Kosmos is a scripted front end for Kontakt v3 and above designed to create an easy to use dual oscillator synthesizer. Besides being a front end for the Homegrown Sample libraries, the main goal was to move away from the idea of fixed presets inside Kontakt and to provide a simple method of randomizing new instruments on the fly, whilst providing enough controls to tweak the sounds to taste. This leads to a much more unique preset than using pre-defined presets and is a creatively rewarding way to work as opposed to scrolling through presets. In essence Kosmos is an attempt to import some of the best features of HGS synths into Kontakt.

 

Also included is a custom built gate sequencer with many play modes and some live triggers for real-time manipulation.

Features

• 2 Oscillators using a large selection of WAV based instruments
• Each Oscillator has:
• a distinct selectable filter type
• 26 different AMP Envelopes to choose from
• 9 different Mix Modes
• 1 LFO mapped to Filter Cutoff
• 21 shapes to choose from
• Tempo synced Frequency
• Retrigger Enable
• 19 different Randomize modes mapped to a randomize button
• Reverb with selectable amount and Time
• Delay with selectable amount tempo synced time
• Modulator selectable between Flanger, Phaser and Chorus at various rates
• Gate Sequencer with 15 Play Modes
• Efficient Scripting - elements not in use are disabled to minimise CPU usage
• Uses Disk Streaming to minimise memory usage

WAV Based Oscillators

Each Kosmos based synth uses a selection of internal Waveforms as its sound source which are selectable via the Wave A and Wave B knobs.

The AMP envelope for each Wave is selected from the list above the knobs from the following selection:

• Full – No Attack, Sustain 100%
• Pad – No Attack, lower Sustain
• Pad Fade – No Attack, long Decay, lower Sustain
• Slow 1 – Slow Attack, Slow Decay
• Slow 2 – Slow Attack, Faster Decay
• Stab – Short Decay to no Sustain
• Pluck 1 – Shorter Decay to no Sustain
• Pluck 2 – Very short Decay to no Sustain
• Swell 1 – Slow Attack, short Decay
• Swell 2 – Slower Attack, short Decay
• Bridge 1 – Equal slow Attack/Decay
• Bridge 2 – Equal slower Attack/Decay
• SH Rel 1 – Very short Release
• SH Rel 2 – Slight Attack/Hold Decay – Very short Release
• SH Rel 3 – Moderate Attack/Hold Decay – Very short Release
• Pulse 1 – No Attack/short Hold/very short Decay
• Pulse 2 – No Attack/shorter Hold/very short Decay
• Pulse 3 – No Attack/shorter Hold/very short Decay
• Long Rel – some Hold/Decay and long release
• FULL LR – Sustain 100% – long Release
• Piano 1 – moderate Decay to nothing
• Piano 2 – longer Decay to nothing
• Piano 3 – long Decay to nothing
• Fadein 1 – Slow Attack to Full
• Fadein 2 – Slower Attack to Full
• Fadein 3 – very Slow Attack to Full

The Wave Mode determines mainly different tuning properties for Wave B:

• Wave A Only – Uses only Wave A Oscillator
• Wave A+B Modes – The Waveforms are mixed and Wave B is detuned by the described value, 1O = 1 Octave, +5 = plus 5 semitones etc..
• Random – Probably not very useful but each note trigger will use a different waveform.

Filters

 

Each Oscillator can have an individual Filter, although both share the same Cutoff, Resonance and Envelope values. This can be very interesting for example when using a Low Pass and a Hi Pass.

• VEL - This determines the amount of Velocity to the filter cutoff. NOTE: 50% is no effect, anything above is has a postive effect ie; the harder a note is played the higher the cutoff. Below 50% has the opposite effect so a setting of zero means the harder a note is played the lower the filter cutoff.
• ENV – The amount of effect the Filter Envelope has on the the filter cutoff. This is the same as VEL in that 50% means no effect.
• Filter Attack – The amount of time for the Attack stage of the Filter Envelope.
• Filter Decay – The amount of time for the Decay stage of the Filter Envelope.

The following Filters are available to choose from the Kontakt selection:

• Pro53 Low Pass
• 6 Pole Low Pass
• 4 Pole High Pass
• Moog Low Pass
• Vowel
• Phaser

LFO

 

 The LFO is dedicated to the filter:

• Retrigger – Whether the LFO Retriggers with each note played.
• LFO Shape – Selects which shape is used, all the usual shapes are there plus a series of custom more complex shapes.
• LFO Frequency – This knob determines the speed of the LFO in tempo synced steps.
• LFO → Filter Cutoff – The amount of effect the LFO has on the Filter.

Effects Section

 

The effects section contains a Reverb, a tempo synced Delay and a selectable Modulator:

• Time – How long the Reverb tail is
• Reverb – The Amount of Reverb.
• Delay Time – The tempo synced time of the delay.
• Delay – The amount of Delay
• Modulator Type – This selects between Flanger, Phaser and Chorus, x denotes the speed in 10% steps.
• Modulate – The amount of Flanger/Phaser/Chorus

Randomize

 

• Random Mode – Here you can select how the random button behaves, there are 19 modes to choose from which should be fairly self explanatory. This menu also gives access to some one-shot commands such as set all to Default which re-initializes the synth, as well as a few specific random triggers. When using the latter, the mode will resort back to it’s previous setting.

Gate Sequencer

 

The polyphonic Gate Sequencer re-triggers notes to the specified rhythmic pattern at the selected clock division using the current selected mode. It can use up to 32 steps.

• Play Sequence – The top row determines the rhythmic pattern to be played. This row should really be though of as on/off buttons but KSL only provides the slider table. Any slider above the centre line will play.
• Velocity – This determines the Velocity each note played. Note: Kosmos only uses a slight amount of AMP Velocity as it is designed to be more of a pad machine than a Piano, however this means that when velocity is assigned to the Filter Cutoff you can get some nice Filter Cutoff Patterns.
• Note Length – This slider table controls the length of each note as a percentage of the current tempo step size.
• Randomizers – On the right there are randomizer buttons for each of the slider tables as well as a global randomizer which will randomize all 3.
• Tempo – This determines the clock division of the host clock used for playback.
• Number of Steps – How many steps are used by the sequence.
• Mode – The Mode determines how the sequencer will play back:
• OFF – This switches off the sequencer.
• FWD – The Sequence plays forwards.
• REV – The sequence is played in Reverse.
• ALT1 – Plays forwards then backwards
• ALT2 – Plays backwards then forwards
• RND 1 – Each note is random
• RND ST – A random sequence is generated when the first note is played and will be used for all subsequent sequences until no keys are held.
• ADV x1, x2, x3, x4 – The 1^st sequence will play forwards normally, the next triggered key will advance by the x number. This is great for syncopating chords.
• BAR – All sequences will wait for the next bar start to begin playing.
• S ALT 1, 2, 3, 4 – Various modes which will use different play modes via a flip-flop for each subsequent sequence, for example switching between FWD and REV with each subsequent triggered sequence.

The trigger Octave – This is located on your keyboard at C1, and each key in this octave will cause the following:

• C – Adds an octave to the sequence
• C# – Adds 5 semitones
• D – Adds an Octave (useful for adding 2 octaves when combine with C
• D# – Adds 7 Semitones
• E – Stutter – This prevents the sequence from progressing causing a stutter effect.
• F – Open – Makes all notes full length
• F# – Adds 3 semitones
• G – halves the tempo
• G# Removes 2 semitones
• A – doubles the tempo
• A# – Adds 1 Semitone
• B – Sets all note Lengths to the minimum.
• All Pitches are accumulative so they can be added together!