Poly-Ana backgrounds can be easily replaced with anything you’d like. This capability of Poly-Ana has been largely superseded by the recent addition of full skinning capability, but if you like the way the built-in controls look and are laid out and just want to change the background image, this is the simplest way to go.
You can download pre-made backgrounds from here, along with a Photoshop template for designing your own.
To activate a custom background on Windows, make sure the file is named Poly-AnaBG.png (or LilPoly-AnaBG.png for L’il Poly-Ana) and create the folder “C:\Program Files (x86)\Admiral Quality\Poly-Ana\” and place it there. (On 32 bit versions of Windows use the “Program Files” folder instead of “Program Files (x86)”. Both the 32 and the 64 bit versions of Poly-Ana will reference this same location.)
To activate a custom background on OS X, make sure the file is named Poly-AnaBG.png (or LilPoly-AnaBG.png for L’il Poly-Ana), create these folders under your user folder, “/Users/(your_user name)/Library/Application Support/Admiral Quality/Poly-Ana/” and place the file there. Note that some newer versions of OS X hide this folder from you by default. You can reveal it by…
In Finder, chose the Go | Go To Folder menu option.
Here are some completed examples to get you started. Remember that you need to rename them to “Poly-AnaBG.png”, place them in the correct folder as described above, and restart Poly-Ana to see your new background. Send us your background image and if we like it we’ll post it here!
Added in Poly-Ana 1.30 Beta 2, you can now make your own Custom GUI Skins!
Until now, the built-in Poly-Ana GUI (graphical user interface) has been rather polarizing. Some people love it; the Admiral certainly built the GUI he likes to use! This GUI was built before any work on the DSP code started — the opposite of how most developers do it. We did this intentionally so that we were forced to use that GUI during developent, which assisted in testing and verifying its usability. It’s not something we stuck on at the last minute and never actually used ourselves. (And we are musicians and do use our own products!) Just the opposite, Poly-Ana’s user interface was carefully thought out and everything it does, including a few non-typical behaviors, is completely intentional and there to enhance workflow. (See the documentation included in the Poly-Ana distributable for more details about and our rationale behind some of Poly-Ana’s unique interface features.)
However, a significantly sized and very vocal group of others absolutely hate the original GUI. (There doesn’t seem to be much mid-ground, it either communicates its intent by invoking the look and feel of classic synths that inspired its design, or causes a furious rage against the misguided evils of skeuomorphism — with no opinion in-between!) For years now we’ve offered the ability to change the background image to anything you like, as well as the ability to change the Mod Source selector dials to dropdown menus (which we’ve now made the default behavior in 1.30 B2). But the fury has raged on, and we have been listening. But to simply take orders from angry non-customers and change the look to meet their demands (and they have been demands) would be doing a disservice to our existing, satisfied customers who love it just the way it is. So for some time now the intent has been to provide a custom GUI system. That work (and it was a lot of work) is now done!
On this page you will find Instructions for creating your own Custom Skin, a FAQ, and our Skin Trade section where we will be sharing any Custom Skins that users send us that we liked. And if we do share your skin, we’ll give you (or anyone else you specify) a complimentary Poly-Ana license or credit of equivalent value for free! Now, we know exactly how much work it is to build a skin for Poly-Ana (which has 212 controls plus a 61 note keyboard) and we don’t want anyone spending all that time making a skin they think we’ll love, only to find out when they submit it to us that we don’t think it’s good enough to share here. (And we are very picky. That’s the “Quality” part of our name!) So please, if you’re embarking on a new skin project and you hope to earn a license for it, contact us early and show us some previews of your work; maybe a mockup or partial mockup of the full GUI. Then we can let you know early on whether we think you’re going in a direction with it that we’ll be interested in sharing, and help guide you towards a look and feel that we can both be proud to share here. As well, we’ll expect skins submitted for licenses to be largely original content, not just a minor tweak of someone else’s skin. (Of course, nothing is stopping you from making any skin you like and sharing them through other means with your friends. It’s only the skins we post on this page that we need to evaluate and approve first.)
Poly-Ana Custom Skins FAQ
Q: What do new skins cost?
A: Just like our program banks, skins are always free! We’re in the business of selling instrument and effects plug-ins, not graphics and sound libraries, which we always share for free as soon as we get our hands on them!
Q: The old GUI didn’t fit on my laptop screen and now this new one is even worse!
A: We know. It doesn’t fit well on our 1366×768 MacBook Air either. A “wide” version of that skin is coming any day now that will fit a lot better on height-limited laptop screens. Please stand by…
Q: Are there custom skins for L’il Poly-Ana, the “Lite” preset player version?
A: No. If you want to use the Custom Skins you’ll need to upgrade to full Poly-Ana. See the Poly-Ana page for details. (As the Beta 2 and 3 updates were mostly for adding the new Skins feature, L’il Poly-Ana is still at 1.30 Beta 1. It will be updated by Beta 4, though it still won’t include the Custom Skins feature.)
Q: I don’t like knobs. Can I make sliders instead?
A: Not at this time. The problem with sliders is they have limited resolution compared to knobs, which have the entire pixel circumference of your screen to use for adjustment. Yes, there can be a fine control mode for sliders (just as there is with Poly-Ana’s knobs when set to Linear Knob Mode) but we never want to force that on the user, it should be a choice which they can select whether they want to use or not from the Options Dialog (opened by clicking on the product name). Still, we’re looking into improving the behavior of the existing slider controls in the GUI code library we use, just as we did with the multiple Knob Modes, and it could be offered at some time in the future. (You actually could make a slider right now, and use it in Linear Knob Mode in a way that would probably seem to make sense. But it would be confusing when in Circular or Circular Relative knob modes. Go ahead and try it if you like, but we won’t share any skins that do that here.)
Q: What about other controls? Can I change the knob’s range angles or get rid of the detents?
A: No. Things like the knob ranges, their detent “sweet spots” that they snap to, and other unique control behaviors are integral parts of the Poly-Ana interface as well as something we don’t want users to have to re-learn when they switch skins. You can change how anything looks, but now how it behaves.
Q: I use drop-down menus. Do I have to implement a knob for the Mod Source dials?
A: Yes. Skins aren’t allowed to limit the capabilities of the product. (Actually, it’s fairly easy right now to push controls off the background so they’re missing, but don’t count on that continuing in future updates.) Might we suggest for the Mod Source dials, a knob that shows the selected value in its center? We’re planning to make some of those soon ourselves.
Q: Can controls overlap?
A: Maybe. Sometimes. Be careful and test thoroughly, no guarantees. (The keyboard controls will have to overlap. The black keys are drawn after the white keys, so they should always appear on top of them. Even so, we’ve still got a few little glitches in how they display to work out. Sometimes black keys are appearing half white. That’s not your skin, that’s our code, and we’re working on improving it.)
Q: My existing knob graphics don’t point in the right direction when I try to use them in a Custom Poly-Ana Skin. Why not?
A: Your existing knob graphics probably don’t go through a full range of 360 degrees. See the instructions below for details on producing knob “filmstrip” graphics for Poly-Ana.
Q: I want to switch rapidly between different skins. How can I?
