Wolfgang Palm, the brain behind the PPG apps and plugins, published today in depth informations about the upcoming Infinite Synthesizer for iPad. I have the chance to check out this app already before the official release and so far I can say that I’m again really impressed by the sonic possibilities with this new Synthesizer. It will be not the cheapest iPad Synth but one of the versatile one because the synthesis structure is very deep and allows the creation of very interesting unheard wavetable type sounds. Check below all the informations about this upcoming new release.
At the end of the 70s Wolfgang Palm developed wavetable synthesis. This was very successful and used by many synthesizer companies in the 80s and 90s. But this technology has its limitations. The main reason is that all sounds are harmonic. In nature this does not happen very often. Many sounds like a piano string have small offsets from the harmonic frequencies. This is even stronger in sounds like bells or percussion.
Infinite overcomes this limitation. The frequencies of the overtones created by Infinite can be totally freely defined. So the sounds it produces are totally free in the frequencies of their overtones. This means that each partial wave can have an arbitrary frequency. Moreover it is possible to move these overtones independently during the duration of a note.
Another important part of most natural sounds is noise. Be it a flute or when a drumstick hits the drumhead – and this all can be reproduced in Infinite.
Furthermore the noise source can be used to modulate the tonal part which results in very powerful effects. Besides these new digital features, we still have the typical 24db Lowpass filter, 2 VCA with stereo out and effects. All this is controlled by 10 envelopes, 4 LFOs and a modulation matrix.
Maybe the greatest innovation in Infinite is the Morpher. It is so easy to create new timbres and real-time effects by morphing the gains and frequencies of sounds with the X/Y controller. To get an impression of the morphing possibilities watch this short video.
Infinite comes with more that 300 tonal resources, which can be loaded into the 5 fields inside the Morhper. But it does not stop there. You can edit these in detail on two extra pages and can import your own sounds from the PPG WaveGenerator and WaveMapper apps.
Key Features:
- New system which can synthesize harmonic and inharmonic sounds
- Morpher – X/Y controller which morphes 5 user selectable sine resources
- Noiser – X/Y controller morphing 3 noise resources and performing modulations on the tonal part
- Molder – acts as a digital filter with any amaginable filter sweeps
- Two detail editor pages for the Sine resources featuring a 3D display
- Import WTS and TCS files from the iPad WaveGenerator and WaveMapper
- Import Phonem utterances and use them in the Infinite Molder
- Versatile matrix system – allowing 16 sources to control 40 parameters
- 10 Envelopes, for control of filter sweeps, waveform, noise and many modulations
- 4 LFOs which can be freely routed via the matrix
- Delay/Reverb effect
- Overdrive/Distortion effect
- A/B compare your edited sounds
- AU extension – run multiple Infinite instances in AU hosts
- IAA – inter-app audio support
- Audiobus 2 with statesaving
- Export audio to AudioShare
- Preset browser with new listing filters
- Directly accessible context help for each module
- Freely configurable schematic keypads, with extremely expressive modulation options
- 4 Keypads play modes: Poly, Mono, Legato and Multitrigger.
- 4 MIDI modes: Omni, Poly, Mono, and Voice-Per-Channel.
PPG Infinite will be available soon on the Apple App Store.
Would love to see what to expect from the AU. I dont buy any synth unless it is fully functional INSIDE CUBASIS 2.
You know you can make a patch in the standalone app and use the patch in Cubasis, right?
Yes you can use them than inside the AU version inside Cubasis 😉
It will be full usable in Cubasis. It will be the same form factor as the other PPG synths. A bit smaller than the normal UI with less features but with all your sounds inside. Sound design is made inside the standalone version, in the AU, you can use your sounds and tweak it a bit 😉
Getting pretty excited. Glad it supports AU and Voice per Channel (probably a version of MPE). Curious about this: “Freely configurable schematic keypads, with extremely expressive modulation options”
Meaning like the existing PPG keypads or something makes them even more expressive?
Too bad about the lack of AudioBus 3 support. Some of the MIDI options would be particularly useful. Maybe in an update.
The “not cheap” part makes me wonder. Palm hasn’t changed an app’s price, AFAICT, so an introductory price is unlikely. App Store prices in Canada have yet to be adjusted. So too high a price would make me wait a bit before purchasing.
Still, it’ll be fun to try.
I’m not sure but I think all the other apps have already Voice per channel support. So extremely configurable are they not.
Normally it will have AudioBus 3 support but I can ask him if it sure or only a mistake in the features. I think the price will be +- the same as the other apps and a introduction price sale will not come I think because he doesn’t make sales.
Compared to other apps on the market, this apps are higher priced but have another quality.
Thanks for this Tom, any ETA?
Hopefully next week but not sure 😉
May be a dumb question, but is this actually the same synthesis type as Waldorfs NAVE? If yes, one should expect a comparison of these two, or is there already a clear killer feature that lets infinity clearly stand out?!
Thanks for the heads up and the preview. Really appreciated!!!
Hey David. It’s not the same synthesis concept than Nave. It’s a different one which offers more in depth sonic possibilities. Especially the morph engine is really cool feature because it can transform sounds directly in something different. A sound design feature which need only your finger 😉
Thank you Sir! This sounds really exciting! Transform sounds directly into something ethereal and transcendent? 🙂 I am always on the search for something omnisphere-ish for the iPad. Omnisphere has an amazing possibility to create beautiful pad sounds… nothing yet for the iPad although the new 10.5 iPad would have the processing power to handle this.
So if I understand your clarification right it means I will be able to produce loooong lasting evolving pad sortof sounds with the upcoming PPG Synth?! Keep us up to date, mate! Many thanks and appreciated!