Hi. My Pure Data Just Intonation sequencing program is up and running, and I'm in the process of making music with it for a dance/music ensemble at my school. The problem is everyone says it sounds like Mario. I tried making a granulator, and it sounded good but used so much CPU I couldn't incorporate it into my sequencer. What I do have is 16 harmonics, filtered noise, a bp/lp/hp selector with cutoff and Q control, and adsr sliders. I have 8 copies of this, each of which only runs when it is changed, and writes its results to a graph, which the sequencer reads. Thus it is also possible to draw the waveform with the mouse, which I've found can make it a little less predictable. But too much of that makes it inharmonic, and even so it still sounds very 80's. I'd like the freedom to work in more sophisticated synthesis. What can I do?
Thanks. -Chuckk
-- "It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters." -Friedrich Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra"
Dear badmuthahubbard!
Have you tried using waveshaping to add a some distortion? Can create some nice sounds, and not too expensive either.
Jamie
On Fri, 17 Feb 2006 14:30:18 -0500 Chuckk Hubbard badmuthahubbard@gmail.com wrote:
Chuckk Hubbard wrote:
there are various other ways to shape synthetic sounds, particularly as a part in a subtractive synth: have a look at frequency modulation, amplitude/ring modulation, oscillator hardsyncing (resetting the phase of an oscillator by another oscillator), or pulsewidth modulation. you can create very interesting sounds if you gently combine these methods, for example feeding a hardsynced oscillator output as a frequency modulator into it's own sync source... something that works good on more complex signals than sinewaves is having a signal delayed by a (maybe amplified, dc'd and shaped) form of itself (having the signal as a source for the delay length of a vd~). be sure to check if lfos and (adsr-)envelopes applied in any part of your construction (modulation depths, frequency microtunings, filter cutoffs, pulsewidths, etc.) can do any good. with such techniques, your synths won't sound like mario, but more like luigi or princess toadstool. another approach might be simple physical modeling: you can create a plucked string which sounds crappy in the bass region but fairly harp-ish in the upper octaves by sending a short, single triangle- (or whatever-) shaped impulse into a feedback loop the length of the note frequency^-1. with a slight lowpass applied on each iteration the signal will warmly fade out. just ask if you have any questions about implementing these techniques.
some synthesis links -> http://www.theprojectstudiohandbook.com/articles17.htm
mfg charlie
very good post! I will check that link now too.
Yes, do check out FM! It's CPU inexpensive, and can do so many different things (i.e. Robert Henke's Operator instrument from Ableton).
~Kyle
On 2/20/06, hard off hard.off@gmail.com wrote:
-- http://perhapsidid.blogspot.com (((())))(()()((((((((()())))()(((((((())()()())()))) (())))))(()))))))))))))(((((((((((()()))))))))((()))) ))(((((((((((())))())))))))))))))))__________ _____())))))(((((((((((((()))))))))))_______ ((((((())))))))))))((((((((000)))oOOOOOO
Hey, thanks everyone. This is quite a bit to check out. I wish I had started sooner. I'm sure I will have lots of questions.
-Chuckk
-- "It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters." -Friedrich Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra"
I forgot to mention that absolute control of pitch is essential. I need to tell it what frequency the fundamental sounding pitch is. Naturally I want complicated waveforms, but FM and (I've just discovered) hardsyncing don't work...
On 2/20/06, Christopher Charles schraubzwingenhalterung@web.de wrote:
-- "It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters." -Friedrich Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra"
Too bad there's no PERCOLATE for pd any more... Strange cus it is still around for Max, wonder if anybody could ever report it?
You could always use something like C-Sound with the pd external, or use OSC to control something like SuperCollider...
What style is it that your compositions are in?
!~David
The style varies. I'm using extended just intonation and all synthesis. I thought of the Csound~ object, but I need to be able to carry my program around to use on several machines, both Windows and OSX. I've had limited success with Csound on my school's Macs (can't install on them) but I don't know, the object might work...
On 2/24/06, cyborgk@nocturnalnoize.com cyborgk@nocturnalnoize.com wrote:
-- "It is not when truth is dirty, but when it is shallow, that the lover of knowledge is reluctant to step into its waters." -Friedrich Nietzsche, "Thus Spoke Zarathustra"
Hello,
I don't think its the synthesis fault only. The absence of effects make it flat sounding. So you should try some delays, which are cheap cpu-wise or freeverb~ as reverb. Usually only one instance of freeverb with some fx channels on your instruments so you can control individually how much one instrument is send to reverb. So you can layer the sounds in space like one instrument is totally sent to reverb so its in the background, another one is half send and one is not sent to reverb so it stays in the foreground.
I think all the filter objects have been designed with mathematics in mind rather than sound.
Check out moog~ filter, its amazing, there is your Reactor, which sounds good because Native Instruments made the choice combining several modules into one so it sounds analogish, but with the right combination of modules in PD you can create the same with more freedom. It can be doubted that a Reactor oscillator is just a waveform generator without additional tricks.
Cheers,
Malte Steiner media art + development -www.block4.com-
Exibition Pixel & Korn 25.3.-2.4.2006 @ Linda, Hamburg, Germany
Elektronengehirn: new release on CD compilation Linx Open Source Sound from Sheffield
more at blog 4, also available as rss feed: http://java.block4.com/blog4/
Hi Malte,
Malte Steiner wrote:
It can be doubted that a Reactor oscillator is just a waveform generator without additional tricks.
There's something to be said for a full compliment of anti-aliased waveforms complete with pulse-width-modulation, which is something that PD sorely lacks beyond [ocs~] and [phasor~]. On top of that, the sound of a digital oscillator improves with the size of the wavetable used (or inversely to the amount of interpolation necessary). In some "blind" listening tests that Kim Cascone wrote me about, made when he worked for a big-time West Coast US sound hardware manufacturer, most listeners thought that Reaktor oscillators sounded better than those of any of the other software synths they checked out.
The advantage Reaktor has would probably be the size of the wavetable, the disadvantage being that these oscillators (as do most things Reaktor) use up a ridiculous amount of resources. I don't know what other tricks Native Instruments has thrown in there, of course, which could account for a lot of the overhead. But I'd be happy to hear some suggestions if they were things which could be implemented on the patch level in PD.
It could be that Csound made it into Cascone&co's (of course subjective) roundup, but I'd bet that the BLOP plugins from the LADSPA library would give Reaktor a run for its money, and surely at a cheaper cost in CPU to boot.
best, d.