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| le B U Z Z L I N E S - INTERVIEW EXCLUSIVE | |||
| Eric Iverson, ObjektSynth | |||
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Objekt is Curt Malouin, an engineer who's been programming
for 19 years, and Eric Iverson, an artsy type who's been
programming synthesizers for about 20 years. Back in '93
they started kicking around ideas for synth design because
they wanted to have better, more efficient tools to use for
making music. The rest is...well, the rest is the interview! le BUZZ: Tell me a bit about the history of your company. CI: In the summer of '96, Curt visited Be Inc.'s offices and met Alex Osadzinski, who introduced him to the BeBox and the BeOS. Impressed with the potential there, upon returning home Curt immediately bought a BeBox. Late in '96, Curt showed me a barely functional early beta of what would become ObjektSynth. Impressed with the potential there, I offered to help Curt in any way he could, and the two of us formed a partnership called Objekt. The name came from our music making endeavor, which actually started in 1992 under the name Ex Machina. Since dozens of techno/industrial bands also use that name, we changed it to Objekt in '95. le BUZZ: What prompted you to create products for the Be operating system? CI: We had tried to develop software synths for two other platforms, but the development tools sucked so it was hard to get up much steam. The aforementioned Alex, and the fact that Curt wanted a dual processor machine to replace his Mac 660AV also helped. le BUZZ: What are you releasing first? CI: Our software synthesizer, ObjektSynth, was first released in Beta form almost 2 years ago, and a commercial "Preview Release" about a year ago, making us one of the first commercial developers for BeOS, though by no means the first. Version 1.x is available for PowerPC and x86 and runs on R3 and R4. le BUZZ: Tell me about its features and why you think it will be especially useful to audio people? CI: Where do I start? ObjektSynth is a modular synthesizer that gives you the kind of functionality you used to be able to get only from racks and racks of hardware. The current lineup of modules is mostly geared toward familiar analog functions, so an old hand at synth programming can start using it right away. It's a multi-timbral synth, so you can get as many simultaneous voices as your CPU will allow! It features very fast response to MIDI, so you can actually play it in real-time without noticing any "lag." You can even program it with a MIDI fader box, so you aren't limited to changing one parameter at a time. Many synth players spend thousands of dollars every year on new synthesizers to replace their old models. They can save a lot of money by going with a software synth and get free or very low cost upgrades, without giving up the way they are used to working. le BUZZ: What are your future plans for products on the Be platform? CI: We're working on the next version of ObjektSynth, which you'll be hearing a lot more about in the next month or two. It'll have improved support for the new media kit and application scripting, as well as UI enhancements, new modules, and other new features. Stay tuned! (We will! Watch for a review of it, right here on le BUZZ!) |
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