A: There’s currently no facility for changing the skin once an instance of Poly-Ana has been launched. (It only loads the graphics at instantiation time in order to speed up opening of the editor after that.) But you can easily have many different skins that you switch between, or revert to the built-in skin, just by renaming the folder they’re in. You will need to launch a new instance of Poly-Ana (easiest to just save and reload your host project) to see the changes, however.
Q: Can I change the Tool-Tips text or behavior?
A: No. But you can turn them off entirely in the Options Dialog (click the product name).
Q: I think I found a bug in the Skin system. My skin crashes Poly-Ana!
A: That’s not really a bug. Malformed skins (so to speak) will often crash Poly-Ana, we make no guarantee that it will handle any skin data. We’re working on adding more error checking and reporting but there will probably always be a way to make Poly-Ana crash with a poorly formed Custom Skin. Best when making your own to start with our included one, and make changes slowly rather than all at once. Be very careful not to break the syntax of the XML file, particularly by forgetting to put in closing tags. Now, if one of the skins we include or share here on this page crashes Poly-Ana, please definitely report it to us because that is a bug! Also note that many host programs will not attempt to load a plug-in after it’s crashed once. To reset this, remove the Poly-Ana .dll, .vst or .component file from the folder you installed it in, restart your host, close your host, replace the Poly-Ana file, and restart your host again. (Some hosts also include a feature to “rescan plugins”, which may or may not be faster than the above procedure, depending on how many plug-ins you have installed.)
Instructions for Building Poly-Ana Skins
Rules:
A “skin” folder under your Poly-Ana data folder (same location where the .key file is kept) will override any Poly-AnaBG.png file found in the data folder.
All graphics are 32 bit, 4 channel (RGBA) PNG files. Use of transparency effects, including glows and shadows, is allowed and encouraged!
All knobs must go through a full 360 degrees, starting at the 6:00 position (down) at the top of the graphic “filmstrip” and advancing clockwise to one step short of the start (6:00) position. The easiest way to manage this is to make your knobs 360 frames, one per degree, going from 0 degrees pointing straight down, to 359 degrees, one degree short of the start position. Yes, that’s a lot of frames but you’re probably (hopefully) not producing them individually by hand, and it makes for very smooth knob motion.
Pitch and mod wheels have the bottom of their range at the top position in the graphic (filmstrip).
Knob and button control graphics can have a “mouseable area” definied which is a sub-set of their size. (This is to allow effects like shadows and glows to appear outside the area that the mouse will affect the control within.)
Overlapping controls are best avoided, though it can work in some cases. (The keyboard is an obvious case where you’ll have to overlap controls. We recommend you make the spaces in the white keys where black keys will go transparent as we expect to soon be adding code to check for this to help improve the functionality of the keyboard controls.) If you try overlapping other controls, TEST, TEST, TEST them, including the MIDI-Learn function. We can’t guarantee it will always work, but it might.
2 and 3 state toggle switches must go left-right, one frame per position, left on top.
Light/push-buttons are all 2 state, 2 frame, off on top.
Splash screen/Options Dialog and is not customizeable. The area to click in to launch it is, but must be at least 2.5% of the background height and width in size and should coincide with the placement of the company and product name branding on the background.
The MIDI Learn box is not customizeable.
New in 1.30 Beta 3! The look of the Program Select and Load and Save buttons can now be customized! The previous system of automatically making all the controls from a single (top, left) coordinate is still supported as well. See the comments in the included Poly-AnaSkin.xml file for more details.
We will not accept skins for redistribution (and to qualify for winning a free license) without the “Admiral Quality”, “Poly-Ana”, and “analog model polyphonic synthesizer” names included. Your design should use the graphics provided herefor “Admiral Quality” and “Poly-Ana”. (You can render “analog model polyphonic synthesizer” however you like.) And, as above, this branding must be at least 2.5% of the height and width of the background and have the Splash Screen hotspot defined around it.
The Mod Source selector dials first frame has ENV 1 selected, then moves smoothly (clockwise) through ENV 2, ENV 3, LFO 1, LFO 2, KEYB, VELO, WHEEL, PRESS, EXPR, OSC 1, OSC 2, OSC 3, MMIX 1, MMIX 2, FILT 1, IN-L, IN-R then back to one frame short of the start. Mod Source dials do not respond in a circular-absolute form (they never jump when you first click into them) so you are free to locate the selected item at any position you like (Poly-Ana currently uses the 3:00 position). While they don’t have to look like rotating dials, they should indicate circular control in some way. Note that while the dials seem to “click” into the 18 positions as you rotate the control, this is done internally by Poly-Ana’s code and your animation frames should be evenly spaced as with any normal knob.
Mod Source drop-down menus positioned relative to the (top, left) origins of the Mod Source selector dials at an offset you specify.
Maximum background size is 409 x 224 (the same size of the Splash screen/Options Dialog which always appears in the top, left origin).
L’il Poly-Ana does not currently support skinnability.
All controls MUST be included and appear within the background. (They are allowed to go outside tbe background by half the height/width of the control’s graphic.)
Tooltips are not customizeable (though they can be turned off by the user in the Options Dialog).
The Custom Skins feature is new, in Beta, and experimental for now, and we can’t guarantee correct behavior with any skin content, particularly content we haven’t vetted and distributed ourselves. Please check plug-in behavior with any custom skins removed before submitting any bug reports. (And note that after a crash caused by a bad skin, you may need to re-scan for plug-ins or remove Poly-Ana from your plug-ins folder, restart your host, close your host, replace Poly-Ana, and restart your host, in order to get it to attempt to load Poly-Ana again.)
Keyboard light sources can be from the right or left. Black keys are always two frames, up (top) and down. White keys have 8 states, alternating up and down. The other “shadow states” depend on the states of the neighboring keys (to the left or right, depending on the light source definition). The frames go, top to bottom on the “filmstrip” graphic:
This key, Neighboring black key (if applicable), Neighboring white key:
Frame 1: Up, Up, Up
Frame 2: Down, Up, Up
Frame 3: Up, Down, Up
Frame 4: Down, Down, Up
Frame 5: Up, Up, Down
Frame 6: Down, Up, Down
Frame 7: Up, Down, Down
Frame 8: Down, Down, Down
XML file
The Poly-Ana Custom Skin is defined by an XML format file named Poly-AnaSkinl.xml which is located in the skin folder under the same folder your Poly-Ana.key goes in. (On OSX in: /Users/Your_user_name/Library/Application Support/Admiral Quality/Poly-Ana/skin/ On Windows in: \Program Files (x86)\Admiral Quality\Poly-Ana\skin\ — or use the Program Files folder on 32 bit versions of Windows that don’t have a Program Files (x86) folder.)
We won’t describe every line of the XML file here, it should be self-explanatory. We’ve added lots of comments to explain things in the demo skin (included in the Poly-Ana 1.30 Beta distributable).
Image files
All background and control image files must be PNG format, 8 bits per channel, 4 channel (RGBA). Transparency works as do shadow and glow effects, and are much easier to do than building separate images for each control with the background “baked” into them. (Though if that’s how you like to work, you’re free to do that as well.)
