WEEK 11

Creative Computing: Computer Music Programming : Streams (1)

CODE @ Exercise :

(1) A synthDef
(2) A stream playback mechanism that controls different parameters of the synthDef and demonstrates concepts presented in "Streams-Patterns-Events1 - 3.html"
(3) Thoughts and issues on the process with an MP3 result.

This code will crash your computer.I can make it not crash but it still does not sound what I want it to sound..So I have choosen to post the code which will crash the computer.
I still need to understand Streams,patterns and events alot better.I have actually spent more time making the synthDef .
I can see where the things are heading,SuperCollider why didn't you come in my life earlier.. I guess I have the whole life to keep working on it. Thanks christian.

References :
1)Haines, Christian."Creative computing : Semester 1, Week 11. "Streams,Events &Patterns". Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 24/05/2007.
(2)McCartney , James et al 2007,SuperCollider Inbuilt Help.
(3)Source Forge,http://supercollider.sourceforge.net/
(4) SuperCollider Help Book
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Audio Arts :Mastering (1)
Mastering is the process of finalizing a recording and preparing it for the final medium on which it will be played back ensuring optimum clarity,balance and consistent levels across the entire recording.In the workshop we looked at the website of Eden Sound Mastering - Australia's first Focusrite Authorised Blue Mastering Suite in melbourne.


How mastering came into existence ?
There were left over inaudible high frequencies on the CD recordings which would give you a headache if exposed over long durations.They are non existent in vinyl's.Hence came mastering.


EQ in mastering is often used to tuck away annoying frequencies and to enhance the frequencies that make the recording special.Through the use of EQ you can shape the final curve of the song so that it has the right amount of bass, midrange and treble. Applying correct amout of compression and limiter with "just the right" amount of attack and release will make the track really special.Remember the settings will vary for each song and style of music.Some songs might just need that subtleness and love whereas another one will need that big size and excitement. It just depends on the genre/style of music/song.
Through the use of “Limiting” in mastering you can put a clamp on the entire mix so that it doesn’t move above a given threshold.This will insure the loudest mix do not goes above the given limit.Another useful point in this weeks readings was use of VU meter as a plugin.It ensures that you are not compressing too hard and helps you in making right decisions with the settings.
I will talk about compression techniques in the next week.There is certainly alot more to compression at mastering stage than just boosting everthing.

Master Mix : Here is a (rough) master of the the group 3F+1M
Previous Mix : Here is the older mix
First Mix : Here is the first mix

I took the final mix in to a new protools session,named it mastering sesssion and applied(from the order of top to bottom)
* 7 band EQ = balancing the frequency ranges which sounded nice to me, a little more gain on the lower range(80Hertz), boosting the mid range for more clarity in vocals. I have cut down 75% gain to the high range(above 12 Kilo Hertz).
* minimax = this was giving a bit of depth in the bottom end.
* limiter = setting the threshold level, i made sure the loudest signal does not peak.
* Compression -I still need to understand more on compression.Whats the right amount of attack and release, whats the relationship with other paramerters,how does the relationship along with other parametres change the sound ? I am confused in terms of completely understnding it,however I played with the knobs and did what sounded good.
*Mc2000Mc4 - I just played with the knobs,I could hear the change it did to the mix. Did I wanted that change ? I am not sure,I have used it very carefully, by just increasing a bit if its output.
Something from this line added noise into the mix.I think its compression or Mc2000Mc4.It was really audible at silent spots.I have to work more on reducing the noise from the mix,otherwise I am sort of happy.

References:
(1)Grice, David.2007."Tutorials on Audio Arts (3) Semester 1, Week 1.Mastering(1)." Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 22/05/2007.
(2) Readings on My Uni.Music Technology(3)2007.
(3)http://www.focusrite.com viewed 27May'07
(4)http://www.edensound.com.au viewed 27May'07
(5)Waves Mastering Help
http://www.waves.com/objects/pdf/general/Update-and-Errata-web.pdf
viewed 27May'07
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Forum :
====================

Memories of forum far apart now.My mind looked somewhat like this picture in those 2 hours. However I rememeber Delany's presentation. Very interesting talk,as much, as the sound examples he played,of people like LustMord, Brien Willaims , Aphix Twin and Robert Rich. Thanks for burning me a Dvd full of Ambient music John, I have not forgotten about burning you some Trilok..

