Plugin Guru Valentine's Day Sale

[Larry Shelby]

PlugInGuru Valentines Day - 30% Off on all libraries this weekend. Valid until February 14th.

Discount automatically applied.

https://www.pluginguru.com

[ZincT]

Also available are my newly Unified GForce Minimonsta, Unified Waldorf Largo and updated Dune 3.5 factory libraries.

You can also still get Tone2 Saurus 3 and updated Pigments 3.5 Unifed factory libraries which I Unified last week.

Another user has also Unified the Phase Plant factory library (some minor changes to make to it but it's very useable as is).

Download links are here...

https://www.pluginguru.com/products/unify-standard/ 

More details in yesterday's livestream where Skippy also demonstrates some of the new features in the new version of Unify, 1.8 which is due out on Thursday.

 

 

Edited February 13, 2022 by ZincT

[lawajava]

Thank you for Unifying the above!

[Fleer]

47 minutes ago, lawajava said:

Thank you for Unifying the above!

Thanks indeed, particularly for Minimonsta, Largo and Pigments 3.5, while Phase Plant is very welcome as well. 

[ZincT]

4 hours ago, lawajava said:

Thank you for Unifying the above!

3 hours ago, Fleer said:

Thanks indeed, particularly for Minimonsta, Largo and Pigments 3.5, while Phase Plant is very welcome as well. 

I appreciate it guys. 

I bought the Kilohearts Ultimate Toolbox a few months ago and always intended to Unify Phase Plant, but there was an issue with handling the macros in Phase Plant (I won't go into the technical details here). It turns out that there's an undocumented feature in Unify which would have made it much easier. So I was planning to Unify it on Friday, but another guy on the PG Forum stepped in and volunteered to do it. I have to say that he has done a great job and even included all of the macro names from Phase Plant on every preset. 

[Doug Rintoul]

On 2/14/2022 at 12:13 AM, ZincT said:

I appreciate it guys. 

I bought the Kilohearts Ultimate Toolbox a few months ago and always intended to Unify Phase Plant, but there was an issue with handling the macros in Phase Plant (I won't go into the technical details here). It turns out that there's an undocumented feature in Unify which would have made it much easier. So I was planning to Unify it on Friday, but another guy on the PG Forum stepped in and volunteered to do it. I have to say that he has done a great job and even included all of the macro names from Phase Plant on every preset. 

Hey ZincT,

What are you using to Unify your libraries? Are you using AHK scripts? Care to share? I am thinking of Unifying some Spire libraries. What undocumented feature are you referring to?

[ZincT]

15 hours ago, Doug Rintoul said:

Hey ZincT,

What are you using to Unify your libraries? Are you using AHK scripts? Care to share? I am thinking of Unifying some Spire libraries. What undocumented feature are you referring to?

Hey Doug,

Yes I'm using AutoHotKey. There's a long thread over on the PG Forums where the idea was gradually developed and tweaked starting around January 21.  Here's the thread...

https://forums.pluginguru.com/unified-libs/autohotkey-unify-patch-browser/ 

Now, the undocumented Unify feature...

When linking macro knobs in Unify to synth parameters, you normally create a list of linked parameters for whatever you are trying to control in the synth.  Taking Phase Plant as an example, the first preset (Analog FM) has a list of Phase Plant macros called FM Amount, Phase, FM PW, Q, Filter Env etc etc.

In Unify you would see these in the Linked Parameters named exactly as above. So, when you create the link it works fine for this preset, but in the next and every other preset, the Phase Plant macros are all different. So, on the face of it, you would need to manually create links from Unify macro knobs to Phase Plant macro knobs for every Phase Plant preset! Quite a job! 

However, the undocumented feature which avoids the above scenario, is that Unify normally references plug-in parameters by name, e.g. inst/1/plugin/paramName, but also allows using their 0-based index, e.g. inst/1/plugin/#0 is the first parameter (regardless how it is named), inst/1/plugin/#49 is the 50th, etc.  If you hold down ALT (Option on Mac) when clicking the "+" button to add a new macro-link, you can select the parameter in the usual way, by name, but Unify will automatically substitute the appropriate index instead of the name. Your resulting parameter paths can be created for one patch, and re-used for others where the actual parameter names might be different.  Shane (the Unify dev) made a note to himself to add this to the Unify documentation so it might appear in the manual soon.

 

Edited February 22, 2022 by ZincT

[Doug Rintoul]

5 hours ago, ZincT said:

Hey Doug,

Yes I'm using AutoHotKey. There's a long thread over on the PG Forums where the idea was gradually developed and tweaked starting around January 21.  Here's the thread...

https://forums.pluginguru.com/unified-libs/autohotkey-unify-patch-browser/ 

Now, the undocumented Unify feature...

When linking macro knobs in Unify to synth parameters, you normally create a list of linked parameters for whatever you are trying to control in the synth.  Taking Phase Plant as an example, the first preset (Analog FM) has a list of Phase Plant macros called FM Amount, Phase, FM PW, Q, Filter Env etc etc.

