "industrial" patches (they just don't know)


1000X YES, this needs to go on the bulletin board of every Omnisphere patch designer. 

I admire your system Charlie, although I'd be scared to delete presets, I definitely think curating a short list of gems is a key to getting any music writing done. I worked on a horror/suspense movie recently and it feels like half of my time was spent just searching for the right sounds. Some cues I felt as much like a sound designer as a composer.


----------



## AmbientMile

el-bo said:


> .....But it evidently still has a place, due to preference and workflow....


I think this is the exact thing that separates long time users from new users. Looking at the interface from a new user point of view, it's not very appealing by today's standards. Lots of extra pages to get to everything in comparison to newer synths (Pigments for example). But long time users like me have developed the muscle memory to fly around the interface fast and get the job done. I can't judge new users who don't care for the GUI. Ironically, for the reasons I stated, I'm scared of a redesign since I am so comfortable with it as is.


----------



## charlieclouser

el-bo said:


> But the 30 presets you're left with are real crackers, right?


That's exactly the point. Just keep the stuff that's inspiring / interesting / just plain great. At this point, I can tell if I'd use a patch or not in the heat of battle, even when auditioning it NOT in the heat of battle, so I can hear a patch and immediately think, "I'd never use that. Delete." Makes the actual moments of searching for something interesting sooooo much easier when you're panning for gold in a river full of gold.


----------



## charlieclouser

jbuhler said:


> I love your posts like this, because they really focus in on your artistic priorities, which I imagine is also why you find you can't outsource the culling even to someone else who is steeped in that world.


Yup. We often hear folks talking about how "limitations help the creative process", and while that theory doesn't lead me to try to compose a film score using tracker software on a Commodore Amiga, it DOES inform my process of reducing the flood of sounds to a manageable pool.


----------



## charlieclouser

AmbientMile said:


> I think this is the exact thing that separates long time users from new users. Looking at the interface from a new user point of view, it's not very appealing by today's standards. Lots of extra pages to get to everything in comparison to newer synths (Pigments for example). But long time users like me have developed the muscle memory to fly around the interface fast and get the job done. I can't judge new users who don't care for the GUI. Ironically, for the reasons I stated, I'm scared of a redesign since I am so comfortable with it as is.


Agreed. The Omnisphere UI is kind of dated at this point compared to slick single-screen UI's like Pigments, with all of its fantastic animated LFO displays and all that, and the weird little "+" buttons in Omni that you use to open an expanded envelope or mod routings page are easy to miss at first, but it gets easier and in the long run it's only a little clumsy and not really terrible at all. Despite other contenders, Omni is still a beast, with up-to-the-minute capabilities, and can sound really great. The difference between some "workstation-y" patches and bespoke stuff is often shocking, like, "Is this even the same synth?" But I think that's evidence of the flexibility of Omni. And I've been impressed at their ability to keep it updated and working across so many generations of OS updates in a timely manner.

Plus Eric Persing is a true O.G. in the synth and sound design world and he absolutely knows what's up.


----------



## KEM

Eric Persing is an absolute legend


----------



## MegaPixel

charlieclouser said:


> Yup. We often hear folks talking about how "limitations help the creative process", and while that theory doesn't lead me to try to compose a film score using tracker software on a Commodore Amiga, it DOES inform my process of reducing the flood of sounds to a manageable pool.


Octamed, loved that thing. When I had musicmaker.org back in 99 they sent me the pc version for free to review, impressive, but I was just getting on the fruity loops train.

Ok, I have gone through every patch...
Deleted everything bar some select presets from:
- Distortion
- Guitars
- Human Voices
- Pads + Strings
- Textures Playable (not many)
- Textures Soundscape (not many)

And on that multi/patch/preset/note , time to dig in deeper into what it can actually do...

And here's Omni passing lag into the DAW even though CPU and DSP loads are low.



It is a silly test but this does get very apparent sometimes from casual use over time, not often but it does fall over and but most of the time it picks itself up again and works on for a while...

And here is Omni going, I liked the last preset, I'm going back... But then it re-selects the newly selected preset after realising it should obey its master 





Also got to love that playing a simple patch can be around 4 to 12% cpu load, but scrolling through presets can be 25% + cpu load  or that 3 hour wait time for a sample import... (don't take that literally now... lets not start another flame war).


----------



## charlieclouser

When it comes to the factory Omni sound set, I don't actually delete the patches I don't like, figuring that they'll only get re-installed with some update. So what I do is make a few of my own category folders and manually duplicate (by option-dragging in the Finder windows) the patches I want to keep. That way I can rename those, and basically ignore the massive factory sound set, but I know that any sample content that my favorites depend on will be there.


