The most powerful drum synth I've ever used // In-depth look at Opal by Fors

I think that one thing that should be mentioned about this great drum synth is that one of the Fors developers is Ess Mattisoson, who also worked on the development of the FM synth in the Elektron Digitone. You can see that in Opal there are many features that are similar to Elektron boxes

@GourlieRecords what kind of Man calls their Record Label name Girly Records?


but then I saw Washington State in bio....You must be a Seattle Cuck

Cheers

Very nice tutorial! Thank you very much for your effort. Bought Opal 3 days ago and I am blown away by its capabilities. Phantastic tool.

Thanks for the video, I learned a lot

I bought this and really like it, HOWEVER... I feel like there's sort of an elephant in the room regarding this virtual instrument, that being cymbal and hi-hat/shaker sounds. I've come closest with the granular synth, but I still haven't been able to get anything close to what I would consider a good, strong hi-hat, ride, or shaker sound. That's kind of a big deal. Am I missing something? I keep having to prop this otherwise great thing up with my Analog Rytm or Digitakt as a result.

Oh this would’ve been a dream on a hardware sampler with a large screen. Dreaming aside - iOS app please :-)

These sounds are not interesting to the ear. At least not for my taste.

No punch and generic FM plugin sound. What drum machines die you use so far, if this is the best, you ever used?

Great walkthrough. Elektron workflow is totally evident here and is awesome to have ITB.

the output tip is very useful! thanx

I absolutely love Opal. Does anyone know by any chance how to actually automate any of the parameters in ableton without using the inbuilt step sequencer? I would just like to automate lets say the warp in the Arrangement view. But the automation doesn`t pop up. Or is there another way to basically record changes live?

Pretty much a $50 Syntakt.

Lost me a Max 4 Live... Is like they make great instruments but they cripple them at the same time by only making them available like this, Make a VST,AU,iPad version. the dev's already spend time and resources making it. Might as well make them available to Use in Other DAW's or Stand alone. As it stands you have to Shell out $$$ Money for Ableton + Max 4 Live + Application, etc. SO CUMBERSOME.
I guess I'll stick with my Analog Rytm Mk2 and Overbridge for now

Hi thanks for the video!! Do you know if there's a way to sequence multiple drum samples on the slate ?

Too bad it is for Live only.. maybe one day ?

Great vid. I just bought this. It wasn't an impulse. I've been checking this thing out for a while. At present, I am choosing to only use M4L and Ableton devices. Thanks!

this is an AD

Nice video! Although, hardware sequencers like oxi one and others have these and much more features and prob interface too 😁!

Holy shit. it actually costs x10 that amount because now I need to get Ableton too :(!! the world seems to be constantly forcing me to use it heh he

Too bad ableton is unfathomably overpriced.

Sold me in 10 seconds.

Looks cool. Reminds me of the new hardware drum machines that use multiple synths. Thank you! 🎉

Opal is amazing fun; though if you like it, you’ll probably LOVE Drambo on iPad, paired with Hilda, FAC Drums or maybe Drum Computer. All the per step modulation power of Opal (x100) and some incredibly fun and sophisticated sound engines.

Opal does an incredible job distilling the essence of an Elektron style workflow, while Drambo goes beyond what Elektron machines are capable of.

I would lose my mind if this were ported to an iPad app

max for live looks sofragile get a vst3

Wow nice! PLEASE MAKE VST/AU, Fors! Or, a version for Bitwig! BTW… For a more analog thing i also love Softube’s drum synth Heartbeat. It’s focused on making ‘similar to but not’ drum sounds calling back to classic machines like Roland Maestro and Korg analog machines of the past.

Tasty lil engine. Well done!

Great walkthrough - thank you!

ableton only?

InstaBuy❤

can you export in separate channels to ableton?

have u tried it with push?

Very well done review. You explain the detail in a way that it is clear. Interested to know if you have a finished track using this that you could post. Would be super to see what you did with this in a finished piece of music!

Concerning the output routing tip, isn't that achievable with Racks for easier sharing? I see Opal comes with a rack folder.

Sounds great. Looks like a cool device.

Thanks for sharing this VST. It looks like a great tool for creative blocks. Also, "modulo" is pronounced more like "modular" ... with an "oh" at the end. But I'll admit, I now want to start saying "ma doo low" for fun.

Okay, I'm going to project a bit and have a negative attitude now, sorry.

But,

I get much higher quality sounds and drums out of serum and vital by self sound designing then this device can do.
It sounds like a childs toy compared with what ableton built in devices stand alone can do.
I have the feeling this thing is truly a waste of time.
I play alot too with synths when sound designing, and create some strange things in a while
But I can't see this thing getting you on a higher level then learning the basics of drum synthesis yourself.
And I didn't find the sound quality of this sequencer and generators appealing.
I just spend 2 days designing a kick, 5 layer melodic techno bass, drums.
These devices lack alot ot basis functionality serum, vital, pigments 2 have,
and can do much more type of sounds.
And manipulate them even deeper and more fundamentally.
And I wouldn't use them therefore.

Great overview 👍

It looks like the cost will be about £300 for me. I have Ableton live lite, so the upgrade cost is high. Is there something similar for VST?

This is VERY nicely designed. Will be picking this up no doubt!

Ooh, this looks interesting...
"It's Ableton only"
AAAARGH. I was hoping to find a rhythm sequencer with an interface as clever as that of Borsta (Klevgrand)... but if it's MfL only I'm afraid that's no good to me :( If I were a live performer I'd consider using Ableton, but not for the studio – the UI is awful for middle aged guys like me with bad eyesight (Bitwig suits me far better with its primary colours and clear controls).

disagree

Argh. This is fantastic. I'm searching for something like this for quite a while now. An Elektron sequencer with great synthesis features. So dope! But I'd need VST :(
Regarding the DFAM replacement, I used just Modular from Softube to build something similar. It's not exactly a DFAM, but close and depending on the needs it works very well.

Can i use this thing in studio one?

Now the real question, does it run on push 3 standalone?

Does this device work on Ableton Live 10 Suite? Or do I need to upgrade to 11?

Not impressed by the way it sounds. Sorry. Expected much more with the title given to this video.

🔥

Too bad is in the box, at least it should be ported to iPad.