Instruments

Synth Designer, Sampler pads and MIDI Learn, Forge Steel, Granular, Noise Lab.

Every instrument in EDM Forge follows the same shape: an overview, a parameter map, a quick try it recipe, and the gotchas we wish someone had told us. Each one runs standalone in the Studio and — for the Forge Steel family — drops straight into the modular rack as a patchable module.

Synth Designer

The everything-synth

A modern wavetable / virtual-analog hybrid. Two oscillators, sub, noise, dual filters, three envelopes, three LFOs, an eight-slot mod matrix, plus an effects chain. Use this when you want a single device that can be a saw lead, a wobble bass, a pad, or a pluck without leaving.

Parameters

OSC 1 / OSC 2	Wavetable + analog shape. Unison 1-16, detune, phase, pan spread.
SUB	Sine / square / triangle, octave switch.
NOISE	White / pink / sample-hold, dedicated filter send.
FILTER A / B	LP, HP, BP, Notch, Comb, Formant. Series or parallel routing.
ENV 1-3	ADSR with curve controls. ENV 1 hard-wired to amp.
LFO 1-3	10 shapes, host-sync, retrigger per voice or free-run.
MOD MATRIX	8 slots — any source → any destination, bipolar amount.
FX	Reverb, delay, chorus, phaser, distortion, compressor.

Try it

Load preset 'Reese — Drift'
Increase OSC 1 unison to 7, detune ~25%
Route LFO 2 → Filter A cutoff at ~40%
Add a quarter-note delay with 35% feedback.

Gotchas

Unison voices stack CPU fast — 16 × OSC 1 + 16 × OSC 2 = 32 voices per note.
Mod matrix is bipolar. If a knob is fully clockwise, +100% modulation drives it out of range and silently clips.

Synth Designer: what's new

Sub module: a clean sine, triangle or square one or two octaves down that skips the filter, for solid low end. Turn up Level to hear it.
Wave displays: a small glass screen under each oscillator shows the exact wave shape you picked.
Step, sample and hold, and random LFOs: in the Modulation tab, pick the Step shape to draw a rhythmic pattern (up to 16 steps) and aim it at cutoff, levels, pitch or FX. Sync it to the tempo for wobbles and gated pads.
OTT Squash: the classic slammed multiband sound, under Pro FX presets.
Import your own wavetables: press Import under an oscillator (or drop a .wav on it). Tables made of 2048 sample frames and single cycle waves both work. Turn the WT Pos knob to sweep through the frames, or aim an LFO or macro at it. Your tables are saved to your account, and collaborators hear them too. Big tables keep 64 evenly spaced frames.
Draw your own LFO: in the Modulation tab pick the Curve shape. Click to add points, drag to move them, drag a blue dot to bend a line, right click a point to delete it. Start from Ramp, Triangle, Pump, Stairs or Wobble, snap to a grid, and choose Retrigger, Free run or One shot.
Hyper / Dimension: detuned copies plus a short stereo delay for huge width. Everything below the Mono below setting stays centered, so the sub stays solid. It's in the synth's FX section and in the track effects rack, with Wide Reese, Supersaw Spread and Subtle Air presets.

Playing the Sampler from a MIDI controller

Plug in a keyboard or pad controller and it plays the 16 Sampler pads right away: notes C1 to D#2map to pads 1 to 16, the standard drum pad layout. Each pad shows its note, and how hard you hit sets the volume.

MIDI Learn: click the MIDI chip on a pad, then hit any key or pad on your controller. If another pad used that note, the two swap.
Reset notes puts the standard layout back.
Chromatic: turn on Chromatic in the Sampler bar, then press Keys on a pad. That sound plays across the whole keyboard with C3 at its original pitch, chords included.
Saved per controller: your layout is saved to your account for that controller model and loads automatically when it connects. If you have never set one up, a collaborator's layout for the same model is used.
Chop a loop: open it in the Sample Editor and use Slice → Sampler to fill empty pads.

Forge Steel Series

Four flagship synths, each named after a layered-metal craft. Each one runs standalone and also appears in the modular rack as a single patchable module — your existing patches and CC mappings carry over verbatim.

Demascus

Wavetable

Folded-steel wavetable synth. Two wavetable oscillators with morphable position, a unique 'fold' shaper that mimics steel forging, and a vowel filter bank for vocal-like leads and pads.

Parameters

WT POS A / B	Scrub through the wavetable. Modulate for movement.
FOLD	Wave-folding amount — adds odd harmonics.
VOWEL FILTER	5 vowel formants, morphable via the X/Y pad.
MOTION	Slow drift LFO targeting WT POS, FOLD, and FILTER simultaneously.

Try it

Patch 'Cathedral Pad'
Push MOTION to 60%
Sweep the VOWEL XY in time with a slow attack.

Gotchas

FOLD past 80% can introduce DC offset — keep a high-pass at ~30 Hz on the master.

SanMai

Three-layer FM synth — outer, core, outer — modelled after the 3-ply san-mai forging technique. Six operators with a fixed bell-clean topology that's easier to dial in than a classic DX-style matrix.

