Operator Improvements: Control Rectangle Shape - as C64 SID

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drzoom
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Joined: Wed Dec 26, 2007 6:10 pm

Operator Improvements: Control Rectangle Shape - as C64 SID

Post by drzoom » Sun Aug 11, 2013 6:53 pm

Recently I tried to recreate the sound of an old C64 track using Live. I failed, because of simple functionality which could easily added and would be a great improvement of Live's synthesizer. I split this topic into two forum posts, one for each feature request. I programmed own music composing software for C64 (some time ago), and was a little bit surprised why this things never got into modern synths.

A: Control of Operator Rectangle Shape

C64 musicians had only sine, triangle, saw and rectangle waveform shapes. But the rectangle shape was very flexible, because there was a register to control the "shape" of the rectangle waveform. More specifically the ratio between the "up" and the "down" part of the rectangle shape.

See this illustration:
Image

Controlling the shape of the rectangle waveform using an LFO, is creating very unique effects. It shouldn't be hard to add this to the "Operator" synthesizer, without breaking backward compatibility.

I created a very simple C64 Arp synthesizer, using Max for Live, which demonstrates the effect:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/2702orl71rjs3uc/dzc64ap.amxd

You can hear the synthesizer in this sample track on soundcloud:
http://snd.sc/14e5nKx

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