We're in need of change. While we figure it all out, please refer to our labels and links to your left. Many, many thanks for all the continued support and interest! If you would like to stay informed on our whereabouts online and off, feel free to visit John's Delicious or my Multiply page for, if not frequent, general updates. In the meantime this blog will remain up and will eventually redirect to our future projects.
Until then...
Regards, Connie & John
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.
This is the second post concerning the bar set order, we decided to throw in some little extras, a cardboard keyboard and a cardboard amp.
The keyboard is a simple enough affair as it is based on a simple circuit that involves a 555 timer chip to produce a square wave. The casing was created by laminating lots of layers of cardboard together using glue and wood screws. In the video below we are playing the keyboard into the ring modulator of one of our earlier instruments, Fotosis No. 003. The resulting sound is the effect of the square wave noise section from Fotosis No.003 being fed into the carrier input of the units ring mod. and keyboard on the main input.
The amplifier is actually three amps and three speakers in one box. The amps are LM386 chips providing 2.5 Watts each. This set up allows us to play three separate devices into the amp where each device will have its own input, volume control, amp and speaker.
Part one of this post can be viewed here.
- J
Connie here. We've been working on a custom order set the last 4 weeks for someone I am very close to. If anything, I wouldn't think anyone else would be capable of supporting 'fotosis' like he has with this one project. In the infancy of our little 'business', it's the friends and loved ones who help us get through the days of uncertainty; the ones who understand our simple dream and allow us to feel that for everything we make, they truly want to be a part of our growing passion and humble expertise. (FYI - I thank all our friends at the end of our blog and also through regular posts)
This set will be showcased in a local popular bar downtown that is known for weekly live music. The requirements were in keeping with our love for recycled materials and parts, as the need for the instruments to be durable to withstand euphoric drunken customers and also the respect of a handmade retro aesthetic including Meccano pieces & salvaged vintage connectors.
We really enjoyed designing and creating this interactive ensemble, something that anyone passing by would want to touch (very important) and an experienced musician could properly plug and play with.
Here is John with the specs;
The optical sequencer contains two oscillators one generating a sine wave the other a square wave. These oscillators are set up as optical theremins, their frequency being determined by three LDR's mounted on the front or the unit.
There are also a number of patch leads, permanently connected at one end to the outputs of a micro-controller. These leads can be connected to banana jacks on the front panel allowing the micro-controller to send trigger pulses to opto-couplers that reroute the frequency determining components connected to the oscillators. The time between trigger pulses is set by a value read from another five LDR's that are connected to the analog inputs of the micro-controller.
Both sound producing sections of the unit are then fed into and mixed by a passive ring modulator before amplification. The resulting noise is a random series of beeps blips and noise that you can interact with by applying lights or shadows to the eight LDR's on the control panel.
The sound producing chips I used for this build were the XR2206 (Sine Wave) and a 40106 (Square Wave).
As this unit is for public use it was important to make the controls as simple as possible so the pots are all dual pots. Example the volume also controls intensity and the filter is also square wave frequency.
The matching theremin with the Egg Beater for an aerial is a solid state unit based on a modified schematic we found online a while back.
All of the materials used to manufacture the casings were found objects like Meccano, random collected screws, bits of metal and wood also a strange French industrial on/off switch.
The whole setup runs off a single boss PSA 230, 9v DC supply.
Part two of this post can be viewed here.
A fellow music blogger I met over at mog has generously written up a post about fotosis on his site cubikmusik. It's a great write up and a wonderful thing to read first thing in the morning, especially with a warm cup of Lyons ;-)
Very kind of you Cubik, 'go raibh maith agat'.
Link
- C
Good news everyone! We have been very busy the last few weeks working on commissioned work and as a result haven't posted anything on our Etsy shop in a few weeks, until now:-)
This instrument which we have labeled Fotosis No.003 was designed and built by Connie it was the first unit she has designed and built alone and I love it.
It is currently for sale on our Etsy shop.
In terms of functions it is identical to Fotosis No.002 only the housing and layout of the controls is different.
We are selling it for 300 US Dollars which the same price that we sold No.002 but translates into a bit less for us when you convert it into Euro. But due to the fact that we have upgraded our basic design recently and all future units will have extra features and different construction our next models will be priced a bit higher.
Fotosis No.003 is a three in one device. It contains a simple optically controlled synth, a separate noise maker circuit and a passive ring modulator all in one box. There are ten pots, two LDR's, seven toggle switches and two momentary switches all of which control the active circuits and allow you to turn on and off various effects or sections and bypass parts of the device.
