GENERATE
Unique Cinematic Polysynth
UNIQUE CINEMATIC POLYSYNTH
Beautifully complex pads. Warm moving keys. Jittery sequenced basses. Out of control leads. Textures, oh my God textures. Take Chaos to the next level with Generate.
CREATE THE CHAOS
Generate is based on a set of chaotic generators. What looks like randomness contains underlying patterns, interconnectedness, constant feedback loops, repetition, self-similarity, fractals, and self-organization. Each of Generate’s 8 chaotic generators bring out these underlying patterns and create an oscillator that can smoothly fade from a sine wave to total chaos, with an expanse of territory to explore in between. The musical textures created include distortion, harmonics, grunge, static, and noise. All of which can be predictably or unpredictably modulated.
Crescent
The core of Generate are its eight chaotic generators which add life to the oscillators. Depending on the generator the chaos can adding anything from a gentle texture to harsh noise to your patch.
The Crescent generator is great for making harmonically rich tonal sounds that are reminiscent of stacked sawtooth waves. This expands Generate's palette into more traditionally synth-ey sounds - while keeping the whole Generate vibe intact.
This patch couples the Crescent generator with pitch DRIFT and a strong vibrato for a vintage Canadian feel.
Blue Stahli
"You had me at chaotic. This is going to be a secret weapon for synth-based score composers."
Justin Meldal-Johnsen
(Nine Inch Nails, Beck, ...)
"It's absolutely captivating. Well done. Wow."
Theodore Shapiro
(Composer: The Secret Life of Walter Mitt, Tropic Thunder, ...)
"Generate has an animal quality that sets it apart from other synths. It's chaotic and alive, surprizing and beautiful."
Matthew Simms
(Wire, It Hugs Back)
"I’m truly blown away by the sounds it can make - it’s a very real experience, like playing a hardware synth."
Including Presets From
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Chris Tabron (Beyoncé, The Strokes, Die Antwoord)
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Chris Carter (Throbbing Gristle, Chris and Cosey)
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Matt Lange
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Adam Schatz (Landlady)
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Matthew Simms (Wire, It Hugs Back)
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The Unfinished (Dune, No Time To Die)
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Jacob Bergson (Nerve, Rubblebucket, taut)
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So Wylie (Gimlet, Mogul, The Habitat)
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Black Sheep Sound (Philip Glass, NPR, Iggy Pop)
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Count (Radiohead, Tycho, DJ Shadow, Zoe Keating)
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Laurie Spiegel (Hunger Games, Golden Voyager Disc!)
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Anthony Baldino (Interstellar, Ex-Machina, Avengers)
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Jacob Shea (Planet Earth, Inception, Battleship)
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Robert Dudzic (Spider-Man, Stranger Things)
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ROCASound (Sting, Seal, Donna Summer, Iron Man 2)
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Matthew Wang (Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist, ...)
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Symbion Project (FreQuency, Amplitude)
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The Unfinished (Dune, The Crown, No Time To Die)
FEATURES
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(NEW!) Generate 1.3 adds new wavefolders based on the Saturate algorithm and a model bent version of the Buchla 259
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(NEW!) Generate 1.3 adds the ability to modulate the effects
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(NEW!) Generate 1.3 includes an updated Sequencer
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Novel chaotic oscillator has 8 types: Double Pendulum, Vortex, Pulsar, Discharge, Turbine, Helix, Crescent, and Magma
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5 Wavefolders based on the Buchla 259 Complex Waveform Generator, our Saturate plug-in, Fractals, and a special Animated Equation
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Low Pass Gate based on the Buchla 292 adds controls for POLES and RESONANCE
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Modulate all controls with MIDI/MPE, two Loopable Envelopes, two LFOs, Sample and Hold/Random, and a Step Sequencer
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Innovative modulation UI allows modulation over every control from the main page, including modulating modulators, allowing up to 1440 simultaneous modulation routings
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Innovative and modulatable EQ, Chorus, Delay, Reverb, and Limiter effects to turn the sounds into magic
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MPE support allows amazing control from expressive controllers
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All mod sources have multiple outputs generated at once, like a modular synth should
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Animations! The Double Pendulum, Wavefolder, and Low Pass Gate modules each have animations to show how each module responds to your input, and to modulation
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Fully resizable UI!
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Intuitive Midi Learn functionality allows you to assign MIDI CCs to any control with just a click
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Color Schemes! Don’t like the look of it, change it
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Nearly 900 Presets, including many artist presets
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Full Preset Librarian with Categories, Tags, Descriptions, UNDO, and A/B Comparison
TECHNOLOGY
There are several new pieces of technology that give Generate its unique sound:
1. Generate’s Chaotic Generator is unique among synthesizer oscillators and has been in development for 4 years. The initial idea was to find out what a double pendulum would sound like if sped up to audio rate. It sounded great, but not very musical. After a lot of tweaking to the dynamical model (underlying math) we found a set of Generators that I was happy with and am proud to release in this plug-in. A great simulation of the double pendulum, and a derivation of the equations of motion can be found here.
2. Even after settling on the oscillator building the rest of the voice took several iterations. The best fit ended up being the “west coast” voice originally developed by the genius Don Buchla. However, when building those modules I started having ideas for other wavefolder equations. These ideas eventually became the Animated and Fractal wavefolder options. Development of these ideas was aided in large part by the online graphing calculator Desmos.
3. The reverb in Generate is an incredibly efficient new design (as far as I know) inspired by the writings of Michael Gerzon.
4. The limiter is also a new design based on the geometry of signals, rather than on an analog or digital prototype. For more reading on signal geometry check out this chapter by Julius O Smith.
5. Generate's Bent 259 Wavefolder is based on a new technique we're exploring called Model Bending. Read this blog post for an in depth look at this wavefolder.
For a more complete discussion of Chaotic Synthesis read this blog post or watch this live stream.