----------



## Junolab

MegaPixel said:


> Octamed, loved that thing. When I had musicmaker.org back in 99 they sent me the pc version for free to review, impressive, but I was just getting on the fruity loops train.
> 
> Ok, I have gone through every patch...
> Deleted everything bar some select presets from:
> - Distortion
> - Guitars
> - Human Voices
> - Pads + Strings
> - Textures Playable (not many)
> - Textures Soundscape (not many)
> 
> And on that multi/patch/preset/note , time to dig in deeper into what it can actually do...
> 
> And here's Omni passing lag into the DAW even though CPU and DSP loads are low.
> 
> 
> 
> It is a silly test but this does get very apparent sometimes from casual use over time, not often but it does fall over and but most of the time it picks itself up again and works on for a while...
> 
> And here is Omni going, I liked the last preset, I'm going back... But then it re-selects the newly selected preset after realising it should obey its master
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Also got to love that playing a simple patch can be around 4 to 12% cpu load, but scrolling through presets can be 25% + cpu load  or that 3 hour wait time for a sample import... (don't take that literally now... lets not start another flame war).



Did you talk to the support? Mine has never done anything like that and all presets takes less than a second to load (beside Keyscape presets). Sounds like a faulty installation or computer (bad ram?)...


----------



## el-bo

charlieclouser said:


> At this point, I can tell if I'd use a patch or not in the heat of battle, even when auditioning it NOT in the heat of battle


That makes a huge difference, I guess. Music-making for me is a battle, just one without the same time-pressure 



> When it comes to the factory Omni sound set, I don't actually delete the patches I don't like, figuring that they'll only get re-installed with some update. So what I do is make a few of my own category folders and manually duplicate (by option-dragging in the Finder windows) the patches I want to keep. That way I can rename those, and basically ignore the massive factory sound set, but I know that any sample content that my favorites depend on will be there.


Ok...so this makes a difference. Makes much more sense to work out a way of organising the handful of presets you want than to try and delete upwards of 14,000 factory presets


----------



## Fever Phoenix

I love the fact that this thread came back to life again after almost a year or so 

Thanks for all the valuable opinions!

That is only one of the reasons why this forum is a marvelous place for people working in and around music production and composition.


----------



## MegaPixel

Junolab said:


> Did you talk to the support? Mine has never done anything like that and all presets takes less than a second to load (beside Keyscape presets). Sounds like a faulty installation or computer (bad ram?)...


Nope, machine is rock solid. Handles other VSTs, DAWs, Virtual Machines, Databses (MySQL/Mongo), Compilers, Adobe Creative Suite with zero issues. Has been maxed out rendering for hours in video and 3D or 7zipping up a collection of folders for archive, even maxing out RAM and into SWAP for hours with custom programmed CLI tools till the language / script falls over.

SSD is a fresh replacement (see high failure rates on EVO 4TB 970 SSDs I posed on this forum for more info on that)... But this machine has been put through many a stress test over the years in many ways from various different types of work loads, zero blue screens. However it was a bitch to build, I had to RMA the mobo, ram and cpu, was like the perfect storm (murphy's law) of pc builds... But shit happens, but solid as a rock now...

As for a bad install, I've re-installed it 4 times now as I've been playing with its folder structures and files, those issues in the videos have always been present on each install.

As for contacting support, I don't think I'm going to be keeping omni, it has a few nice factory sounds, its sound design capabilities are decent but nothing I cant achieve with what I already got. It just isn't my cup of tea.

So the only contact they are going to get from me is the request to sell it on and how much its going to cost me. They have a very vague BS web page about making a request for a transfer and that they will evaluate how much it costs per a person (🤬 WTF 🤬) and that they might respond in a week or 2...


----------



## MegaPixel

charlieclouser said:


> When it comes to the factory Omni sound set, I don't actually delete the patches I don't like, figuring that they'll only get re-installed with some update. So what I do is make a few of my own category folders and manually duplicate (by option-dragging in the Finder windows) the patches I want to keep. That way I can rename those, and basically ignore the massive factory sound set, but I know that any sample content that my favorites depend on will be there.


Thanks for that tip, I will look into making a folder or moving things to the user folder or something...

That way if I still have omni on an update and all gets re-installed I can just delete the factory folder after moving anything new that might be of any use.


----------



## MegaPixel

*Omnisphere 2.8 - I like CPU core 2, I like it a lot...*




*Omnisphere 2.8 - Now that's what I call lag 2022 (VA)*




*And for those who think it's my machine or audio interface*





Omni, you really got to bounce.... Bounce come on now... Bounce yeah yeah yeah... 
(or was that Lulu - Shout)
Bounce those tracks down, bounce I tell you BOUNCE!


----------



## Zanshin

@MegaPixel brought the receipts!


----------



## MegaPixel

Zanshin said:


> @MegaPixel brought the receipts!


Ye, I don't want to think how much I spent on all that lol...

Summer sales and BlackFriday sales (which basically turned into all of November sales last year) helped a lot though... And some from forums VI & KVR.

But still...
Really don't want to think how much I spent on all that and then instrument & sample packs...

Need a new bathroom put in, could have, should have, nope went on VSTs instead...


