Knobula - Poly Cinematic (Dark Mode)

The dark side of Knobula's Poly Cinematic, a complete and well-designed polyphonic synthesizer with 8 voices!

Poly Cinematic is a powerful 56 oscillator synthesizer that features full 8 voice polyphony, 12db/octave multimode filter and a stereo reverb in 12hp.

The Poly Cinematic is designed for generating smooth pads and punchy stabs, while being simple to use, with a dedicated control for each parameter. This gives you immediate access and guarantees for fast and easy workflow. Because of its special purpose of generating pads and chords the module features a very suitable type of filter, multiple de-tunable oscillators and reverb.

The blue envelope section controls the amplifier and filter at the same time, modulating the volume and filter cut-off via Env Depth. The filter section gives you control over the filter type (lowpass, notch, highpass), cutoff-frequency, resonance and a switch to select the Key Follow behavior.

The lowpass filter setting would be your go-to type for most sounds, while the notch filter has a nasal, phaser like quality ideal for thicker retro string sounds. The highpass filter setting is great for thinner glassier type sounds. The adjustable resonance can go into self-resonance at higher settings. All in all, this covers a lot of ground for polyphonic pads and chord sounds.

The oscillator section is also tailored for its special purpose, polyphonic, cinematic sounds. There are 3 wave types, featuring between 3 and 7 oscillators per voice. While being quite complex, the oscillator section remains easy to use with only a few parameters to adjust.

In Super Saw mode you get the most oscillators per voice – the free running 7 oscillator super-saw can produce rich trance leads or super smooth strings. Mode I is mostly a single oscillator playing the root note with side oscillators providing a subtle chorus. Mode II is more intense with louder side oscillators and Mode III is with all 7 oscillators set to full volume.

You get several square wave based modes with phase locked waves, suitable for more percussive tones to be created for punchier sounds. The detuning and unison will produce a static non-phasing wave. Mode I is a pure square wave, Mode II is a 33% pulse wave and Mode III is a pulse wave heavily overdriven to produce even greater harmonic overtones and thicker detune artefacts.

The Tonewheel Organ mode features is a blend of pure sine waves in 3 different classic drawbar combinations. Furthermore, the tone wheels are rigged as three oscillators that can be in unison or detuned 5ths or octaves apart.

And let’s not forget an essential part of cinematic sounds – the reverb! No pad sound is complete without it. Poly Cinematic features a 24bit stereo reverb with the easiest control -one knob controls both the amount of reverb and the decay time of the reverb. Small values introduce a light room effect, increasing to a hall all the way to a large cathedral mixed in equally with the original sound.

To make things clear, the Poly Cinematic is a digital module and features a MIDI input for playing up to eight notes at the same time. The v/oct input is able to transpose saved chords that you select via CV. Without connecting Midi, a factory fresh Poly Cinematic will play a single note when you either press the Trigger button or send a gate signal to Trigger in. If play it via MIDI, the chord memory will continuously keep the last note/chord you played in memory and assign it to the button – and there is more to the chord memory, check out the well-made manual for more information on that topic!

This is the limited black edition.