Camel's Alchemy: Wanna be convinced?

[Newecho]

http://www.camelaudio.com/alchemymanual/

[Newecho]

http://www.camelaudio.com/alchemymanual/mod/mseg/

Reminds me of Absynth.


Sequencer details here
http://www.camelaudio.com/alchemymanual/mod/sequencer/

[glitchrock-buddha]

http://www.camelaudio.com/alchemymanual/mod/mseg/

Reminds me of Absynth.

Very much so. They've taken many of the best features from other products like absynth and kore and put them in with their cameleon and camel space vibes and improved on everything.

One of the few areas though where I like the absynth approach better still is
the multi-envelopes. In absynth it's cool that you can see them all together as well as seeing a position marker run through the timeline. I could be wrong but I don't think alchemy's mseg's have a position marker showing the sound over time. And you only see one mseg at a time.

[Newecho]

One of the few areas though where I like the absynth approach better still is
the multi-envelopes. In absynth it's cool that you can see them all together as well as seeing a position marker run through the timeline. I could be wrong but I don't think alchemy's mseg's have a position marker showing the sound over time. And you only see one mseg at a time.

I think your right. I also agree that the way Absynth handles overlaying envelopes is great.

I'm hoping that the performance params are mapped a the beginning of the 128 possible in Live. I can't buy till after xmas - so if someone else picks this up chime in with notes on how midi mapping ties to Ableton please.

Mark

[Geezus]

http://www.camelaudio.com/alchemymanual/mod/mseg/

Reminds me of Absynth.

Very much so. They've taken many of the best features from other products like absynth and kore and put them in with their cameleon and camel space vibes and improved on everything.

One of the few areas though where I like the absynth approach better still is
the multi-envelopes. In absynth it's cool that you can see them all together as well as seeing a position marker run through the timeline. I could be wrong but I don't think alchemy's mseg's have a position marker showing the sound over time. And you only see one mseg at a time.

Thats my favorite thing about absynth too, and its really surprising to me that NOBODY else has followed their lead since it really seems like a common sense feature to have when it comes to envelopes. I mean we're almost to 2010 and we still have to figure out what our envelopes are doing by playing notes over and over and listening to them? Jesus christ, let me see position markers and all the envelopes at once so I know what the fuck is going on!


I'm all amped cause I bought alchemy on student discount, but my plans of tweakage have been thwarted because their server is getting hammered and its a bitch trying to download the program files.

[Newecho]

I'm all amped cause I bought alchemy on student discount, but my plans of tweakage have been thwarted because their server is getting hammered and its a bitch trying to download the program files.

I'm jealous. Looking forward to your first impressions.

[glitchrock-buddha]

http://www.camelaudio.com/alchemymanual/mod/mseg/

Reminds me of Absynth.

Very much so. They've taken many of the best features from other products like absynth and kore and put them in with their cameleon and camel space vibes and improved on everything.

One of the few areas though where I like the absynth approach better still is
the multi-envelopes. In absynth it's cool that you can see them all together as well as seeing a position marker run through the timeline. I could be wrong but I don't think alchemy's mseg's have a position marker showing the sound over time. And you only see one mseg at a time.

Thats my favorite thing about absynth too, and its really surprising to me that NOBODY else has followed their lead since it really seems like a common sense feature to have when it comes to envelopes. I mean we're almost to 2010 and we still have to figure out what our envelopes are doing by playing notes over and over and listening to them? Jesus christ, let me see position markers and all the envelopes at once so I know what the fuck is going on!


I'm all amped cause I bought alchemy on student discount, but my plans of tweakage have been thwarted because their server is getting hammered and its a bitch trying to download the program files.

No doubt. A lot of people have been waiting impatiently for it to be released.
About the envelopes, I'm thinking of making a suggestion about that. To have a dedicated page to be able to see all envelopes,sequences and arps etc. at the same time. And also to have a position line visible running through the mseg's. I'd also like to see something similar in the spectral window. Either a position line moving throuhgh time or a little arrow at the top/bottom indicating the position of the sound through time. I think that would help for editing and painting in the spectral editor.

[Geezus]

No doubt. A lot of people have been waiting impatiently for it to be released.
About the envelopes, I'm thinking of making a suggestion about that. To have a dedicated page to be able to see all envelopes,sequences and arps etc. at the same time. And also to have a position line visible running through the mseg's. I'd also like to see something similar in the spectral window. Either a position line moving throuhgh time or a little arrow at the top/bottom indicating the position of the sound through time. I think that would help for editing and painting in the spectral editor.

yeah I'll back you up on those requests. seems like the best way now to know where anything is is to draw in some kind of clutter and to try and listen for it when it hits that point on the sound, which is just dumb to me.

[ashtonron]

Well after a couple of hours with it last night I have to say I am impressed...

The spectral editing is fantastic... You can take a drum loop and highlight certain frequencies bring out the transients etc all by just painting with a brush... you can even use it to remove unwanted bits from the loop

...really impressed...