In Unify you would see these in the Linked Parameters named exactly as above. So, when you create the link it works fine for this preset, but in the next and every other preset, the Phase Plant macros are all different. So, on the face of it, you would need to manually create links from Unify macro knobs to Phase Plant macro knobs for every Phase Plant preset! Quite a job! 

However, the undocumented feature which avoids the above scenario, is that Unify normally references plug-in parameters by name, e.g. inst/1/plugin/paramName, but also allows using their 0-based index, e.g. inst/1/plugin/#0 is the first parameter (regardless how it is named), inst/1/plugin/#49 is the 50th, etc.  If you hold down ALT (Option on Mac) when clicking the "+" button to add a new macro-link, you can select the parameter in the usual way, by name, but Unify will automatically substitute the appropriate index instead of the name. Your resulting parameter paths can be created for one patch, and re-used for others where the actual parameter names might be different.  Shane (the Unify dev) made a note to himself to add this to the Unify documentation so it might appear in the manual soon.

 

Thanks ZincT. I have read that thread thoroughly many times over, and modified a couple of AHK scripts to Unify some of my Zebra libraries. The scripts I found were a year old and somewhat awkward  to use. I was wondering if something more recent had been developed. The videos were for doing Omnisphere which I do not have, but perhaps the principles are the same for other plugins.

Thanks for the info on the undocumented feature. Are you willing to share the AHK code segment that uses the feature? Or even your Pigment 3.5 script?

[ZincT]

3 hours ago, Doug Rintoul said:

Thanks ZincT. I have read that thread thoroughly many times over, and modified a couple of AHK scripts to Unify some of my Zebra libraries. The scripts I found were a year old and somewhat awkward  to use. I was wondering if something more recent had been developed. The videos were for doing Omnisphere which I do not have, but perhaps the principles are the same for other plugins.

Thanks for the info on the undocumented feature. Are you willing to share the AHK code segment that uses the feature? Or even your Pigment 3.5 script?

I don't use AHK for the undocumented feature; it's more about whatever macro knob changes you make to the first patch getting carried over to other patches. In the case of Phase Plant unless you could make the macro knobs "generic" then they wouldn't function when carried over to other patches. That's where the undocumented feature helps, because it makes the macro knob settings generic.

That said, the chap who Unified Phase Plant used a combination of AHK and some Python/C# code to harvest the macro knob information from Phase Plant. I'm not that advanced and tend to just stick to AHK and also use some of Shane's development tools for things that I used to have to script.

I can share the Pigments AHK script but I'm not sure how useful it would be and, unfortunately, AHK can be a bit awkward to use.  The process is far from fully automatic and will always require debugging and manual intervention for any particular case. You also have to pick the right type of script depending on how accessible the patch names are for the plugin. I have even done a couple where I created a big file of patch names by OCR'ing the screen of the plugin, when no other method worked. Let's continue the discussion by message as I don't want to derail this thread any more than necessary!

Edited February 22, 2022 by ZincT

[abacab]

On 2/22/2022 at 5:13 AM, ZincT said:

Yes I'm using AutoHotKey. There's a long thread over on the PG Forums where the idea was gradually developed and tweaked starting around January 21.  Here's the thread...

https://forums.pluginguru.com/unified-libs/autohotkey-unify-patch-browser/ 

Now, the undocumented Unify feature...

I may have to kick the tires on this AutoHotKey. I got Phase Plant in the Valentines Day Sale*, which included 3 extra non-factory banks. I would love to at least have "Hardwire" unified. It's a cool retro analog-ish sound bank. Shows that Phase Plant can do analog!

It's only 50 presets, so if all else fails I can probably save them manually!

*at AudioPluginDeals. Deal has ended.

Edited February 23, 2022 by abacab

[mibby]

55 minutes ago, abacab said:

I may have to kick the tires on this AutoHotKey. I got Phase Plant in the Valentines Day Sale, which included 3 extra non-factory banks. I would love to at least have "Hardwire" unified. It's a cool retro analog-ish sound bank. Shows that Phase Plant can do analog!

It's only 50 presets, so if all else fails I can probably save them manually!

Wait a sec.  I haven't really been reading this thread; "plugin guru, libraries" blah blah blah...

... BUT, then I read PhasePant and "It's a cool retro analog-ish sound bank. Shows that Phase Plant can do analog!"! ....     ?

So what's that about this "Hardwire" unified thingy??   ?

Edited February 23, 2022 by mibby

[abacab]

46 minutes ago, mibby said:

So what's that about this "Hardwire" unified thingy??   ?

Let's back up for a sec. I was merely suggesting using the available tools to Unify this bank for my own personal use, since I own a license for it.

The Unified banks are only publicly released for factory banks, as the "Unification process" entails capturing some plugin data. Anyone can "Unify" presets for plugins and preset banks that they own. But for personal use only.