This instrument is housed in a thin sided wooden box also purpose built. Most of the wiring is point to point (in a vintage style) to reduce solder board complexity. The instrument is coated in an orange tolex like material and has steel corners and aluminum trimming around the control panel, there is also a leather carry handle on the front.
The sounds produces vary from weird drones to little sequences of chirps, bleeps and beeps and also full on noise.
There are three sections, two oscillators and a ring modulator each oscillator can be used on its own or can be mixed using the ring modulator.
It can be used as an instrument on its own or as an effect that can modulate the sound of other line level devices that are fed into the input of the ring mod.
There is a video of the instrument in action at...
It measures 36 cm long by 22.5 cm wide, the control panel is sloped and is 10 cm at its highest point Fotosis No.003 weighs about 900g.
Features:
Firstly there is a passive ring modulator comprised of three jacks, input, suppressed carrier frequency input and output. There is also a bypass toggle that switches the input straight to the output. But as with most passive ring modulators the inputs and outputs are interchangeable.
Optically controlled LFO producing a pure sine wave, with frequency switching function, low and high pitch switch and a toggle that switches off the optical function allows you to control the oscillator using two pots for when you want very slow non audible sine waves used mainly with the ring modulator as the carrier signal. Just above the main controls there is a volume knob. You can interact with this sections using the two LDR's mounted on the face of the control panel using you hands or other light sources, our favorite is to use flashing bike lights, strobes or torches for weird whining tones and intense beeps.
Next is a strange square wave noise generator that consists of two oscillators interacting with one another. Screaming high pitched tones can be produced as can low fuzz like sounds when the pots are at their max or min positions, in between you find effects similar to a simple two tone sequencer changing relative to one of the pots. There is also a low pass filter and volume control.
We have been playing around with it for a while now and have still have not discovered all the possible sounds you can create. It would be perfect for anyone into Circuit Bending, dronescape music, performance art, noise art installations, DJ's or just musicians who want a device on the side that they can use as a noise wig out machine. It is capable of plenty more subtle sci-fi effects and also when effect units like delay, phase, fuzz or pitch modulating pedals are connected between the device and an amplifier the number of potential sounds you can produce grows.
None of the controls are labeled because they are often quite difficult to describe, but we will be suppling a drawing of the control panel with descriptions relating to the function of each knob and switch to get you started.
Here is a basic run down of the controls:
Oscillator 1 Top of control panel:
High / low pitch toggle switch.
LDR switching on / off.
LDR / potentiometer select.
Kill switch.
Momentary bypass kill switch.
Volume knob.
Sine wave intensity knob.
Oscillator 2 Bottom of control panel:
High / low pitch toggle switch.
Low pass filter setting knob.
Volume knob.
Square wave 1 frequency knob.
Square wave 2 pulse speed knob.
Square wave 1 Square wave 2 mix knob.
Kill switch.
Momentary bypass kill switch.
Oscillator 1 LDR's.
Centre of control panel:
Ring mod. bypass toggle.
Oscillator 1 momentary bypass of kill switch.
Oscillator 2 momentary bypass of kill switch.
Oscillator 1 LDR's.
Power indicator LED.
Rear of unit:
Oscillator 1 1/4" output mono.
Oscillator 2 1/4" output mono.
Ring mod. input 1/4" mono.
Ring mod. carrier input 1/4" mono.
Ring mod. output 1/4" mono.
Power on toggle.
9v dc jack.
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
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.
Our internet is down at the moment, so we are trying to maintain out blog from internet cafes and friends houses, cheers guys. They tell us it wont be back for ten days sorry everybody.
We have just finished Fotosis No. 004. Its a hybrid synth /effect unit that combines noise maker, ring modulator and optical theremin. It was a custom job for a friend and includes two new features that were not on the original Fotosis No. 002. There is now an extra oscillator (Extra Knob) on the square wave section and a footswitch so you can bypass the ring mod. as you would with any normal guitar pedal.
The extra knob gives the synth lots of new capabilities and seems to act a bit like a sequencer, generating a variety of interesting beeps and blips that repeat every couple of seconds. Before I would have described it as a simple noise making unit but now with this modification it has become a whole lot more interesting to me. The sound clip below is a short composition I created the other night to demonstrate some of the devices sounds.
We are constantly redesigning and improving our instruments, trying to build devices that we feel are tough enough to last a lifetime and have a sound unique enough to keep any electronic musician happy. Each instrument will be an improvement on the last exhibiting its own visual style is well as new materials and construction techniques.
Improvements to Fotosis No.004 include, tougher case now made from tolex coated 8mm pine and leather carry handle.