Some of the keys presets are really good.. very playable with lots of expression..

I am really impressed with the GUI i watched one of the tutorial vids, and havent looked at the manual after that.. really intuitive and easy to start programming your own sounds..

Preset management is really nice as well everything i laid out nicely with a separate tree for your own presets.. and if you want to start a new sound simply click on the clear and everything is reset....

performance controls are easy to map up and all the presets have good tweakability, bring out the accompanying ebow in a piano patch for example...

I want to start making film sound tracks now...

[rbro]

I bought it and played around with it briefly last night. It looks very impressive so far. If comparing to Omnisphere, I would say the one downside (imho anyway) is that the quality of some of the samples isn't quite up to par with Omni's (especially the psychoacoustic stuff Omni has) I was disappointed with the Nylon Guitar for instance. But to be fair, I only played around with it for about 1/2 hour or so. Then again Omni has about 20X the amount of sample content and 10X the presets. Alchemy seems much easier to tweak though and has a lot more flexibility and lets you import your own samples to tweak....and is 1/2 the cost of Omni. I think Alchemy will actually compliment Omni nicely, as opposed to being an Omni-Killer. Well I have them both now. Gonna be a busy holiday.........

[Geezus]

Here's my take (with a limited 45 minutes of usage so far):

-it sounds fucking amazing

-controls are easy to figure out. GUI is pretty easy to navigate. Its actually one of the easiest synths to use considering what it can do. You can just stick to regular VA stuff if you want and its still dead easy and sounds ridiculous. I would totally buy it just for VA if that's all it did. Granular stuff is a breeze on this and actually makes granular editing fun again. I used to use sampler for that kind of stuff but now I got something that I can actually MODULATE SAMPLE START TIME, ETC WITH LIVE (hint hint abes). Additive and spectral edits are the easiest of any additive/spectral synth on the market.

-only thing that requires lots of clicking around is modulation, but thats only because every effin parameter has its own mod matrix. you click on the parameter and it brings up its assigned modulators, you navigate through each lfo/ahdsr/mseg/whatever (there can be multiples isntance of each used). You can even modulate the parameters of the modulators themselves. But you can only look at one at a time

-performance controls make it easy to get to the parameters you want to tweak, even on a SL or novation remote (the performance controls are the first parameters on the list so theres no problem with the 128 limit or the SL assigning them to funny controls). Also has a pretty sweet auto assign function that automatically throws the most common controls on the performance controls to save you time.

-randomize feature kicks ass (not as sweet as synplant but it comes up with some sick shit that sounds pro). Sometimes random stuff sounds too low volume-wise or has funny attack timing or some other glitch (too long of a delay or other stuff that messes up a sound) but other than that I've heard it come up with really interesting sounds.

-cpu doesnt really seem TOO bad considering what it does. the additive/spectral stuff will take up the most cycles and regular VA or granular stuff doesnt hit it too hard.

-good presets, but I try to avoid presets so I haven't really been focusing much on them

-randomized and factory presets have the velocity sensitivity set to the max which makes playing shit kinda awkward on my remote. You have to turn down the velocity sensitivity or bang on your keys to make sure sound comes out at a decent volume.

-did I mention that it sounds fucking amazing?

its a limited review cause I haven't gotten deep with it yet but I'm already blown away with it, which should count for something.

[rozling]

That's a good concise review - thanks!

Not being smart but just slap a Velocity device in front of it to sort out the velocity thing.

[epiphanius]

I was just poking a bit of fun... I have no idea where Shirley is from

Consider me guilty of taking trivial things a little to seriously.

Let's make some music!

e.

[Geezus]

That's a good concise review - thanks!

Not being smart but just slap a Velocity device in front of it to sort out the velocity thing.

ya I know, that or lower the sensitivity of the amp velocity mod or throw a utility on top of it to boost the volume. Its just annoying cause the volume of the presets/randoms have a super wide range (no consistency) so I'm always adjusting volume settings in one way or another to keep it consistent with the rest of my track.

[dbolt]

-good presets, but I try to avoid presets so I haven't really been focusing much on them


-did I mention that it sounds fucking amazing?

Good presets but not that many and I do tend to use presets its just easy and then tweak... But I have to say with limited presets it makes you create your own... I thought about the preset expansions since I got the educational discount which was nice since I just shelled out $500 or Omni... and I just bought Sylenth/Circle here recently .. So the $120 I spent on Alchemy was a no brainer....

Has anyone purchased the additional presets?

Here is something I put together very quickly showing off Alchemy.. I hope this link works for everyone I hardly use my Mobile Me website so I figured I would give it a try.... Everything is Alchemy except the drums...

Edit: The track I mention above is called Sunset Groove... I just posted another track called Afrovibes which is a more Electro Funky House track which features Alchemy...




http://web.me.com/dustinseabolt/Site/Music.html