Horizen
Pristine Cinematic Sound
Initially born to serve the demands and requirements of composer/producer Andy Hodgson, Horizen 2.6 is a true breakthrough in terms of sonic capability and workflow. Having worked on countless Netflix/Amazon titles and with artists from Bryan Adams to Katie Perry, Andy often dreamed of a synth that would aid his professional workflow while sounding phenomenal. After a chance meeting with veteran audio developer Lindon Mulcahy-Parker of Channel Robot, it was clear they shared the same vision. In fact, Lindon was already working on the original concept that would become Horizen.
Horizen Origin
A joy for sound designers and producers alike, Horizon’s 10-voice architecture allows for combining 4 sample engines with 4 voice dual OSC/wavetable synths plus 2 loop player engines. The resulting sounds are lush, extremely detailed and with a depth not often heard. Horizen will effortlessly fit to any genre - from Rock to EDM to Lofi and everything in between, it also offers a LOT for those working in Game/Film. A synth made by composers for composers!
"I now use Horizen in almost ALL of my productions and will do so going forwards. I hope others find it as inspiring as I do" - Andy
Lose Yourself in Sound
The deep yet intuitive XY pad design lets you drag & drop any of Hoizen's 10 sound sources to any of its corners. Simple movements and gestures allow you to blend the different sources together with creative and exciting results. These X/Y gestures can be recorded so you can take your hand off the mouse and focus on performing. You can even save and load gestures into another patch should you wish.
Ultimate Control
At the heart of Horizen you'll find its Modulation panel. Simply choose from the LFO preset menu or design your very own before dragging to designated targets around the instrument. Up to 6 LFO modulators can be used, covering a wide range of shapes/speeds that support any sound design need. A single LFO can be assigned to as many targets as you like. As of 2.6 you also get a scrolling display of the LFO shape, so you can visualise the effect it will have, and depth CC control, that allows you to assign any CC controller to affect the depth to the LFO - Andy uses channel aftertouch (CC129) amongst exclusively but its up to you.
You'll also find two Key modulators to be used alongside two Velocity modulators, and as of 2.6 two CC modulators, so you can refine your control even further... if you so wish.
Each modulator allows you to create fantastic user-drawn shapes to be run over various time sequences. You can lock time to the DAW tempo, run free or even make your modulation run in oneshot mode. The Synth Factory has included some interesting and useful shapes to get you started.
Complex Performances Simplified
Horizen offers several tools to add instant movement and harmony to your sounds. A classic arp is on hand which allows you to define its number of steps, adjust swing, tempo sync and octave movement. The velocity, note length and pitch can be adjusted per step and playback is offered in 6 different directions (including chord playback). Each of the voices in HoriZEN can be routed to one, both or none of the arps, allowing for voices that can play freely and arpeggiated at the same time. As of v2.6 you now have a Pattern Generator to allow you to build easy, flexible and most importantly usable arp patterns.
And speaking of Chords, Horizen has you covered with a dedicated player featuring sixteen MIDI keys. It’s set up to play back one of a wide range of chords based on a user-defined root note, one of 12 popular chord types and the octave range. The augmentation options easily facilitate more complicated chord structures.
23 Glorious Voice & Master Effects
A huge amount of time and dedication was spent by Lindon on the 23 onboard effects and the results speak for themselves. The idea was to eliminate or reduce dependency on 'better' 3rd- party plugins by offering a range of high quality, producer-friendly options within Horizen. The effects system is both comprehensive and extensive, with a dedicated Send and Master Effects section. Each Horizen voice has 4 dedicated Sends to the 4 Send Effect Slots, and these Sends are targets so you can modulate the amount of each voice going into each send effect slot. It's quick and easy to set up your own sequence of effects and where appropriate effects have dedicated LFOs for further control.
Drag & Drop Loops From Anywhere
Horizen's Loop players allow you to load, play and blend your very own audio files. Simply drag & drop wav files from anywhere directly into the Player window, or even set your own user defined library within the Loop Browser. The latter will ensure your existing loop collections are automatically loaded and ready to be processed with the tools available. Audio can be played as a loop (hence the voice name) or as a one-shot per note press. You can have the loop play forwards or reverse and pitch-track the keyboard or play a constant pitch, and as of 2.6 you can expand the loop display to set your loop points even more accurately.
Over 400 Beautifully Crafted Presets
You'll find over 400 presets designed by Andy himself. While they fit a multitude of genres and production scenarios the driving force behind them all was to inspire! To help you navigate a vast library with ease, we've introduced a tag-based retrieval engine for sounds, loops, and presets. Each sound and preset comes pre-tagged with carefully chosen keywords, ensuring you can quickly find exactly what you need. Plus, you have the flexibility to add or remove tags to suit your personal workflow. Effortlessly explore and organize your sounds with Horizen's intuitive tagging system, and let your creativity flow without limits.
