Custom Order: Fotosis No. 007, Noise Generating Synth.

Hello world, its been some months since we have completed anything in the realm of homemade electronics. Basically we have had our world turned upside down lately, I am now living in a whole other country working at a new job and trying to do as much Fotosis related work as possible on my off time when I come back to Lyon on the weekends.

This project was a custom order that challenged us to develop several new systems, most notable a sample and hold circuit and a micro-controller based trigger pulse generating system.

There are too many controls to list individually and descriptions would be difficult because I don't think it would be possible to find similar controls on another system to compare them to. This will probably be the last time I try to make an all in one unit this complex due to the time it took to develop build, test and debug the various circuits and programs that it contains. I feel in the future it would be better to build each of the systems individually and house them in separate enclosures that could be attached to some sort of board that gives them power etc.

Anyway here it is in action Fotosis No. 007...



There are still two more sections to complete, a CV interpretation module that will take in a control voltage and convert it to trigger pulses that can be used with the trigger pulse system and also a rocker pedal that will control the pitch of the oscillators as well as several other functions.

The sound range from more conventional synth noises to full on noise as well as different patterns of beeps and tones created by the trigger pulse generator. It would be the type of instrument ideally suited to someone wishing to create strange little samples for use on their tracks or it could be used live as a bizarre noise generating unit.

So essentially I am not going to go into details regarding the technical elements because there are just too many, so please just bask in the glory of this weird and interesting creation.

-J

Happy Holidays / Download Fotosis EP

* The new link to our EP is here.

About two weeks ago we embarked on a little project to remix a track by another group. It was to be a fun project for Christmas that would be released on the web etc. etc.

Anyway we started messing around with this track and after a few hours of cutting and pasting and applying effects in Audacity it was decided that we take a break and since we had all or our gear set up it might be fun to jam a little and record the results.

Well two days later we had 28 minutes (10 short tracks) of music that we were very happy with. An entire EP comprised of sounds created using a collection of household objects a bank of guitar effects pedals and our very own home made instruments. I suppose the resulting collection of tracks could be described as a blend of ambient electronica, dronescape experimentalism and randomized improvisation.

We do not claim to be professional musicians in any shape manner or form but we were extremely surprised with the results. One visiting friend who was the first person aside from ourselves to listen to the EP described it as "Dark" as if it didn't fit our personalities:-)

Well the track we were supposed to be remixing was sort of forgotten and buried under the responsibilities of everyday life coupled with a heavy dose of procrastination and was eventually returned to only for us to find that our dark electro souls didn't really lend themselves to Christmas songs and so we failed in our mission to create the next Xmas number one:-) But we did end up with a collection of really interesting little tracks as a byproduct.

Below you will find two links, one where you can listen to our tracks and the other where you can download a zip file that contains all the tracks and a text file relating to the methods and equipment used to create our music.

You can download and listen to the tracks here or get the entire EP zip file here (In.solit.us the site we use to host our files is a bit weird you have to scroll down to get to the button that lets you grab the track, its below the stupid banner ad).

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year,
John & Connie

Pure Data: Build Your Own Virtual Synth

I'm probably way behind the curve with this as this software has been around for years but I've only just started playing around with it the last few weeks and am feeling very proud of my first creation (synth / multi effects processor). The software is called Pure Data, there is a wikipedia site here which will tell you all the background you need to know regarding it.

It is free to download from the Pure Data site and is supported on Windows, Linux, Mac some OS's I've never heard of and there's even a version that works on PDA's.

Pd is described as "a real-time graphical programming environment for audio, video, and graphical processing".


Unless you are fairly computer literate or a programmer don't expect to get much out of it straight away. The best approach is to download a few simple patches created by others and play around with them for a while to get a feel for the GUI and then explore the examples that can be found in the help browser. Start by building an oscillator [osc~] then adding volume control [*~] and reverb using the freeverb [freeverb~] object. Using pd you can build virtually any sound or effect you can imagine there is even a [moog~] object that emulates a Moog resonance filter.

Pd can also be controlled using external midi devices and firmware can be downloaded which allows you to control pure data with the arduino micro-controller board so potentially you could build a reconfigurable personalized music machine with your computer creating the sounds.

The latest version called pd - extended 0.40.2 contains many of the extensions you need to make the patches sometimes called abstraction that you find mentioned on the web work.

