The Orb

The innovative Orb feature is both a remarkable sound manipulation tool and an intuitive performance interface—it can be thought of as a “circular controller.” With a single click of the mouse, it is possible to instantly manipulate a sound in a wide variety of ways. Best of all, the Orb automatically works with every Patch a user has, there’s no setup necessary.

The Orb is a fun and intuitive way of introducing movement and animation into the sound by simply moving the Orb cursor with a mouse, a MIDI controller or in the case of an iPad or Windows Multitouch, with fingers directly on the Orb itself. As the Orb moves around the concentric circles, it morphs between automatically generated parameter scenes in Omnisphere’s STEAM engine in a highly intelligent and musical manner—all Patch-dependent—manipulating the sound in subtle or radical ways appropriate to that particular Patch.

The Orb’s unique dynamic results are based on Radius and Angle controls. The Angle defines which scenes or sets of parameters it manipulates, and the Radius defines the intensity of those manipulations. That means the closer to the edges of the circle the cursor is moved, the more dramatic the changes will be. Moving the cursor to the center of the Orb or pressing the CLEAR button returns to the sound of the original Patch. The overall intensity of the sound modifications can be determined with the DEPTH slider.

If you don’t like what the Orb has created, a complete new set of manipulations can be chosen by simply rolling (clicking) the DICE button, which instantly creates a brand new group of intelligent sonic modifications and effects to try. There’s no limit to how many serendipitous sonic variations the DICE can create—opening up the vast power of the STEAM engine to every user, regardless of synthesis knowledge. For advanced synthesists seeking maximum flexibility, the Orb can also be setup manually and used as a new modulation source in Omnisphere’s Mod Matrix.

The INERTIA controls of the Orb allows the creation of a ‘movement trail’ after letting go of the Orb, just like a ball might roll and bounce off the walls of a circular enclosure, adding a musical symmetry to the “performance” of an Orb interaction. The ATTRACTOR button causes the ORB cursor to behave like a non-linear pendulum.

It is also possible to Record performance movements directly into the Orb and play the performance back in sync with the host. The Orb’s movements and sonic results can be saved within a UserPatch, User Multi or the host’s session for later recall. The movement of the Orb can also be automated in the host. Each part in Omnisphere has its own Orb, which means that multiple Orbs can manipulate different sounds simultaneously.

The ideal control surface for Omnisphere’s Orb are the multi-touch interface of the Omni TR iPad app, but the Orb can also be used with a standard mouse, trackpads, Windows Multitouch, and MIDI controllers.

ORB POWER SWITCH

This switch will turn the Orb ON or OFF. Note that turning the Orb ON will activate some processing modules and enable FX units (in the Aux Rack) in your Patch in order to ensure moving the cursor creates some interesting sounds. Turning the Orb OFF deactivates any processing modules and removes any FX that were instantiated when it was ON.