Wolfgang Palm WaveMapper 2 is out for PC and MAC

[robotmonkey]

Everyone is entitled to his or her opinion on that matter.

I can see both sides of the argument - the honest consumer who doesn't like to be treated like a potential criminal, living with the possibility that the authorization server goes offline one fine day, together with the company; and the software writer who has to deal with the constant possibility of some little shit cracking his software, resulting in a sharp 99% income loss because humans are an opportunistic species and most will gladly take the cracked version. C/R is a way to prevent that - of course, said little shit could still reverse-engineer large parts of the code to remove all the associated mechanisms, but that's work. Much more so than a keygen. A serial number scheme requires a lot of trust from the developer into his customers - warranted by most, but unfortunately not by all.

I wish there was a better solution that suits both sides equally well. I just can't see any; HW dongles are even worse in my opinion.
There's just too many bastards out there...

I think there have been just too many cases of companies disappearing or just turning off activation servers for software to have any confidence in such schemes. Being locked out of your software is just not nice and I have had just enough problems and expenses related with intrusive CP that further down the road I just will not consider any software that has CP that leaves me at the mercy of some external entities.

For example, on the last 1year or so I have again used E-MU Emulator X3 a lot. It was left out from my setup for some time, but last time when I did reinstall of my system I put it back (it's actually the best ROM-pler ever if you have all the Sound Central soundsets). Fortunately I was still able to authorize it even though E-MU has been dead and buried for many years already. It seems that Creative has kept the activation servers going for now. But how long will it last? Creative itself has been in severe downfall for many consecutive years so I would not be surprised if they will pull the plug soon on the grounds of cost cutting. And that would mean I would be locked out of probably the most expensive piece of software I have ever owned (and that's not even including the soundsets). I have hundreds and hundreds of ideas and pieces that make use of Emulator so they all would be lost.

So my only hope is that some nice person somewhere would just patch out the CP of Emulator X3 by the time I want to upgrade to Windows 10. The sad truth is that I have learned over the years to never buy a piece of C/R protected software before making sure there is a fully working patched version out there that one could fall back to if something happens.

[wagtunes]

I see at least one of the sound designers has contributed to this thread. Hopefully, one of them can lend some assistance.

I'm demoing Wavemapper 2 and have just about everything figured out except for one thing.

Very simple. How exactly do you create a root preset that can be loaded into the sound map?

Thanks. Will be buying this very shortly.

[c_voltage]

Hi, sorry forgive my laziness, perhaps it has already been discussed (then can just give a link to the post about compare), but In short, what is the main difference between Wavemapper 2 and Wavegenerator ?
I not tried demos yet, just quick looked at oficial site description of both products. Well, superficially - similar pictures and features list )) need some clarification.
Or can ask otherwise - it makes sense to have both products?

[plexuss]

Hi, sorry forgive my laziness, perhaps it has already been discussed (then can just give a link to the post about compare), but In short, what is the main difference between Wavemapper 2 and Wavegenerator ?
I not tried demos yet, just quick looked at oficial site description of both products. Well, superficially - similar pictures and features list )) need some clarification.
Or can ask otherwise - it makes sense to have both products?

Here is my take on them: Wavegenerator is "the" wavetable synth, having come from the inventor of wavetable synthesis. It embodies everything you need and would expect for great sounding wavetable workflow and sounds. Wavemapper is more of a different implementation of wavetable synthesis but with a different kind of the interface. It produces a different kind of sound and has a different workflow.

So they are exluaive enough from each other to justify having both.

One good way to get access to them is with the iPad versions which as far as I can tell are exactly like the desktop versions but much less expensive. Then if you take to them you can migrate to the desktop versions. if not, you have a couple cool ipad synths for not much money.

YMMV

[c_voltage]

Hi, sorry forgive my laziness, perhaps it has already been discussed (then can just give a link to the post about compare), but In short, what is the main difference between Wavemapper 2 and Wavegenerator ?
I not tried demos yet, just quick looked at oficial site description of both products. Well, superficially - similar pictures and features list )) need some clarification.
Or can ask otherwise - it makes sense to have both products?

Here is my take on them: Wavegenerator is "the" wavetable synth, having come from the inventor of wavetable synthesis. It embodies everything you need and would expect for great sounding wavetable workflow and sounds. Wavemapper is more of a different implementation of wavetable synthesis but with a different kind of the interface. It produces a different kind of sound and has a different workflow.

So they are exluaive enough from each other to justify having both.

One good way to get access to them is with the iPad versions which as far as I can tell are exactly like the desktop versions but much less expensive. Then if you take to them you can migrate to the desktop versions. if not, you have a couple cool ipad synths for not much money.

YMMV

Ok, thanks for info.
(No, i dont have ipad, and in general I am a hater of iphones and ipads also as all phone based mobile devices ).

[chk071]

Demo'd Wavegenerator a bit yesterday. Hell, if there'd be a price for the worst GUI ever, Wavegenerator would be a candidate for me. Not only i had a hard time finding the filter at first, but i also didn't find the filter envelope amount setting after like 15 minutes or demoing, and searching it. The whole workflow of the thing also seems pretty cumbersome. Really wished i could say something good about it, but, nope, just not my cup of tea.

