Output, Inc. is thrilled to announce the release of PORTAL, a granular synthesis FX plugin that transforms audio in a forward-thinking and musical way. Turn your VSTs, drum samples or any live input such as vocals or guitars into infinite new possibilities.

In the past, the results of granular synthesis were often chaotic and abstract. PORTAL is a step
forward, re-synthesizing sounds to give you a result that’s more closely related to the original
input. “With PORTAL we aim to flip the script on granular synthesis,” said Output CEO, Gregg
Lehrman. “This powerful engine takes a method that has previously been out of reach and
impractical for many musicians, and makes it accessible and easy to integrate into the creative
process. Less random bloops and bleeps and more creative music making."

See PORTAL manipulate space and time at www.output.com/products/portal

Looks awesome just as pretty much everything you guys have done.
(It’s like a shortcut to making flume-style synthesis)

Just one comment about Output in general: I'm not investing another dime in their product line -- existing or new -- until they address their horrific technical issues. My company owns several copies of, and has several subscriptions to, most of their products and nearly every one is buggy to the point of being unusable. One of my coworkers asked a detailed question a week ago and just today received a response which in return asked nothing more than 'what OS are you running?' I have emailed them countless times asking about the stuck MIDI notes in many products and late-starts when Arcade plays more than a couple samples at once, etc., on and on. They've provided not a single piece of helpful info, only saying that they're aware of it and working on it. This has been going on for years.

It's unfortunate because, like Antelope, they have great sounding products but an unworthy technical backend; deal-breaker bad. I hate being the guy who steps on new product alerts but consider this a public service announcement, and the public should know about how Output operates in the real world.

7/16/19 edit: after some discussions, Output is taking these issues to the mat and they've been quite interactive and attentive.

ouch really that bad! I have all their products EXCEPT Arcade and this one. I use Movement a lot which seems akin to this new one in terms of not being an Instrument per say. All my correspondence with them has been not Lightning fast to be honest but always helpful and accommodating.To be fair in all my cases there were solutions at hand so all my issues and requests were solved. It is true you kind of have to search for a contact email on the site if the FAQ's don't get you further.
Anyways Grainspace has been one of my favourite instant inspiration inserts in the past. Definitely going to give this one a whirl.

Output. If you're reading this, please consider an upgrade path for those who already own your full product suite.

Thanksss

There is one already.

I have everything else they make (apart from Arcade, no need) and it's a 114 eur upgrade.

k

Just log into your account!

Ahhh, you're right. Completely missed it in the header lol.

Thanks chaps!

Wow. I’ve never had one single issue with any of their products.


This is seriously one of the most mind blowing plugins I’ve seen. The level of control and creativity is ****ing nuts. Output for the win again.

Which DAW? Our composers use PT and/or Logic and every one of the PT guys has an issue with every one of their products. The Logic guys are much more in the clear, but not entirely bug-free either. MIDI-intensive sessions trip it every time whereas sparser sessions might be ok.

I want to stay onboard with Output, and I want to jump into Portal, they're just not making it easy though they've had a couple years to follow through.

I use Studio One - I have Logic and PT but don’t use those, so I can’t vouch for the performance there.

Gregg Lehrman here from Output. First a warm thank you to all of our customers ... We do read forums and try to stay up to date w/ the word on the street. We're excited about Portal and yes, anyone that's purchased a previous product will find a custom price in their account.

@ Elambo Please send me your name or email and I'll look into the matter. We very much believe in making our customers happy not just because we are in a repeat business industry but because we are a company made up of musicians - like yourself. We take a lot of pride in what we do as many of you would attest to, and wouldn't last very long if we put out buggy products w/out customer support. FYI- we were the first music company to offer full returns on our products, no questions asked - a trend that's starting to make way across the industry. I don't usually respond to people trying to pick fights, but it's hard to believe your Arcade issues have been "going on for years", considering it came out a year ago last week. Again, I'm happy to look into your details if you want to provide them.

Gregg - Founder & CEO - Output

Where do we find the demo?

Maybe I'm alone on this one but I don't find $114 to be a good upgrade path for one plugin, considering I just bought their entire bundle last month. I'll be skipping this one even though it looks pretty cool.

Thanks Gregg. We can take this offline but to address the statement that a fight is being picked here, or that my experiences aren’t as I’ve described them: if you reread my post you’ll notice that I stated that we’ve been using most of your products for years, not just the one-year-old Arcade, and our support tickets date back a long time, with some as recent as today.

Bump

Hey Loopy-hope you're good!

There isn't one. They have a 14 NQA Return Policy (for the plugins at least).

I don't see what's so mindblowing about this, granular synthesis isn't new, except that this is a FX plugin. But basically you can get the same result with something like Valhalla Delay which only costs 1/3. The demo video seems to confirm my suspicions.

I'd really like them to do another big library of well produced and curated loops but I guess all that stuff is now going into Arcade which I find horribly clumsy to use.

looks cool, like ribs but more user friendly. how can I demo this?

Output's demos don't do this plugin justice.

I upgraded this morning and have been playing around. IMO, this plugin is incredible.

The implementation of the XY control is genius. One preset becomes 10+ presets by simply dragging around the XY.

It sounds super clean—and the UX is what we expect from Output. Intuitive, creative, and simple to use.

Thank you, Output.


P.S. Those asking for demos... there isn't one. If you'd like to try it, there's a money-back guarantee. If you're not happy with it, you can request a refund.

@ Gregg Output

PM sent yesterday.

+1
Never had a problem with any of those wonderful Output instruments or effects, and I have all of them. I consider Output to be one of the best developers for my kind of (ambient-organic) music (running on Logic Pro).

I'm honestly a little jealous, but that provides hope, assuming Output fixes the issues existing primarily in the ProTools environment. Developers tend to point fingers at others (here we have Avid, Native Instruments and Output) so progress can be challenging. Or, we just switch to Logic, right?

Our Logic composer has reported the same issues we're seeing, but it takes more stress (more simultaneous MIDI) on his computer for them to surface.

Regarding Portal, I'm always in search of ethereal guitar tones a la Eventide and GRM. Does Portal make an easy front end for complex and interesting guitar pads? The demo hints at it but doesn't prove it.

Strange.
I'm on Pro Tools and Digital Performer over here, as well as VEPro hosting and I've never had a problem with any Output products.
I have them loaded in every template I use. The only "bug" is that when using server instances, the GUI is a little squirrelly till you connect the host. But they got back to me immediately with a response on that.

Excited to try out Portal

No, you can't. I have both plugins and they are both excellent and different.

There are 30% off deals maybe twice a year. I can wait. k

Borderlands granular app on my ipad can do similar things in a very intuitive way for a fraction of the cost

Do you typically run Output's products on the VE host? I've not yet tried that (and don't want to have to operate that way, but it's worth testing). I only know that we're batting .000 at our PT facilities -- in multiple locations with varying configurations -- with the possible exception of Signal which behaves more normally, likely because we use it very lightly.

I love output - though i recently sold all the sample based kontakt instruments due to the fact that i design 100% of my sounds now...they are still great though.
So i will have no upgrade price. Regarding the product....it looks like a granular fx plugin? Like the melda one? The melda has like....10 layers you can add, with a TON of parameters.
Just wondering if there is anything new here, of whether it is just simple and useful.
I am sure they did a great job either way, just not sure i need it

GRM Grain Spaces and Shuffler came to mind when I saw this