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Tomofon by Klevgrand | Video Giveaway & MPE Demo
Tomofon by Klevgrand | Video Giveaway & MPE Demo
See the pinned YouTube comment for giveaway details, appstore link and appstore description etc.
PS: At the time of writing I have an open giveaway for Octachron Midi Drum Sequencer, details are also in the pinned YouTube comment
Here I demo Tomofon being played expressively with a Roli Seaboard - Tomofon just got MPE capabilities recently!
🟣 REVIEW: I’m happy this got MPE added. I feel that maybe the choice of target destinations for modulation could be increased, but - as I hope you can hear - this is a nice addition to the toolbox of MPE apps on iOS. Not as realistic as Audio Modeling SWAM sounds etc, but also capable of much experimental sound design, and with polyphonic abilities too, which SWAM apps do not have. Excuse any dodgy playing on my part here - haven’t played the Seaboard in a while! One tedious thing - even the paid for preset packs currently available have very few MPE presets, so you will mostly have to roll your own. I hope Klevgrand add more MPE patches to the Factory banks. The only paid preset pack at the time of writing which contains MPE-ready presets is the Loney Tunes pack. Also - there is - unless I’m mistaken - no ability to assign note-off velocity as a modulation source.
Also - do please remember that likes and comments etc help support the channel. There are no ads in the middle of this 4.5 min long video.
The winner will be announced in 2 days.
Comments
That recent FutureMusic Article got my attention by listing Tomofon as an innovative MPE Synth:
I noticed I can just load any preset and using “Controller Settings” I can turn on MPE 48 step Pitch Bend which suffices for my needs. There are also options for breathe control and modulation but nothing particular for release velocity.
I need to see what happens when I add my own samples and drive it with a decent MPE controller… I have NOT made that Roli hardware leap yet. So, I’ll probably go with Velocity Keyboard or GeoShred.
I was pleasantly surprised to see I did buy this app already but never really dug into it.
It’s innovative, yes, but I still haven’t really made up my mind about this synth. Mostly, to be honest, I’m not a huge fan. I’ll explore it more now that it has MPE, but I found it quite hard to make interesting audio models from scratch - if anyone has any tips, feel free to share. The factory presets are mostly underwhelming, very synthetic sounding, and not in a good way, to my ears. Too ‘uncanny valley’. The paid preset packs are a very mixed bag, though there are a few good ones in there.
I think I could like very much Tomofon but for now I fail importing properly my audio sample and converting it into wavetable. The resulting sound is completely different from the wave file, sounding synthetic.
It’s as if the wave analyser was not interpreting correctly the cycle of my waveform. Something that could maybe “solve” the issue is the ability to define manually the length of the waveform when assigning to a note (although that should be done automatically…). I don’t know. Also, I would find wonderful if the model was able to mix audio waveform and wavetable, for example to keep the attack transient at the beginning of the sound, then switch to wavetable during sustain. That would help sounding very natural.
I will still try to explore…
Yeah, I spent a fair bit of time on this around and before it came out. I just found it so hard to make interesting patches. New it may be, but I think I prefer physical modeling for realistic sounds, and other types of synthesis for non-realistic sounds. It is clearly possible, if difficult, to make some great stuff - some of the paid preset packs have amazing patches. But the vast majority of presets, both paid and free, are a bit 'meh' in my opinion.
I just tried again to record my own voice with basic OooOhhAhh vowels (one single pitch, let’s say C3).
But when importing audio, the waveform is automatically analyzed and transform into a dumb wavetable with a rapid succession of different inconsistent pitches, going randomly from D1 to E4…
We should be able to force Tomofon to create its wave pattern according to a fixed wave length.
Ie. If I know I recorded a C3, I should be able when importing the sample to force Tomofon to interpret it as a C3. There is here an automatic process that should be defeated with a manual mode. For me, this is the main and big frustrating point of Tomofon. I don’t know how Klevgrand did to create their sound packs but I have the impression I should follow a master class to create and import samples, which is not normal.
I will send a comment to one of Klevgrand YouTube videos, hoping they will hear this and try to improve Tomofon on this particular aspect…
I doubt they check that stuff much, I'll send this comment to them directly
Right…
Will open a ticket to support.
I already emailed it to the head dev 👍
Lots of people have been saying similar stuff, and like I say, I've had very hit and miss results trying to make my own audio models, so I think it is something they would benefit from looking at. Cheers!
It is not a sample player and any audio file used to create an audio model is going to sound substantially different than the input sound. That said, I have had pretty good results importing my own samples, including snippets of distinctly polyphonic material. I have only done the automatic import but so far it has provided interesting derivative sounds of the original.
I haven’t tried manual import yet, but even with the controls on offer it isn’t going to be the same as a pitch shifted sample, and that wasn’t the intent. So I think @Paulo164 that your expectations might be inconsistent with Tomofon’s intent.
Yeah, I love Tomofon. Maybe it’s a taste thing but I love what it does to samples. I haven’t spent much time with the presets, to be honest.
So I think @Paulo164 that your expectations might be inconsistent with Tomofon’s intent.
Well, let’s say that if I wanted to create a human voice model as Klevgrand did in their factory presets, them I am totally unable to do it with the same pretty good results they achieved. Willing to build similar models as the ones showcased in the factory presets should be at least part of compliant expectations, don’t you think ? I don’t manage to get these results, by far, and hence feel really frustrated…
So what’s left ? Creating weird sounds with unexpected results ? It would be okay if we had after the wavetable stage other synthesis options (FM, ring modulations, etc). But apart from a delay, a reverb and an EQ, that’s all. So I had higher expectations about how good and easy it was to translate my own samples into wavetable models. I still believe the stage where a sample is converted into a wavetable should be improved as this is the key feature of this app.
