Galbanum has introduced Architecture NI Waveforms 2 - a collection of over 1,800 Wavetables available in three popular formats.

Wavetables are single cycle periodic waveforms that form the most fundamental building block of synthesis. They are the sound generators, and can be thought of as the oscillator of a classic analog synth, but they provide infinitely more variability in shape and spectrum. Wavetables are responsible for determining a given sound's primary timbre, or "tone color". This collection offers a huge variety of waveforms logically organized in sub-folder categories.

The first version of this collection contained over 1,000 waveforms and was originally developed for Galbanum's MetaSynth content DVD, Architecture Volume One. In June of 2006 it was translated to NI Absynth format and released as the "Architecture NI Absynth Waveforms" collection. In August of 2006 a large part of it was then also licensed to NI to use as composite Wavetables in Massive. This is the second version of the library for Absynth and MetaSynth. It is the first time it has been released in Universal (.wav) format, and opens the library to a sea of new users. It contains more than 800 new waveforms to push the total to over 1,800

The collection contains some very interesting new categories and vastly expands some of the previous ones. Many of the new waveforms were designed not only to be used as oscillators, but also to function in more advanced capacities depending upon what application they are used in. These uses include things such as LFO shapes, envelope shapes, modulation shapes, distortion curves, and much more. Users interested in the true bleeding-edge of modern sound-design are encouraged to explore these immensely powerful areas.

According to Galbanum, anyone with aspirations to be on the cutting edge of modern sound-design, or lead new movements in all forms of progressive electronica will find this collection invaluable. Key users include sound-designers, producers, scoring professionals, artists, multi-media developers, and all synthesis and sound-design enthusiasts who are looking to expand their sonic pallet into new territories.

These products are a simple and inexpensive method to quickly and effortlessly expand Absynth's, MetaSynth's, or other third-party synths' and samplers' awesome sonic potential in various ways including:

• Vast expansion of available timbre pallet for wavetable based synths
• Transformation of sampler instruments into synth instruments
• Bleeding-edge sound-design using complex waveforms as modulation sources and other advanced techniques

Galbanum's Andrew Souter has been closely involved with the development of MetaSynth for several years and is the sole developer of Architecture Volume One. He is part of NI's sound-design team, and worked on the recent Absynth 4.0 and Massive releases.

The Architecture Waveforms collection was developed by Souter using tools that allowed for a new level of detail and precision that was previously impossible. Many of them were computed algorithmically in 64-bit floating point using Visual C++. Many others were tediously edited at the single sample level - single sample point that is. Doing this ensured that all waveforms were as mathematically perfect as possible and represent exactly the perfect form at the highest possible fidelity for a given function.

Pricing & Availability

The Architecture Waveforms collections are available for purchase and direct download.

• Architecture NI Waveforms 2: $24.95 or $9.95 for upgrades.
• Architecture MS Waveforms: $24.95 or $9.95 for upgrades.
• Architecture Universal Waveforms: $29.95.