There is also a very good forum called pure data hurleur, this community shares and develops objects and extensions for pd and offers advice and feedback to people getting started.

It is possible to play an instrument through your diy virtual effects processor using the adc object [adc~] if you have a line in on your computer or if you have one of those audio to USB converter thingys.

Cycling 74 the creators of Max/MSP which is a more evolved and expensive version of pure data have a free tool called Soundflower that allows you to connect audio packages together (Like jack but easier to use) so for example you could use Soundflower to record pd using Audacity.


Here you will find a cute little synth to play around with just download and install pd and open the file.

I haven't recorded anything yet but as soon as I do ill post it on this site.

Now if someone could just tell me how to emulate distortion of fuzz that would be great.

-J

Deviant Synth: For all your Synth Oddities

Again something from the musicthing blog. A new synth orientated site that purports to only post about totally out their electronic oddities. Their manifesto states no "links to fansites for Kraftwerk, Klaus Schulze, Can, Tangerine Dream, Ultravox, Gay Fairy Twinkle, or any other hideous 70s or 80s funny-haircut nostalgia keyboard act.... All tech must be ODD".

The site is called Deviant Synth and I will be checking it often thats for sure. The site creator says they are looking for contributors and anyone interested with a wordpress account can add content to the site.

-J

Yuri Landman: Experimental Luthier

I came across Yuri Landman several months ago while doing some online research into alternative guitar construction. At the time I thought information on Yuri was limited to a wiki entry on him as I somehow missed his official website hypercustom. So I was thrilled today to find a link on the musicthing blog to a pitchfork article all about this very interesting artist. The article describes the reasoning behind many of his guitars features and the logic he has applied to his instruments tuning and the materials he likes to use.

He has recently been creating unique guitars for a number of bands including one of my all time favorite groups Sonic Youth.

His guitars look amazing, I cant wait to hear the sounds these wonderful instruments produce. I love to read about other people exploring new possibilities in the realm of electro acoustic music as it makes me feel more positive about my own experiments in this area.

-J

Jeff Gburek - Musician

I recently had the good fortune of meeting Jeff Gburek an American experimental noise artist who currently resides in Berlin.

Jeff is primarily a guitarist although his techniques would seem quite unorthodox to many. Usually his guitar is laid flat on a table and plucked, played, interfered with using objects like metal files a cello bow and a whole range of different bits and pieces. He also utilizes a laptop during his performances for the live synthesis of electronic sounds the playback of pre-recorded samples and to effect the signal coming from his guitar.

We just saw him perform a piece called Myopia by Djamla Primordial Science that combines experimental movement theatre and live electro acoustic music here in Lyon. We came away from the show feeling eager to discuss what we had just seen. I love it when I'm challenged by by a piece of art or a performance and this certainly did just that.

He is currently touring France and a few other places presenting this and other works with Ephia who performs the bodily elements of the shows. A list of tour dates can be found here.


Samples of Jeff's guitar orientated music can be downloaded from the futurevessel site and you can listen to his computer compositions on his myspace. He also has several CD's coming out soon filled with track which I suppose would be classed as IDM (Intelligent Dance Music) so keep your eyes open.


He gave me some of his back catalog to listen to and I have been doing just that for the last few days. Here is a link to download one of the tracks I was given. Its is a composition comprised of recordings of radio broadcasts collected over several years and is part of a four disk set called Radio Wide World 1994 - 2004. The sound samples were collected using a shortwave radio and include recordings of Number Stations, background noise and random broadcasts that have been arranges to form complex soundscapes.



Below is a shorter but in no way less interesting piece uploaded for your enjoyment. Download here.

"Free Beer, Free Speech, Free Jazz" / IXI Software

Read on the always excellent CDM, I bookmarked the ixi software page for John and I to discuss tonight and hopefully explore soon. ixi is an experimental project with digital music instruments. The visual interface being essential to the music creation, enhancing the process.

Peter Kirn says it best,
"There have always been echoes of that in instrument design: buxom, carved women on viola da gambas, the way a piano keyboard reflects a system of tuning and pitch relations, and fantastical landscapes painted on virginals and other instruments. But I suspect we’ve only begun to see how this area could be blown up with digital instruments."

Here's more info from the ixi about pages to give you a better idea of what they are doing,


"ixi audio is an experimental project concerned with the creation of digital musical instruments and environments for generative music. We are interested in the computer as a workshop for building non-conventional tools for musicians..."

