Up for some squabbling squid sounds, some fabulous fishy fins or some down-right satanic bubbles? Never fear, POSEIDON is here!

There is something about watery synths, I liked Orca from the first tone it generated. True, true, I haven’t used it a lot, but it was rather limited compared to POSEIDON. I liked POSEIDON from the first tone as well, mostly because the default preset sounds really cool, especially with some pitch-bending and modulation. In fact, I made a 30 second song (or whatever you’d like to call it) with this preset, some filtered drum loops and a few other VIs before I even decided to browse the rest of the presets or tweak any parameters at all!

Windows (and some wicked things)

POSEIDON has two windows, the presets window and the spectrum window. Starting with the presets window, to the right is a list of different categories, timbres, expression and styles (picture way down in this article). Clicking any of these brings up the available presets in the left column. Clicking another doesn’t de-select the first but instead adds the new category to the list as well. Clicking a selected category again de-selects it. A little like dealing with an Apple Loops browser in Logic or GarageBand. At the top of the plug-in you’ll also find a drop-down banks menu.

Now enter the spectrum window, the first thing that strikes you is how good it looks, especially if you play a couple of notes while you have it open. Another thing to notice here is that the left column no longer is a list of the same presets, which I found a bit confusing at first, instead it has turned into sound models. Clicking any of these doesn’t change the controls of POSEIDON like clicking a preset does, it just makes a new sound “stand model” for the controls. Most of the sounds are analyzed samples of real instruments, but one category (artificial) contains mathematically generated models. I should also say that you can zoom the spectrum itself in an Ableton Live manner, that is, simply click and drag the rulers.

Wait a minute, analyzed samples? Yup, a simple click and you can import any file to analyze so it ends up in the right column with the other sound models. It doesn’t stop at sound files though, and let me tell you that this really flipped my wig, it can in fact analyze .bmp images! I in fact analyzed the Digidesign logo but didn’t really dig the sound of it so I think they should change it…

At the deep bottom

Alright, so beneath the windows and the right column we have the controls. First of we have the standard synthesizer controls such as two LFOs, arpeggiator, midi controls, tuning and ensemble controls. There’s also a keyboard and the standard pitch-/modulation wheel.

These synth controls can help us come up with some pretty cool stuff, but the time manipulator section gets us even further. I found this to be very easy to use, especially in conjunction with the spectrum window. You see, whenever a note is played a line appears in the spectrum window, almost sort of like scanning through the spectrum to show what’s being played at the exact moment. In other words, if you don’t trust your ears you can always rely on your eyes. The time manipulator section features a bunch of controls, like knobs for position, time, loopstart and length. The exact use of these knobs becomes very apparent when you hold a tone and let the lines “scan” through the spectrum while you’re turning the knobs. There’s also a drop-down menu for choosing different types of looping options (you know, when you hold a note).

Also an important section is the modeling section, here you can truly change the character of the sound with controls like bright and spread. This is also where you find VirSyns unique F-Domain filters, they also change the sound drastically. There are several filters to choose from, such as high pass, low pass, two combs, anti resonance and an inverse filter. Saying “changing the sound drastically” is no overstatement, you can do a whole lot with these controls and each filter is certainly different from the other.

Once you know what’s what there’s really no problem separating the different sections because then you can easily figure out where one ends and the next one begins, but to tell you the truth, I didn’t even notice that all these were separate sections until I saw it in the manual. Some thin lines separating them would’ve helped mark this out more clearly.

What else? Some pretty advanced panning and level controls (complete with EQ), and a bunch of effects. In the effects section you’ll find reverbs, overdrive (with several characteristics such as tube and tape), delays, chorus, flanger and phaser. Not bad.

Even more?

One cool thing this synth has is a… Slot machine! I kid you not… It’s basically a random button that loads up a sound sources and envelope settings. It’s pretty cool. Of all the times I tried it I never encountered any programs that bugged out or didn’t work.

POSEIDON also has a midi learn feature, it’s just a matter of right-clicking and turning your controller to make it learn. Nice. Normally you won’t see on the screen what controls are assigned to midi, but the click of a button quickly displays that.

In an older version of POSEIDON it seemed to have the memory of a gold fish. If you dialed in a sound and closed the plug-in window and then reopened it, it would be set back to default. This however, have been fixed in a free update, so no need to worry about that anymore.

The possibilities

VirSyn have reused the oscillator from their synth CUBE which you might be familiar with. You can of course use POSEIDON to emulate instruments but in my opinion it’s in the more synth-styled department that it really shines. There are some wicked good sounding presets in there and you can tweak them to the end of the world and back. Really, there is so many ways you can manipulate the sound that you’ll never get bored with it.

Back to the sounds themselves, for you landscape builders out there, you definitely must give POSEIDON a go. It might sound like it’s only capable of synth-styled sounds and pads, but of course it isn’t, the first preset I made was actually an Appalachian duclaimer arpeggio, analyzed from a one-note sample I had lying around. One of POSEIDONs biggest strengths could be it’s intuitive workflow. Working with it in real-time is really something else thanks to all the possibilities, in many cases you can play and manipulate the sound at the same time.

Conclusion

Of course this synth can be used for more than bubbly sounds, I mean, it can analyze any sound file and it has a load of presets for all kind of instruments, so don’t be fooled by it’s heathen god-appearance. Despite being an advanced synth in terms of possibilities, I find it fairly easy to operate, the spectrum window helps a lot, but most of the controls are obvious as well, at least if you take a quick peak in the manual. POSEIDON is also very good to work with in real time thanks to VirSyns unique approach, and of course the ever appreciated midi learn function. The sound generated by it is good to my ears, and especially a lot of experimental synth sounds have ended up in my sessions. Go to VirSyns website and listen to the audio demos, they say many of them are in fact made by one preset only.

Now VirSyn, can we please have a synth named Odin, just for the sake of it? I’ll help you design it!

VirSyn