Knob images must go a full 360 degrees around, starting at the 6:00 position (pointing straight down) and advancing clockwise until one frame short of the 6:00 position. We recommend making knob “filmstrip” graphics 360 frames tall, one-frame-per-degree, but you can make any number of frames you want. (More than 360 is probably massive overkill. Much less and you can see the steps as the knob advances. We think 360 is perfect, and it also makes a lot of the math work out to convenient and intuitive values as well.)
Note that, unlike most other virtual instruments and effects that travel through 270 degrees, Poly-Ana’s knobs (at least the ones that don’t freewheel through a full 360 degrees) go 300 degrees. You’ll want to take this into account when designing your background images. We did this because real-world potentiometers go through 300 degrees, and we wanted to maximize the control area to provide the finest possible resolution.
Here is a JKnobMan project file that will help get you started making Poly-Ana knobs. It sets the correct start angle, number of frames and end angle: PolyAnaStartKnob.zip
Here is a JKnobMan project file that makes a Poly-Ana Mod Selector knob. All the correct text and angles are filled in for you: PolyAnaModKnob.zip
Here’s an online gallery of public domain JKnobMan projects you can use to make many, really slick looking knobs. To make these knobs compatible with Poly-Ana, you need to go through each layer that rotates and change the starting angle to -180 degrees (should point straight down) and the end angle to 360-(360/NumFrames). If you set the number of frames to 360 in the preferences, which is what we use, your end angle will be 179 degrees: Free Knob Gallery
If you’re producing knob graphics from some other method, like 3D software, you may need a utility program to stitch the individual frames together into the tall “filmstrip” format we use. Here’s a good one: http://www.niallmoody.com/apps/pngstitch
Here is a .pdf file with Poly-Ana’s original panel layout and that also contains our branding which you’ll need to use if you’re making a skin that you want to qualify for sharing here (and earning a free license). Poly-Ana_Panels_v130.pdf
The Skin Trade
Skin to win! Send us your skin and if we like it and post it, you’ll win a Poly-Ana license for you or a friend (or equivalent credit for you).
2015-08-27 And we have another winner! This time, with a little bit of attitude! “Industrial”, by, DavidF!
2015-08-24 “Moderne”, our second winning Skin submission from famous music software skinner, Limeflavour! This all-original skin is available in two different sizes to fit any screen, and offers 8 choices of background color! Fantastic work, Limeflavour!
980×735:Poly-Ana_skin_Limeflavour_Moderne_980x735_v01a.zip (15/08/25 – Updated to v01a to fix Program Selector not updating when Prev/Next program buttons clicked on OSX only, Windows users who already installed v01 don’t need this update.)
1200×635:Poly-Ana_skin_Limeflavour_Moderne_1200x635_v01a.zip (15/08/25 – Updated to v01a to fix Program Selector not updating when Prev/Next program buttons clicked on OSX only, Windows users who already installed v01 don’t need this update.)
2015-08-06 New! Our first winning Skin submission from Hoverland, “Dusk”! Now updated with cool new controls for the Mod Sources as Dials mode. (Also note that this skin folder contains 4 other folders containing optional backgrounds that you can copy up into the skin folder to enable.) Great work, Hoverland!
New! Hoverland has graciously shared his Photoshop document that he used to create this skin with us, as well as the JKnobMan project used to create the “cylindrical” Mod Source control, so now it’s an easy matter to tweak it in any way you’d like! Thanks again, Hoverland! HoverlandDuskSkinPSD.zip Hoverland_ModCylinder01_knob.zip
2015-07-31 New! Our first alternate skin offering, “Wide SEM”. As promised, here’s a wide skin that should better fit in the vertical dimension of your laptop screen. It also changes the look to dark labels on a light background, and loses the “scales” that don’t work well when rendered as dark under the dark knobs.
2015-07-19 Our original demo skin, “Redux”, a re-working of the original Poly-Ana GUI that loses the perspective of the panels and keyboard and the wooden sides, but should otherwise look very familiar to long-time Poly-Ana users.
Here’s another great work contributed by Dangerous Orange, “made exclusively with Poly-Ana (apart from the drums)”. It’s from the soundtrack for the film “Guile Point” by OK Retro Films, available here. We really love how this one showcases Poly-Ana’s ability to create convincing, glitchy and continuously evolving sound that you’d swear was produced by real analog electronics.
New!
Poly-Ana owner, SMH, kindy created and shared this demo of the effect version that comes included with Poly-Ana, Poly-AnaFX. Here he is using it to process clean electric guitar. SMH says, “This is Polyana FX applied to a loop of clean Stratocaster. I’m playing along on the keyboard to bring out different parts of the guitar performance and using the mod wheel to bring in LFO. Patch is basically the built in ‘002 polyphonic comb’ preset in PAFX but I changed LFO wave shape to square.”
Great work, SMH!
Original unprocessed guitar:
Processed with Poly-AnaFX:
A rockin’ new Poly-Ana demo video by virtuoso keyboardist, Mistheria!
These are 100% Poly-Ana, except for the drums. Mistheria tells us he mostly used Poly-Ana’s built-in preset programs to make these demos.”I enjoy working with Poly-Ana, one of the most versatile and powerful analog model virtual synthesizers available today! The sound is impressive, I’ve total control over any parameters, I can make my sound aggressive or mellow, open filters or use the amazing “waveform morphing”. The demo songs “Ana’s Attack” and “Ana’s Dream” both feature sounds from Poly-Ana’s built-in presets list with a couple of sounds slightly customized by me. The massively analog approach is the strong point of this stunning instrument!” – Mistheria
We think this is great. It’s wonderful to see what Poly-Ana can do in the hands of a master. Everyone should check out more of Mistheria‘s keyboard virtuosity at www.mistheria.com
A great new song from Poly-Ana owner, Jason Judy of CENTRIC. Jason tells us this song “features the beautiful Poly-Ana instrument prominently on poly brass and synth bass. The instrument couldn’t have come out any better in the mix so cheers to great work! … The only synthesizers you hear which are not the poly-ana is a Shruthi-1 kit which I built and sounds amazing in its own right.”
Jason continues, “For this recording I wanted a big epic analog bass sound without the epic price tag. I tried a bunch of the Native Instruments stuff but I could never get anything convincingly analog out of it. I went through a bunch of analog modules in my synth rack as well, minitaurs, mophos, bass stations. They sounded great but didn’t give me anywhere near the power and flexibility I was looking for. So I gave Poly-Ana a try and was blown away by how analog it sounded, while still being super stable and not a resource hog like the Arturia stuff. Any thick punchy analog bass I could dream up was now at my finger tips. I’ve always been a hardware lover and enthusiast but you’d need to start with AT LEAST $3,000 to try and get that kind of tonal pallet from hardware. Needless to say Poly-Ana made the cut for being the bass synth on the lastest CENTRIC recording, and was used for some really nice brass pads as well!”
Great work, Jason! We love it! To hear more music from CENTRIC check out http://centricmusic.com
Poly-Ana power user Synth-Project has built a custom hardware controller for his Poly-Ana! We couldn’t be more impressed!
Poly-Ana owner APZX sent us this beautiful, somewhat trippy piece that uses Poly-Ana as the only instrument. (The drums are TR-808 samples.) He also applied a smattering of typical third-party effects; limiters, reverbs, delays, and compressors, to achieve a very finished, polished sound for this piece. Check out more stuff from APZX on his SoundCloudand YouTube pages.