Genre : dArk ambient music
Form : long form timbral variation
characterstic : visual music

John said " feels like I am in a dark forest long from anywhere"..
Stephen said "Continous low level tension without any release"

References:

Whittington.Stephen . “Construction and Deconstruction.” Forum/Workshop presented at EMU space, Level 5 Schulz, Thursday 24' May' 2007.

Delany.John . “Construction and Deconstruction.” Student Presentations. EMU space, Level 5 Schulz building, Thursday 24' May' 2007.

Whitelock.Simon . “Construction and Deconstruction.” Student Presentations. EMU space, Level 5 Schulz building, Thursday 24' May' 2007.

Shea.Nathan . “Construction and Deconstruction.” Student Presentations. EMU space, Level 5 Schulz building, Thursday 24' May' 2007.

Week 10

Creative Computing: Duplication

It is a method for duplicating the signal which gets sent to the next bus, hence acheiving a stereo signal from a mono channel.
Out.ar(bus: 0,channelsArray: signal.dup == signal sent to bus[0,1]

Some very interesting points were covered in the class really to do with using arrays to generate massive amount of data with very simple code.

Array.series( range,start, increment)
Array.series(10,1,1) * $1(any variable),
Multiplying by 2 - gives even harmonics ,
multiplying by 3 will give 3rd harmonics,
multiplying by 5 will give 5th harmonics and so on..
multiplying by 44oHertz will give octaves of A

Array.geom(5,1,3) == geometric harmonic
Array.geom(10,1,3) %5 == weirdo using modulo
Array.fill(3,"hello world") == 3 * string name

CODE : "Exercise" :Creation of a large synthesiser assembly using the concept of duplication.
(1) MIDI Input and playback
(2) A synthesiser definition incorporating carriers, modulators and modifiers created using large scale duplication
(3)An effects synthDef
(4) The synthDefs will be organised so the main synthesizer definition will have its output routed through an effects synthDef.
Mp3 result

References :
1)Haines, Christian."Creative computing : Semester 1, Week 10. "Duplication". Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 17/05/2007.
(2)McCartney , James et al 2007,SuperCollider Inbuilt Help.
(3)Source Forge,http://supercollider.sourceforge.net/
(4) SuperCollider Help Book

Audio Arts : Creative Production (2)






The whole hour was dedicated looking at AD2022 - Avalon's fourth generation fully discrete,symmetrical Pure class A microphone preamplifier.

I tried couple of things to try this long awaited piece of hardware.My initial experiment failed cause everything I tried resulted in feedback.I was trying to take the audio out from protools into Avalon and then record the mix back into protools.Taking the Auxillary out from the C24 to Avalon and recording that in protools didnt work either.How can I send the master to Protools 3&4 out as well, so that I can take those outs and send it through Avalon ??
Well I was not muting the 2 new tracks that were assigned to record the mix.The signal which was played back was recorded as well and played back too while recording.. Hence feedback ..
I simplified the things and used my computer to play back the mix and recorded that onto protools using Avalon's front panel unbalanced inputs.

Mix of 3F+1m : Here is the mix of the group I recorded.
I have used Avalon to record the vocals and then I sent the whole mix through Avalon.The mix you are hearing is [(MixNoVoicewithout Avalon + Voice) + Mixwith AvalonVoice + Voice].bounce;

For comparison,hear the old ones.
No Voice : Older mix with no voice without Avalon
With Voice : Older Mix with voice without Avalon

References:
(1)Grice, David.2007."Tutorials on Audio Arts (3) Semester 1, Week 10.Creative Production(2)." Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 15/05/2007.
(2) Readings on My Uni.Music Technology(3)2007.

Forum :
Words replacing colors.Whats the term when you start seeing words as colors, alphabets become pixels and sentences form shapes ? I am suffering from that.
In this life let me hear sounds and see words.

*(all I want to say for this weeks forum)

Reference:

Whittington.Stephen. “Forum – Week 10 – Construction and Deconstruction." Workshop presented at EMU space, lvl 5 Schulz building, University of Adelaide, 17th May, 2007.

Fredrick May. "Forum – Week 10 – Construction and Deconstruction." Student Presentations. EMU space, Level 5 Schulz building, University of Adelaide, 17th May, 2007.

