Pigment 1.2 released...

[Tj Shredder]

I wish Arturia will soon make all of its synths micro tuneable; especially the DX7 V would greatly profit, and I could put FM8 to grave.

Its not??? That was one of the key features of the original DX 7, they really missed on that?

[exmatproton]

Great update, but still no "real" polyphony option. The notes are still being killed by by themselves. Which is a shame. Other then that; great update!

What do you mean with "real" polyphony? You can select between Mono, Legato, and 2 - 32 voices under Play Settings.

When you choose 2 (or more) polyphony, and you play 1 note (long release for instance), this note will be killed when you play the same note a second time. With "real", i mean something similar to Round-Robin. For instance; 12 voices uses 12 voices, no matter what notes are being played.

I see, that makes sense. Have you tried contacting Arturia about it?

yeah, i did. After the initial release AND after this update.
Still waiting for a reply

Maybe I'll try dropping them a message too.
I just checked, and their Prophet 5 actually has those options.

"Circ" is round-robin, Reset works like Pigments does currently. Weird that Pigments doesn't also have those options.

They replied;

" (Arturia Support)

Jun 14, 22:27 CEST

Hello,

Yes you are right, but is more like it needs a play mode, like Reset, Circle, etc.

I will pass your comment to the DevTeam as a feature request for future firmware updates.

Please feel free to contact us if you need more assistance."

[Tj Shredder]

If they are at it they could add a MPE play mode...

[rlared]

I like their support a lot. Both times they handled my requests friendly, quickly, and professionally. They are doing everything right at the moment!

[ians]

There also seems to be a new free sound bank called Percussive Drive in the store section of Pigments. It's got some neat stuff on it

[Razzia]

Im really quite conflicted on this synth. For all that it does right or excels at, theres usually a corresponding omission or oversight that seems so necessary and obvious

The layout and workflow are great. It really is an easy synth to get flowing with. The oscillators and wt interpolation sound great. Filters are pretty good. But its missing the most basic stuff.

Unison on the wavetable osc but not the analog one. Three analog oscs per engine, but no way to pan them apart from each other. No way to even pan one engine away from the other, without dedicating both filters to the task. Special "super" unison mode but no way to stereo spread it.

Two fx busses but no way to route an oscillator or filter to them individually.

Randomizable arp/seq that even snaps to scale but no way to record its midi output so you can capture the moments when something cool comes up spontaneously.

I dont think im being unreasonable. If it were a simple analog emulation i would understand the limitations, but it seems to be touted as a workhorse synth- and would be an excellent one- but it consistently falls just a little short in simple, bread and butter things like panning and several different types of routing.

I dont want to sound critical or negative. Its a very good synth and i like it a lot. I just think it would take only very simple things to make it an absolutely exceptional synth, and yet it doesnt seem there has been much focus on remedying things that are obvious bottlenecks to its flexibility and utility

[Sinisterbr]

Im really quite conflicted on this synth. For all that it does right or excels at, theres usually a corresponding omission or oversight that seems so necessary and obvious

The layout and workflow are great. It really is an easy synth to get flowing with. The oscillators and wt interpolation sound great. Filters are pretty good. But its missing the most basic stuff.

Unison on the wavetable osc but not the analog one. Three analog oscs per engine, but no way to pan them apart from each other. No way to even pan one engine away from the other, without dedicating both filters to the task. Special "super" unison mode but no way to stereo spread it.

Two fx busses but no way to route an oscillator or filter to them individually.

Randomizable arp/seq that even snaps to scale but no way to record its midi output so you can capture the moments when something cool comes up spontaneously.

I dont think im being unreasonable. If it were a simple analog emulation i would understand the limitations, but it seems to be touted as a workhorse synth- and would be an excellent one- but it consistently falls just a little short in simple, bread and butter things like panning and several different types of routing.

I dont want to sound critical or negative. Its a very good synth and i like it a lot. I just think it would take only very simple things to make it an absolutely exceptional synth, and yet it doesnt seem there has been much focus on remedying things that are obvious bottlenecks to its flexibility and utility

I agree, it's hard to understand the absence of things like panning and VA unison on Pigments.

[jeffb01]

Excellent points, Razzia. I love that synth, but I can't disagree with anything you said. I'm encouraged that they have updated it. Hopefully they will continue.

[Rastkovic]

When you choose 2 (or more) polyphony, and you play 1 note (long release for instance), this note will be killed when you play the same note a second time. With "real", i mean something similar to Round-Robin. For instance; 12 voices uses 12 voices, no matter what notes are being played.

I liked it, it sounds like a piano.

The other option (rotating voice assignment) would result in little phasing. Maybe one reason, why chords with Pigments sound so clean.

Choosing the assignment mode would be the best solution.

[exmatproton]

When you choose 2 (or more) polyphony, and you play 1 note (long release for instance), this note will be killed when you play the same note a second time. With "real", i mean something similar to Round-Robin. For instance; 12 voices uses 12 voices, no matter what notes are being played.

I liked it, it sounds like a piano.

The other option (rotating voice assignment) would result in little phasing. Maybe one reason, why chords with Pigments sound so clean.

Choosing the assignment mode would be the best solution.

For a lot of patches i made, i really was hoping for a cycle, or round-robin option.
So, it should be an option.

[aMUSEd]

NKS, nice!

Good that official NKS support is here but why make the mapping template so minimalistic? It leaves out too much imho (Synapse did the same with their Dune 2 template).

So for me this does not replace the unofficial Pigments template I made when it first came out which is a much more comprehensive mapping - and therefore will still remain available as an alternative, sound designer's mapping, with factory patches and previews in the NKS user library (link in my sig)

[DJ Warmonger]

New feature list shows they know what they're doing, Pigments is a serious contender!

[monomaker]

It's the micro tuning! It's a must have these days, hope not only for me.

+10 - it's the reason I stopped using any Arturia software. Now I'll certainly be looking in to Pigments, hope they extend it to their other plugins.

[dune_rave]

I wonder when will they implement saving/loading sequencer settings separately...
Also some kind of "Locking" method will be awsome (lock the sequencer, lock filter, Lock Engine1 etc.)

[realtrance]

I keep forgetting to talk about Pigments; new update just out. Arturia continues to make substantial advances with it.

It’s really a monster of a synth, right up there with Massive X. Those who are frustrated by the current state of MX’s interface would enjoy the one in Pigments.

It has the ability to use FM, phase modulation and wave shaping on any wavetable, separately or all at once.

Arturia’s default soundsets are mostly on the conventional/beautiful side, but Pigments is by no means limited to that! The included patches are really subtle and sophisticated in design.

I hope people are digging into this, along with all the other amazing wavetable synths out now. There’s as big a sea of them now as there were analogue monosynths not long ago. Pigments, MX, Wavetable (Ableton 10.1) in software; Quantum of course in hardware.

I am reminded that wavetable synthesis is ultimately really my favorite kind, but it really takes effort to master it, as easy as the current generation of interfaces and architectures make it to use immediately.

Further thought: we may be at the edge of a Next Big Thing, pioneered currently on the Quantum: wavetable/granular hybrids (it’s even more than that, but for starters).

Wavetable really lends itself to round tones, and granular to biting ones. Combine the two and you expand the musical palette of what you can do even more.

I still feel we’re a ways from really playing to the strengths of granular, or even knowing what they are; that’s a big step that needs taking.

But it feels to me like granular and wavetable are natural partners, as types of synthesis.