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Download Cobalt
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Music Demos

By Mitchell Burdette

  • Cobalt Demo

    Mitchell Burdette created this wonderful demo using Cobalt.

By Atomsplitter

  • Are You Ready?

    Atomsplitter used many of the sounds he programmed for Cobalt to write this intriguing piece

By Beatslaughter

  • Cobalt Demo

    The demo song was done in Renoise and uses 15 instances of Cobalt. Additional effects used were two Renoise internal filters for the bassline starting at around 40 seconds, a Renoise internal bus compressor to tame the drums a little and a Renoise internal maximizer as limiter. No samples were used, the drums are done with Cobalt too.

Credits

A lot of people helped make Cobalt possible. Working with them has been a thoroughly positive experience. I am very grateful for their time and effort.

Rick Christy (GRYMMJACK)

Rick designed the UI; he did the background image as well as all of the graphical elements. He also provided a lot of helpful advice early on. Contacting him was one of the best things I ever did for this project as I'm not sure Cobalt would have seen the light of day without his help.

Donvan Stringer (SICKLE)

Donovan set up a web forum for Cobalt beta testers to post bugs, comments, and anything else relating to Cobalt's development. He also provided a lot of helpful advice and suggestions. Like Rick, his contribution has been invaluable.

Shannon

Shannon beta tested Cobalt and found a few problems early on that would have slipped right by me without her help.

Mike McFarland

Mike has helped with everything from beta testing to proof reading the manual. He's been a great source of help, always there when I needed an opinion or insight.

Mitchell Burdette

Mitchell did quite a bit of beta testing and created a wonderful demo song.

Alexander Stoica

Alexander did some beta testing for me and created a set of wonderful patches.

Atomsplitter

Atomsplitter provided a set of very cool and interesting patches. He wrote an evocative demo, Are You Ready, using sounds he created with Cobalt.

sinkmusic

Did extensive beta testing of Cobalt and created a few of the factory presets.

Roby Burgos (SWEET_TRIP)

Beta tested Cobalt in its later stages and provided a lot of help and support. He belongs to a band called Sweet Trip. You can check them out here and here.

CobaltVST Instrument

a VSTi software synthesizer inspired by many of the digital synthesizers from the 1980s

Cobalt Small UI (612 x 592)
Cobalt is a VSTi software synthesizer inspired by many of the digital synthesizers from the 1980s.

In the early 80s as digital technology became cheaper, many manufacturers designed synthesizers that combined earlier analog technology with newer digital technology. These were known as hybrid synthesizers.

Well known hybrid synthesizers are:

  • 26 waveforms

    ...many of which were resynthesized from 80s hybrid synths

  • Flexible modulation routes

    2 envelopes, 2 LFOs, PWM, and FM

  • Pulse width modulation for all

    PWM works on all 26 waveforms

  • A sound designers LFO

    LFO tempo-sync, and delay

  • Poly, Mono, Portamento

    Polyphonic portamento as well as mono

  • Key tracking envelopes

    Amount adjusts as you play up/down the keys

  • OVERDRIVE!

    Rich overdrive effect based on custom algo.

In analog/digital hybrid synthesizers, the oscillators responsible for generating waveforms are digital while the filter section remains analog. This approach freed designers to use any kind of waveform; they were no longer restricted to traditional analog waveforms such as sawtooth, triangle, and pulse. However, by using an analog filter, these synthesizers retained the warmth earlier analog synthesizers were known for.

Though Cobalt is a purely digital synthesizer, its overall architecture is very much like those early hybrid synthesizers. It features a wide selection of waveforms, most of which were resynthesized from actual hybrid synthesizers, while providing traditional subtractive synthesis capabilities for sculpting its sound.

Cobalt can sound at times warm and rich while at other times cold and stark. From gentle pads to screaming leads, Cobalt's gotcha covered.
Tutorial Instructor

Tutorials

Cobalt in Action

Watch and learn as Les builds a few patches from scratch using Cobalt.

Flash Required
Part 1 - Strings

Learn how to build synth strings sound step by step starting from the Cobalt default patch sound. Teaches you about envelopes and modulation.

Part 2 - Bass

Build a bass synth with the creator of Cobalt, Leslie Sanford. Teaches the fundamentals of subtractive synthesis.

Want to learn more about synthesis? Check out Leslie's extended video tutorial on subtractive synthesis. This video features Cobalt throughout the entire session and demystifies subtractive synthesis sound design.

Download

Downloads

More Cobalt stuff

Feed your Cobalt with additional third party goodies, treats, and tidbits.

Official Preset Banks

  • Bank 00
    An empty bank filled with default presets.
  • Bank 01
    Cobalt factory presets (in case you need them again)
  • Bank 02
    Picks up where the factory bank left off with tons of pads, leads, basses, and more.

User Supplied Preset Banks

  • Teksonik Bank

    By Mark Hoppe (TEKSONIK)

    This bank contains 32 patches by Marc Hoppe. You can tell Marc has spent some quality time with Cobalt. These patches take advantage of Cobalt's capabilities. Very nice.
  • Xenos Bank

    By Brian "Xenos" Lee

    Bryan was especially commissioned to create this bank for Cobalt. It covers a large variety of musical styles -- Trance, Techno, 80's Synth Pop, Industrial, Ambient, Filmscore, Drum & Bass, etc. There's a little something here for everyone. This is a superb collection of patches. Bryan is a professional sound designer, and his wide-ranging talent is evident in this very cool bank.
  • Atomsplitter Bank

    By Atomsplitter Audio

    This superb bank was created by Grymmjack and Atomsplitter. The bank has 12 categories of sounds ranging from phat basses, synthesied drums to dramatic strings and pads.
KORE2

Native Instruments Kore2 Cobalt Setup


BY DONOVAN STRINGER (SICKLE)

This is Cobalt's Factory Sounds imported into Kore 2 .ksd format. The user will need to place them inside their Kore 2 Shared Content/Sounds directory. Once they are there, the factory presets will be available in Kore 2's Browser and will load with all the controller assignments I've set up: Cobalt's Factory Sounds imported into Kore 2 .ksd format

The Kore hardware controller has a set of 8 knobs and 8 buttons. You can have as many user-defined 'pages' of assigned controllers as you'd like. In Cobalt's case, I set up 10 well-defined User Pages. Each page has the relevant title for the parameters each page contains, like so: Master (the most frequently used controllers for quick access), Oscillators, Pulse Width, Frequency Modulation, Filter, LFO's, Envelope 1, Envelope 2, Pan/Chorus, Delay.

'Midi Channel' got stuck into the delay area as I couldn't jack it in anywhere else, but it's probably the least used controller, so... Also, here's a Cobalt Performance file: Cobalt Performance File

You should be able to just load that up and let 'er rip, but best to have the .ksd's where they belong.

I've provided this because Kore 2 doesn't seem to keep the User Pages data stored anywhere but in the Kore Sound and Performance files, so when a person loads Cobalt via Kore 2's VST menu, they'll need to also load up a preset or just open up this performance file. It's also possible that I might not have saved it correctly, as I'm not the greatest power-user with Kore 2's Browser.