----------



## Junolab

MegaPixel said:


> Nope, machine is rock solid. Handles other VSTs, DAWs, Virtual Machines, Databses (MySQL/Mongo), Compilers, Adobe Creative Suite with zero issues. Has been maxed out rendering for hours in video and 3D or 7zipping up a collection of folders for archive, even maxing out RAM and into SWAP for hours with custom programmed CLI tools till the language / script falls over.
> 
> SSD is a fresh replacement (see high failure rates on EVO 4TB 970 SSDs I posed on this forum for more info on that)... But this machine has been put through many a stress test over the years in many ways from various different types of work loads, zero blue screens. However it was a bitch to build, I had to RMA the mobo, ram and cpu, was like the perfect storm (murphy's law) of pc builds... But shit happens, but solid as a rock now...
> 
> As for a bad install, I've re-installed it 4 times now as I've been playing with its folder structures and files, those issues in the videos have always been present on each install.
> 
> As for contacting support, I don't think I'm going to be keeping omni, it has a few nice factory sounds, its sound design capabilities are decent but nothing I cant achieve with what I already got. It just isn't my cup of tea.
> 
> So the only contact they are going to get from me is the request to sell it on and how much its going to cost me. They have a very vague BS web page about making a request for a transfer and that they will evaluate how much it costs per a person (🤬 WTF 🤬) and that they might respond in a week or 2...


Sure, nonetheless there's a conflict in your system as I (and many others) have absolutely no issues. Spectrasonics can't fix a bug they don't know about. And totally fair regarding the UX and sounds. I like it, but somethings its more fun to use a "proper" synth.


----------



## MegaPixel

RE: Lag issues
Seems I'm not the only 1 and the thread goes back to 09/2018








KVR Forum: Omnisphere 2 slow interface - Instruments Forum


KVR Audio Forum - Omnisphere 2 slow interface - Instruments Forum




www.kvraudio.com


----------



## charlieclouser

MegaPixel said:


> Thanks for that tip, I will look into making a folder or moving things to the user folder or something...
> 
> That way if I still have omni on an update and all gets re-installed I can just delete the factory folder after moving anything new that might be of any use.


Yeah I just leave the factory content where it is, and make new folders for Multis and Patches whose names all start with "[space] CC". That way they sort at the top of the lists. I think the way I did it was to use Omni's built-in facilities to set up the folders and save some patches manually at first, so I wasn't desktop hacking at first, and once those folders were established then I could move on to manually option-dragging patches on the desktop.


----------



## MartinH.

MegaPixel said:


> So the only contact they are going to get from me is the request to sell it on and how much its going to cost me. They have a very vague BS web page about making a request for a transfer and that they will evaluate how much it costs per a person (🤬 WTF 🤬) and that they might respond in a week or 2...



Maybe you get a better deal on the license tranfer cost if you report the bug first and they can't fix it.


----------



## charlieclouser

MegaPixel said:


> *And for those who think it's my machine or audio interface*


That is some weird stuff, sucks that you're experiencing that garbage.

Nothing like that has ever happened here - on MacOS Mojave on Xeon 12-core. (All Omni content stored on 980mb/sec internal OWC 2tb upgrade boot drive.)


----------



## fakemaxwell

charlieclouser said:


> Reasons for which I unconditionally delete patches:
> 
> • Sounds like FM (any sound with a bell-like spectrum)
> • Sounds like an organ (any sound with that multi-octave tone wheel sound)
> • Sounds like "The Fifth Element" (any sound with that eighties workstation "fantasy glisten" thing going on)
> • Sounds like plastic (it's too easy to get Omni to sound like this, and many devs accidentally do)
> • Cheesy arpeggios (again, that eighties workstation corny pulsing "one finger suspense cue" thing)
> • Reverby harp/piano/pluck with a pad behind it (instantly banished to the pits of hell)
> • Corny "bad-ass" distorted "industrial" patches (they just don't know)


Charlie fears nothing.

Except for...


----------



## sostenuto

Post #220. Spectrasonics rocks. Couple interesting comments re. efficient Patch sifting /organizing.
Huge input, by user with mind fixed against, and determined to justify.
Much better ways to invest time and energy for huge base of competent, pleased, productive Omni Users _ e.g. Pluginguru.com. Truly capable, enthusiastic user, creator, tutor. Just stays focused on strengths _ not determined to scratch open every possible weakness.
Moving on _ positively ! 
C'mon Eric P ! StylusRMX has amazing possibilities, yet untouched. 👏🏻


----------



## Pier

@MegaPixel have you tried with another DAW?

For me Bitwig on Windows has been rock solid, probably the most stable DAW I've ever used, but maybe there's some incompatibility. Honestly I don't think Spectrasonics are testing on Bitwig which is pretty niche.

Also, are you using the VST3 version?


----------



## charlieclouser

fakemaxwell said:


> Charlie fears nothing.
> 
> Except for...


More like, DX-7's fear *ME!*

I have taken my vengeance on the bell-tone "fweep" of the dreaded DX-7 countless times. In fact, Victim #16 is permanently bolted down outside my studio as a scarecrow to keep any Yamaha FM synths from approaching the building:


----------



## el-bo

charlieclouser said:


> More like, DX-7's fear *ME!*
> 
> I have taken my vengeance on the bell-tone "fweep" of the dreaded DX-7 countless times. In fact, Victim #16 is permanently bolted down outside my studio as a scarecrow to keep any Yamaha FM synths from approaching the building:


I think someone needs to try an keep doctoremmet occupied for as long as it takes to advance this thread a few pages, and to be on hand to comfort him...just on case


----------



## TomislavEP

I've heard and read so many good things about Omnisphere that always made me wonder. However, I've chosen another path: Komplete as a basis plus a solid collection of Kontakt libraries. Having invested quite a lot in this (for my circumstances), getting Omnisphere as well always felt like an "unjustifiable expense". Truth to be told, I was always somewhat discouraged by having too many sound choices and countless presets to choose from. Not that I don't have this problem with Komplete and my sound collection (that also includes a number of handpicked free libraries), but I don't imagine the things are necessarily better in the world of Omnisphere.

