Topic: Preview: Zynewave zPEQ

@suges wrote:

To Super Crunchy, I’ve never heard anyone say in my life 5 bands is “overkill”…maybe “good enough” but not overkill. Can’t always “choose another instrument to replace the part” for example, if I was mixing a Britney Spears record and HER VOCALS needed more than 5 bands to sound good (which is likely 😉 ) would you suggest replacing HER? Hahahh.

My background is electronic and dance – and I always get sounds to work from teh start – so that’s my experience 🙂 Of course, everyone works differently and to achieve different things, so all our opinions are valid (including mine)

@Zynewave wrote:

There’s an idea for another plugin: zPectrum.

Yes Suges suggestion is a very good one!

I intend to raise the price some time this year. It will probably happen when the Podium guide is completed, and a few more z plugins are available. The next pricepoint could be $150.

That is not a bad starting point for a price increase.

Although I would prefer selling e.g. one license at $500 rather than 5 licenses at $100, I just don’t feel I can charge that much money for a download only application. If you pay $800 for a product, I assume most people would want to have it supplied in a box.

I think getting more money for each license is the ideal set up. I don’t think you are too far off being able to charge up to $400 – $500 for Podium.

As for your views on not being able to charge $500 for a download only application…maybe so maybe not. Sony have a few packages that are boxed and can be downloaded. Price wise ACID pro 5 for instance http://www.sonymediasoftware.com/shopping/item.asp?PID=279&cid=109 can be downloaded for $299. I doubt your download installer would be close to ACID’S 84MB! Not really a problem with so many people with faster connections anyway.

While maybe selling Podium as a download only application at $500 could be pricey, I think certainly up to $299 or maybe even more could be possible. I guess it depends on the the Podium feature set in future, or by the time you decide to raise the price.

Just as an example Podium IMHO is not exactly trailing ACID by a great deal…

1.CD burning.
2.Video Support
3.Time Stretching
4.Rewire

That is about it in my opinion as far as key features go. While ACID’s media manager is very useful Podiums List view can achieve almost the same thing but just without tempo sync.

ACID ships with a few NI plugs and a large loop collection. But while nice to have they are not part of ACID.

Podium has the following that ACID does not.

1.Considerably cheaper price, about $200 cheaper (the first consideration for most buyers anyway so a very big deal)

2.Tiny install foot print. If I am not mistaken it does not not even make changes to the Windows registry but even if it does, there is very little change for such a feature packed product.

3.Far more advanced Piano roll than ACID 5 and equally capable compared to even V6 IMHO.

4.Instruments can be inserted into a project in real time without stopping the audio engine. ACID will stop playback for this. Real time or Live usage is one of the big Ableton buzz words. Podium is it’s equal when doing anything in real time and better than ACID5 here. Few people know this.

5.Support! (not that ACID does not have any but…)Frits has really kept his word about this “Software updates are released frequently and are planned with the involvement of the user community.” For years now he has done exactly what he promised and implemented many user suggestions along the way (including mine).
As someone who works *strictly solo* he can respond far quicker than a larger set up.

6.Cutting edge features, Podium was one of the first hosts to offer 64 bit file support, and dual core support. Remarkable. (Edit: yes ACID has cutting edge features as well but Frits efforts as a one man band in this area are superb).

7. Simple download, no activation required. Simple and easy.

I have used ACID as a comparison because it can be bought as a download at present even though it can also be bought boxed. So there is not a great deal of difference between the two downloadable products. But the price difference is great.

ACID and Podium are both great products anyway. The comparison is not a criticism of ACID. Of course there are more ACID features and even Podium features not mentioned here.

Certainly as more features hit the Podium spec sheet $299 would not be unreasonable for a downloadable product IMHO but rewire would be expected. Any more than that price wise and notation might come into play as even Cubase LE and Cakewalk Music Creator (£19 download and £25 boxed) have notation features with rewire support. Cakewalk Music Creator has video support as well.