"We acknowledge the constraints that software puts on the musician, the limits that the tool sets for the creative process and we therefore promote and try to disseminate technologies that open up the limits of software (or define new boundaries). We think it should be the artist that defines the scope of his or her instrument (and therefore music), not a commercial software company."

Their free programs are available for download on their website. Check it out!

ixi software page

- C

(photo from Create Digital Music)

Brilliant Arduino Sequencer

Spotted this fantastic Arduino based synthesizer / sequencer on the make blog this morning. The official website for this project can be found here. The links include video of the device in action is well as code and schematics in case you wanted to build your own APC (Arduino Punk Console) not to be confused with the 555 Timer based Atari Punk Console (APC) which is an entirely different but totally fun weekend noisemaker project. Be sure to check out the rest of their website Beavis Audio as they have lots of other cool audio devices and effects.

I have spent hours playing around with the Arduino board since I purchased one almost a year ago today. Our first instrument an optical theremin we called Fotosis No. 001 used one to control various effects. The possibilities this simple USB cross platform micro-controller presents are almost limitless (Well not really limitless) and I love to see what lots of people around the world is doing with this great tool. I also like the fact that this device is getting the attention it deserves from websites like Make so more people can be turned on to its potential.

-J

Downloads: Where to find all of our sound clips

I thought it would be a good idea to do a short post showing anyone interested where our sound clips can be downloaded. I use an upload service called in.solit.us from which we usually embed mp3's but if you want to download the files feel free to do so they can be found here. We release everything we do under the creative commons 3.0 license so you can remix, reuse and redistribute the files with our blessing.

-J

Modification to the Wacky Sound Generator

Here is a little drawing of a modification you can add to the music from outer space wacky sound generator.

This was one of the first noise making units I built. Its a really simple fun little project that produces lots of cool strange sounds and has the potential to be modified in lots of interesting ways. Here is a post we did earlier regarding our own WSG housed in a cardboard enclosure.

How does this mod work? Well one of the first things you learn when studying electronics is that capacitors in parallel have their values added. So when the transistor in my circuit is open the value of capacitance that determines the frequency of the WSG's square wave is increased by 0.01uf. This translates into a lower tone being produced every time the transistor opens and a higher tone every time it closes. The frequency of open / closed cycle is determined by the inverter connected to the base of the new transistor. So instead of your noise maker making just two distinct tones there are now three or more tones to be heard. Below is a sound clip of the mod in action.

The cool thing about this modification is that you can add several of them to the WSG creating a device capable of even greater sonic madness. Just built the above circuit several times using whatever inverters are free on the CD40106 and connect them all to Q1's emitter. Vary the values of the capacitors and see what sort of noises are produced, experiment.

The only change to the WSG circuit I would recommend that you make would be to change the value of C5 to 0.01uf or 0.015uf so the values don't get so high that no audible sound is generated.

You can set it up on solderless breadboard first and connect it to your WSG using patch cords with crocodile clips.

Parts List:

Resistors

130K Ohm 1/4 Watt

10K Ohm 1/4 Watt

1M Ohm Linear Potentiometer

Transistor

2N3904

Capacitor

1uf Ceramic

.01uf Ceramic

.015uf Ceramic

Cigar Box Electric: Sort of

This is a simple cigar box style electric guitar I made last year using the wooden box that comes with the Electro Harmonix Micro Synthesizer as the body. The neck and bridge were just lying around my workshop in Ireland and I had nothing to do that day so after several hours of work I ended up with this weird instrument.

The scale length is shorter than the fret spacing on the neck would like but it still sounds great when played with a slide or prepared or modified with a third bridge. The hollow body gives the guitar a rather unique resonating quality that produces really interesting tones. Below is a sample of some noises I created using this guitar and our latest electronic synth / effect unit, Fotosis No. 004 there is a picture of the equipment setup at the end of the post.

The pickups are good quality single coils that were replacements I bought for my first guitar. It was not being used anymore due to the fact that it had become so modified and broken normal music was impossible to play on it, but it looked and sounded totally cool. I removed the pickups from the old guitar and cut slots into the EH Micro Synth box through which I pushed the pickups and then secured them in place wit four screws.

This instrument was a gift for Connie as was the little Danelectro Honeytone pocket amplifier that we use all the time now as a preamp.