Here’s an exciting actual song from Vim Cortez featuring a whole bunch of Poly-Ana tracks. Most of the synths in this fantastic example of synthfunk are Poly-Ana (with the exception of the sync lead at 2:21 and the arpeggiated sound at 2:37). We particularly like the juicy Poly-Ana bass, authentic sounding brass stabs, and the saw lead hook that Vim tells us this song was built around.Be sure to check out the other great funk tracks from Vim’s SynthFunkatero album, available on iTunes, a reinterpretation of the funkiest vibes of the eighties through Vim Cortez’s musical lens. Vim Cortez pays tribute to the sounds that marked his childhood — from Michael Jackson to Shalamar, from Prince to Cameo. Big synth bass sounds rub shoulders with old school drum machine hits, fresh synth stabs and hot guitar licks. But this is no nostalgic or tongue-in-cheek wink at the kitsch-loving crowd: there is an urgent, darker edge to the beats, the lyrics and the vocals to remind us that synthfunk is the angry, fidgety little brother of future soul.
Thanks to Phatso Brown for this new L’il Poly-Ana demo. Excepting the drums, a little added echo, and some limiting, that’s 100% straight-up L’il Poly-Ana.
Some very authentic sounding 80s jazz/funk in this all-Poly-Ana song by The unshushable Coktor, titled Run, Captain, but also dance. This one really shows off Poly-Ana’s expressive capabilities as a hands-on player’s instrument. Says Coktor, “Everything you hear is Poly-Ana, all synths and all drums and fx. I used effects such as compressor on some of the drums, reverb and delay on most of the synth sounds, but only to enhance the space, not to modify or distort the sounds (meaning no chorus or phasers or such).”
A new all-Poly-Ana demo from The unshushable Coktor! Coktor says: “here’s a demo piece that shows Poly-Ana’s ethereal qualities. It’s called ‘Jacques Can’t Believe His Eyes’. This piece accompanies Jacques Cousteau on an underwater expedition, and he’s about to make a fascinating discovery! Everything is 100% Poly-Ana with additional delay on one of the lead synths in the middle of the piece, and some bass rolloff plus a reverb at the end of the master bus. Also some panning and volume modulation in the sequencer.” Once again Coktor, all we can say is WOW! Is there no musical style this guy can’t ace? And with only ONE INSTRUMENT no less!
“It’s a mock 90s Amiga computer game music in the style of mid-80s or late-80s Tangerine Dream. Imagine it being the music to the Level One of some really cool “jump’n run” game. It is 100% Poly-Ana with some FX like Delay and Compression, nothing wild though to not distort Poly-Ana’s sound.” – thus spake The Coktor.
Nicholas May says of his Poly-Ana demo, Alien’s Party, “Poly Ana inspired me to make this track. It’s truly motivating synth!”. Great use of some of Poly-Ana’s preset patches here, as well as some processing of the entire mix at the end by our famous SCAMP filter (Poly-Ana can pull off SCAMP-like effects too, with the included effects version, Poly-AnaFX!) All instrument sounds are from Poly-Ana excepting the drums, although that deep bass drum sound is coming from Poly-Ana too!
Here’s a very animated Poly-Ana demo from catalog, appropriately titled Anamation. Poly-Ana is the only synthesizer used in this track. Catalog also mentions he used: “Bertill by Shruiken to get the growl in the melody track. Flofi by Betabugs for the harmony, Tl’s pocket limiter, Blockfish by digital fish phones, and Arguru’s Stardust as a mastering tool. The track is just 6 instances of PolyAna and one instance of Kore Player Free by NI for the hi hat. All synths, kick drum, and snare are PolyAna.” Nice one catalog!
Here’s another 100% Poly-Ana demo, only a bit of reverb and compression added, by Wolf-Ulrich Schnurr. This song was featured on the July ’07 issue of the German KEYS Magazine DVD, along with a glowing review of Poly-Ana!
Here’s an all-Poly-Ana demo from pilgrim heart that does a great job showing off Poly-Ana’s analog modeled filters with some slow resonant sweeps. This is uneffected, clean, Poly-Ana in all her naked glory!
A lot of very organic, changing sounds and a mean melody in this one from MDK who also contributed some presets to Poly-Ana. All sounds including drums are Poly-Ana! A bit of reverb is the only effect added. Check out more stuff from MDK at relivethefuture.com
Here’s three Poly-Ana compositions, by Heath Blair. Very evocative of 60s and 70s electronic film scores. All sounds are generated by Poly-Ana with some reverb and echo added.
VST 2.4 and Audio Units compatible with 32 or 64 bit code and/or audio processing.
MIDI MPE compatible allowing independent, per-voice, multi-channel control of Pitch Bend, Pressure, Expression, two assignable CCs, and Mod Wheel!
Light preset-player version L’il Poly-Ana, available. Same big sound as full Poly-Ana, reduced interface and complexity, discount price!
Maximum 12 note polyphony featuring unison, voice detune and a unique poly-unison mode!
Three oscillators per voice!
Two filters per voice, 12/24 dB/Oct, LPF/HPF, can be run in parallel or in series allowing for additional multi-mode capability!
Filter Resonance Modulation. Rarely offered on other synths!
Stereo signal path throughout the voice. Poly-Ana produces dramatic stereo effects without using any tacked-on delay or chorus effects!
All voice parameters always visible and accessible with a single click!
GUI controls that work like the real-world items, like automatic knob detents and single-click toggles!
Unique modulation routing scheme! All the power of modular without the tedious complications of using patch cables or a modulation matrix. And all Poly-Ana mod destinations can be modulated at audio rates!
Waveform Mod automatically morphs oscillator waveforms!
PWM for ALL oscillator waveforms!
Oscillator PM (Phase Modulation) allows creation of “FM synthesis” type sounds, never heard before in an analog modeled design!
Noise Sync. Oscillators can sync to noise source as well as normal pitched tones!
Two LFOs per voice with retriggering! Allows separate phase for each voice’s LFOs, creating echo-like modulation effects.
Full Host-Sync for LFOs with adjustable phase offset!
Three ADSR envelopes per voice with adjustable curves!
Two Modulation Mixers allow for complex combinations of modulation sources through Addition, Multiplication (ring modulation) a Sample and Hold, a Full/Half Wave Rectifier, and a Lag filter!
Unique, oversampled voice engine sounds more like real analog than any soft-synth you’ve heard yet!
Quality control lets you reduce Poly-Ana’s CPU power requirements while recording performances.
MIDI CC# mapping of all controls with MIDI learn. Just right click any control to set it’s CC.
Automatic MIDI guitar controller support for multi-channel control in MIDI “Mono” mode.
Cutoff knob smoothing, no more “zipper noise” when performing and automating filter sweeps from the front panel.
Cutoff and resonance gang buttons. Control both filters together, or separately.
Oscillator retriggering and starting-phase controls. Great for punchy basses and many other effects not possible on most traditional analog designs.
Analog Drift feature, oscillators and filters can be set anywhere from rock solid, to out-of-tune unstable.
GUI Options: User customizeable background .PNG files, optional tooltips, and an option to replace Mod Source dials with drop-down lists.
