23 December 2013

SchallWelle Awards Voting

Like last year I'm nominated again for the SchallWelle awards. Together with Remy Stroomer this time with our collaboration album 'PrimiTiveS'.

You can find Remy & Synth.nl in: Artist 2013 international
And PrimiTiveS in: Album 2013 international
Bring out your votes (also the simple instructions are explained here):

http://voting.schallwelle-preis.de/
I wish you all Happy Holidays and a Merry Christmas (if you celebrate it of course).

22 December 2013

New Mutec Word Clock Generator

 I have a lot of digital out board gear that needs to synchronize. For this I use Word Clock. So far I used an Apogee Big Ben to generate and distribute the clock signal, but it has only 6 outputs. This means you have to make a lot of loops and terminate them. Recently I had some trouble with my clocking and it looked like a loose terminator or connector, but go find that :( I could solve it by fiddling around at the cables, but this was only a temporary solution. So I decided this was one of the first things on my list to solve with the studio rebuild.

At first I looked for an extra distributor to replicate the Big Ben's signal, but eventually I chose to replace it by this Mutec iD + iD dp. I already had some equipment from them and it is really good stuff. This clock generator has 16 Outputs! This meant that I could seriously avoid looping the signal though several chains, but that I could attach more equipment directly to this clock generator. Today I decided to remove all BNC wires from the Big Ben and put this one in. As you can see in the picture it is in the same spot now.

And here is what I was left with after the operation. I replaced all cables by version that were as short as possible and removed as much T-connectors and terminators as possible, since they are usually the source of all clocking connection troubles. Where possible I used the internal 75 ohm termination of the equipment itself. Most digital equipment has a switch to select whether you want termination or not.

And here is the good old Big Ben on it way to someone else. I already sold it. It is a good machine and it has helped me trough several album recordings, but for me 6 outputs is not enough. They really should consider making a version with more outputs.

After I hooked everything up again and checked if all equipment was synched to Word Clock again, I did some testing and was curious if I could hear any difference. It might be my mind playing with me, but I had the idea the sound was a bit brighter than before. But the problem is with these kind of things that you can't really be objective. But the most important thing is everything works again and is clocking like new :) More updates soon. For today it was enough of a job :) You can find more information on Mutec here: http://www.mutec-net.com

21 December 2013

Clavia Nord Lead 4 in the Studio

You all know by now I guess I have a thing for Clavia synthesizers. I still remember the first time I saw Jean Michel Jarre play the Nord Lead 1 when he introduced it during his concert in Rotterdam. I just had to have one. It was the first virtual analog synthesizer back then. In the mean time Clavia did quite some improvements and just introduced the 4th model: The Nord Lead 4. This time it has an extra effects section, just like they did on the Nord Wave.

In the effects section there is also a drive button, that gives the sound a subtle overdrive effect. I really like that. It has again become a more mature synthesizer than the Nord Lead 2 I was used too, even though I have the impression that the Nord Lead 2 sound a bit more 'raw'. As you can see in the picture on the right there are actually 4 Clavia's in my studio now. I'm doubting if I will keep the Nord Lead 2 but, the Nord Modular G2X en Nord Wave are actually quite different synthesizers. I had to let one machine go, since the studio is full. So if something goes in something has to go out. This time I sold the M-Audio Venom. It was nice for a while, but not special enough to keep. For now I will be making some presets for the Nord Lead 4. Hopefully that will give me some inspiration to start some new music soon. Keep an eye on this blog. More news is coming soon. I'm actually rebuilding the studio a bit and of course I will keep you posted on the blog on this project.

Virtiso now VMWare VSSP Provider

Virtiso BV is now officially VMWare VSSP Partner. This means we can use all the software there is from VMWare and you pay for it on a montly basis. This makes working with VMWare very flexible and it also means that our customers profit from paying a low montly fee for their Virtual Server based on VMWare.

Virtiso BV specializes in services based on virtual servers. You can rent virtual servers from us from 35,- euros per month including Ubuntu Linux, maintenance, monitoring and nightly backup. Maintenance means keeping the operating system up to date including installing security updates. If you choose for the Windows operating system we are also MicroSoft SPLA partner so you can benefit from the same monthly payment structure for you licenses.

If you are interested in renting virtual servers based on VMWare do contact us on info@virtiso.nl

15 December 2013

NewTek LightWave 1.6 now on RenderFarm.NL

From today RenderFarm.NL also supports NewTek's LightWave version 1.6. So If you use this 3D application and you need affordable render capacity for your 3D animations you can contact me on michel@renderfarm.nl. I also did some minor updates on the RenderFarm.nl website that you can find on http://www.renderfarm.nl

04 December 2013

First Useful 3D print

Today I finished my first usefull 3D print. The machine you see on the left is our coffee machine. Once in a while it needs cleaning and then there is water coming from the two nozzles left and right. Since there is not much space and it is quite a lot of water coming out of it, my wife usually has to pay attention since she has to empty the stuff she used to put under there half way. But it always is a bit messy. So we came up with the idea to make custom made compartments to hold the water.

As you can see in the picture on the right this is quite a large object already for the printer. It also took about 20 hours to print each of them. I designed the whole thing in Cinema 4D by the way and then exported to STL format. It is really nice to be able to make something like this just from software I already know :) Yesterday we did the first cleaning cycle with them and it worked out really fine. So another project finished.

It might look easy by the way, but I can assure you that this project took a lot of time. I also had a misprint where the PLA on the role got tangled :( So after 15 hours of printing or so, I could start all over again. So far every time I walk away from a print, something goes wrong. So I now plan my prints when I'm at home the whole day. So yes... 3D printing is nice. But it is time consuming and you need to know what you are doing. I'm really looking in to a more professional printer now, to hopefully get better quality and less hassle. I'll keep you posted :)