There are two ways to acheive this. 1) Image swapping, using the Choice Integer to select the appropriate image. 2) Using Frames in an image, Animation Position selects the correct image frame.
Image file switching.
The first way is to create a series of screenshots from the ‘scope making sure to get the size and framing accurate to prevent “jumping” or “jitter” when swapping the images. The images are then switched as each oscillator waveform is selected. This method requires some third party modules by Eleana Novaretti; ED GUI Fixed String, ED Switch > String.
How the image switching works.
The list of options is taken from the Oscillator module, and converted to an enumerated list composed of ; Choice, a list of Integers from 0 to 6 (the list of options always starts at 0) and Item List, the list of options in text form (each item separated by a comma). List to animation converts the List to Animation position, which is used to select Items from the list. The Integer part of the list is sent to the ED Switch > String, this takes the value from the approproiate ED GUI Fixed String and sends it to the Plain Image module, so as we rotate the knob and select the desired Oscillator waveform, the matching image is displayed.
To create your Images you’ll need some sort of picture editing software to crop them to a uniform shape and size using the ctrl+Print Screen combination, then pasting the screenshot into the photo editor to crop the images and save them.
Swapping images using Frames.
This works by having a single large image in a long vertical strip composed of all the required images, which is interpreted by SynthEdit as “Frames”. A text file is created along with this image file and stored with the file in the default skins folder. So if you name your image file waveforms.png, then you would need to name the textfile as waveforms.txt. An example of waveforms.txt could be; type animated frame_size 120 , 100 mouse_response rotary The line frame_size 120 , 100 is the telling Synthedit the dimensions in pixels each frame of the image file, so here each frame needs to be 120 px wide, and 100 px high. Width is specified first, then height. This needs to be correct to keep the animation of the frames smooth.
The list is taken from the VCO module and converted by the PatchMemory list into an enumerated list, then fed to the List to Animation module which sends the Choice value (as usual starting at 0) to the Vector Knob C (You could use a knob mage with an Image2 module-it’s your choice), and the Image 2 module. The Image2 module interprets the Animation position as a Frame number, and selects the correct section of the large image to display (this is why your image measurements must be correct, and consistent). Note: because the Animation Position data is bi-directional, if the Mouse Response for the Image2 module that displays the images is set to Horizontal or Vertical the mouse can also be used to select the waveform by clicking on the waveform display and dragging in the appropriate direction.
Which method is best?
Frames: Using frames gives the simplest structure to work with, but relies on making up a large composite image using identically sized smaller images. With this method the waveform display can also be used to select the Oscillator waveform. Individual images: Using individual images uses a slightly more complex structure, with carefully sized images, but saves making a large composite image with carefully sized and placed images. With this method it’s not possible to use the mouse with the waveform display to select a new waveform.
This module is one of the essential foundation blocks of any Sub-Control we would wish to make. It can be used to take an image or a series of frames of an image and use them to make a control such as a slider, a knob, an LED/Lamp, a push button, an indicator, a meter or a switch. The only downside is that the images that can be used being .bmp or .png they are not rescalable. For images to be rescalable they need to be vector of SVG garphics, which are not usable with this module.
The Image 2 module plugs.
Animation Position:- Selects which frame to display, the value of this is normalized between zero and one. Allows for for animating the image, and for generating a control value from this movement. Filename:- Enter the filename of the image (.bmp or .png). Hint: – This text displays as popup yellow tooltip when the mouse hovers over the image. Note: The Hint pin only works for clickable images. So to make the popup hint work for a rotary control, you need to create a basic text file containing – “mouse_response click”, and save it in the default skin folder (you could call it mouse.txt-the name isn’t important though). Menu Items/Menu Selection – Provides a right-click popup context menu for the image. This is commonly used for adding a MIDI-Learn menu. Mouse Down:- Provides a bool “True” signal whenever the mouse is clicked on the image, for the duration of the “click”. Frame Count – Outputs the total number of frames in the image. Used by the Image-To-Frame module.
Properties panel.
