A Doepfer Mini case was selected to keep the project small. For waveshaping the new company Abstract Data's "Reactive Shaper ADE-10" was the way to go. Three flavours of separately controllable waveshaping in series. Doepfer's audio divider, and dual ring modulator works well and were very affordable. But then there was the envelope and trigger delay issues and only six HP to play with. (HP, Horizontal Pitch is the eurorack module width units, 1 HP = 5.08 mm or 1/5 inch). Actually I had bought the Doepfer dual trigger delay initially, but though occasionally important I don't use trigger delay that often. In most of the patches that module wouldn't be patched in. What a waste of space. And I really wanted voltage controlled attack. I then discovered the genious Make Noise "Function". An analogue computer based module that does virtually anything. For example VC controlled: AD and ASD envelopes, LFO, Trigger delay, slew generator, sample and hold etc etc. Everything with log, linear or exponential shape. Pure genious for the space limited modular. An intellijel multiple filled the remaining 2 HP. Now I'm finished. The Zebra modular with sidecar can do anything I want to do with a modular synth. Yes there are endless amounts of other great modules that would be so fun to have. This is the golden age of the analogue modular synthesizer, there have never existed so many good innovative modules as now. But I have what I need to make the sounds I can imagine, and the limited size makes it fairly fast to work with. Now... WHERE is the new music I have promised for so long? So incredibly delayed - but something interesting is cooking deep inside the laboratory.
Showing posts with label synthesizer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label synthesizer. Show all posts
Thursday, 21 March 2013
The Zebra Sidecar finalized
Modular synthesizers are great fun, but they also consume time. For me, the entire purpose with a modular synth is to do things that would be impossible on any of the other synths. If a normal synth can do it, the fun but cumbersome modular is a waste of time. The small Zebra modular have plenty of resources, but it was lacking a few things. It's lacking a trigger delay, and sometimes I'd like to delay the start of one envelope generator. It has X-or gate based ring modulation (built in the MFB OSC2), but I also have that in the MS-20, MFB Synth II and ARP Odyssey as well. Ring modulation that handles other waveforms than square would be nice. I thought 4 VCO's would remove the need for suboscillators. But suboscillators are in phase. It sounds different compared to using several VCO's. And if you have some suboscillators you can do very crude additive waveforms - like the weird Korg Poly-800 sawtoth that actually is squarewave's in different octave's with different amplitudes. None of the existing envelopes had voltage control of attack or decay, which I sometimes want. And waveshaping would be marvellously fun. My OB-12 has great folding, and it is one of the more fun functions on the Arturia Minibrute. I definitely wanted waveshaping.
It was time for a sidecar.
A Doepfer Mini case was selected to keep the project small. For waveshaping the new company Abstract Data's "Reactive Shaper ADE-10" was the way to go. Three flavours of separately controllable waveshaping in series. Doepfer's audio divider, and dual ring modulator works well and were very affordable. But then there was the envelope and trigger delay issues and only six HP to play with. (HP, Horizontal Pitch is the eurorack module width units, 1 HP = 5.08 mm or 1/5 inch). Actually I had bought the Doepfer dual trigger delay initially, but though occasionally important I don't use trigger delay that often. In most of the patches that module wouldn't be patched in. What a waste of space. And I really wanted voltage controlled attack. I then discovered the genious Make Noise "Function". An analogue computer based module that does virtually anything. For example VC controlled: AD and ASD envelopes, LFO, Trigger delay, slew generator, sample and hold etc etc. Everything with log, linear or exponential shape. Pure genious for the space limited modular. An intellijel multiple filled the remaining 2 HP. Now I'm finished. The Zebra modular with sidecar can do anything I want to do with a modular synth. Yes there are endless amounts of other great modules that would be so fun to have. This is the golden age of the analogue modular synthesizer, there have never existed so many good innovative modules as now. But I have what I need to make the sounds I can imagine, and the limited size makes it fairly fast to work with. Now... WHERE is the new music I have promised for so long? So incredibly delayed - but something interesting is cooking deep inside the laboratory.