VST/AU instrument AND VST/AU effect versions! Effect version can process external audio and/or use external audio as a modulation source! Poly-Ana’s Modulation Mixers can manipulate incoming audio, allowing anything from the original audio-rate signal to a rectified and smoothed envelope follower signal. Combine it with other modulation sources or even the other audio input for truly massive possibilities!
Built in bank of 128 sounds plus 2 additional user banks included and more to come on our site as users contribute them. We will never charge money for Poly-Ana patches!
Volume and Tune settings returned to global rather than per-program.
GUI Keyboard animation bug fixed, you should once again correctly see the virtual keys
exactly as played on your controller keyboard.
1.3.4 – 2018-07-09
Init Bank. The default bank file Poly-Ana and L’il Poly-Ana automatically load when
instantiated can now be changed. Place preferred bank file named “ init.pab ” in the Poly-Ana
settings folder. (Please note that this isn’t the same folder you have the plugin(s) installed in, it’s
the folder your license key-file and skin folder, if used, go in. See the Custom Skin instructions
or your license-key email to create/locate this folder on your system.)
Fixed slight jump in knob position when first clicking on to a knob with detents when Knob
Mode set to Linear.
1.3.3 – 2018-05-15
Fixed crash bug from 1.3.2 when Custom Skins that set Tooltip color were loaded.
1.3.2 – 2018-05-09
Poly-Ana 1.3.2’s New MPE Mode
New option MPE (ON)/GUITAR MULTI-CHANNEL MODE switch added to Options Dialog for improved MIDI MPE support. Turn on for MPE controllers, leave off for the multi-channel Guitar Mode that Poly-Ana has always offered. MIDI Pitch Bend, PRESS, EXPR, IN-1 and IN-2 modulation sources already worked in Guitar Mode and work similarly with MPE On. MPE On Mode adds new multi-channel support for the WHEEL modulation source, and also uses MIDI Channel 1 as a MPE Master Channel for the 6 multi-channel capable MIDI modulation sources listed above, controlling every voice/channel when received on Channel 1 (MPE Master Channel) and only controlling the targeted Channel’s voice(s) on any other MIDI Channel. (Any other MIDI CC/Learn mappings affect front panel controls which are of course always shared across all voices/channels produced by a single instance of Poly-Ana. Only the six modulation sources listed above support multi-channel Guitar/MPE control.)
Changed version numbers to have two dots to match the schemes of our other products.
1.31 2017-07-03
Anti-Aliasing moved inside the oscillator oversample loop. This costs a bit more CPU power when both AA and oversampling (Quality control) are used in combination, but greatly expands the control over the character of the sound.
1.30 Beta 8 2017-06-16
New Anti-Aliasing feature completely re-factored (re-written from scratch). Try it again for the first time! Removed “EXPERIMENTAL” from AA tool-tip label. Turned AA on for most built-in programs. (As always, old projects and patch/bank files will still load with the sound they originally played with. We never break sounds in the same major version!) Added AA label to built-in background image.
Copy Protection: Now looks for Poly-Ana.key.txt if Poly-Ana.key is not found, as some email clients append the .txt extension to our attached key files which isn’t always visible to the user by default, causing frequent support nightmares. Either form should work now.
Added an A=440 Hz reference to the Tune parameter display. (Now all you A=432 Hz kooks will know when you’ve got the magic frequency!) Label is now Cents/Hz.
1.30 Beta 7 2015-10-01
Custom Skins: Added optional font and background color definitions to for the Tooltips. See XML file in the included skin folder.
Custom Skins: Added a new, optional mode to the XML Mod Source control definitions, <NoForceCircRelative> which will disable PolyAna’s default behavior of always forcing the Mod Dial controls to use the Relative Circular Knob Mode. This helps with our new dial graphic that demos a knob that turns what appears to be a cylindrical mechanical display and may be more suitable for other types of circular controls designers may wish to make for the Mod Sources when set to Dial mode. (Mod Sources as Dropdowns mode is not affected, nor is Linear Knob Mode which is always relative.) Install the included skin folder to demo this new style control.
Fixed a long standing bug that caused all circular controls with MouseAreas that are off center from the control bitmap’s borders to not use the MouseArea center for calculation of circular control angles but rather the bitmap’s center. With this fix, knobs controls that are highly off center from the rest of the bitmap that contains them (say to support a long shadow or a knob with a built-in accompanying display above, below or beside it) will now work as you’d expect them to, with the circular mouse movement centering on the MouseArea (which is typically set to be just around the knob portion of the larger graphic).
Fixed the Options Dialog mistakenly launching when the mouse cursor was dragged over it while adjusting another control that cropped up in 1.30 Beta 6.
1.30 Beta 6 2015-08-18
Custom Skins: Added optional font and background color definitions to the Parameter Display. Added optional font color definition to the Program Number selector and Program Name edit field (they can have different colors) and their background and border colors (shared between the two controls). Added optional font color definition to the Mod Source selectors when in dropdown mode. Sorry, we looked into customizing font face and sizes too, but it’s hard to get consistent results cross-platform, so those are going to stay un-customizeable for now to keep skinning from becoming overly complicated by cross-platform testing.
Custom Skins: Fixed a problem with drawing lit-from-left keyboards and fixed the lowest C key not shadowing correctly in lit-from-right mode.
Custom Skins: Prevented a crash bug that was only happening on OSX 32 bit builds intermittently when notes were playing with the editor open. Unfortunately this makes the shadowing not work quite right in OSX 32 bit when the virtual keyboard is played with the mouse (it works fine when played from MIDI input). We’ll continue to try to find the cause of this and fix it right, it’s a weird one!
Custom Skins: Fixed Mod dials not using their MouseArea definitions.
Custom Skins: Fixed Load/Save buttons not using their MouseArea definitions.
Anti-aliasing somewhat improved but still needs some work. It makes bad sound when one step runs over another step, which happens at extremely high pitches, narrow pulse widths, or when the waveform is very close to square or saw but not quite exactly on them. Use at your own risk. (It shouldn’t crash or anything, the only risk is to your ears and that patches incorporating anti-aliasing may change their sound somewhat before the end of this Beta period. 🙂
Fixed crash on OSX when program/bank/MIDI save dialogs were cancelled out of.
Fixed sample rate dependent parameters like envelope times not updating internal coefficients when sample rate is changed after initial plug-in instantiation (as can happen by rendering to a different sample rate than your host project is set at). Current program now re-loads causing a re-calculation of all internal coefficients after sample rate changes.
1.30 Beta 5 2015-07-29
Added a helpful error message if a Custom Skin is missing any controls or attempts to place them more than half their height or width outside the background. (We do not want the new Customs Skins feature to be used to remove functionality from our product and future updates may refuse to run at all if your skins are incomplete!)
1.30 Beta 3 2015-07-25
New <Offset> tag added to <ImgSrc> definitions in the Poly-AnaSkin.xml file. Allows for shifting of all controls using that image without needing to recalculate and edit the positions for every individual control. Great for compensating for different sized control graphics when editing a preexisting skin!