Also if you do offer a boxed product in future a fully written manual would have to make an appearance. I suppose a getting started guide could be enough with the current full PDF guide/manual.

SUGGESTION TIME…

Frits you mentioned a synth some time ago, I don’t think you gave it a name (not sure) but you did describe it as fun so maybe zfun was an initial description for the plug? 😆

Anyways…Tracktion has a very simple Sampler, really simple I just wondered if you might develop a built in sampler for Podium with support for say 16,24 and 32bit files at least?

Literally thousands of samples are given away with Computer Music, Music Tech Mag, and Future Music every month (I have quite a few) It would be nice to at least be able drop one sample into the Zsampler (he he) and be able to play it across a keyboard.

Live 5 has a very similar sampler to Tracktion, more advanced but the idea is the same. Drop a sample into it and you are good to go. Quick and easy. I have considered getting Kontakt 2 or Independence but the cost, patches, bugs, dongle (independence) e.t.c have put me off the idea.

I would prefer a built in and very simple sampler that can over time of course, have other key features added to it. Less can be more. Certainly when it relates to productivity.

Some synths have sample support built in, so the synth you are working on could maybe have sample support? The sampler idea is a very simple one, so possibly a simple separate plug may be a better idea.

Simple samplers can be very useful and it would certainly raise the value of Podium and make it even more self sufficient.

New users trying out the demo for instance could load it up with their own samples e.t.c.

What do you think Frits?

I think $149 is a reasonable price point for Podium with some plugins added in.

I also think that $299 is not an unreasonable amount but there are few gaps that would need to be filled before you could reasoanbly get there. Here are few:

– midi export (at first I didn’t think much of this but when collaberating with someone remotely it sure is hand to just export the midid and send it.

– fade in/out cross fade (I think this one is pretty important. I’ve looked at grouping capabilities in other daws, and while that’s kind of neat the ability to do fades at the object level could be a showstopper)

– rewire (while I haven’t needed I do understand the requirement)

One more thing…. When is the zeq going to be ready? I’m just about to start working on the mix of an arrangement I’ve been working and I would much sooner give this a try than go with something else. If it’s just around the corner I’ll wait abit.

@Zynewave wrote:

I just wondered if you might develop a built in sampler for Podium with support for say 16,24 and 32bit files at least?

I probably will. It would be ideal to use the sound objects in the project as sources for the sample player plugin. The Podium sound editor is also suitable for editing waveforms used e.g. in a wavetable synth.

Great. Looking forward to that!

Not the first one I’m planning

I think a separate plug is a better idea anyway. Take as much time as you need. 😉

I also think that $299 is not an unreasonable amount but there are few gaps that would need to be filled before you could reasoanbly get there. Here are few:

– midi export (at first I didn’t think much of this but when collaberating with someone remotely it sure is hand to just export the midid and send it.

– fade in/out cross fade (I think this one is pretty important. I’ve looked at grouping capabilities in other daws, and while that’s kind of neat the ability to do fades at the object level could be a showstopper)

– rewire (while I haven’t needed I do understand the requirement)

Yes, agreed, I forgot about the fade/ fade out feature that would be nice to have in Podium as well as midi export and rewire. I think they are all on the list already anyway so they should appear in Podium at some point. 😉

@super_crunchy wrote:

My background is electronic and dance – and I always get sounds to work from teh start – so that’s my experience 🙂 Of course, everyone works differently and to achieve different things, so all our opinions are valid (including mine)

Yeah no doubt, sorry for not quoting you exactly. I do deep house strictly, and just like you said, all the synth tracks and drums tracks, 9 times out of 10 I barely EQ them. But because it’s DEEP house, it usually has vocals and live instruments (like real bass, piano, guitar, whatever) in it, and often those need some serious EQing.

oh i made it happen again but it turns out the track doesn’t have a subtrack lol so maybe that is why?

yeah I am indeed on a p4. go for it, I’d be happy to help 🙂