Below is another picture of the unit which shows the 25 Way D type connector into which you plug the footswitch.
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
We have reached a point where it is necessary to supply some documentation with our products. In the left hand column there is a .PDF document, just click on the link to view or download.
This document contains general information regarding our base model and describes the function and purpose of each control and jack. There are also sections like getting started, hacks, additional options, contact information and pricing.
When you read this document you will see references to switches labeled S1 through S10, potentiometers K1 to K10 and jacks J1 to J5. To make sense of these keys you must download the appropriate Fotosis No. XXX drawing. At this stage the only difference between models will be the control panel layout and jack location and a drawing will be provided with each purchased instrument and will be available for download here for evermore.
We have added a note to the right hand side column of our blog concerning our starting price for instruments. The base model will always be identical in function to Fotosis No. 002 but the look in terms of colour, layout and approximate size can vary depending on the buyers preferences. These instruments will be priced at 250 Euro and several modifications are available on request, the options are detailed in our documentation.
If you wish to purchase an instrument from us just send us an email and we will get back to you to discuss just what it is you are looking for and how it can be customized you suit your likes and needs.
More options will become available in the future, we will post them on this blog and update the documentation accordingly.
Modifications and options being developed now include:
Circuit Bending controller accessible via a 25 Way D type connector located on the rear of our devices. This will be a microprocessor based system that will allow you to control one or more circuit bent devices using our instrument. It will consist of a number of electronic switches (between 5 and 10) that you can tap into through the 25 way connector. The switches will act just like toggles but will be turned on and off by the microprocessor in a variety of useful ways, allowing you to interact with your circuit bent equipment in a whole new way. The methods of interaction that will trigger the electronic switches will include theremin like control using an LDR and also control of all glitches using a single pot. Settings will include, cycle through all glitches with variable speed, random glitch generator and the ability to skip up and down through the switches with the turn of a single pot.
Built in third bridge guitar. This will require the Fotosis instrument to be a little longer but it should look super cool. There will be a six sting, two handmade pickups, short scale length guitar with a moveable / removable center bridge built into the control panel just above the knobs and toggles. It can be played sort or like a lap steel guitar with a slide or plucked with both hands like a harp. Platforms will be mounted below the strings so you can prepare it using household objects like springs and small electric motors etc. to expand the range of experimentation possibilities.
Modifying the existing square wave noise maker to it has an even greater range of sounds.
More to come, will post pictures of the development and testing of these options as they near completion, the picture above was our first foray into pickup design and building these should become a feature on future Fotosis products, hint built in guitar.
-J
We have been experimenting with different effect processors in the last couple of weeks. With a Digitech Whammy pedal and the Electro Harmonix Micro Synth, a whole new range of sounds and filtering capabilities can be realised with our Fotosis instrument. We love it!
Here are 3 samples:
By The Sea - We set the Fotosis to a modulated drone. Then with the Micro Synth and Whammy produced a series of simulated bowed sounds which were very clear and precise.
We Shall - A sequence of two notes John produced. The frequencies were alternated up and down every four modulation cycles. The blips and beeps were created using the momentary kill switch bypass.
Connie's Wigout - Like the title but with my preferred Whammy pedal used as an instrument with reverb pedal.
- J&C
I've decided to post a schematic for an optical theremin / synth that is a simplified version of our first creation, Fotosis No. 001. Its based around the XR2206 function generator which produces the sound (Sine Wave) and the 40106 chip that I use to trigger the LDR switching function on the XR2206. The controls are simple, three pots and three toggle switches. The pots control volume, sine wave intensity and LDR switching speed and the toggles turn LDR switching on / off (S1), (S2) for high and low pitch setting and (S3) which gives you the capability of redirecting the timing resistor pins on the XR2206 chip to some other form of resistance.
You could build a hybrid sequencer / optical theremin using a micro-controller like the Arduino board with a few opto-couplers switching the timing pins through resistors (4N37's work well) or make a noise maker using the spare Hex Schmitt Triggers on the 40106. There are many possibilities. All of the Capacitors are 1uf ceramic (Farnell part number 110-0420) except C4 which is 0.33uf polyester (Farnell part number 116-6040) all resistors are 1/4 Watt. The LDRs are 1M Ohm in total darkness and the whole circuit runs on 9V dc.
A .PDF of the same schematic can be found here.
Here is a more complicated version we built and sold a few weeks ago, the link includes a video so you can get an idea of what sounds you can expect.
Any questions I will answer to the best of my abilities...
Just posted "Fotosis 002" for sale on ebay.co.uk, you can view the listing here.
