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The weird yet fascinating world of Soniclabs' math driven synthesis and sound design (Oceanic discussion)

There's 3 programs, Oceanic is the app that operates outside of the DAW and communicates with 2 programs inside the DAW. Wavebot is the sound generator and the other program is Wave CC that generates midi data sent from Oceanic outside of the DAW

You can use a midi keyboard but the sounds you get are not completely diatonic. I believe you can map midi controls from your DAW to the VST to control parameters with knobs, sliders. I personally think the interface is clear enough and easy enough to use a mouse.
It feels to me like it was designed more for mousing around. Just my opinion.

Some complaints I've seen on other forums are about how it feels like you aren't playing anything because it's automatically generating sounds over time. The Oceanic sounds evolve from tweaking parameters like frequency, drift, sleep and just letting it play overtime. But that's how generative music tends to work.

Using Oceanic isn't like playing keys on an instrument to get a result. Running multiple instances (4 is the max per track) can yield some pretty wild sounds. Running one already does. Although you can blend it pretty easily with other synths, VSTs, orchestral samples to get a very unique results. I'm having a lot of fun with it right now.
 
L70 said:
There's 3 programs, Oceanic is the app that operates outside of the DAW and communicates with 2 programs inside the DAW. Wavebot is the sound generator and the other program is Wave CC that generates midi data sent from Oceanic outside of the DAW

You can use a midi keyboard but the sounds you get are not completely diatonic. I believe you can map midi controls from your DAW to the VST to control parameters with knobs, sliders. I personally think the interface is clear enough and easy enough to use a mouse.
It feels to me like it was designed more for mousing around. Just my opinion.

Some complaints I've seen on other forums are about how it feels like you aren't playing anything because it's automatically generating sounds over time. The Oceanic sounds evolve from tweaking parameters like frequency, drift, sleep and just letting it play overtime. But that's how generative music tends to work.

Using Oceanic isn't like playing keys on an instrument to get a result. Running multiple instances (4 is the max per track) can yield some pretty wild sounds. Running one already does. Although you can blend it pretty easily with other synths, VSTs, orchestral samples to get a very unique results. I'm having a lot of fun with it right now.
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@L70 thank you for the much needed context. I've watched countless videos on Oceanic and picked up a little of what it's all about, but your insight and perspective has filled in the gaps. Thank you!
 
c0nsilience said:
@L70 thank you for the much needed context. I've watched countless videos on Oceanic and picked up a little of what it's all about, but your insight and perspective has filled in the gaps. Thank you!
Click to expand...
No problem. I'm no synth expert. Just a novice who enjoys the program. I think I would have bought it just for the GUI. It's mesmerizing. 😂
 
L70 said:
No problem. I'm no synth expert. Just a novice who enjoys the program. I think I would have bought it just for the GUI. It's mesmerizing. 😂
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Yep, I get that! I’m a hobbyist as well that just enjoys tinkering with sound. I picked up StarWaves a few years ago when it was offered through the Apple App store and enjoyed it. Oceanic looks like it takes it to another level! I agree, the GUI is fascinating. 🙂
 
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This video was just published:



For those with an interest in Sinan’s creations, it may be worthwhile to check his collaborator Laurent Mialon’s work as well (linked above). Among other things he has worked on presets for SonicPlanet’s StarWaves as well as created a whole bunch of cool Ableton Live projects revolving around Cosmosf M31. The latter are an excellent primer on some of the things that are possible with these generative music creation tools.

Mialon, also known under his artist moniker La Peste, is a really interesting artist and musician.

Laurent Mialon — Wikipédia

fr.m.wikipedia.org fr.m.wikipedia.org



A longer M31 performance in Live:

 
I've also been running Wave Bot and Wave CC through FX plugins like the stuff in Melda's Creative Bundle (cabinets, Chorus, delays, etc.) and Serums FX plugin.

The most interesting results have been running it through Cherry Audio and other software modular VSTs but it can get too complex for my tastes My favorite plugin to use with Oceanic is Plugin Alliance's Triad. Very simple with quick and bizarre results that can be surprisingly musical. If you use Ableton or Bitwig, the possibilities get even wilder.
 
doctoremmet said:
This video was just published:



For those with an interest in Sinan’s creations, it may be worthwhile to check his collaborator Laurent Mialon’s work as well (linked above). Among other things he has worked on presets for SonicPlanet’s StarWaves as well as created a whole bunch of cool Ableton Live projects revolving around Cosmosf M31. The latter are an excellent primer on some of the things that are possible with these generative music creation tools.

Mialon, also known under his artist moniker La Peste, is a really interesting artist and musician.

Laurent Mialon — Wikipédia

fr.m.wikipedia.org fr.m.wikipedia.org



A longer M31 performance in Live:

Click to expand...

I don't know why I keep coming back to this thread every time I have decided that it isn't for me. 😅

I guess I will have to watch those videos as well.
 
Michel Simons said:
That's probably the case. My problem is that the videos don't give me a clear idea of how it actually works. Most of that is down to me having a pea brain.
Click to expand...
I think that's part of the process of discovery. I'm embarrassed to admit that I find myself reading many threads of products that I won't ever buy. I do it simply out of curiosity and general knowledge. We are all musicians/artists looking to explore and make sense out of the unknown. I think that's fantastic.
 
Oceanic uses Gerstner's wave solutions to model ocean waves, data can then be drawn from this model to drive wavetable synthesis (WaveBot) or MIDI CC data (WaveCC). I think.

Then, the architecture is that WaveBot and WaveCC are two seperate vsts you can load in your DAW. You can actually use these as standalone audio or MIDI CC data generators, respectively. Oceanic is a desktop application that allows you to sync and control multiple WaveBots / WaveCCs - it connects over a network port that WaveBot and WaveCC expose. I think.

I'm still figuring it out, so far I've been mainly generating discordant / haunting / melancholy / angry noises that annoy the family with Oceanic controlling WaveBot... WaveCC is also really cool in a different way - I was able to route 4 different MIDI CC channels from it to filter cutoff, oscillator fine tune, phase, etc using Spire as a simple experiment - you can get some nice subtle natural "breathing" modulations that make a static pad into a breathing living, well, still pad, but more interesting. I suppose you could do that with LFOs and MSEGs etc but this is a kind of generative modulation I guess?
 
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