MOTM

You are still talking about technologies that were available almost 
fifteen years ago. Perhaps not on your lap top, but these products are 
simply commercialized versions of early discoveries. The buffer of 
"innovations to come" and current software is pretty much on the same 
page these days. There are no more "natural" resources to tap in terms 
of innovations that couldn't be done because of slow computers. This 
leads to a stagnation in peoples interest to explore. Like you say, 
everything is available and it would take a lifetime to explore. Sure, 
but that comes with the luggage of knowing that what you're working on 
right now probably already exists on a sample lib! The notion that 
everything has been discovered or will be very shortly, puts an extreme 
time pressure to come up with good stuff. It's almost like saying, -I 
can cover most areas with my commercial sample lib and if there's 
something missing then I'm not going to take the time to cook up my own 
sounds because It will probably be covered by a new sample lib by tomorrow.
This knowledge sets the bar very high and leaves little or no hope for 
new exploration. Or I should say in depth exploration that yields 
passionate results.

This problem comes from the same fabric that runs through the entire 
music industry. It's the same dilema wether you're a mix engineer, 
songwriter or a sound designer.

The Synclavier is a good example of a product that lend itself towards 
great discoveries. Only a few people could afford it, and it was way 
ahead of it's time. These circumstances led to an oasis of exploration. 
People did things with samples and FM that had sounded amazing! They 
dared to spend long hours of tedious mapping etc., because they knew 
they were pushing new ground. The Synclav window of opportunity lasted 
almost ten years! Ten years of quiet time for the driven experimentalist 
to explore! Explore without having your invested time interrupted by a 
pluggin that can do almost exactly what your doing.

I saw the Yamaha vocal software in action almost to date five years ago. 
I am more than thrilled to see that it's going to be released, and not 
put on ice as first intended.

Tobias

elhardt@... wrote:

>
> There are a couple of problems with this thinking. First is that there 
> is quite
> a bit of new stuff coming out regarding synthesis and synthesis related
> processing.  Examples like Spectral Delay real-time FFT manipulation 
> software,
> Yamaha's new vocal software giving you realistic artificial vocals, 
> realtime
> independent pitch/time/formant manipulation software, finally new 
> powerful
> additive synthesis with features never before available, EQ curve 
> extracting
> software, harddrive streaming samplers (semi-new), and so on.
>
> The other problem is that there is more available now than any person 
> could
> fully explore in his lifetime.  When I hear people clammering for 
> more, more, I
> think, why?  Are you being held back from creating something because 
> there are
> too few software/synth choices?
>