Mouse response allows you to choose how the control interacts with the user: Off- Disabled, no interaction. Hint popup is not available in this mode. Auto- Responds to vertical, horizonal step and rotary modes of operation. The hint popup operates in this mode. Vertical- Only responds to vertical mouse movement. Hint popup is not automatic in this mode. Horizontal- Only responds to horizontal mouse movement. Hint popup is not automatic in this mode. Clicks- Responds to a mouse down event on the the control. The control goes to the 1 position. A button is non-latching in this mode. Rotary- Responds like a rotary control. Hint popup is not automatic in this mode. Step- A rotary control moves in steps of 0.1. A button latches in the on or off position when clicked (depending on it’s current state).
The stock SynthEdit image files.
The file names are shown in brackets after the module name. By deafult these images are located in (For Windows, Not being a MAC user I don’t know their default location) C:\Users\Public\Documents\SynthEdit Projects\skins\default2.
How the image file is animated.
The Bitmap Image sub-control lets you use multiple-frame .bmp or .png images as controls. You have used them and seen them in action but here is a basic overview of what you need to know (as far as a non-programmer).
This image is made up of 40 images known as “frames”, which means the animation runs very smoothly. In the skins default folder there is a text file referenced by the Moog control knob, this is the moog_knob.txt file, and this is what it contains: moog_knob.txt type animated (Tells Image2 that the control is meant to move) frame_size 48, 45 (The size of the image file in pixels) mouse_response rotary (The control rotates) padding 13, 7, 13, 4 (The amount of space (padding) to allow round the knob. As the image rotates the position of the knob image is converted to a float value. In the structure in figure below, a PatchMemory Float3 and a Float to Volts converter convert the image’s Animation Position to a voltage output. Any multi-frame image can be used in this way to create visual controls such as buttons, switches, knobs and sliders.
Using the “Moog” Knob.
The two Image2 modules are linked so that the shiny cap will rotate with the knob. Animation position is also fed to the PatchMemory Float3 module, and converted to a DSP signal> this is converted from Float to Volts, any steps or jerkiness is smoothed out, and output at the IO module. Hint: Make sure that both Image2 modules have their Mouse Response properties set the same, otherwise the two different rotations can look a little odd. Hint: Sometimes you will want this control to send information to another GUI external module or prefab. In this case always make a connection from either the Animation position or GUI Value plugs on the IO Module. Don’t waste resources by converting the DSP Voltage back to GUI Float again. Hint: When you connect up a Text Entry module for a label for the control it’s a good move to connect the Text input to an IO module (you won’t have to keep opening up the module to change the label, unlike the stock Moog knob prefab).
Creating a slider control.
This uses the vslider_med.png image, and the vslider_med.txt information file the contents of which are shown below; type slider frame_size 28, 40 handle_rect 4, 41, 28, 55 handle_range 1, 26 orientation vertical For this control you can leave the mouse response setting as Auto- we don’t want to change this.
Creating a Button type switch control.
Here the image of a button has just two “frames”, for it’s “on” and “off” states. Click on the ellipsis by the filename box in the properties and find the button.bmp file, and load it into the module. The text file associated is quite simple, and needs no alteration. type animated frame_size 18, 30 mouse_response click. To change the mouse response for our prefab, you can do this from the Image2 properties, go to the MouseResponse List. Auto or Clicks will give you a momentary switch, Step a latching switch. Vertical, Horizontal or Rotary will work, and give you a Latching button, but I would really discourage doing this as it’s going to confuse your VST’s users.
Or you can use button_sm.png
Creating your own On/Off Switch.
The same principles apply to creating your own on/off switch. Click on the ellipsis by the filename box in the properties and find the switch.png file, and load it into the module.
This is the switch.txt file associated with it (I’m just showing you this for reference)- SynthEdit automatically reads this file. ; medium vertical slider type animated orientation vert frame_size 25, 26 ; extra space at: top, bottom, left, right padding 5, 2, 5, 3 mouse_response stepped You can see it’s quite different (the lines with the semi-colons are just comments-not read or used by SE) from the moog_knob file. For a start the orientation is vertical, not a rotary control, and that extra line at the end mouse-response stepped means that when you click on the control it stays in it’s new state until you click on it again. In this application the Animation position does not change value gradually with control position, it has just an on and an off state, with a float value of 1=on, and 0=off. The observant among you will notice I have connected the LED prefab directly to the Animation Position…but the LED prefab has a DSP Plug. I took out the conversion modules and connected directly to the Image2 module in the LED prefab (saving on un-ncessary DSP-GUI conversions). So we now have a switch with a label and on/off LED indicator.