However, after watching many videos that feature Omnisphere in action, I was always under impression that this is a solution that "just works". It features sounds that seem instantly playable and easy to use. Then, there is this large ecosystem built around it, the long-time tradition, all-in-one approach, intuitive GUI, and organization. At least, this is my impression from what I've seen and heard. But it's highly unlikely I would be making this investment anytime soon, as I don't really feel the need. Plus, I still have so much more to draw out from what I already have.


----------



## el-bo

TomislavEP said:


> It features sounds that seem instantly playable and easy to use.


The thing that Spectrasonics have a habit of getting right is imbuing even very simple sounds with playability and musicality. Also, it doesn't take much tweaking to turn a "When would I ever..." patch into something useable. In many cases, just turning off one of the layers (Omni patches often have too much stuff vying for attention) can make something cacophonous that ain't gonna fit into anything, to a perfect pad/underscore sound. Also, the soundsource library contains many examples that need very little actual synthesis to become fully-realised patches. 

Not trying to convince you to buy, as Kontakt with a varied set of libraries can definitely offer similar and/or superior options. But there is an immediacy, given the features and unified experience, and combined with a huge varied library, that is likely a huge reason Omni still relevant.


----------



## wst3

I would never try to convince someone to buy anything - there are just too many variables - pesky humans<G>.

The thing that strikes me about Omnisphere is the quality of the sounds, and by this I mean the quaity of the recorded samples that make up a patch. Which leads to some truly awesome sounding patches - all before you start to worry about how to use them. I can still get lost auditioning sounds.

It is, however, a very expensive tool! You need to be pretty sure you'll make use of it. They do offer one resale per license, so there is that.

The quality of the sounds in Omni led me to purchase Keyscape, and later Trillian. They are as gorgeous sounding as Omni, and can be used as sound sources within Omni.

I've only been a customer since shortly before 2.5 came out, so I can't swear to their update schedule, but since purchasing all three have been updated a couple times - nothing quite as earthshaking as hardware integration, but the new features and bug fixes were well thought out, and so far the updates have been free.

i think if you are considering Omnisphere you should frame it as an environment instead of a single synth... if that makes sense.

It won't be for everyone, and I'm hardly beating myself for not getting on board earlier (well, maybe occasionally) but I am glad I jumped!


----------



## sostenuto

Eariy decision to Omni /Trilian /StylusRMX, never questioned, often reinforced by strong Updates, plus many 3rd Pty expansions. Most recently _ UNIFY embellishments.
Self-critical over indecision over Tribute and Keyscape. Both surely bring notable enhancements.

_None of this demeans any of several top-tier softsynth alternatives. 
Simply not yet so competent with Omni v2.8, to commit major new learning challenge. 
Kudos to many who do it so well !_


----------



## AmbientMile

wst3 said:


> ....It is, however, a very expensive tool!....


When people say this, it makes me look back at what I spent in the past for other tools. My Korg Polysix was $1995 in 1980, I forget how much my Fender Rhodes was in 1979, my first version Fantom was over $2800. Then I look at what Omnisphere can do hooked up to a simple midi controller and it seems dirt cheap to me. But I do understand that people compare the cost of Omni to other software instruments.


----------



## wst3

AmbientMile said:


> When people say this, it makes me look back at what I spent in the past for other tools. My Korg Polysix was $1995 in 1980, I forget how much my Fender Rhodes was in 1979, my first version Fantom was over $2800. Then I look at what Omnisphere can do hooked up to a simple midi controller and it seems dirt cheap to me. But I do understand that people compare the cost of Omni to other software instruments.


Yeah, you guessed correctly, I was comparing the price to other tools that are available today.

I too spend a small fortune on MIDI hardware. And early sample libraries. Someone can correct me, but I am pretty sure that the early GigaStudio libraries (Garritan Orchestral Strings, Scarbee Basses, etc) were close to, or even north of $1K.

If we compare any software tools to even a decade ago it really is a pretty good deal. It's just that writing a check for nearly $500 is not something most of us do frequently. Although there are sample libraries still priced in that range, and more.


----------



## charlieclouser

I've also taken the Kontakt+libraries approach to lots of sound-design-y and synth stuff, and some thoughts about the two approaches:

• With Kontakt it's been way more expensive over the years. While there's lots of fun little narrow-focus libraries for $20-$50, there are of course many that have been way more expensive. And those cheap-n-cheerful libraries are usually something like a few sample-sets of bowed wineglasses or dulcimers with a handful of different processed versions and various playback parameters.

• With Omni, it's rare to find a third-party library that's over $50, unless you're talking about bundles of different titles. Most have at least some sample content - the ones that don't are usually much cheaper than the ones that do. If you spend $500 on Omni libraries you'll spend days auditioning the content - spend $500 on Kontakt libraries and you'll get a comparatively tiny handful of stuff.

