Helm

Helm is an open-source, free sound synthesizer mainly written in C-like programming languages. Although in its early development stages, you can test the program's sound oscillators, multi-modulation features, and appealing visual feedback

At a very basic level, a synthesizer is an electronic musical instrument with the purpose of creating sounds through synthesis methods. It is quite fascinating how technology can enable sound production and modulation at such high qualitative rates.

When it comes to digital polyphonic synthesizers (like Helm), these are programs capable of producing two or more sounds simultaneously. In order to obtain the so-called polyphony, each physical or digital sound producing tool must perform octave division; for this division to happen, the synthesizer needs 12 oscillators (or repeating waveforms), criteria that Helm fulfills.

Helm is a program that can load compositions and export digital sound creations in a HELM format only. The program has a nice interface, a visual indicator of every change you perform. This GUI offers immediate feedback to users, which is both aesthetically pleasing and a good source of feedback. Understanding music and sound creation and modulation is a difficult task; however, when you can visualize the process, it becomes a lot easier to learn the ropes.

Helm offers 32-voice polyphony and a complex modulation system (multiple features for changing from one tone to another). The aforementioned polyphony wouldn't be possible without oscillators; Helm has the ability to create dual oscillators, and for each modulation, around 15 oscillations. Among others, you can visually determine the amplitude and fluctuation of the envelopes, distortion, stutter, delay, and reverb.

All things considered, Helm is an excellent program taking into account that it is in development. Although the app is visually appealing, offers instant feedback, and has a great, detailed user manual (downloadable here), some introductory videos, step-by-step instructions for beginners (maybe a full song creation and adaptation tutorial) could reduce the product adoption time and increase the number of active users.