Polyverse SUPERMODAL Review
Polyverse has released a new filter/resonator plugin Supermodal.
Supermodal contains 27 different modal resonator models arranged into 9 groups of 3.
With built in modulation, midi tracking, and morphing between modes, there’s a fair bit this simple plugin can do.
Supermodal seems to have a nice polish, with control curves feeling natural and pleasant, it’s not easy to take Supermodal too far, yet it stays interesting and dramatic.
As far as the filter portion of this plugin is concerned, we all have filters, there’s not much to say here, it’s rather smooth and clean, and can easily be keytracked, but again, we’ve seen filters before.
Things get interesting going into the modal resonator, there’s 3 flavors of 9 different modes, and they can all be smoothly morphed between using the control as an XY grid, or via modulation.
Each mode is an arrangement of tuned resonant bandpass filters, with lots of interesting options ranging from vowels, noise, materials, chords, harmonics, and even a fairly convincing spring reverb emulation.
Being able to keytrack the cutoff frequency means you can even play Supermodal like a monophonic physical modeling instrument.
You get a few more controls over the timbre of the modal section, with intuitive decay and damping controls, and a partial range selector which allows you to remove lower or upper resonances to really dial in the engine.
Built in modulation isn’t quite the selling point it used to be anymore, but it is always welcome and fun to see. Supermodal has 4 modulators which can be set to macros, envelopes, or lfos.
There is both a midi triggered ADSR envelope, and am amplitude sensitive envelope follower. The LFO is also a step sequencer, with many shapes to chose from, and there is also a sample hold randomizer if you want to make things more chaotic.
You will need to use a modulator for midi note tracking, but the routing system is fairly simple and easy.
Over all, the results you can get from Supermodal aren’t particularly new or unique, you could likely replicate it in snapheap, but there seems to be a fair amount of care taken to fine tune control ranges and curves and prevent clipping or excessive feedback. The whole plugin is a sweetspot and I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s a bit of multiband compression going on to sweeten things up a bit. I liked most of the modal models and found morphing between them to be fun.
If you are interested in Supermodal I’d recommend taking a look at Tritik Moodal, A.A.S. Objeq Delay, or even Minimal Audio Rift Feedback Light if you’re just looking for a simple tuned resonator. While there’s a bit of overlap between these plugins, they all kinda do things a bit different, and offer varying levels of control to “magic”.
*Supermodal is currently on sale for 50 bucks and in public beta as of 10-27-2022, so features and price are subject to change