• Storage media costs for Kontakt libraries can quickly get crazy. I'm at 16tb of Kontakt, so that's 4x 4tb SSDs backed up to multiple copies on 16tb spinning drives. Sure, lots of that 16tb is huge orchestral libraries, but just the synth+sound design stuff is a whole 4tb chunk. Kontakt stuff is the single most expensive and labor-intensive segment of my data-wrangling world.

• Even with all of my third-party Omni libraries that include sample content, the total size of my STEAM folder is well under 100gb and fits easily on my boot drive, where it's super-fast to load and doesn't need a separate Pelican case full of backup drives.

• Even though Kontakt libraries can have really slick user interfaces, and some like Thrill / Arclight / etc. have clean, simple, and unique UI's with goodies like the X-Y pad, the fact that there is little consistency can slow things down as you poke around looking for the darn filter cutoff knob (if there even is one!). Also, any mapping of external MIDI controllers is unique to each library and must be configured separately for each title. Some have a filter knob that you can map, some don't. This gets messy very quickly.

• With Omni the UI is consistent no matter what third-party library you're using. Once you get the hang of operating the Mod Matrix or whatever, you'll never have to re-learn it, no matter what wacky library you've loaded up. And of course, once you set up external MIDI controller mapping the way you want, you can continue to use that setup across all of your patches in a consistent manner. For many users, Omni's recent auto-mapping stuff that lets you use the front panel of your hardware synths to control Omni's engine is a fantastic addition. I use a Virus TI desktop for this (I don't even use the sounds from the Virus anymore!) and it's great because the Virus front panel looks+feels like a synth and the knobs are labelled. It's not perfect but it's so much better than the "slider 1-16" on most generic MIDI controllers.

So, for orchestral, percussion, and real-instrument stuff obviously Kontakt destroys Omni. But for synth and sound design stuff Omni begins to gain ground for sure. Neither are perfect but both are great.


----------



## KEM

@charlieclouser have you ever heard or tried the Omnisphere Arkham soundset by Sonic Underworld? The name peaked my interest (I love the Batman Arkham games) so I watched the walkthrough and I could definitely hear a bit of your style in it, I wouldn’t doubt if they were influenced by you while making it. I thought it sounded really good so I’ll definitely be picking it up soon, so I figured I’d mention it to you as well


----------



## Soundbed

I knew I wouldn’t use Omnisphere if I didn’t buy the Everything Bundle from The Unfinished also. So, I waited to get Omnisphere until I could afford both together, and I am a happy camper. I usually 100% ignore the factory presets and begin my search in the Unfinished folders first. Usually find something close to what I want by the fifth preset I audition. Then I tweak it. I learned how to use Omni mostly from Plugin Guru videos and studying Unfinished presets.


----------



## proggermusic

This has been a surprisingly cool thread with some well-thought-out perspective from many angles. The high level of civility and thoughtful discourse is so rare on the internet and speaks highly to the culture of VIC, I think. 

Each of us is unique in our needs and use-cases, but when it comes to soft synths, I'm pretty basic: Omnisphere is my absolute favorite and there is no close second. Particularly combined with Keyscape, it typically gets more use than my other VIs combined. I have tons of other soft synths and VIs I love, but when I want to get work done quickly (for my weird niche), I almost always end up reaching for the Spectrasonics stuff.

My favorite mic of all time is the Neumann U87ai, so... I guess I'm just a sucker for the prom queen that everyone else loves to trash-talk.


----------



## Nick Batzdorf

I probably wrote the same thing earlier in this thread, but my favorite thing about Omnisphere - apart from its having endless outrageously cool sounds: you don't have to re-learn its interface if you don't use it for a month.

It's really easy to see what's doing what and tweak sounds.

And it looks like Charlie is saying something very similar.


----------



## vitocorleone123

Interesting. I prefer a combo meal rather than a “platform” - but I’m not cranking music out every day or with deadlines of a professional full-time musician, which would likely make Omni more appealing, or even necessary.

Right now I have 3 go-to softsynths: Hive 2 (I like better than Omni for that sound of virtual analog), Korg Polysix, and Repro1. Add in Kontakt usually for some drums or drum accents, sometimes orchestral sounds or other stuff, maybe Ethera vocals like on my latest track, and I’m good. Finally, I’ll usually also add at least one of 3 hardware synths I have.

I’ve always been “I should really invest the time to learn Omni” and then get bored of trying to do just that. And for someone that doesn’t know the ins and outs of Omni depths, it does start to have a samey kind of sound to it, which doesn’t help encourage me. Given that I LOVE learning new interfaces, it’s odd that I don’t react well to Omni. Perhaps it’s the huge amount of options. Hmm. Maybe I just like “simple” instruments- preferring many simple ones to one complex one.