A Doepfer Mini case was selected to keep the project small. For waveshaping the new company Abstract Data's "Reactive Shaper ADE-10" was the way to go. Three flavours of separately controllable waveshaping in series. Doepfer's audio divider, and dual ring modulator works well and were very affordable. But then there was the envelope and trigger delay issues and only six HP to play with. (HP, Horizontal Pitch is the eurorack module width units, 1 HP = 5.08 mm or 1/5 inch). Actually I had bought the Doepfer dual trigger delay initially, but though occasionally important I don't use trigger delay that often. In most of the patches that module wouldn't be patched in. What a waste of space. And I really wanted voltage controlled attack. I then discovered the genious Make Noise "Function". An analogue computer based module that does virtually anything. For example VC controlled: AD and ASD envelopes, LFO, Trigger delay, slew generator, sample and hold etc etc. Everything with log, linear or exponential shape. Pure genious for the space limited modular. An intellijel multiple filled the remaining 2 HP. Now I'm finished. The Zebra modular with sidecar can do anything I want to do with a modular synth. Yes there are endless amounts of other great modules that would be so fun to have. This is the golden age of the analogue modular synthesizer, there have never existed so many good innovative modules as now. But I have what I need to make the sounds I can imagine, and the limited size makes it fairly fast to work with. Now... WHERE is the new music I have promised for so long? So incredibly delayed - but something interesting is cooking deep inside the laboratory.
Monday, 1 February 2010
The noise-modular aka "The Zebra" is finalized!
Specs ended up pretty impressive: 4 VCO:s, 4 LFO:s, 3 envelopes, 3 VCA:s, 3 filters (though 2 are permanently in series), 2 mixers, 2 mixer/buffered multiplier/inverters, 2 crossfaders (also useable as VCA:s), 2 noisegenerators, 2 slew limiters, 2 808:ish sound sources, 1 random voltage and one 2x4 multiplier.
What didn't get there? Well, sample and hold, but two of the LFO's has the usual random S/H waveform so that is sort of covered. There is no true ring modulator, but the MFB OSC-02 has built in MS-20 like X-OR based ring modulator so that is also sort of covered. I had wanted a waveshaper, but I preferred another bigger VCO with more ins and outs.Yes, the Peavey Spectrum filter is gone.. It's no longer needed.
Component list from left to right
Racks: Schneidersladen
Upper rack:
MFB powersupply/midi interface
Doepfer A-117 DNG
Doepfer A-118 Noise
MFB Dual LFO
MFB OSC-02 Triple VCO
Dopefer A-138b Mixer
MFB Dual ADSR
Doepfer A-132-3 DVCA
Doepfer A-106-6 XP VCF
Lower rack:
MFB powersupply/midi interface
Doepfer A-140 ADSR
Doepfer A-170 SL
MFB Dual LFO
Doepfer A-180 Multiples
Analogue Soulutions MX224
Doepfer A-138c PMIX
Doepfer A-134-2 Dual VC CF
Analogue Soulutions MX224
Tiptop Z3000 Smart VCO
Analogue Solutions SY02 Multimede filter/VCA
This will have to do. Now it's time to make some new music.
Wednesday, 15 July 2009
Noise Modular Project
I have had a Peavey Spectrum filter for quite a while. My original purpose with it was to add analogur filter to one output on the ASR-10. But I hardly used it. The spectrum is almost a monophonic synth with a mixer instead of oscillators. It's got a moog-like filter, a vca, and two envelope generators and the usual midi control. Well oscillators and lfo's was needed to make it sound. And MFB have recently released the wonderful VCO:s from Synth II as a module. So I bought a MFB/Schneidersladen rack and some modules. From left to right it's MFB MIDI/CV-Netzteil, Doepfer A-117 Digital Noise/Random Clock/808 Sound Source, Doepfer A-118 Noise/Random, MFB Dual LFO, MFB OSC-02 Triple VCO, Doepfer A-138b Exponential Mixer, MFB-DUAL ADSR, Doepfer A-132-3 Dual linear/exponential VCA and Doepfer A-106-6 XP Filter. I call it the "Noise Modular" since it has several sorts of noisegenerators. Notice anything missing? No utility modules! I had miscalculated Teileinheiten and two Analogue Solutions MX224 Mixer/Inverter/Buffer (splitter) didn't fit. How useful is a modular without utility modules? Another MFB rack is now ordered which to start with will contain the two MX224:s, a Doepfer A-180 Multiples, Doepfer A-138c Polarizing Mixer and Doepfer A-170 Dual Slew Limiter. I think this will be one for it's size very powerful synthesizer. The Doepfer XP filter is inspired by Oberheim Xpander and contains 16 filtermodes of which eight can be used simultaneously. Sounds from three parts of the racks can then be fed to the Spectrum synth engine. I'll continue to fill the second rack of cause. More lfo's and envelopes. And a ring modulator. The MFB oscillator has a built in X-OR gate type ringmodulator like the MS-20 and ARP Odyssey, but I definitely want a "true" ringmodulator too. Also the Doepfer wave multipliers seems very interesting. Expect to hear much from this on the next album...
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