Hint: So you need a non-latching (momentary) switch? Thats easily done, click on the Image2, and in the properties panel click on the Mouse Response list, and change from Auto, to Clicks. Now your switch won’t stay in the same position, it will “flip” back to it’s default off position.
Hint: If you leave the Mouse Response as Auto then it will use the setting in the associated text file. If you select anything but Auto from the list, this will over-ride the setting in the text file.
Small Illuminated Push-Button.
A simple little prefab that gives a small circular illuminating push button switch. Look for the image file Led.png in the ususal way, and select either clicks for a momentary switch action, or step for a toggled (locking) button.
How to create a “roll your own” customizable Joystick control prefab.
Note: This relies heavily on third party modules: Davidson’s DAM modules; DAM V XYo Circle, DAM Rectangle. Elena’s ED GUI Modules; ED GUI Fixed In, ED GUI Fixed Float, ED GUI Timer.
Once again I’m going to stress that you should never convert from a GUI signal to DSP, perform a math or timing function, then convert this back to a GUI signal. It’s very wasteful on CPU resources, and can cause many problems.
GUI Container for the Joystick.
The Joystick control iteslf uses the DAM V XYo Circle module. This resturns the position of the circle, which can be extensively customized. Here I have pre-set it with a red theme. In the interests of simplicity I’m just connecting the following plugs to the IO Module; 1) Animation Position- The output value of this plug is 0 till the circle receives a click (Mouse Down), it then changes to 10. 2) Position X- The X co-ordinate (horizontal) of the circle (Normalized value of 0-1) 3) Position Y- The Y co-ordinate (vertical) of the circle (Normalized value of 0-1) 4) Circle Size- The size in px of the circle.
The settings in the properties panel are shown below. Make sure the Jump Back Position List is set as “None”, the Mouse Response is set to “Click”, and The Gradient Lock check boxes are ticked. These are the colour settings I used, but as always that’s your personal choice. Mouse response- This selects various modes, the main ones are; None- Nothing happens when you click on the circle, and it’s locked in position. Click- Click on the circle and the Animation Position changes to 10, the circle assumes its “Alt” colour scheme, and can be moved. Step- Click on the circle and the Animation Position changes to 10, the circle assumes its “Alt” colour scheme and the circle can be moved. The Animation Position value and “Alt” colours are held until a second mouse click is received.
Settings for the DAMV XYo Circle and DAM Rectangle modules.
I have shown these settings as screenshots.
The control section.
The x and y output values are passed as usual to PatchMemory Float3 modules. These then send the Float values to the output IO module as GUI Float, DSP Float and Volts. The Volts as usual is converted by the stock Float to Volts module. Returning the Joystick to the centre position. This is done with a pair of Spring 3 modules to send a value of 0.5 to the Position X and Position Y plugs. The ED GUI Timer is used to send a short (10 mS) pulse to the Spring 3 modules when the Centre On/Off plug is set to true. (I found that the Joystick wasn’t reliably setting to the centre when switched on otherwise). Setting the Joystick’s output ranges. As usual the ranges of the output values can be specified via the Patch Memories. To make this easier I recommend changing the Patch Memory names in the Properties panel to something like x-axis range, and y-axis range.
X and Y Value (GUI) containers.
These are just standard Float to Text conversion, both connected to the Value output of the PatchMemories to show the actual value being output by the joystick, rather than the Animation Position.
