June 12th, 2008 by niwa | posted in download, info, niwa's audio corner |

Yesterday I stumbled upon the site of Chris Roberson, a guy from Texas who develops VSTi. There are a lot of developers around like that, but I want to share this with you because Chris has made substitutes for two of my favorite synths, and they’re available for free!

The first time I tried Native Instruments Pro-53 I was immediately sold. Based on the Prophet 5 synth, it makes some hot sounds that can be used for a retro 80s makeover as well as fresh crispy electronic music we hear everyday. It does use a bit of CPU which is nasty on older systems, and it’s price is ranged from $130 to $200.

In comes Roberson with his Prophanity 1.1. Next to coming real close to the Pro-53 sound, it even has an interface that captures the Prophet 5 feel.

prophet 5	pro-53	prophanity

Although the Prophanity doesn’t meet the full specifics of the Pro-53 (no built-in delay, filter keyboard tracking, less customizable LFO and only 15 presets opposed to the 500 Pro-53 offers), it still has the bare essentials and produces a thick and warm sound. It’s also notably lighter on the CPU, so you can use multiple instances while retaining room for other plug-ins or samples.

4 clean Prophanity presets

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The other synth Roberson has recreated is the legendary Arp Oddysey, of which Gmedia already gave us the software build known as Oddity. A pure 70s machine which is best known for emitting freaky bleeps that go wild next to the clear italo-like sound it produces. Chris’ version is called Oddy-free.

oddysey	oddity	oddy-free

Just as with Prophanity Oddy-free captures the original layout of the Arp Oddysey, and it also lacks a bit of functionality that is present on the Oddity VSTi. But again, this won’t spoil the fun. It still delivers clear sounds as well as the freakonomics. As opposed to the $130 you could spend on Oddity, Oddy-free is.. exactly: free of charge.

4 clean Oddy-free presets

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Get them here