Hartmann Neuron, Keyboard users Options

[CatloveX]

Hi,

Please, to anyone using the keyboard version of the Neuron, could you say for how long have you had it, the use it is having in your studio and if it is worth it?

All the demos I heard on the net are ambient, also, it is always the same "metallic" sounds I hear; Is that the only use you can have from it?

Thanks in advance for eventual replies.


Is it still posible to find the MODELmaker soft somewhere on the net?

This post has been edited by CatloveX: Sun 2 Apr 2006, 06:00

[mobilegazer]

Well....first of all thanks for mentioning my site www.surroundsfx.com/forum :-)
I used to do the techsupport at Hartmann Music before they became inoperational and together with Stephan Bernsee of OSXTools (who wrote the synthesis engine of the Neuron) we're taking care of the Neuron Kybd/VS community

You'll be glad to know that we are now hosting the Modelmaker and most other stuff that used to be available via the now inoperational "Members" area of the Hartmann website. You can get them at
http://www.surroundsfx.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=7 (requires free forum membership); you'll also find a variety of other cool stuff for and around the Neuron series of instruments there.
You can read about the current state of affairs wrt Hartmann Music and/or their product range at
http://www.surroundsfx.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=25

But now to the original question....i've used the Neuron on quite a couple of records, for various types of sounds, and am very happy with it. I actually bought a second one ;-) It excels at atmospheric stuff, that's why you hear a lot of that on demos, but it is equally suited for creating hybrids between percussive sounds and sustained, synthetic stuff....like a very high-tech vocoder if you like. Or you might sample a vietnamese solo violin song and morph that with a distorted guitar riff, which results in the violin playing the harmonics of the guitar. You won't get that sort of thing anywhere else. In another situation i used a distorted guitar stab morphed with an FM-synth waveform as main synth-line for an electro-clashy techhouse track (you can see the video clip that was played on viva at www.linear-music.de as wmf, the main chorus synth is a neuron).....so there is a lot the Neuron can do. what it doesn't do is replace a sample-player or a virtual analog synth...you'll be disappointed with it if that is what you're looking for. Also it takes a while to learn which parameter set works well with which type of source material; some combinations give primarily unmusical (or metallic) results, others really blow your mind :-)
But for 1800 euros it's a REAL bargain if you ask me...grab it while you can.
If you have any more specific questions, i'm your man ;-)

cheers
Denis / Mobilegazer