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## tmhuud

charlieclouser said:


> I've also taken the Kontakt+libraries approach to lots of sound-design-y and synth stuff, and some thoughts about the two approaches:
> 
> • With Kontakt it's been way more expensive over the years. While there's lots of fun little narrow-focus libraries for $20-$50, there are of course many that have been way more expensive. And those cheap-n-cheerful libraries are usually something like a few sample-sets of bowed wineglasses or dulcimers with a handful of different processed versions and various playback parameters.
> 
> • With Omni, it's rare to find a third-party library that's over $50, unless you're talking about bundles of different titles. Most have at least some sample content - the ones that don't are usually much cheaper than the ones that do. If you spend $500 on Omni libraries you'll spend days auditioning the content - spend $500 on Kontakt libraries and you'll get a comparatively tiny handful of stuff.
> 
> • Storage media costs for Kontakt libraries can quickly get crazy. I'm at 16tb of Kontakt, so that's 4x 4tb SSDs backed up to multiple copies on 16tb spinning drives. Sure, lots of that 16tb is huge orchestral libraries, but just the synth+sound design stuff is a whole 4tb chunk. Kontakt stuff is the single most expensive and labor-intensive segment of my data-wrangling world.
> 
> • Even with all of my third-party Omni libraries that include sample content, the total size of my STEAM folder is well under 100gb and fits easily on my boot drive, where it's super-fast to load and doesn't need a separate Pelican case full of backup drives.
> 
> • Even though Kontakt libraries can have really slick user interfaces, and some like Thrill / Arclight / etc. have clean, simple, and unique UI's with goodies like the X-Y pad, the fact that there is little consistency can slow things down as you poke around looking for the darn filter cutoff knob (if there even is one!). Also, any mapping of external MIDI controllers is unique to each library and must be configured separately for each title. Some have a filter knob that you can map, some don't. This gets messy very quickly.
> 
> • With Omni the UI is consistent no matter what third-party library you're using. Once you get the hang of operating the Mod Matrix or whatever, you'll never have to re-learn it, no matter what wacky library you've loaded up. And of course, once you set up external MIDI controller mapping the way you want, you can continue to use that setup across all of your patches in a consistent manner. For many users, Omni's recent auto-mapping stuff that lets you use the front panel of your hardware synths to control Omni's engine is a fantastic addition. I use a Virus TI desktop for this (I don't even use the sounds from the Virus anymore!) and it's great because the Virus front panel looks+feels like a synth and the knobs are labelled. It's not perfect but it's so much better than the "slider 1-16" on most generic MIDI controllers.
> 
> So, for orchestral, percussion, and real-instrument stuff obviously Kontakt destroys Omni. But for synth and sound design stuff Omni begins to gain ground for sure. Neither are perfect but both are great.


You bring up some very interesting points. I strongly agree with points 1. ) (Storage space), 4.) Consistency, Spectra had a great handle on percussive rhythms but dropped the ball (IMHO) I honestly don't know why Stylus was abandoned. But they could have ruled combining orchestral with hybrid/ synth in that engine. Imagine the possibilities. In fact why was the CLOSEST they got to orchestral in Stylus (I'm thinking maybe 9 volt Audio (RIP) had a so so Timpani add on). I believe Eric's heart was in synthesis. (nothing WRONG with that!)


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## Pier

Nick Batzdorf said:


> you don't have to re-learn its interface if you don't use it for a month


I'm curious, what virtual synths have made you relearn its interface after not using it for a while?


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## Nick Batzdorf

Pier said:


> I'm curious, what virtual synths have made you relearn its interface after not using it for a while?


All of them. 

I'm exaggerating, but the point is that Omnisphere's interface is so clear and straightforward.


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## MegaPixel

Pier said:


> @MegaPixel have you tried with another DAW?
> 
> For me Bitwig on Windows has been rock solid, probably the most stable DAW I've ever used, but maybe there's some incompatibility. Honestly I don't think Spectrasonics are testing on Bitwig which is pretty niche.
> 
> Also, are you using the VST3 version?


I've tried FLStudio 20.9 and Studio One 5 Pro (latest version), both have varying levels of the same issue, I've been on email with support, so far with no success... I'm scheduled for a tech support call today.

I made 4 videos for them, 1st time firing up omni in a few days, they asked me to test in standalone mode and set GPU settings for it add it to exclude lists on AV software etc (already tried this and had fully disabled AV defence completely), same result, but ironically the first 2 videos with omni in stand alone resulted in a crash, good to catch it on video.

I had to actually re-install it to get the tests done...

Multi Daw testing results:

*FLStudio*
I created a single sequence with a midi pattern dragged in with 3 or 4 other VSTs, Diva, Zebra etc and Omni. Result was the highest CPU load of the 3 DAWs and the most stutter of all the DAWs, graphically. Audio was mostly unaffected but omni's issues were by far the worst.

*Bitwig*
Dropped omni into an existing project, huge lag issues, slow to load, often locking up, sometimes actually taking out BitWig, but BitWig 4 (latest) has a Plugin container issue that they haven't worked out the issue with yet, they are slow on this fix... As per my previous reports, DSP is low, CPU core 2 (aka 3) maxing out on preset scroll, huge lag on changing from setting to setting etc etc.

*Studio One 5 Pro*
As per FlStudio, created a test project 3 or 4 other VSTs, dropped in the same midi track into all tracks including Omni. Scrolling through presets was greatly improved, loading times was greatly improved but it would suffer the same issues randomly from time to time, and the lag was passed to the DAW giving it some graphical stutter but by far the least. Omni however reported a latency time locked at 0 in SO5Pro regardless of what it was doing.