(This item is now available for purchase at our Etsy Shop) Starting bid is £175 sterling. I so wish I could sell these for less so more people could be in possession of very their own noise machine (because everybody needs a noise machine) but alas components are not free and it took me like four days to build it from scratch so I felt the starting price was as little as I could charge. Anyway still 
messing around with it trying to get as much playing (Testing) time with it as I can before I have to give it away and I still think its amazing. The picture on above is the development process of Fotosis 002 where I carefully connected various other home made circuits to the half finished device so I could assess nice values for the components that influence the sound before soldering them into place. I like to use different value components in every device even if the devices look the same on the outside in order to give every instrument a unique voice.
Here is a new sound clip I recorded yesterday. Its the voice of Winston Churchill doing the we will fight them on the beaches speech being played from my laptops headphone jack via the ring modulator with oscillator two (The square wave one) being used as the carrier frequency.
Or you can download it directly here.
Bye for now:-)
We have been very busy the last two weeks deciding on a final design for this instrument which will be our main product from this point forth. The challenge was to create something that was not so complicated it would be really difficult to build or play and not so simple that the person playing it would get bored after an hour or so thinking that they had discovered all the instruments potential. In the end we built "Fotosis No. 002" which is comprised of three sections, optical theremin (Sine wave), noise maker (Square wave) and a passive ring modulator.
The first section is an updated version of our premier instrument "Fotosis No. 001", which was an optically controlled sine wave generator. This section no longer has built in microprocessor controlled effects, I did this to reduce complexity but I have added the ability to bring the sound synthesis chip under the control of two pots instead of the LDR's with the flick of a toggle and I've also added a kill switch and momentary kill bypass button to the output (Thanks Ian for the pointers). This section can be used on its own as an optical theremin or as a drone machine, there are one or two other functions but they would take a while to explain so ill leave them a mystery for now:-)
The second section is a simple enough square wave noise maker that produces nice high and low pitched tones, squeals and fuzz sounds. On its own it can generate quite a few interesting sounds, some scary, some annoying. This section will keep you occupied for a while as a noise maker but its real purpose is to provide the ring modulator with a carrier. Like the first optical section there is a volume pot a kill switch and kill bypass before the output.
In the top of the unit there are five standard audio jacks the one on the far left belongs to the optical section, the jack on the far right is dedicated to the square wave noise maker and the three in the middle concern the ring modulator.
These three jacks (In the middle) from left to right are ring mod. input, carrier input and ring mod output but actually they are interchangeable. Either oscillator optical or noise maker can be used as the carrier that will modulate whatever signal is on the input which can even be from another instrument such as a keyboard, guitar, laptop head phone output, AM radio etc. anything that is at line level can be fed into the ring mod and distorted and made all weird. Passive instruments need to be amplified by some kind of line driver as would be the case for a guitar or bass where an overdrive pedal would be needed to drive the input transformer.
The ring mod. is a passive system as in it uses no power and contains no active components. It is made from two 1:1 ratio CT transformers and four matched germanium diodes. The sound produced is often bell like, sometimes lightly distorted and generally way out weird. You can also bypass the ring mod. section with the flick of a toggle switch so your input signal is untreated. You can have hours of fun modulating oscillator one with oscillator two or vice versa and looking for interesting tracks in your music library to play through it.
The whole unit is housed in a wooden box with a pine frame on the interior, everything is first glued together and then fixed to the pine frame with many many stainless steel screws. The box is coated in a Tolex like material that I found in my local art store to make it look nice. There are also steel corners to protect it from knocks and rubber feet on the bottom so it wont scratch the hell out of you table.
The whole thing runs off a standard nine volt negative tip positive shell PSU, I generally supply a Boss PSA 230 wall wart with each unit sold because I find they are pretty robust and reasonably priced.
It took me about a four day to build this not working full time of course and I've been testing it continuously since I finished and I have yet to find all possible permutations of knob settings.
Ill be putting it up on Ebay pretty soon so if anyone is interested in buying it just let me know before I auction it.
Here are some Youtube clips...
Part 1...
Part 2...
Here are some sound samples. To download, the download button is at the bottom of the page that the download button brings you to if that makes any sense? You'll see:-/
Download audio directly.
Clip 1...
Clip 2...
If you have any more questions regarding this device feel free to contact me ill be more than happy to send you extra sound clips of the unit in action or answer any questions you have relating to it.
We are still setting up this site so make sure to check back for updates. Our soon-to-be developed blog will include our sales information, other traditional and electronic instruments, recycled art projects and various other DIY happenings.
Feel free to contact us by email, info is on your left.
Thanks for coming by, J&C