How is it possible to reset three controls from a single button? If we try to link the controls in any way to send a reset value to them from a single source, being Bi-Directional we have immediately linked the controls. There is also the issue that many modules using Animation Position will only allow you to connect one input per module, fortunately the PatchMemory Float3 does allow this, but you still can’t can’t connect all the Controls like this without linking them The answer is to “chain” a number of Spring3 modules, one for each control to be reset. Note: This does not work on the stock controls in the Controls folder, we can only do this by making our own custom knobs or sliders. This must be done (as always) with all GUI modules.
Tip: Give each of the PatchMemory Float3 modules a useful name in the properties, so if you want to adjust the range of the control you know which one you’re adjusting. Note: Changing the range of a control does not affect the Animation Position range. This range is always 0 to 1.
Having the Mouse down output plug on the left side of the Spring3 modules allows for easy chaining of these modules. Being an Animation Position value, the range for the value is 0 to 1. with 0.5 giving a centre position.
Each knob is contstructed as follows, yes, thats’s correct, at this stage there is no patch Memory. This is outside of the control’s container. Two PatchMemories for one control can quickly become a confusing mess.
The existing Patch Point modules are fine, but a little basic. If you’re setting up a panel with a large number of patches you need to be very disciplined about labelling and arranging them. As I have found it’s too easy to get in a muddle. As you see below we can start with a nicely laid out pattern of patch points, switch to the panel view…and it’s chaos, and you have to select ech one, then switch to panel view and arrange everything. With some labelling the problem is solved, you can just arrange your panel view in one go.
Making life easier.
What would help is a text label and maybe some colour coding. We can do this fairly easily with a few sub controls. With a little planning we can produce a Patch Bay something like this… even having a few useful things like gain controls and inverters in the patch bay. Note: I’m sorry but the colours are limited to the patch points, there’s no way round this until Jeff introduces (please, please do this Jeff) colour customizable patch leads for the Patch Points. Also the transparency can’t be altered either. Patch cables are only fully visible when you hover the mouse over the patch point. Note: You can plug more than one cable into a Patch Point. Note: To disconnect a cable, right click on the Patch Point itself.
How the patch points are customized.
Not much to say about this really, this is just to point you in the direction of your own style of Patch Points and patch bay. Note: Do pay attention to the Z-order of the modules, otherwise you can end up with a hidden lable or Patch Point! From top layer down you want this order; 1) Patch Point 2) Text 3) The rectangle.
A Patch Point for connection to the Output of a module.
The plugs on the prefab are for controlling the appearance. (Apart from the input/output signals of course). Text: The is the lable next to the patch point Text ARGB: the ARGB colour settings for the label text Back ARGB: The ARGB Colour settings for the background of the text. You’ll most likely want to leave this as 00000000 (Transparent background) Control ARGB: The ARGB colour settings for the Rectangle used as the Patch Point background. Note: If you want rounded corners just go into the properties settings on the panel and adjust them.
Inside the Text container. This is containerized just to make the structure on this article a little easier to read
A Patch point for connection to the input of a module.
An Inverter patch point, and a gain control patch point. Just for ideas, really all sorts of patch points are possible from now on.
Using a drop down list to select between different control panels.
Using some simple logic , and SynthEdit’s ability to make the control panel of a container visible or hidden, we can easily switch between a variety of different control panels. Using this you could swap between say; 1) a standard oscillator, 2) A Supersaw oscillator, 3) A Casio CZ style phase distortion oscillator, 4) A Sample Oscillator.
The Selector logic.
The Popup Menu module should have the following entered into it’s Item List box in the poperties panel 1,2,3,4 (No full stop or comma at the end of the list.) This value is selected from the popup menu, and sent via the PatchMemory Int module to the Int to Bools module. If 1 is selected the Int to Bools module then makes the output I have labelled as Panel 1 Visibility switch to “True”, and if 2 is selected the Int to Bools module then makes the output I have labelled as Panel 2 Visibility switch to “True” and so on. The Bools To Int is used to display the option you have selected in the Popup List. Note: You must have the First Bool Val connected and set to “False” with the ED Fixed_Bool module, otherwise the numbering will go out of sequence. The Int To Text is there to convert the numeric value back to a text string.
Inside the numbered containers I just put the following to test & demonstrate the sub control
As you select a number in the popup list on the panel, the number displayed will change to reflect your choice.