Another test I ran was to watch Disk IO, Omni spends a lot of time reading and possibly writing to a db file even after close, disk was nowhere near maxed but resource monitor accessed via task manager (link bottom left) shows a cpu load going straight to 100% if omni is running where as task manager show other details. Might grab an alternate cpu load monitor for further testing.

*RE: DAWs and me*
FLStudio
Well I started with FLStudio, it was a great gateway DAW lol, but it's no longer my thing, it's good, got one, if not the best Piano Roll Editor of them all but me and FLStudio have parted ways ever since I used BitWig, it just can't do what BitWig can do, as simply as BitWig can or as quickly and cleanly, and all the LFO tools, modulators etc, I use them so much.

*So why don't I use Studio One 5 Pro?*
I do like this DAW, a lot better piano roll editor than BitWig, up there with FLStudio's, but again it can't do what BitWig can do, but I do use it from time to time to give me a freshen up. But I find myself going far too often saying, "to do this would be so much easier in bitwig" or going, "nope can't do that in this DAW, not without buying LFOTool". etc

*V1 Omni Insta Crash - No warning*



*V2 Omni Crash 2 - classic style*



*V3 BitWig with Omni in a project - The lag*


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## vitocorleone123

MegaPixel said:


> I've tried FLStudio 20.9 and Studio One 5 Pro (latest version), both have varying levels of the same issue, I've been on email with support, so far with no success... I'm scheduled for a tech support call today.
> 
> I made 4 videos for them, 1st time firing up omni in a few days, they asked me to test in standalone mode and set GPU settings for it add it to exclude lists on AV software etc (already tried this and had fully disabled AV defence completely), same result, but ironically the first 2 videos with omni in stand alone resulted in a crash, good to catch it on video.
> 
> I had to actually re-install it to get the tests done...
> 
> Multi Daw testing results:
> 
> *FLStudio*
> I created a single sequence with a midi pattern dragged in with 3 or 4 other VSTs, Diva, Zebra etc and Omni. Result was the highest CPU load of the 3 DAWs and the most stutter of all the DAWs, graphically. Audio was mostly unaffected but omni's issues were by far the worst.
> 
> *Bitwig*
> Dropped omni into an existing project, huge lag issues, slow to load, often locking up, sometimes actually taking out BitWig, but BitWig 4 (latest) has a Plugin container issue that they haven't worked out the issue with yet, they are slow on this fix... As per my previous reports, DSP is low, CPU core 2 (aka 3) maxing out on preset scroll, huge lag on changing from setting to setting etc etc.
> 
> *Studio One 5 Pro*
> As per FlStudio, created a test project 3 or 4 other VSTs, dropped in the same midi track into all tracks including Omni. Scrolling through presets was greatly improved, loading times was greatly improved but it would suffer the same issues randomly from time to time, and the lag was passed to the DAW giving it some graphical stutter but by far the least. Omni however reported a latency time locked at 0 in SO5Pro regardless of what it was doing.
> 
> Another test I ran was to watch Disk IO, Omni spends a lot of time reading and possibly writing to a db file even after close, disk was nowhere near maxed but resource monitor accessed via task manager (link bottom left) shows a cpu load going straight to 100% if omni is running where as task manager show other details. Might grab an alternate cpu load monitor for further testing.
> 
> *RE: DAWs and me*
> FLStudio
> Well I started with FLStudio, it was a great gateway DAW lol, but it's no longer my thing, it's good, got one, if not the best Piano Roll Editor of them all but me and FLStudio have parted ways ever since I used BitWig, it just can't do what BitWig can do, as simply as BitWig can or as quickly and cleanly, and all the LFO tools, modulators etc, I use them so much.
> 
> *So why don't I use Studio One 5 Pro?*
> I do like this DAW, a lot better piano roll editor than BitWig, up there with FLStudio's, but again it can't do what BitWig can do, but I do use it from time to time to give me a freshen up. But I find myself going far too often saying, "to do this would be so much easier in bitwig" or going, "nope can't do that in this DAW, not without buying LFOTool". etc
> 
> *V1 Omni Insta Crash - No warning*
> 
> 
> 
> *V2 Omni Crash 2 - classic style*
> 
> 
> 
> *V3 BitWig with Omni in a project - The lag*



Have you tried Waveform Pro 11.5? Not for Omni testing (I mean, sure, if you want), but for the clean piano roll, built in drag and drop modulation, and racks, etc.? It won't be as powerful as Bitwig in that regard, but it might be a happy medium.

It has different piano roll types like S1 (drums, etc.), a chord track (even with some suggestions), and more. The stock effects are not really worth using, though, if you have others.


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## MegaPixel

vitocorleone123 said:


> Have you tried Waveform Pro 11.5? Not for Omni testing (I mean, sure, if you want), but for the clean piano roll, built in drag and drop modulation, and racks, etc.? It won't be as powerful as Bitwig in that regard, but it might be a happy medium.
> 
> It has different piano roll types like S1 (drums, etc.), a chord track (even with some suggestions), and more. The stock effects are not really worth using, though, if you have others.