Info on the "Hardwire" bank available at Kilohearts (most of the synth sequence in the promo video is preset "Star Chaser"):

https://kilohearts.com/products/hardwire

 

Edited February 23, 2022 by abacab

[Fleer]

Great sound bank!

[Fleer]

That said, you guys talk Chinese

[ZincT]

11 hours ago, abacab said:

I may have to kick the tires on this AutoHotKey. I got Phase Plant in the Valentines Day Sale, which included 3 extra non-factory banks. I would love to at least have "Hardwire" unified. It's a cool retro analog-ish sound bank. Shows that Phase Plant can do analog!

It's only 50 presets, so if all else fails I can probably save them manually!

Why not give it a try. With AHK you are making it replicate what you would do if you were saving all of the patches in Unify manually. So you are telling it where to move the mouse and where to click, copy, paste etc etc. It takes a little bit of setup using Window Spy to work out where the mouse has to click, and also working out delay times between clicks etc. However, the great thing about Phase Plant is that all of the metadata that you need is not only visible on screen but can be clicked and copy/pasted. 

So, for example, the first patch in Hardwire (Analog Reese), you can click on its name and copy/paste the name and you can also double click on the macro names to copy/ paste those. So once you have the macros saved using the 0-based index method for the first patch (I usually set up a dummy patch) they will get replicated across all patches and the macro names can be copy/pasted by AHK from each patch as it steps through them.  You could just try a simple script to start with copying only the patch names to each Unify patch.

I also have Hardwire (Kilohearts gifted it to me) and Tremor which I bought cheaply from KVR as well as the freebie Grattis 2021.  
I have now made an AHK script for these PP expansions and have Unified Hardwire and Tremor (cannot share the Unified libraries though - see below).

One of the things we discussed over on the PG forums was the need to ONLY share Unified Factory libraries (developer permitting). That's why, for example, I have Unified a number of expansions that I own for various synths but I won't share these as I would be giving away paid expansions for anyone to use! However, it's ok to share any AHK scripts to Unify expansion libraries, since whoever runs them must own the library or running the AHK script would be pointless. That hasn't happened though mostly because it then becomes a massive support headache for the script author to assist others to get the script running on their system. Especially if they aren't familiar with all of the ins and outs of running AHK with Unify. For example, all of my scripts make use of my Ultrawide monitor (3440 x 1440) so I use coordinates that would be off screen for most 1080p monitors. At the very least, anyone running them would want to change the coords of any windows used which would then alter the coords of where to click etc. You can change whether the coords are relative to the screen or active window but I tend to work with the screen mode.

Edited February 23, 2022 by ZincT

[Doug Rintoul]

Thanks to ZincT's help, today I was able to Unify Spire's factory presets. It was kind of fun to see AHK clicking all those buttons and typing all that text, faster than I could ever dream of doing. I did it on a 1080 monitor but it was not really that difficult to modify the script ZincT shared with me to work in my environment.

[ZincT]

8 hours ago, Doug Rintoul said:

Thanks to ZincT's help, today I was able to Unify Spire's factory presets. It was kind of fun to see AHK clicking all those buttons and typing all that text, faster than I could ever dream of doing. I did it on a 1080 monitor but it was not really that difficult to modify the script ZincT shared with me to work in my environment.

Pleased you got it working Doug, and glad to help. 

I remember the first library I Unified (RA Synferno) - 350 patches Unified manually. What a chore and took a few days off and on! I thought "there must be a better way".

Once I got AutoHotkey up and running it became a bit addictive; that's how I ended up Unifying so many libraries. 
I hate to think how long it would have taken to manually Unify Hive (2,451 factory patches) or UVI Synth Anthology 3 (3,554 factory patches).
There are quite a few that are over 1000 factory patches. 

 

 

[Fleer]

I would like to see Unification of more EastWest (Choirs, Backing Vocals, Ghostwriter, Fab Four, Gypsy) and Spitfire (Albion ONE, Neo, Tundra). 
One can dream, right?

[ZincT]

6 minutes ago, Fleer said:

I would like to see Unification of more EastWest (Choirs, Backing Vocals, Ghostwriter, Fab Four, Gypsy) and Spitfire (Albion ONE, Neo, Tundra). 
One can dream, right?

I would have Unified them Fleer, if I owned them  I like a lot of their libraries but I stopped buying them when I realised that I couldn't resell them.
I guess Composer Cloud might be a way of obtaining them to Unify, but we are talking about some pretty huge libraries so not sure I have the disk space.

Simeon's been Unifying a lot of Spitfire libraries, so maybe EastWest could be his next venture?  Then again I watched one of his videos on VSL BB recently, and I think he said that Unifying this type of library could be tricky as the player is so much a part of how it operates. Maybe that's also true of Opus or Play IDK?   

[Yan Filiatrault]

16 minutes ago, Fleer said:

I would like to see Unification of more EastWest (Choirs, Backing Vocals, Ghostwriter, Fab Four, Gypsy) and Spitfire (Albion ONE, Neo, Tundra). 
One can dream, right?

No, make the dream happens! YOU can do it! Believe in the dream!