Yes you can, but only for for selecting options using the Many to 1 and 1 to Many flow switches. This is a useful but very poorly documented feature in SynthEdit. It only works when using the stock Popup Menu module, unfortunately the List Entry 4 module does not support this feature. Here is the popup menu we are all familiar with:
However with a little planning we can have a popup menu like this
The menu syntax
Using this structure below we can have our popup menu, organized into submenus. In this example we would have an arrangement where we switch between the selected modules , which would be kept in the container. As you can see some of the plugs on the switches have these groups of >>>> and <<<< symbols preceeding the text on them. This is the key to our sub menu system; >>>>Filters means “start a submenu called filters <<<< Means “end the submenu. You can add a submenu to a submenu like so; >>>>Filters >>>>Digital Filter 1 Filter 2 Filter 3 <<<< takes you back to the level Filters, to go back to the top menu level, add a second <<<< after the first. To add a spacer into the menu, just insert a —-.(four hyphens)
To create the menu below, you would use the following; Sine >>>>Triangular Saw Ramp Triangle <<<< Pulse >>>>Random White Noise Pink Noise <<<< —- New Menu
Does the check mark for the selected item annoy or bother you? This can be removed by selecting a checkbox in the properties panel. If you check the “Momentary” option the check mark (tick) is no longer shown.
The structure inside the container is below, I have not shown too many modules, just enough to give you the idea. Important note. I have limited the modules shown below to keep things simple. When implementing this yourself please make sure there is a module that has no output such as a voltmeter connected to all the unused Inputs to avoid the “Hanging Modules” issue. Just put the module inside a container, and un-check the visible property so it remains hidden, it doesn’t have to be a Voltmeter, the volt meter module is special because it has no outputs and has a special flag set that tells SE’s “voice watcher” to ignore it. Other similiar modules should work too. . This is important as “dangling wires” can mess with polyphony sometimes.
Sub Menus for Modules with pre-defined Option Lists.
We can also use this with an Oscillator or Filter module. Do not connect the Patch Memory List’s Item List plug to the Popup menu, if you do you won’t get your Submenu system, just the default list of options. The menu system you want to use must be entered into the Popup Menu’s Item List in the properties panel.
Using the following item list will give you the menu shown underneath; Sine=0,>>>>Triangular, Saw=1,Ramp=2,Triangle=3,<<<<, Pulse=4, —- , >>>>Random, White Noise=5, Pink Noise=6, <<<<,
This project is an Attack-Decay envelope generator, with no “hold”, as soon as the envelope reaches it’s peak, it immediately begins to decay. There are three envelope curve options; Linear, Logarithmic and Exponential. The output level is controllable, inverted envelopes are specified by a negative gain voltage. All of the timings are in seconds per volt, there is no conversion needed between voltage and time.
This project relies on third party modules. These modules are available from Elena Novaretti’s website ED Glider 2, ED Log (Audio), ED Clip (Audio).
How the Timing section works.
A trigger pulse is received from the MIDI keyboard, or a suitable trigger source, this only needs to be a short pulse, no matter how long the trigger pulse is the envelope timing will not be affected. The attack control voltage is sent directly to the UP Time (sec) plug on the ED Glider 2 module, and to the Monostable Pulse Length via a Multiply module which has it’s Input 2 set to 10 (Attack V *10) as the timing voltage for the Monostable is in 1/10th Second per volt. This send a pulse with the same timing as the UP Time for the ED Glider 2 module (Without this the attack wouldn’t work for any timing except 0). The Decay control is sent directly to the Down Time (sec) plug.
Note: For the Envelope Generator to produce the correct results when used with a VCA module the VCA must have its response set to linear.
The Envelope Curve section.
Exponential: This uses a Level Adj module with Input 1 and Input 2 both connected to the output of the Glider module. This means that the output will be Input 1 * Input 2 converting a linear voltage envelope into an exponential curve. Linear: Is taken directly from the output of the Glider 2 module through a Level Adj module with its Input 2 set at 10. Logarithmic: The Glider 2 output is fed through the ED Log (Audio) module. There is a range Clipper on the output to ensure that the voltage cannot pass outside the normal 10V range (I found that sometimes negative voltages were being producedat the start/end of the envelope), and the Level Adj module to increase the positive output voltage to the normal level.
