I have spent a lot of time creating atmospheric\ambient\FX samples for the Homegrown Sounds Sample CDs and as anyone who has done it knows it is a time consuming process. The initial idea behind Astralis was to make a synth which made this process easier with plenty of soundscaping abilities. I began in 2005 and the first synth was over complex and very CPU hungry although was capable of the type of sounds I was looking for. Since then I have rebuilt the synth many times, slowly simplifying the interface and reducing some features, and have heavily optimised and re-optimized the synth to get the load time/CPU usage to an acceptable standard for a synth of such capability. I am pleased with the end result, it has been a long process and it is a relief to finally have the finished synth. I hope that people find it an intuitive synth to use, I have changed the control interface more times than I can remember trying to achieve the most logical layout.

There is a manual included with the synth available from the start menu after install, but I will briefly go through each section here:

Effects

Astralis A is the Oscillator based Synthesizer from the Astralis VSTi Pack and uses a Dual Oscillator for Synth 1 and a Spectral Oscillator for Synth 2, which is swappable for a second Dual Oscillator.

Astralis B uses the same system but has a single filter and a slightly reduced feature set with the aim of being lighter on CPU usage.

DUAL Oscillator

Uses 2 Oscillators with a variety of mix modes and is capable of a wide array of sounds.

OSC A/B: Selects the wave type between:

• Sine
• Saw
• Ramp
• Soft Ramp
• Peak Ramp
• Square
• Triangle
• Peak
• Octava
• Cluster 1
• Cluster 2
• H-A/H-B: Selects the number of Harmonics the Oscillator Uses.

Mode: Selects the interaction mode between the 2 oscillators between:

Single - Wave A only (standard mode)

Dual A+B, Dual A-B: PW controls phase of both waves

Dual Mix: PW controls Mix between waves A/B

Astralis A:

• Dual Oscillator - 11 Waveforms, Harmonic Control, 9 Mix Modes and Realtime Modulation
• Spectral Oscillator - Sine based oscillator with 16 Partials and realtime modulation. The Spectral Oscillator can be swapped for a second Dual Osc.
• 2 complete synths, synth 1 uses the Dual Oscillator.
• 2 Polyphonic Filters with Low Pass, High Pass, Band Pass, Notch, Peak A, Peak B and both cascadable up to 8 times.

Astralis B:

• As Above but 2 Oscillator Single Synth
• 1 Polyphonic Filters with Low Pass, High Pass, Band Pass, Notch, Peak A, Peak B and both cascadable up to 8 times.

NOTE: Astralis A will be replaced by Astralis Bion, but the original Astralis A and B synths are still available as part of the Astralis Collection.

If interplanetary excursions are your thing, you will love Astralis A , a synth to lose yourself in. The Astralis synths are packed with soundscaping features, an intuitive hands on professional sound design environment.Ideal for any style of music though slightly inclined more towards Ambient, Psy, and atmospheric textures. It is a tweakers synth, be warned whole nights can vanish very easily!

The Astralis VSTi Synthesizer Pack contains 2 Synths, A and B are both oscillator Based. Visit the following pages for more info on each:

Astralis A and B - Main Feature List

Astralis A and B Oscillator Info

A look through some of the features

They all share most features which include:

• A Microtuning Patch System
• Two Modulation Sequencers
• A Gate Sequencer