Images for Load/Save buttons, Voice Display and Program Inc/Dec buttons can now be defined in the skin. Included skin updated to demonstrate this. (Previous method of automatically drawing the old style controls at a given position still works as well. See Poly-AnaSkin.xml file comments for details on switching between these two modes.)
“PROCESS WHILE SETPARAM!” debug message in the Parameter Display removed from production builds. (It was never an indicator of anything wrong, just an internal testing message.)
Changed short (VST 8 character) parameter name “Sustain” to “Hold” to match panel and avoid confusion with ADSRs’ Sustain. Also changed “A1ModSrc” to “A1Src” to avoid confusion with Mod Source Selector (and for Amp 2 as well). And “A1PMAM” to “A1PM/AM” (and for Amp 2 also). (The VST parameter names are also the control identifier codes in the Custom Skin description xml file.)
By popular demand, made Mod Source dropdown menus the DEFAULT! You can change them back to “annoying” dials in the Options Dialog (click on the product name). 🙂
New virtual keyboard controls when using a Custom Skin. Still a work in progress, there’s some slight drawing bugs we’re aware of (half-drawn black keys), and we hope to enable glissandi by dragging the mouse across multiple keys in the next update.
1.30 Beta 1 2015-05-09
Added (currently unlabeled) new Anti-Alias control in the Quality section. WARNING: This feature is half baked! (Please don’t tell us it sounds bad in some cases. We know and will return to improving it soon. We just needed the new control in place before moving ahead with our skinning system, coming in the next update. Otherwise people would start building interfaces missing one control!) It will dramatically reduce aliasing frequencies in simple cases but currently produces a “bad noise” when oscillator pitch is too high or pulse width too narrow. Probably best to just leave it turned off for now. We’ll get back to it later in the 1.30 Beta, but it’s been holding up development on the user skin system so we needed to put this final new parameter in before users started working on skins, even though it’s not quite ready for prime time yet. And while you might use that “bad sound” to effect, note that as this is a Beta period, the sound is not guaranteed to stay the same so any patches you make that utilize the new Anti-Aliasing feature may change their sound in later updates to the Beta. (Your old programs that don’t use Anti-Aliasing will continue to sound the exactly same as they always have. We never break pre-existing sound in updates, except during Beta periods and even then, only where it involves new features like this one.)
OSX: Poly-Ana will now attempt to create its settings and key-file folder. The warning message if it can’t has also been improved to be more clear about exactly what folder you need to create manually. If you’re still getting the warning message, please let us know what host and OSX version you’re running, that will help us a lot.
patch (*.pap) and bank (*.pab) file load now initializes the Hold and new Anti-Aliasing parameters to off, so when loading older patches these settings will reset to how they were before. (Loading old projects and/or .fxp/.fxb programs and banks into the host already does this.)
Fixed parameter duplicate name FInput-1 to FInput-2. (These are the parameters that set the filter tracking input MIDI channels in the Options Dialog, opened by clicking on the product name.)
1.30 Beta 0 2015-02-18
Stability bug that would intermittently cause voices to hang, particularly after changing programs while notes are playing should be fixed. Please let us know!
OSX: Incorrect double slash in Warning Dialog for configuration folder missing corrected. (Does not affect plugin behavior, just a fix to the confusing path that was displayed to the user in the warning message.)
1.21 2014-12-13
Custom backgrounds now working again on Windows and added to OSX. Custom backgroud files (Poly-AnaBG.png and LilPoly-AnaBG.png) go in the same folder as your license key file.
Fixed swapped positions on L’il Poly-Ana for bank: and prog: load buttons.
1.20 BETA 5 – 2014-11-09
L’il PolyAna has now joined the Beta and now uses the new keyfile based authentication system. (Existing L’il PolyAna owners, please contact us at sales@admiralquality.com to receive your new keyfile.)
Quality buttons failing to redraw correctly after changes in some hosts should be fixed. (Let us know please!)
Minor changes to the authentication system to support cohabitation with L’il PolyAna.
1.20 BETA 4 – 2014-10-05
OSX: More fixes to program and bank file load/save dialogs, they should work in all cases now and the duplicate extensions have been fixed. (Please note that some of our program (.pap) and bank (.pab) files in the Poly-Ana Patch Exchange are unzipping on the Mac with the executable file attribute mistakenly set. This prevents them from being able to be selected in the file load dialogs. When this is occurring you will see in Finder the file’s “Kind” listed as “Unix Executable File”. To fix this, you can use “chmod -x [filename]” in a Terminal window to remove the executable attribute directly.)
OSX: Program (.pap), bank (.pab) and MIDI-Map (.pam) save/load location now defaults to the ~/Library/Application Support/Admiral Quality/Poly-Ana folder, the same location as your key and settings files. (Note that you are still free to keep your program, bank and MIDI-Map files anywhere you’d like.)
More improvements to program and bank “chunk” save and recall behavior. Chunks of unexpected size are now recalled, using the minimum of the expected and received sizes.
1.20 BETA 3 2014-09-30
OSX: Fixed patch and program load/save buttons not working. (On OSX, now enforces .pap and .pab filename extensions on PolyAna program and bank files. Note that you may need to rename your existing program and bank files to include these extensions in order to load them.)
OSX: Fixed missing two-position toggle controls!
Program and MIDI-Map save now defaults filename to program name.
Program names are now prevented from having illegal filename characters.
Fixes to program and bank save and recall.
Fixed program name list overflowing on successive bank loading.
1.20 BETA 2 2014-08-25
Added Poly-AnaFX, the effect version that allows processing of and/or modulation from the audio inputs. OSX: In AU hosts, regular Poly-Ana will now show in your instrument list. Poly-AnaFX will appear as a “MIDI Enabled Effect” in your AU effects list.
Added authorization info to the Options Dialog/Splash Screen.
MIDI Program Change is now supported, and an option has been added to enable or disable it.
Fixed: Volume knob is now obeying Knob Mode option.
EXPERIMENTAL: Hold feature. Held keys are now shown as depressed in Poly-Ana’s virtual keyboard. Poly-AnaFX has also added held keys to the two effect demo programs (001 and 002 in Poly-AnaFX). Held keys are particularly useful in the effect version for allowing sound to pass through the voice envelopes.
Sustain (damper) pedal MIDI control now changes state at value > 63 rather than value > 0 as before.
Fixed: MIDI-Learn box no longer leaving a mess behind when closed
IMPORTANT: Sorry, but we’ve had to change the location of Poly-Ana’s .key, .ini (configuration) and .pam (MIDI Map) files on OSX again. They are now under your user folder in ~/Library/Application Support/Admiral Quality/Poly-Ana/ You will need to create this folder manually, and if you have authorized Poly-Ana you will need to locate your key-file there. (We plan to eventually have this created automatically by an installer script.)
Fixed: OSX: User folders on disks other than the system disk should now be correctly detected. (Let us know, please!)
Fixed: “Bad chunk size” message is now shown in parameter display instead of a dialog box. And the cause of the bad chunk size message should be gone now. (Let us know, please!)
Fixed: Options Dialog was not appearing again if editor was closed while it was open.
AND EVEN MORE NEW FEATURES COMING VERY SOON IN THE NEXT 1.20 BETA UPDATE!
1.20 BETA 1 2014-07-16
New keyfile based copyprotection system!