This module produces a random train of 100 mS long pulses, and a randomly varying control voltage, the minimum and maximum values of which van be varied.
The Random Pulse Generator.
The principle of this module is that it produces two unsynchronized pulse trains running at different speeds. Pulse train B continually (1 second intervals) has a random value added to the Interval B mS setting by a an ED Random Int generator when the Module is triggered by a the ED DSP timer. Pulse train A and pulse train B are fed into an X-OR gate. This produces a pulse whenever A or B is high, but not when both are high. The result of this is a pseudo random chain of pulses sent to the ED Random Int generator which outputs a new integer between 100 and 1000 each time it receives a Trigger pulse. The random integer is then fed to the Final ED DSP timer which is set to produce 100mS pulses with an interval set by the Random Integer. This is fed to the RND Pulse out and a Monostable with the pulse Length set to 1 dS, this is used to flash an LED each time a pulse is output. The structure of the Random Pulse Generator is shown below.
Note: This project relies heavily on Elena Novaretti’s module pack. The modules used in the project are; ED Random Int, ED DSP Timer, ED Add Int, ED Level Bar 2, ED Random Volts, ED Glider 2.
The Level Indicator.
This is just used as a visual indicator of the CV level being generated.
The Complete CV and Timing Randomizer.
The RND Pulse out is fed into the ED Random Volts module. Each time this is triggered a new voltage is randomly generated. The Minimum and Maximum range of the output voltage is set bu the Min and Max knobs. The output voltage is fed to the ED Glider module. This module allows the rise and fall times to be set. The Glider mode should be set to constant time.
This design has a multiple VCO arrangement, this allows for morphing between Sine, Ramp, Triangle and pulse, as well as phase modulation. There is wavefolding on the Sine and Triangle oscillator outputs. The fifth oscillator has no audio output and is used purely to phase modulate the first four oscillators. The oscillator is fed to mutiple waveshapers which morphs bertween different waveshaping formulae. The waveshaping is based on the formula 5*sin(x/pi). The waveshaping is split into odd and even formulae with morphing between the two sections.
Five standard stock oscillators are used to allow morphing between the waveforms. Foldback is only used on sine and triangle wave shapes as the ramp and pulse shapes tend not to be worth wavefolding. The Sine 2 oscillator is used purely for Phase Modulation of the five audible oscillators.
The wavefolder.
This relies on the RH-Wshape module fo gradually fold the waveform back on iteslf when it reaches a certain level. The amount of wave folding is controlled by the VCA on the input stage. Adjusting the CV range for better control. The ED Range clipper is used in combination with the multipler module so that the useful range of the Fold control voltage falls within the usual 1 to 10 Volts, otherwise the control was shomehat “cramped” as the useful voltage range without this conversion fall between 7 and 10 Volts. Input 2 of the divider is set to 1.5. The Range clipper is set to a Minimum of 7 volts and a Maximum of 10 Volts and the Mode is set to clip.
The Odd and Even wave-shapers.
I’ll describe both of these together. They are both made up of six Waveshaper2B modules using the formula 5*sin(x/pi) as a starting point. The formula changes slightly for each sucessive waveshaper. The ED Morph1D module at the output allows for a smooth morph between each formula. Each formula affects the harmonic content of the output in a different manner. The formulae are listed in the table below.
Even 5*sin(x/π) 5*sin(x/π*2) 5*sin(x/π*4) 5*sin(x/π*6) 5*sin(x/π*8) 5*sin(x/π*10)
The complete Complex VCO structure.
All the main control settings on the Complex VCO can be modulated usin a CV within the range 0 to 10 V. The Scope3 module is optional, I just include it so the effects of changing control settings can be seen. There is a Sync connection so that the oscillators can be synchronized to a single source, this could be connected to the output of another oscillator, or to the keyboard trigger plug on MIDItoCV to ensure phasing between oscillators is always constant.