Parameters

OP 1-6	Each: ratio, fine, level, envelope (4-stage).
FEEDBACK	Per-operator feedback for noise-like timbres.
ALGORITHM	12 hand-picked algorithms covering bass, bells, pads, plucks.
VELO → INDEX	Hard-wired velocity to modulation index — touch sensitivity for free.

Try it

Algorithm 3 + carrier ratios 1, 2, 3
Set OP 6 feedback to 0.8 for a noisy attack.

Gotchas

Operator levels are exponential. Going from 95 → 100 is a much bigger jump than 50 → 55.

ColdWeld

Hybrid

A laboratory hybrid: virtual-analog oscillator + granular layer + physical-model exciter, all running in parallel and bonded by a shared filter and envelope. Designed for sounds that don't fit a single category — metallic plucks, breathy basses, broken keys.

Parameters

ANALOG OSC	Saw / pulse / triangle, PWM, hard-sync.
GRAIN	Sample slot + size, density, position scatter.
EXCITER	Karplus-Strong with damping, position, and a noise burst.
WELD	Bond amount — cross-modulates the three layers.
SHARED FILTER	Drive-and-feedback LP/HP, post all three layers.

Try it

Drop an 808 sample into GRAIN
Pull ANALOG OSC level to 60%
Push WELD to 70% and play C1.

Gotchas

GRAIN streams from your sample — switching presets reloads. Keep grain samples short (<2 MB).

Filigree

Additive

64-partial additive synth with a spectral brush. Paint a harmonic profile, draw partial envelopes, then morph between four snapshots over time.

Parameters

PARTIAL BRUSH	Pen-style editor for harmonic amplitudes 1-64.
MORPH XY	Interpolates between snapshots A/B/C/D.
DETUNE	Per-partial detune for analog feel.
SPECTRAL DELAY	Each partial delayed independently — creates risers and gestures.

Try it

Brush a 'pluck' profile (high low partials, decaying highs)
Animate MORPH from A → D over 4 bars.

Gotchas

With 64 partials and >8 voices, CPU is heavy. Use 'Voice Limit' to cap polyphony.

Sampler Deck + Pads

One-shot & loop player

Drag any audio onto a pad slot or the sampler deck. The deck is for melodic playback (mapped across MIDI), the Pads device is the 16-pad finger-drumming grid.

Parameters

ZONES	Multi-sample mapping — split by velocity or note range.
PITCH / GAIN	Per-pad, semitones + dB.
VELOCITY	Per-pad curve (linear / log / fixed).
CHOKE GROUPS	Group pads so one cuts off the others (classic open-hat / closed-hat).
WARP	Optional time-stretch for loops; locks to project BPM.

Try it

Drop a 909 kit on Pads
Put closed/open hats on choke group 1.
Record-arm and finger-drum 8 bars.

Gotchas

Warping a one-shot smears transients. Keep warp off for percussion, on for loops.
Pads device uses sample-accurate triggering; choke groups behave like hardware drum machines.

Granular Engine

Texture sculptor

Granular sampler designed for pads, textures, and risers. Load a sample, the engine spawns grains across it — control density, position, size, pitch spread, and panning per-grain.

Parameters

GRAIN SIZE	5 ms – 500 ms.
DENSITY	1-200 grains/sec.
POSITION	Where in the sample new grains start. Modulate for scrubbing.
SCATTER	Random offset per grain.
PITCH SPREAD	Random ±semitones per grain — wide for clouds, 0 for tight.
FREEZE	Freezes the buffer in place — playhead stops but grains keep firing.

Try it

Load a vocal phrase
FREEZE on, DENSITY 80, PITCH SPREAD 0.5
Play long chords.

Gotchas

High density × wide pitch spread = aliasing on bright source material. Drop a soft LPF after.

Noise Lab

Experimental sound design

Four engines under one device: FM noise, Karplus-Strong, spectral, and the 'uncertainty' chaos engine. Shared mod matrix and an output FX chain make it a one-stop shop for risers, impacts, atmospheres, and SFX.

Parameters

ENGINE	FM noise / Karplus / Spectral / Uncertainty.
MOD MATRIX	6 slots, sample-and-hold and chaos sources included.
HUMANIZE	Adds per-trigger micro-variance to every parameter.
VARIATIONS	Saves N parameter snapshots; cycles between them as you trigger.

Try it

Engine: Uncertainty
Bind chaos source → filter cutoff at 60%
Trigger with a quarter-note clock.

Gotchas

Uncertainty is non-deterministic — bouncing twice gives different results. Bake to audio when finalizing.

Drum Kit & PolySynth

Default voices

The 'just give me something' voices. The Drum Kit is the 909-style default behind new drum tracks; the PolySynth is the simple 2-osc subtractive behind new melodic tracks. Both are designed to sound good with zero tweaking, but every knob is still there.

Parameters

DRUM KIT	Kick / snare / hat / clap / tom voices — each with pitch, decay, tone.
POLYSYNTH	OSC A+B, sub, LP filter, ADSR amp + filter envs, single LFO.

Try it

New project → the default track is already a PolySynth. Hit Z–M to play.

Gotchas

Both are deliberately CPU-light. For bigger sounds, swap to Synth Designer or a Forge Steel device.

Pro

Every device here can be controlled by a hardware controller via MIDI Learn — right-click any knob, hit Learn, wiggle a CC, done.