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MillimeterSpectrasonics Omnisphere Review
Nov 11, 2009 12:00 PM, By Gary Eskow
Sound-design module offers power and relative ease of use.
Omnisphere ships with a PDF manual, which Spectrasonics continues to develop and expand (check the website often for updates to the manual and new, downloadable content). But I highly recommend that you study the video tutorials that can be accessed through the site once you purchase the product. Spectrasonics has done an admirable job of placing power at your fingertips in a user-friendly fashion, but Omnisphere is complex. The tutorials will help you work your way through.
I'd suggest you start out by exploring the multiple browser views. On the most fundamental level, Omnisphere works like this: Samples are loaded into at least one of the two layers that form a Patch. (Think of Patches as the collection of elements—including samples, waveforms, and the changes you've made to Omnisphere's editing parameters—that constitutes a single sound.) Alternatively, you may choose to build a sound in either the A or B layer by loading and shaping a raw waveform. If you're in the Edit page, these two layers are clearly visible. Click inside one of them, and the Soundsource browser comes into view (provided you've selected Sample rather than Synth in the Edit page). A Soundsource is either a sample or a raw waveform.
But you'd like to explore the more than 1,000 Patches that ship with Omnisphere, so you click in the Browser window that sits in the middle of the Edit screen and bring the Patch Browser into view. Simple.
If you own Stylus RMX, you'll see that Omnisphere's Multi page borrows from this earlier ancestor. Head back to the Edit page and click in the Browser window that sits at the top of this screen, and you'll be able to load various Multis. A Multi is a collection of up to eight patches that can be stored as a single unit. Each patch in a Multi can access signal processors—reverbs that ship with Omnisphere, for example—in common with the others. Each of the up to eight different Patches in a Multi features its own level, pan, and effects settings. Multis are incredibly powerful, so make sure you take advantage of them.
Spectrasonics has done an admirable job of making it as easy as possible to get to know all of the sounds that ship with Omnisphere. Study the tutorial on Browsers, and learn how to use Tags (and create your own), and when you're under the gun looking for a sound, you'll find it easy to winnow down your search and find the most appropriate Soundsource, Patch, or Multi.
Programming early synth/sample players was very difficult, particularly because the LCDs on these modules were small. As a result, they required you to scroll through multiple pages to get at the parameter you wanted to modify. Once you got there, you had to use forward, backward, and up and down arrows to affect the sound. Many users ignored the edit functions entirely.
Omnisphere, on the other hand, is a real pleasure to edit. Head over to the Main page if you want to make only some basic parameter changes. Here you can solo, mute, and pan individual layers, turn on the Arpeggiator (a fantastic extension of a decades-old feature), adjust the Master Filter, and perform a few other functions.
But the Main page is just a point of departure. When you're ready to do some serious work, slide on over to the Edit window. Take a moment and study this screen before diving into it. Did you own a classic synth, maybe a Roland Juno-60? In the bottom right quadrant of the Edit page, you'll see the Envelope section, with the attack-decay-sustain-release (ADSR) sliders that were common to all of these dinosaurs. Even if you've never experimented with these controls, you'll quickly notice the effect they have on a sound. Make sure you load only one sound or waveform, though; we want to pinpoint how the various edit functions affect a single sound.
Without getting too techy here, Modulation, the routing scheme that determines how one or more sculpting tools changes a sound, is one of the most critical aspects of any synthesizer. Be glad that the Spectrasonics team cut its teeth on the early analog synths. These giants required the programmer to make physical cord connections, patches, to change a sound. All software synths and sample players incorporate the concept of patching. Spectrasonics has done an outstanding job in this area. Master Modulation, and you're well on your way to becoming a seasoned sound designer. While we're on the subject of classic synths, the quality of all of the included sampled sounds, including many synths from the '80s and '90s, is stunning.
Continue the discussion on “Crosstalk” the Millimeter Forum.