Hi all. I’m building an iOS AUv3 synth designed specifically to be played from an OP-XY, and I’d rather ask people who actually use one than guess.
Short version: it’s the Mutable Instruments Elements engine (modal physical modelling — bowed, blown and struck resonators) based on spectral IOS APP wrapped in a UI that copies the OP-XY’s own logic. Four encoders, one page at a time, a big readout while you turn, and a visualisation in the middle instead of a wall of sliders. No keyboard, no sequencer, no effects, the opxy already does all that. The idea is that your hands stay on the OP-XY and the iPhone is just a sound module with a screen that tells you what you’re touching. Same layout on both, so you’re not translating between two mental models.
Watch this vidéo for the sound modal /element module : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rGOFCIA1-E&t=1019s
for the the original app, here it is : Spectrum Synthesizer Bundle App - App Store
Where I need help is the parameter layout, because it has to match how you’d actually reach it.
If you were sending MIDI from the OP-XY to an Iphone (sorry android user I am lazy and as you guess its IA works), would you rather:
- Use the external MIDI track on the aux page — 8 assignable CCs across M2 and M3, which maps cleanly onto two pages of four, or
- Use an instrument track set to the “external” engine, so the synth sits in your normal track flow?
The reason it matters: the aux track gives a tidy 8 CCs but only one LFO destination. Instrument tracks would let you run several, each with its own LFO on a different parameter — at the cost of a track slot each. I don’t know which trade people actually make in practice.
Also curious how you’d route the audio, iPhone back into the OP-XY input, or straight out to an external mixer?
Thanks. Happy to share build if there’s interest. (open source project that will stay open source, not for sale)
And if if it works I would be interrested to translate other Braids sounds engine which are very fun, as a collection of other simple instruments as well.