If it comes to it I would rather sacrifice omni than BitWig any day.

At first I thought, oo hang on this looks like Ableton, and I really didn't get on with that thing... Then found it to be far simpler, more modular and then I found the "modulators". After about 1/2 a day of just messing with them with any built in or external vst, FLStudio and Studio One 5 Pro have all but been pretty much retired... I don't touch FLStudio anymore but I will still pick up Studio One 5 Pro from time to time...

The piano roll's from FLStudio and Studio One 5 Pro granted are light years ahead of BitWigs, BitWig's piano roll tbh is complete and utter *SHAIT*, I would almost pref' to be using my Amiga with Octamed or Medtracker/Modtracker or the modern day version of them aka ReNoise than it's piano roll . It does the bare minimum of what a piano roll should do and it doesn't even do that well, it's complete and utter crap.... But those modulators... God daymn I use them a lot...

And if I really really really need to I can fire up Studio One 5 or FLStudio, use their piano rolls from exported midi from BitWig and then export from them to midi again and bring it back into BitWig. They know it's crap, don't know why they don't put some effort into improving it.





__





An Introduction to Modulators







www.bitwig.com






I am tempted to go down the Reaper path though, I do like a lot of what that can do and it's workflow.


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## vitocorleone123

MegaPixel said:


> If it comes to it I would rather sacrifice omni than BitWig any day.
> 
> At first I though, oo hang on this looks like Ableton, and I really didn't get on with that thing... Then found it to be far simpler, more modular and then I found the "modulators". After about 1/2 a day of just messing with them with any built in or external vst, FLStudio and Studio One 5 Pro have all but been pretty much retired... I don't touch FLStudio anymore but I will still pick up Studio One 5 Pro from time to time...
> 
> The piano roll's from FLStudio and Studio One 5 Pro granted are light years ahead of BitWigs, BitWig's piano roll tbh is complete and utter *SHAIT*, I would almost pref' to be using my Amiga with Octamed or Medtracker/Modtracker or the modern day version them aka ReNoise than it's piano roll . It does the bare minimum of what a piano roll should do and it doesn't even do that well, it's complete and utter crap.... But those modulators... God daymn I use them a lot...
> 
> And if I really really really need to I can fire up Studio One 5 or FLStudio, use their piano rolls from exported midi from BitWig and then export from them to midi again and bring it back into BitWig. They know it's crap, don't know why they don't put some effort into improving it.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> __
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> An Introduction to Modulators
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> www.bitwig.com


I suspect half of those modulation options (I didn't compare and count or go in depth but went off memory) are also in Waveform, though not quite as well done, I think. Like I said: Waveform Pro is probably a happy medium between Bitwig and Studio One. But it could also land in an "uncanny valley" depending on what you need/use. 

But enough about the Waveform DAW, since this is supposed to be about Omnisphere. It just seemed relevant to mention in context.


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## MegaPixel

vitocorleone123 said:


> I suspect half of those modulation options (I didn't compare and count or go in depth but went off memory) are also in Waveform, though not quite as well done, I think. Like I said: Waveform Pro is probably a happy medium between Bitwig and Studio One. But it could also land in an "uncanny valley" depending on what you need/use.
> 
> But enough about the Waveform DAW, since this is supposed to be about Omnisphere. It just seemed relevant to mention in context.


Cool, thank for the tip then, will go watch some videos on YT about it.


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## Manuel M.

Didn’t want to start a new thread here since it’s about Omnisphere anyway. 

So here‘s my question or „problem“ I shall say:

At the moment, I try to replicate some of my Pigments patches in Omnisphere to see where I can take them with Omni. In Pigments I often like to assign an LFO to the filter‘s envelope sustain to have some movement on the cutoff after the AD stages. However, this appears to be impossible with Omni. Can’t assign a LFO to any sustain stage of any envelope. Any workarounds here? Assigning a LFO to the cutoff itself and applying a delay to the LFO might be a solution but is a bit cumbersome and inelegant. Most likely I‘m just missing something obvious 😅

Thanks for your help! 😊


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## cmillar

I'm totally in love with Omnisphere again after having veered away the last couple of years.( I blame the pandemic for giving me too much time on my hands to try some other software synths and samplers!)

What I'm rediscovering is how Omnisphere can basically do pretty much everything I'd ever want and more.

Of course it won't replace my orchestral sounds, pianos, etc. etc.

But for synths, sound design, messing around with imported audio, and so on the only limitation is pretty much on me.

Having 'grown up' in the Roland universe since the '80's, my brain is probably 'wired' into programming the Spectrasonic way since I've owned JV-1080's, XP'80's, SRJV-2080's, the Integra, and now a JunoDS (which also makes for a great MIDI controller!)

So, I feel like I'm 'returning home' to an old friend just in time for a dance score project in which the choreographer is looking for very organic-based sounds that can take the audience on a journey through innerspace.... not outerspace.

The only problem I have with Omnisphere....don't start using it late at night! You'll never get any sleep. Or, I often end up closing my eyes to really absorb myself in the sound and then I snap out of it 20 minutes later with my finger on the same key. 

That's a good thing!


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