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Thread: Digisynth. Anyone own it ?

  1. #1
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    Default Digisynth. Anyone own it ?

    Looking to talk with someone who uses and owns this software. Also it seems like development of it has been pretty mum since 2010. The forums are locked to users, so I can't find what I want there.

    Thanks.
    leading in trailing technology

  2. #2
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    Have you tried contacting either Chuck Rau or Matt Pollock directly? PM me if not.

    Adam

  3. #3
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    I have it and it is a wonderful program and lots and lots of fun to use. Contact Chuck Rau for details. Expensive but worth every penny. Expect a really high learning curve and a lot of what it does can be done with Andrews software. What it can do though that Dr lavas doesn't easily do (I bet someone with enough time can do most anything in either) is amazing. Expect a high learning curve to do "special" abstracts. It also doesn't do anything but abstracts. very worth a look and yes they are still developing it on a regular basis.

    PS: Matt's name is polack

  4. #4
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    Quote Originally Posted by kecked View Post
    PS: Matt's name is polack
    Actually, we're both wrong. It's Polak. (No 'c')

    The sad thing is that I've been making that same mistake for over 3 years now!

    Adam

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by polishedball View Post
    Looking to talk with someone who uses and owns this software...
    U can also talk to Mr. Rogers.. http://www.photonlexicon.com/forums/...3577-lasertodd ...He doesn't 'hangout' much on PL but he's been 'in the biz' for decades, and is a DigiSynth-owner / user and sings its praises.. His contact info (outside of PL..) is in this old-threadie: http://www.photonlexicon.com/forums/...848#post231848

    ..fwiw..
    j
    ....and armed only with his trusty 21 Zorgawatt KTiOPO4...

  6. #6
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    just email matt or chuck. very nice but plan to spend a lot of initial time learning.

    Mailing Address
    Raven Systems Design, Inc

    9000 Bank St., Ste. B

    Cleveland, OH 44125

    USA

    Email
    sales@raven-systems.com


    Phone/Fax

    Phone: +1 440-546-7283 Fax: +1 216-574-7600

  7. #7
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    Obscure that email helps prevent spambots to fetch that email.
    Change @ to (at)
    . to (dot)

    Looks cool btw!

    Email chuck chuck (at) digisynth (dot) com
    I just spoke to him on facebook on the digisynth page.
    Last edited by masterpj; 12-26-2013 at 10:33. Reason: merged post

  8. #8
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    Hey guys this might be of interest:

    "
    Hi Pieterjan,

    I found a video for you, I'm not sure if you saw this one... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7JDYiZB29s

    There are a few songs up there too that you may want to check out.

    A few years back we announced it at the ILDA cruise, but it was a pretty poorly attended event and while some people thought it was cool, no one was really interested. Thinking that was the state of the industry, we haven't pursued it much since, with a very small customer base. We probably could have tried harder, but have had other successful projects paying the bills.

    As with any significantly different software, people have to be willing to take the time to learn it, and adapt their operation to accommodate the new tool. Some people hear "light-pipe" and immediately think that means they need to run all of their shows on ADAT tape, but that simply isn't true.

    It also didn't help that all of the light-pipe devices that we would recommend became discontinued. It is still possible to find some on occasion from Ebay and other sources, and there are probably a couple very expensive ones available new, but relying on a 3rd party device put us at the mercy of those companies. We even tried to work with one of our favorites to keep it going, but as there was little interest, the volume just wasn't there, but we've been looking at some options at this end for direct output to ILDA. We intend to revise the Optical Showlink Transcoder design to take another digital protocol directly, removing our reliance on sound card companies, so I am hopeful that a little more DS development time is on the way.

    While I would be happy to sell DigiSynth, I'd like to be very honest with you about the state that it is currently in, and what we see as great uses for it. We don't go out of our way to try to sell it, but hope to have a resurgence in our efforts in the future, as it really is capable of making some great images.

    I was fortunate enough to be taught how to patch on old analog synthesizers, and later used a more modern version that AVI had put together. That technology is pretty much all gone, at least in the scale I was used to, so when I found DigiSynth, I immediately fell in love with it, and ultimately helped to steer the project into a more useful tool.

    The real power of DigiSynth comes from the ability to create patches, like the old analog days, that are able to then be performed. The big difference is that unlike analog patching, it doesn't suffer the same issues with noise and adds the advantage of being able to save it for later use!

    While some people like and use abstracts in their work, others only do corporate events and don't realize how very abstract most of their beams really are! There are some great tools in there for making very cool beam effects, and even cooler screen abstracts.

    We use DigiSynth regularly for live beams, but also for performing abstract imagery that is then recorded, with more of the classic laser show look. With DS, the patch is recalled, then performed, typically using a Behringer BCF2000 midi console. You can then perform the imagery or beam effect selected.

    There have been a few incarnations of the software, but unfortunately while many behind the scenes bugs were fixed in version 3 compared to 2, others were introduced, and most significantly, the timeline was never what it needed to be.

    I made a bunch of songs on DS2 while working for a company programming for planetarium style laser shows, and it was my favorite piece of software. It still is. I do some programming still, and look forward to getting back into it more as I get my new studio together.

    Personally, I'm a fan of spending the time in the studio to get the performance right, compared to live presentations, but it has worked very well at many events, so there are multiple ways to use it, and it will be up to you to determine what works for your operation.

    If you have any specific questions, I'll be happy to answer.

    Thanks for your interest!
    -chuck
    "

  9. #9
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    Chuck tell them about finger paint

  10. #10
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    so are they still selling it even with most of the "officially" supported interfaces NLA?

    if so does it still cost eleventy billion dollars?

    I would love to play with digisynth (even have my ADAT stuff handy) but I've already spent too much $$$ on stuff that doesn't make me any money lol

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