Dragos Nastasie. “Forum – Week 10 – Construction and Deconstruction." Student Presentations. EMU space, Level 5 Schulz building, University of Adelaide, 17th May, 2007.

Matt Mazzone. “Forum – Week 10 – Construction and Deconstruction." Student Presentations. EMU space, Level 5 Schulz building, University of Adelaide, 17th May, 2007.

WEEK 9

Creative Computing :Busses, Routing and Ordering
The client side representation of an audio or control bus on a server.Manages allocation and deallocation of bus indices.[ read more about busses and routing]

code : This code is incomplete and has got some errors.. I will update it very soon.

Audio Arts: Creative Production (2)
We were supposed to look at AutoTune, a pitch correcting plug-in by Anatares.Unfortunately we don’t have that in the studios,a million-dollar studio without necessary plugins. I am disappointed with myself too that why don’t I own them. I guess I was always working in the uni and confessing that I have spent the money on other things. But now its the right time to get one, I am still double minded about Mbox Pro or Digi 002, which is only $400 more right now.

Auto-Tune works in two modes:
* The Automatic Mode corrects the pitch of a vocal or solo instrument in real time, without distortion or artifacts, while preserving all the expression of the original performance.
* The Graphical Mode displays the performance's detected pitch envelope and allows you to draw in the desired pitch using a variety of graphics tools.

Important notes and features:
Auto-Tune does not like double notes or a chord - it only works when sustained a single note.
"A side-effect of using very fast pitch correction is that shallow vibrato is ironed out altogether, while deeper vibrato turns into a trill.
Auto-Tune also has the ability to add delayed vibrato to whatever sound is being
processed, so in theory, you can strip out the vibrato from the original performance and replace it with something far more mechanical and precise".

One function of the hardware version of Auto-Tune is its ability to shift
pitch according to a MIDI input. In theory, this means you can input a MIDI melody and whatever audio input you have fill be forced to fit that melody.
Things to try: It has the ability to make the human voice sing impossible arpeggios or in that case any instrument. How about taking a single-note instrument like the tanpura or didgeridoo and changing its sound to a melodic bass line?
Every thing comes to the conclusion of being as creative you want to be, with just a little precaution.

Task of the week :
Mix of the group (3F+1M : NO VOCALS [Feli.Ban.Georgi] ;
Mix of the group 3F+1M): WITH VOCALS [Bel.Feli.Ban.Georgi].scope

I am hoping to record the vocals seperately in the coming week.There is a lot of spill from the other instruments in the vocal microphone,since it was recorded live in the EMU space along with other cats.As you can hear the mix with vocals sounds quite reverby from the one without vocals and i can hear the room especially when the loud snare hits..I have asked belinda to come and do the vocals seperately over the recording.
I think, bass needs just a little cut off from the bottom end or may be little level down will solve what i am hearing right now.I cant quite trust this room as well(studio 1). I might have a break and come back and listen to it.Why am i worring about the mix with vocals,few things are not under my control.

References:
(1)Grice, David.2007."Tutorials on Audio Arts (3) Semester 1, Week 9.Creative Production(2)." Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 08/05/2007.
(2) Readings on My Uni.Music Technology(3)2007.
(3)http://www.macmusic.org/software/version.php/lang/en/id/9107/
viewed on 13 May'07

Forum :

Week 8

Creative Computing : Buffers
Buffers : Sample, automation, location - a way of storing data, address or a value
Buffering represents the creation of temporary memory space for the purposes of storing information such as data arrays, envelopes, windows and samples - whether for recording or playback. [click here to read more about buffers]

Code : This code is incomplete, I am working on it and will update it very soon

References :
1)Haines, Christian."Creative computing : Semester 1, Week 8. "Buffers". Lecture presented at the Electronic Music Unit, University of Adelaide, South Australia, 03/05/2007.
(2)McCartney , James et al 2007,SuperCollider Inbuilt Help.
(3)Source Forge,http://supercollider.sourceforge.net/
(4) SuperCollider Help Book

Audio Arts:
Gating Techniques:A gate mutes a signal whenever its level falls below a
threshold level.During the periods of very low signal or non playing time of a
particlar track in the session, its shuts down,preventing noise or spill in the
track.Most gates have the facility to make the opening and closing of the gate
more gradual.Attack time and release time specifies how quickly the gate opens
and shut..