Did you do this with manual mode import or automatic? [page 29 of the tomofon manual describes manual import]
This video quickly goes over the different automatic and manual methods of creating a model. Maybe useful:
it is a Different synth/tool, but the presets are all so SAMEy. the manual video kinda helpful. shit is frustrating though ,keep overwriting my own presets. someone somewhere mentioned the trick "save this, not that".. anyone know?
@Gavinski said:
One tedious thing - even the paid for preset packs currently available have very few MPE presets, so you will mostly have to roll your own.
Of course you're right, that the presets we're not created with MPE in mind, but you can just activate MPE, set ctrl1 to Timbre/slide and press the little lock. After that, whatever preset uses ctrl1 reacts to MPE.
Yes, I tried both methods.
I still hope I am missing something…
Thanks anyway.
Nice remark, thanks !
Ah thanks for pointing out that lock - tbh until I made that vid yesterday I hadn't used the app in quite a while, though I did read the manual etc thoroughly around the time of release, cheers!
I can definitely see the complaints but I personally love Tomofon a lot. I’ve been a big fan since it came out. Something about it just clicked with me I guess 🤷🏻♂️ I also just really love Klevgrands plugins. I know they kinda get lukewarm reception now, but I enjoy and use everything I own by them quite a bit.
I'm overall a big Klevgrand fan. Grand Finale, the drum apps, all get used by me a lot. Rum is a wonderful room simulator, Kleverb an excellent and intuitive reverb. Pipa I loved when it first came out but the novelty wore off kinda quickly. Tomofon left me pretty disappointed from the start. I guess it had been so hyped by some online music press that I was expecting a lot. Mostly I think it's because it just has this synthetic sound like Pipa that I can't really get into. That whole uncanny valley thing. However, I obviously really like the stuff I used for that video, otherwise I wouldn't have made it, but the patches I really like are fairly small in number and most of my own experiments I felt were pretty meh - and yes, I did read the manual and have tried various ways of building audio models. Might be interestingb if some people shared presets they made along with a sample of the material they used and mentioned (if they remember) whether they did the model through auto / manual process or whatever.
copy/pasting from another thread about Tomofon, maybe seeing it all together i can make sense of it...
Yes.... It's very weird they didn't just put an init patch in there, bizarre. For anyone who doesn't realise, create a user preset. Open that and then scroll back with the preset arrow, this will bring you to the unit patch. Probably wise to save this as a user preset with the name init.
Now, open that preset before you import audio to make a new audio model. After importing it will ask you to save it if you try to go to the synth screen. This is another slightly bizarre thing to me. Anyway, then go tweak the synth settings and when you have got sth you like, make your final save for this new preset.
No - totally wrong. There are two things to save. One is the audio model you make. Another one is the synth preset you make using that idiot model, which does of course save the matrix settings. This is a synth you absolutely must read the manual and watch some vids on to grasp. Klevgrand already have a few good tutorials up.
Guess its ok to add different presets to diferent model.
Then you have to resave preset. Then resave model with a matching preset name but different name than the original.
Or just save model and state save via host.
If you make changes to the model, then you will want to save it as a new model, and the app will ask you if you want to save the model before letting you move on to the synth tab. If you make various synth presets based on the same model, it will presumably just access the same model each time, but remember the different synth settings. Pretty simple really!
Hey fair enough! Not every app is for everybody. And I can definitely see why someone wouldn’t take to it as much. I haven’t delved super far into making my own models and have only made some patches, but this is inspiring me to really give it a whirl. I’ll repost here whenever I do.
Nice shoutout for Rum though. I don’t use it nearly enough. I love Pipa too but never got Kleverb. My favorite is their percussion apps. Skaka, Borsta, Slammer, and Ting are all amazing (imo) and I think Hillman Synth is a really good/cool take on the classic Mellotron sound.
The more recent Speldosa and Richter were good too, imo.
messing around in Tomofon. im so blind. also new to it. wrote down questions and found answers, maybe this helps someone else.
to zoom in on Source Audio or Wavetable, is the white bar under each. i was trying to pinch in and out n it wouldn't move, but you can pull in from either side and that zooms and slides around. can really get in there n find the notes u want.
think someone mentioned it can only do 15second sample?
maybe that's why some audio files won't open.
can delete any of the bars, or all, in wavetable.
and i didn't even realize i could fill the Empty wavetable box by pressing the little chicklet keys with notes...i was too busy playing with the big keys. NO, EDIT. PRESS a band in the Audio Model section and it is shown in Wavetable box.
also i can play, on the audio model bars MPE (if i understand it) crazy sounds u won't get from bigger keys. i thought mpe support was just if u have awesome midi board or right app.
this gets funner as you explore it.
now i see MPE in Controller Settings. i read the manual but it's actually playing that seals it in.
would like to try their Pizza Box purcussions sometime too.
Loved Speldosa, too. Richter I didn't think much of compared to, say, Knock or Beef.
Pizza box percussions? I guess that must mean 'Ting', though I don't think Ting actually has a pizza box sound from what I remember. Best to grab it now if you can afford it, it's only 3.99 at the moment, one of my most-used percussion apps.
Borsta has a Pizza Box preset.
Ting and Slammer has just about everything else you’d find in the house and elsewhere.
Wow $3.99 for Ting is crazy.
I like it a lot for some things but definitely a little out of league compared to Beef or Knock (though I only have the clipper).
Ah yeah Borsta, thanks, haven't used that one as much as the others actually
I’d recommend it. It’s great for some extra sauce in the percussion section. Or for a small bit it drums for an otherwise lowkey song.