New support for x64 (64 bit) AU! (OSX VST and AU now contain both 32 and 64 bit executable in the same package.)
Internal processing is now always full 64 bit double precision in both 32 and 64 bit versions of the plugin, and whether connected to 32 or 64 bit audio paths. (Input and output samples are 64 bit on hosts that support 64 bit audio data.)
Hold button now saved/restored with program/host project.
EXPERIMENTAL: When hold button is down when the program or project is saved, the held keys are also saved in the program/project! We’re not entirely sure this is a good idea, but we’re going to try it. So let us know… 1. If it works. and 2. if it’s useful. We expect it will be most useful in PolyAnaFX (coming in a later 1.20 BETA release) for enabling audio passthrough without needing to sequence a key held down. (It may not always work however, as many hosts send MIDI “all notes off” on project load, as well as transport reset, which will instantly kill the held notes. Again, let us know what host you use and if it’s actually working and any use to you.) We are also aware that the held keys do not show on the virtual keyboard, when recalled. We’re working on that.
Windows: New x86 (32 bit) compiler optimizations. CPU use improvement of around 5%.
Quality setting changes no longer silence the currently playing voices. (Please torture test this for us!)
Fixed: Oscillator Phase controls not getting saved and recalled correctly
Fixed: Mod wheel not showing correct value when project first loaded
Fixed: Crash when program change while editor closed
Windows: Program select menu (click on the program number in the top left) is now in 4 columns for better fit. (Mac menus don’t support this but their scrolling behavior is at least a little faster.)
Fixed: Oscillator Octave switches were acting as continuous controls instead of switches under MIDI control
Fixed: “Coming soon” showing in Filter IN1 and IN2 button display and tooltip. Instrument version now shows which MIDI channel it is notetracking(set in Options Dialog) when activated.
Cycle Assign display label is now “voice” instead of redundant “assign”
1.191 – 2011-03-20
Fixed crash when program changed while editor is closed.
1.19 – 2010-07-08
Fixed a bug causing a small jump in position when knobs were first clicked on, affecting knobs with detents in linear and relative circular modes.
Added mod wheel smoothing, certain MIDI controllers that produce relatively sparse event streams that created “zipper noise” now sound smooth.
OSX: Background image can now be changed for both VST and AU version by placing 1000×750 PNG file Poly-AnaBG.png in \Library\Application Support\Admiral Quality (for LilPoly-Ana use a 409×224 PNG file named LilPoly-AnaBG.png)
1.18 – 2010-05-25
Now using Symbiosis AU wrapper for OSX, VST file installation no longer required
Fixed bug, Osc 3 internal sync setting being copied from Osc 2 after suspend/resume called while GUI continued to show correct program setting. Happened at record or render time (depending on host behavior), after bypassing, and when Quality setting was changed.
Stability and other minor bug fixes including Ableton crash on OSX.
1.17 – 2010-02-18
Now supporting Mac OSX Audio Units and VST!
Various minor bug fixes
Stability bug at highest quality setting fixed
Added (serial #) Copy and (license key) Paste buttons to Authentication controls
1.16 – 2009-11-17
Fixed host crash when deleting plug-in instance when mod sources as dropdown lists is enabled.
1.15 – 2009-11-05
New platform support for Windows x64 VST and OSX VST.
Splashscreen replaced by new cross-platform Options Dialog. Click product name to activate.
Clicks in Cakewalk Sonar while working editor controls may be fixed (let us know please).
By popular demand: Faster editor loads after first time!
Silent gap demo mode only now on all platforms. Demo never expires! Nag
1.14 – 2008-11-25
Yet another evaluation reset! Enjoy a free, week long, fully functional evaluation period, even if you’ve tried it before in the past.
New demo mode, activates after free evaluation week expires, product still works but with occasional gaps in the output and native patch saving is disabled.
Added new version L’il Poly-Ana, a preset player with all performance related controls left on, as well as filter cutoff and resonance controls.
Poly-Ana owners already own L’il Poly-Ana. But L’il Poly-Ana can be purchased alone for a discounted price. See our website for details.
Custom background images are supported in L’il Poly-Ana. Place a 409 x 224 PNG file named LilPoly-AnaBG.png in same folder with LilPoly-Ana.dll
Small bug fixes and some very slight performance improvements.
1.13 – 2008-07-03
Restored the upper cutoff limit on the filters, prevents a sudden jump in volume at higher cutoff frequencies (well above Nyquist). This will fix any programs that may have sounded different in version 1.12.
Fixed crash problem when closing editor in certain poorly behaved hosts.
1.12 – 2008-06-27
Yet another evaluation reset!
Receptor compatible.
New SSE2 optimizations have reduced CPU usage to as little as 75% of version 1.00 on some platforms.
Fixed bug in polyphonic mode where stolen voices weren’t retriggering.
Fixed some stability bugs in the editor.
Added program name edit field, program select dropdown menu (click the program number), and program increment/decrement buttons to top of editor. Authorization controls have moved above keyboard and the “Auth” button has been removed. Simply hit “enter” or select any other control to confirm your key entry.
Removed limit from high end of filter cutoff range. This allows the HPF mode to completely cut all sound now, rather than always letting some highs pass through as before. (Restored to original behavior in 1.13)
Voices in release stage now show in voice display. Changed behavior: Incoming MIDI no longer turned to automation events. Didn’t prove useful as a feature and can cause conflicts in some cases.
Fixed bug when handling “duplicate timestamped” MIDI events of the same type. In this case the last received duplicate event will be used now. Fixes pitch bend and modulation errors from some host/controller combinations.
Fixed a long standing bug relating to oscillator sync that was causing Poly-Ana to get “sick” under certain, rare conditions. (Hosts that make random patches were very good at casing this.) Poly-Ana should no longer have “poison patches”.
Fixed another oscillator sync related bug where sync was internally turned off after bypassing/resuming even though editor panel still showed the correct setting.
Changed the method Poly-Ana uses to find its .dll location, may help users who were having trouble loading the custom background Poly-AnaBG.png
1.11 – 2008-03-11
Fixed bug in unison legato-portamento (auto-glide) behavior.
Fixed crashing in hosts that try to set program names longer than the 24 characters.
Vista users will find they have new serial numbers. Please email support@admiralquality.com with your new serial and we’ll issue you a new key.
1.10 – 2008-02-26
Fixed new Osc Phase knobs not showing motion when driven from MIDI CC.
New default soundbank. Original ver 1.0 soundbank also included as well as banks by Coktor, Cosmus and Construkx.
Fixed Analog Drift wasting CPU power on silent voices.
Hotlink to www.admiralquality.com website now launches buy page with product serial number automatically filled out.
Evaluation period set back to 1 week.
Fixed program name updating problem on some hosts.
Fixed quality setting not displaying on editor open.
Quality setting is now stored in patch (.pap) and bank (.pab) files.
Quality tooltip added.
Fixed recalled program names being truncated one character short of maximum.
Fixed Poly-AnaFX inputs not connected as modulation sources (this bug appeared in 1.1RC0).
Evaluation reset! Try her again for a free week… fully functioning!
1.10 RC3 – 2008-02-07
User customizeable backgrounds in .PNG format. Just place a 1000×750 file named Poly-AnaBG.png in the same directory as Poly-Ana.dll
Hold/damper button to right of keyboard now saved in patch.
