Three hundred synths, 3 hardware projects, and one app
midi.guide80 points by ductionist 8 hours ago
80 points by ductionist 8 hours ago
OK, call me too synth nerdy, but have you guys ever longed for a project that allowed you too match stuff like envelope times and between synths?
E.g. (totally made up values in this example) if you want to approximate the amplitude envelope from SH-101 to Bass Station 2, if the attack knob is at 5/10 position on 101, that's 500ms, which means you need to set attack knob to 6/10 on Bass Station 2 to get same attack time?
I hope this gets made one day, but I'm too poor and stupid to make it.
Anyways, this sort of system would make it much easier to create "universal" patches that would work between synths.
I'm not sure there's much to be gained by mapping values. Maybe envelope time is comparable since seconds are seconds, but not every synth interpolates ADSR values in the same way (some use just linear or logarithmic interpolation, some high end synths are heavily configurable). Also, other values like filter cutoff impact the sound in dramatically different ways depending on the kind of filter...
Good point - again for this, filter cutoff knob position or MIDI CC value percentage of 0/max value # would be mapped to cutoff frequency Hz #.
And yes, envelope times have different transition formulas between points, like linear vs logarithmic, as you stated. But again, having a direct map for of just A,D,S,R ms times would save you a ton of time, and honestly, just a sanity check sometimes, when trying to recreate similar "classic" subtractive patches between synths.
> OK, call me too synth nerdy, but have you guys ever longed for a project that allowed you too match stuff like envelope times and between synths?
Yes actually. I thought about doing something like this to convert Juno 106 patches to Novation Xiosynth patches, because I have a 106 and a Xiosynth 49 sitting beside me, and a pretty viable Juno 106 emulation.
Getting the times for the Juno is easy because the lookup tables and code for the envelope is a known quantity but I'd need to actually just measure the envelopes in the Xio. They might also not have quite the same response "shape" but they'd be pretty close.
This looks like a really great project.
I naively thought that with 300ish synths covered they'd have everything I own but I can see that's not the case.
I've got Alesis, Casio and Yamaha equipment that's missing. Time to dig out the manuals and get a PR ready.
It's easy to forget how successful the MIDI standard is. It might be the most stable and still relevant digital standard of all time.
My oldest bit of kit is a Casio CZ-5000 from, I think, 1985. That I can plug it into the latest equipment without drivers and it still works is amazing. 5 pin DIN for the win!
Thanks! I have never heard of it. Need to buy my son a new ipad so I can use this with his old one.
Very cool project. I am impressed by the ability of the different format downloads like Hapax. Kudos!