Design: Fotosis No. 005

Fotosis instrument No. oo5 will be a hybrid guitar / synth, but not 80's keytar style. Actually it will have everything our previous instruments had with a special sort of experimental guitar added to the control panel. That means square wave noise maker section, optical theremin, passive ring modulator and a weird stringed instrument all in one. The picture on the left is my first drawing of the proposed device. I suppose it'll look and play a bit like a lap steel guitar.

The guitar has two rails running parallel to and just below the strings. These allow the player to insert a third bridge at any location they like or place a platform / fretboard under the strings on which the can mount objects to play the instrument as a prepared guitar. There will be two handmade high output pickups (similar to the ones I made for this instrument) located at both bridges. Each pickup will have independent volume control and its own 1/4" mono output to increase the experimentation potential of the device. The instrument can be played into the ring modulator and made to sound nothing like a guitar at all.

We will be starting construction in the next week or so after we catch up on our current orders and will post images of the design and construction process here.

The sound clip below was a test I did a while ago to determine what sounds would be produced by such a device. I simply plucked the strings with one hand and adjusted the controls on the square wave section of Fotosis No. 002 with the other. The embed is a bit slow give it a few seconds to get working but the file can be downloaded here if you still have trouble.



This picture is of the setup used to produce those sounds, notice the chop stick rammed under the strings. This acts as the third bridge.


-J

Experimenting with Binaural Beats / Does It Work?

First off, I want to thank everyone who has linked to us over the last few weeks. Don't be surprised if I make a visit because I am collecting screenshots for our personal photo archive of sites that discover or feature something we've made. I really enjoy it as our readership is getting more international by the day and we are discovering some great sites in the process. Really, thanks.

So tonight we decided to experiment with binaural beats. I realise that the company i-doser has gotten lots of publicity the last few months but the findings of this scientific discovery has been around since 1839.

Here's the basics:

"Binaural beats or binaural tones are auditory processing artifacts, that is apparent sounds, the perception of which arises in the brain independent of physical stimuli. This effect was discovered in 1839 by Heinrich Wilhelm Dove.

In nature, two sounds that are similar but slightly shifted in frequency will beat to produce two new frequencies which are the sum and the difference of the original two sounds. For example, a 400 Hz tone and a 410 Hz tone will form a ~405 Hz tone pulsating 10 times per second.

The brain produces a similar phenomenon internally, resulting in low-frequency pulsations in the loudness of a perceived sound when two tones at slightly different frequencies are presented separately, one to each of a subject's ears, using stereo headphones. A beating tone will be perceived, as if the two tones mixed naturally, out of the brain. The frequency of the tones must be below about 1,000 to 1,500 hertz for the beating to be heard. The difference between the two frequencies must be small (below about 30 Hz) for the effect to occur; otherwise the two tones will be heard separately and no beat will be perceived.

Interest in binaural beats can be classified into two categories. First, they are of interest to neurophysiologists investigating the sense of hearing. Second, some protoscientists believe that binaural beats may influence the brain in more subtle ways through the entrainment of brainwaves and can be used to produce relaxation and other health benefits." - Wiki

It all sounds a little heavy and new age but being sensitive to motion, light and sound I was really interested in trying this, as was John.

We decided to stop whatever we were doing and try 'one dose'. The lights were dimmed and we each put on our respective headphones. The track was 30 minutes long. I was sure that both of us would have a different experience - I believed John would enjoy the experience more readily but wouldn't have the same lasting effect as on myself. In fact I was sure he would go to bed while I stayed up all night with untapped energy. The conclusion was, I was right. The length also had us on different sides. He felt the 'song' lasted ten minutes, I felt like it was timeless with several conscious wake-ups although I woke up right before the file ended, knowing it was about to end.

This kind of experiment is surely based on your own desire to see it through. We both had no psychedelic notions but we were certainly open to discovering the sounds that would be presented to us and how that would effect us. This element is the most natural for people like us, we both are enormously sensitive to noise and stimuli around us in everyday life.

The after effect was in one word euphoric. We discussed our experience and concluded that indeed something happened and that the sound sample had some great variations. All in all, this is something I think we both want to explore because the sounds we heard tonight were actually very well orchestrated and layered, well thought out. In hindsight, it really wasn't far off from our usual experimentation with music but I wish I could go to sleep!

Links:

Binaural Beat Brain Wave Experimenter's Lab
Binaural Beats via Wiki

- C