OUTLINES is the newest Kontakt instrument from THEPHONOLOOP, a company founded by two Polish music producers and sound designers, Roman Chmurak and Filip Dobrowolski. Their approach is to make instruments and experiment with sounds they would use in their own work—which is exactly the kind of thing you want to hear from a developer.
THE OUTLINES SOUND ENGINE
As described by the developers:
The engine in outlines is built around two independent granular layers, allowing different playback approaches to run side by side. Each layer runs on its own engine, making it possible to combine traditional polyphonic playback with sequenced or granular movement.
In practice, this means you can run two polyphonic layers, two animated/granular layers, or blend both approaches together. The layers can interact, contrast, or complement each other, opening up a wide range of paths to explore.To keep the workflow intuitive, the engine also features a system of five instrument modes – designed to offer quick starting points while still encouraging deeper sound exploration.
The instrument offers five modes of operation, which determine the XY pad controls, expression control, and animation programming.
- Singular
- Duets
- Sculpt
- Lengths
- Orbits
Detailed descriptions can be found by clicking on the current mode name to expose the other possibilities.
The interface for this instrument has several layers and offers deep user manipulation of samples and sound sources. It offers four slots for sample layers, XY pads for performance and real-time processing, modulation envelopes, onboard FX, granular processing, a feature-rich 16-step sequencer, the ability to load in your own samples, and more.
MIDI can be mapped to all controls and can be configured for MPE and Polyphonic Aftertouch. There are several modulation types, including Orbit, a unique two-dimensional modulation that operates in conjunction with the XY pads. You can also record XY movements.
The Noise section features various noise types such as scraping, friction, mechanism, hardware, vinyl, foley, and field recording sounds. This section also has dedicated modulation parameters.
The onboard effects include chorus, flanger, delays, reverb, resonator, and filtering. The Master FX section includes a highpass filter, EQ, compression, and stereo width controls.
SOUND SOURCES
This instrument is far too deep to dive into every parameter without regurgitating the manual. Suffice it to say that tweakers will enjoy the ability to fine tune and adjust things to their personal taste. But the robust collection of presets are excellent starting points and are organized by general texture type with several variations of each.
The main sound source categories include: acoustic, modular, tape loop, synth, and combinations. Then there are search terms like bowed, plucked, wind, perc, analog, digital, tonal, atonal, looped, and one-shot. You can quickly find the sound you’re after in the search matrix and mark favorites for future use.
The product page provides an exhaustive list of all sound sources that includes:
- Acoustic sounds: 119
- Various/Electric: 6
- Synth: 67
- Modular / Sound Design: 139
- Tape Loops: 65
- Noise / Texture: 103
VIDEOS AND EXAMPLES
There are over 400 hundred presets to explore which will take you some time initially, but will be well-worth the effort to discover the possibilities of OUTLINES. Below are some videos provided by the developers.
Promo Video
Preset Examples
Sound Engine Overview
CONCLUSIONS
OUTLINES is an excellent instrument for music production or sound design work. The textural possibilities are infinite, thanks to the inspiring combinations of modular synthesis sounds, field recording, and acoustic samples. It can be used for all sorts of tonal applications as well, making it equally at home in the context of commercial music production, sound design, and experimental music. This is a versatile device that exploits all the capabilities of Kontakt in a well-crafted and inspired instrument.
EXTRAS
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