Sonic Charge releases Synplant
Posted November 10th, 2008 by Oliver CheslerFiled Under: plug-ins
Sonic Charge, the makers of the well loved µTonic (MicroTonic) have released their new creation Synplant. I would describe Synplant as a Generative music plug-in. The results from Synplant don’t sound like random 
bleeps though. I was checking out some of the audio demos on the Sonic Charge site and at first I thought they were human created songs. Peter Kirn at Create Digital Music has been testing the plug-in and is also working on a video walkthrough. Here’s his post: click here
Synplant is a software synthesizer with a genetic approach to sound creation. Instead of creating patches the conventional way by turning dials and knobs, Synplant lets you explore a world of organic sounds by planting seeds that grow into synth patches. The purpose of this product is to move focus away from the sometimes intricate and difficult process of sound synthesis and instead let you develop sounds by simply using your ears. – soniccharge.com
Synplant is $89. 3 week fully working demo: click here
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It’s very easy to use and most important it isn’t a toy. You can create wide range of sound very fast. I think this kind of interfaces will be future of most synths. :]
This is not a generative music app. It’s a softsynth with a generative synthesis engine. The patches are generated through growth, DNA, and mutation, but the actual melodies are played by hand or sequenced via midi like any other softsynth, so the demo songs you heard ARE human created.
seriously Horrorist you’re definitely turning into a hippie – ocarina’s and now organic synths! – wtf :p
no seriously that looks very interesting and cool – im gonna d/l now :)
Ah yes… I got it a bit wrong. Still… interesting plug-in!
Nice plugin, some good sounds, I love it. Thanks for sharing!
The strength of Synplant is it’s sound. The synthesis mixing isn’t really as complicated or automated as people think, but that’s to be expected because alot of the people that will love this synth are those that don’t want to spend time creating elaborate multitimbre patches on their favorite synths.
There’s nothing generative going on here. The genetics is a method of patch/timbre morphing where the amount of morphing that takes place can come from multiple sources, most obviously (since its the way the gui is represented) is by note (and that’s per note patch morphing, not for the full range) and by modwheel (entire range/full morph).
It’s a creative interface that simplifies a very complex patch/multimbre synth engine and this feat is what really makes it impressive. I could mimic all the features of this synth in a modular host with some imaginative split/morph/etc controls setup across multiple synths (and have done) but synplant makes the process for such a powerful multitimbre set into something really simple and that’s just awesome.
Another huge point is the sounds that it creates, it’s not traditional subtractive synthesizer as it also uses some additive style synthesis to help with the degree of morphing and range of sound. Magnus makes awesome sounding instruments and Synplant is no exception. Also, for the preset whores out there.. the included patch library is great, especially for the price.
Unfortunately.. I find the inevitable problem with Synplant is that it will be so widely used, particularly the presets, that it’s sound will over time become easily identifiable by anyone familiar with it.. that’s not a concern to everyone or even top40 people though, so don’t expect that to hinder it’s popularity. Besides, if I know Sonic Plant, they’ll probably roll out many patch libraries for sale (and free) in the future that there will be such a daunting lib available that this will also help avoid the issue.
Great synth, great price, amazing concept at simplifying what is actually a complex multitimbral synth.
The one main complaint I have is the ADN editor (where i’ll be spending alot of time because I do not like to use presets at all, specially with this synth because if you use a preset as a starting point you’ll be swinging randomly because so much of the work has already been done for you that deconstructing them is more work than its worth when you can just start from scratch).. editing with it can sometimes be annoying and hindering because of its pretty graphics. I would like to see just a simple list of controls without the DNA style design.. maybe as an option in a future update.