Andrew Huang Unleashes the Osmose CE: Tactile MIDI Mayhem

The Osmose CE isn’t content with just velocity and aftertouch—it’s a playground for pitch bending, pressure glides, and all sorts of finger acrobatics. Each key can be wiggled left or right for pitch bends, and you can dial in exactly how much you want. Pressure glide lets you morph between notes based on finger force, not some boring global setting. It’s like having a whammy bar for every finger, and the envelope shaping responds to your touch with surgical precision.

Polyphonic aftertouch? Check. But there’s more: the lift gesture means letting go of a key can trigger an extra note or a subtle variation, depending on how you release. It’s a tactile buffet—every gesture is mapped to something musical, and Andrew shows how it all adds up to a keyboard that feels alive. If you want to see just how deep the rabbit hole goes, you’ll need to watch the video for the full finger ballet.

Here’s where things get spicy: the Osmose CE comes bundled with Expressive E’s new Control E plugin, and it’s not just a token freebie. Over 900 presets, all optimised for the CE’s wild gestures, and a browser that actually makes sense. Andrew highlights how you can dive into categories and even access presets for third-party synths—whether you own them or not. If you do, you get full editing; if not, you still get eight macros to twist sounds into new shapes.

Vital and Zyklop are free, so you can go deep without spending extra. The plugin is a proper sound playground, letting you use the CE’s expressive arsenal to its fullest. Andrew’s demo is a blur of macros, presets, and sound-mangling—if you want to see how far you can push it, you’ll need to check out his hands-on chaos.

Integration is where most controllers fall flat, but the Osmose CE actually delivers. Andrew walks through DAW Control Mode—Cubase, Ableton, Bitwig, Logic, all covered at launch. You can browse presets, tweak macros, and jump between tracks without menu-diving hell. The four knobs are smart: click to swap top/bottom, hold shift for momentary jumps, and you’re never stuck in the wrong tab.

Transport controls, metronome, loop brace, track selection, volume, pan, mute, solo—it’s all there, and most of it works without leaving your creative flow. There’s even quantise-on-the-fly with a shift combo. Andrew doesn’t cover every last menu, but it’s clear this thing is built for real-world use, not just spec-sheet flexing. If you want to see the workflow in action, the video’s got all the knob-twiddling you crave.