I personally love NeXuS.
I do agree however that the lack of ability to really fiddle around with the deep inner workings of it does greatly limit it. I love the sounds in it, but I wish I could get down and dirty with it and learn HOW they make those wonderful sounds, and see what I can tweak it to become. I know I've often wanted to be able to slightly tweak a sound in it . . . like a given trance synth sounds great, but fuck, I wish I could take out the lower octave of it. Or something of that nature.
If NeXuS ever did grant users that kind of malleability, I think it could be one of the best plugins out there.
Don't entirely knock presets. In my opinion they're the best way to learn. I'm learning how to deconstruct the countless presets on my Virus TI at the moment, and see what I can learn from that, so I can build my own sound.
NeXuS is a great tool when all you want to do is just compose music without worrying about having to create your own synths. There's nothing wrong with that. It's what I've done for maybe a little under a year now, and I've learned a lot along the way. However, I'm moving further now, and starting to tackle creating my own synths. It's just the way my sound has gone.
A comparison that I'd like to make, for reference... classical music, in a way, uses "presets." Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart all use violin, viola, cello, and contrabass in their music. But nobody claims that they are unoriginal for doing so. Rather, they use the tools of their choice - stringed instruments, among others (each composer has their own set of favorite intstruments after all) - and create their own unique, individual music.
On this same note - please don't turn your nose up at others' music because they use presets. There's plenty of room for creativity and originality even using them. |