[plexuss]

Demo'd Wavegenerator a bit yesterday. Hell, if there'd be a price for the worst GUI ever, Wavegenerator would be a candidate for me. Not only i had a hard time finding the filter at first, but i also didn't find the filter envelope amount setting after like 15 minutes or demoing, and searching it. The whole workflow of the thing also seems pretty cumbersome. Really wished i could say something good about it, but, nope, just not my cup of tea.

Agreed. This is what happens when a company ignores user experience design, user research and usability. Typically they either don't really understand what UX is (but think they do) or they think UX has no value. Usually its developers and engineers that mess this up, thinking that what they think is a utilitarian UI will work for people. these products are an excellent example of the result: the UI reflects the structure of the underlying software design but has no relevance at all to human behaviour. Many devs and engineers think naturally the way their deliverables are, and that's great for them, but most people are not coders and engineers. Alas. Bain of my existence (I've been a professional UX designer for 25 years and this is the single most occurring challenge, and failure of products).

But, I struggle through Wavemapper, Wavegenerator and Phonem because they sound great. But I am in no way digging deep into these products because the UI and workflow are a major barrier.

Feel free to hire me to do a redesign. We'll do some primary user usability research, needs analysis and UI design wireframes. Ya right... I wont hold my breath.

[chk071]

Glad it isn't just me. I mean, really, the attempt is there, and i can see how the dev thought this might be straight forward here and there, but in the end, most of it is just esoteric, and counter-intuitive. I mean, it's nice to just pull the envelope shape to change the filter cutoff, but there should be a logical concept to changing parameters, not 2 or 3 different ways to do it. And to not be able to find something as trivial as the filter envelope amount is pretty much a no go for me. Yes, i know, some people will probably happily tell me now that they found it after 5 seconds, but, yet, i wasn't able to find it, and i'm someone who has been fiddling with all sorts of synths for years now. But, again, the whole concept doesn't tick with me anyway. Not a big fan of drawing waveforms myself, it's random, and i get enough random results from waveshaping synths, or simply, subtractive synths already.

[Ingonator]

Not a big fan of drawing waveforms myself, it's random, and i get enough random results from waveshaping synths, or simply, subtractive synths already.

FWIW the editor in Wavegenerator offers an option to draw additive partials and it automatically records multiple new waveforms in the current wavetable while you draw those. When done right this is a way to get smoth transitions between waveforms.
Of course creating waveforms based oi the additive editor makes more sense then free drawing them by hand.
If you got the partials from another synth you could also replicate those in the edior of Wavegenerator.

If you got both Wavemapper 2 and Wavegenerator and also teh free Audio Term tool there are 3 options to get custom wavetables:
usee the built-in editor in Wavegenerator, import a sample withe the Resynthesis in Wavemapper 2 or build a table from up to 33 singlecylce waveforms in Audio Term that has a compatible export format.
The wavetable format of Wavemapper 2 and Wavegenerator is compatible.

Wavegenerator also offers combining multiple smaller wavetables into one. With the help of Audio Term that way you could create a full 256 waves wavetable based on many single cycle WAV waveforms.

I do not mean that this is as simple as with e.g. Icarus but it is possible.

[Apostate]

Demo'd Wavegenerator a bit yesterday. Hell, if there'd be a price for the worst GUI ever, Wavegenerator would be a candidate for me. Not only i had a hard time finding the filter at first, but i also didn't find the filter envelope amount setting after like 15 minutes or demoing, and searching it. The whole workflow of the thing also seems pretty cumbersome. Really wished i could say something good about it, but, nope, just not my cup of tea.

It is far from the greatest gui, no question there. All I can say is, break out the youtube demos and user manual and you will find 'generator to be quite the sound design monster. Once you've mastered it, the rewards are manifold and ongoing. Both Generator and Mapper helped me learn it's always best to start out with the manual. Being that I write music for a living, I don't have the time to let myself get confused for 15 minutes (or longer). My wife calls it "being a hopeless man", trying to just navigate things by my own (not entirely intuitive) lights.

Paucis verbis, by opening a new synth with its manual and/or tutorial videos you open yourself up to making things both easier and holistically educational for you.

I do not mean that this is as simple as with e.g. Icarus but it is possible.

Well, for me Icarus is one of those synths that tries to make things easier for you. Not just the gui (though that is nice), but the workflow and effects, etc. I liked it the first few days I had it, but then noticed I put it away and reached instead for Nave, Serum, Electra, the abovementioned PPGs, and (the big winner here) Zebra/HZ. I realize all of those aren't especially "wave synths", but there it is.

Icarus to me an example of Tone 2 making yet another of their typically great sounding, characterful and easy to work with synths...but not making enough out of it to compete with the aforementioned biggies. I found it strangely wanting, though naturally it's one heck of a lot easier to look at than the 'generator. Tone 2 just seems to do that a lot, look at Gladiator: fantastic sounding and looking synth, but I already have Sylenth and Massive...not too much more that Gladiator does, at least to my ears.

[c_voltage]

I can not find Wavemapper2 + Wavegen bundle on oficial site, it removed?

[c_voltage]

Check today WM2 in Ableton Live (always used it in S1) so, i did catch reproducible crashes during switch presets and open\close UI. Maybe someone use it in Live ? (Win7)
Checked also WaveGen and Phonem in Live - all ok it seems, strange.