Expansion Sound Packs
Underground Expansion Pack (for Horizen)
$30.00
84 All Year Expansion Pack (for Horizen)
$30.00
Deep Horizen Expansion Pack (for Horizen)
$30.00
Tape-OP Expansion Pack (for Horizen)
$30.00
Full Specs
- 10 voice Architecture (Samplers,Synths & Loop Players).
- Over 850 Voices with Browser-based user-favourites.
- VA & Wavetable Synths.
- FM on all voices.
- Drag-and-Drop Modulators.
- User defined LFO shapes.
- User defined XY Pad targets.
- Load your own Sounds.
- Dual Arps, voice assignable.
- Multi-FX Send and Master effect slots.
- Multi-mode Filters per voice.
- Over 350 presets.
New in v2.6
Get ready to elevate your music production experience with Horizen 2.6! This major update to the acclaimed and already powerful virtual instrument brings a host of new features and improvements, all at no extra cost for existing 2.x users.
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Expansions. Unleash the full potential of Horizen's with a range of new expansion packs! Now, you can effortlessly display, load, and play expansions, giving you the power to enhance and extend your sound sources like never before. The choice is yours—select and install the expansions that best suit your creative vision.
Each expansion pack comes loaded with 50 to 150 new sound sources and loops, ready to be integrated into the sampler and loop players. Plus, you'll get a set of presets that make the most of these new sounds, ensuring you can hit the ground running. Elevate your music with Horizen's expansions and let your creativity soar! - Tag based search and retrieve for sounds and presets. With the addition of Horizen expansions you may well end up with many many hundreds of sounds! To help you navigate a vast library with ease, we've introduced a tag-based retrieval engine for sounds, loops, and presets. Each sound and preset comes pre-tagged with carefully chosen keywords, ensuring you can quickly find exactly what you need. Plus, you have the flexibility to add or remove tags to suit your personal workflow. Effortlessly explore and organize your sounds with Horizen's intuitive tagging system, and let your creativity flow without limits.
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Scalable vector interface. We believe in giving you complete control over your creative environment, which is why Horizen 2.6 now allows you to set the UI size to your exact preference, ensuring it remains crisp and clear at any scale. We wanted to avoid a flat, characterless interface, so we've worked hard to retain the rich visual feedback from previous versions. But that's not all - you'll find a host of quality-of-life enhancements to make your experience with Horizen even better including:
• Customizable Voice Names: No more generic labels like "sampler 1" or "synth 4". You decide what each voice is named.
• Zoomable Loops, Parametric EQs, and LFOs: Enjoy up to 4x zoom for precise granular control and animated LFOs to visualize value changes in real-time.
• Skinnable Interface: Personalize your workspace with a variety of skins.
And there's so much more to discover, download 2.6 and experience it for yourself! -
All new FX. Explore and enjoy six brand-new and inspiring FX including:
• Soft Clipper: Smoothly tame your peaks for a polished sound.
• Wavefolder: Add rich harmonic content and unique textures.
• Compressor 2: Achieve precise dynamic control with our upgraded compressor.
• Twin Chorus: Create lush, wide choruses with dual modulation.
• Spectral Tilt EQ: Shape your sound with versatile spectral adjustments.
• Transient Shaper: Enhance the attack and sustain of your sounds for added punch.
We've also streamlined your workflow by moving note effects like Glide and Note Harmoniser to their own dedicated Note FX panel. Plus, we've added an octave folder and per voice user-drawn velocity mapping for even more customization. And to top it all off, we've improved the limiter in the global output for better overall sound quality. -
Tempo Additions. Tempo-synced options for effects, arpeggiators, and LFOs have been expanded, adding five new slower tempo settings. Now, you can go as slow as 2 bars, 3 bars, 4 bars, 6 bars, and even 8 bars, perfect for crafting those long-term effects and smooth transitions.
Whether you're looking to create epic build-ups or subtle, evolving soundscapes, these new tempo settings give you the flexibility to shape your music exactly how you envision it.
Horizen Design Team
Andy Hodgson
Andy Hodgson, owns and runs the well known "OrangeTreeStudios" and was responsible for the sound design for all of the Synth Factory's products, from first seed to final preset creation, has worked on countless Netflix/Amazon titles. as well as successful bands throughout his career, from Bryan Adams to Katie Perry and most genres in between. Horizen has been a breakthrough in terms of sonic capability, from our initial design meetings through to final completion, its been a wealth of experience & enlightenment seeing such a strong workhorse come to fruition, that I now use it in almost ALL of my productions today and will do going forwards.
Lindon Mulcahy Parker
Lindon Mulcahy-Parker owns and runs the audio development company Channel Robot, and is responsible for the design and coding of all Synth Factory products. He has been developing virtual instruments and effects for over 15 years both for Channel Robot and for a wide range of third-party clients. He started out as a guitarist and record producer before transitioning into real-time application development for the audio and telecommunications industries. He now spends his time extending and developing functionality in the core audio and effects engines used in Horizen.
Training resources
Learning Guides
Video tutorials
System requirements
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macOS 10.9.5 or Later
64-bit Intel or Apple Silicon
AU / VST3 -
Windows 8, 10, 11
64-bit
VST3