Cutoff knob smoothing added, should eliminate “zipper noise” when performing cutoff knob automations.
Fixes in editor, might solve some stability issues.
Optimized filter code resulting in a slight performance improvement
Added Program Name edit field above the keyboard.
Pitchbend smoothing is no longer an option, always on now. Compensated for varying host sample rates.
Fixed PWM amount acting as zero until Amount knob was adjusted following switch from PM to PWM modes.
Fixed Mod Source Drop-downs showing wrong values for Env-3 and Mix-1.
1.10 RC2- 2008-01-24
Fixed Amp PM/Am switch and click filter switch not being saved correctly in .pap and .pab files
Fixed clicking in legato triggered unison sounds caused by Amp anti-click filters when legato trigger set to on
Adjusted Amp anti-click filters cutoff and resetting behavior
Fixed bug with internal Osc phase offsets resetting to zero after a quality change
Osc retriggering on legato played note-ons with legato trigger behavior checked. Note that clicks WILL happen on unison sounds when oscs are set to retrigger and legato trigger is off. This is normal and a result of the new feature. Either enable legato triggering or turn off the Osc retriggers to eliminate the click.
1.10 RC1 – 2008-01-17
Fixed problem with mod source selections not restoring correctly on some patches.
1.10 RC0 – 2008-01-14
VST 2.4 compatible
Filter Cutoff and Resonance Gang buttons. Filter 2 can follow Filter 1’s CF and Resonance controls.
Oscillator Phase Retrigger buttons. (For a demo try turning on all 3 on the “Default Synth Brass” patch.)
Oscillator Phase Offset knob. Used to control starting phase of retriggered waveform. Also note the FM effect on the oscillator when knob is being moved.
Oscillator PWM Source and Amount controls now share double duty with new PM (Phase Mod) controls. This opens up the world of “FM Synthesis” to Poly-Ana, but controlled in the familiar, classic analog style.
Quality control has moved to front panel and is now automatically adaptive to different project sample rates. The default 192 setting is the same as the old default of 4X at 44.1kHz or 48kHz. Note that while you can select, save and recall settings below your project sample rate, Poly-Ana can’t actually render audio below the host’s project sample rate.
Analog drift knob. Randomly detunes the oscillator pitches and filter cutoffs over time.
Saturation button. A “smooth” saturator. Limits Poly-Ana’s output to max at 0 dB. Not recommended as a substitute for a real mastering compressor, but can be used as a hard clipping effect (see the “MDK Kick” preset).
DC Cut button.
Pink Noise available now as well as White.
Amplifier Pan Modulations now share double duty with new Amplitude Modulation.
Anti-click filter button added to Amplifiers.
Added 3 way rectifier switch to Mod Mixers. Adds Fullwave or Halfwave Rectification between the S&H and the Lag filter.
FX version no longer rectifies the IN-1 and IN-2 audio input modulation sources. You can use the new rectifier in the mod mixers to create this effect now, or use the full positive to negative range of the input waveform.
Fixed bug involving pitchbend initialization across multiple MIDI channels.
Fixed a voice assignment bug in PUNI mode.
Fixed problem with optional Mod Source dropdowns not matching dials on some settings.
Fixed bug in MIDI polyphonic pressure messages, poly-pressure now works as it should.
1.00 – 2007-04-02
Evaluation Reset! If you already tried it in Beta you can try it again for another free week!
Rearranged presets and added 58 new, for a complete bank of 128 presets. More soundbanks will be made available soon on our site, FREE!
Changed Auth box text prompt
Fixed program name not updating on host when program or bank loaded
Fixed .pap and .pab program loading problems with patches saved from non-compliant hosts with >24 character names
Moved Auth dialog into resume function to prevent crashes, hung audio drivers, when loading projects in some hosts while Poly-Ana is unauthorized
Added file overwrite confirmation to program and bank file save dialogs
Fixed “short circuit” bug between Env2->Env3
0.91 – 2007-03-02
Legato triggering of unison sounds now maintains original note velocity. Eliminates clicks in patches like Bassmaster when played legato with varying velocity. Polyphonic sounds and/or sounds without Legato Trigger on will not be affected by this change.
Added pitchbend smoothing and option to disable.
0.90 – 2007-02-16
Poly-Ana is now a VSTi synthesizer (Poly-Ana.dll) and a VSTfx effect (Poly-AnaFX.dll).
Fixed processor compatibility bug.
Added hold (damper) button to GUI, right of keyboard.
VSTi version: INPUT-1 and INPUT-2 buttons on the filters now add tracking of monophonic keyboard performances on 2 extra MIDI channels.
Fixed buzzing sound from resonant filters in -12dB/Oct mode when cutoff raised too high.
Playing the GUI keyboard now sends velocity to MIDI output.
Fixed compatibility issues on some CPUs.
Added more presets
0.40 – 2007-01-12
More performance optimizations. CPU load reduced to approximately 50% of version 0.10.
Support for MIDI guitar control in “Mono” mode over 6 MIDI channels.
Fixed bug in Envelope 3.
Fixed Quality and MIDI CC settings not being recalled with program/project.
Fixed MIDI CC dropdown height.
0.30 – 2006-11-28
Significant performance optimizations. CPU load reduced by 25% – 35% from version 0.10.
Stability bugs FIXED? Test please…
Fixed click from envelope retriggering during Release stage when “Vel Level” was non-zero.
Damper pedal was inverted. Fixed!
Polyphony knob always showing 6 on editor open fixed.
LFO 2 Rate knob always showing zero on editor open fixed.
Oscillator Semitone knob was missing value +23. Fixed!
Added MIDI CC# map to program data. Right-click controls to set MIDI CC#s.
Added save/load of default MIDI CC# map as well as to .pam (Poly-Ana MIDI Map) files.
Programs and banks now saved as “chunks” by host. Note that .fxp and .fxb files from older version of Poly-Ana should still load in most hosts.
Expanded Poly-Ana program file format, replaced .polyana with .pap (Poly-Ana program) and .pab (Poly-Ana bank) files. Old .polyana files from previous versions WILL still load.
Implemented MIDI “all notes off” and “all sound off” controllers.
Prevented opening of more than one file open/save dialog at a time.
0.23 – 2006-11-03
Quality setting was accidentally inverted at version 0.20. Fixed!
Crash when Polyphony set to 12 voices fixed.
0.22 – 2006-11-02
Limited parameters to safe range, fixed value going negative problem when in linear knob mode.
Fixed linear knob mode stopping when turned counter clockwise for knobs with 360 degree ranges
Fixed wrong value displayed for Envelope 3 Decay (did not affect sound).
Fixed voice assigner problems with 1 voice polyphony. Setting Polyphony to 1 voice now forces Unison mode.
Completed Relative Circular knob mode. Switch knobs between Circular and Relative Circular by pressing SHIFT before clicking on the control.
Added option to force knob mode to Circular, Relative Circular, Linear or to use the host’s preference.
0.21 – 2006-10-25 Oops!
Fixed a bug in the new dropdown list mod selectors that was making some values appear to be off by one.
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“Ana’s Attack”
