Willem Twee Studios - The Netherlands

This looks like a great studio.
Well worth a booking if you're in Holland.

Official website
https://www.willem-twee.nl/studios/

Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/willemtweestudios/?pageid=120494768636017&ftentidentifier=393452684673556&padding=0

There are 2 studios


Studio 2 has the Arp 2500s etc

Studio 1 has lots of test equipment


I'm particularly interested in the old analog computer


Melodic rhythms

Lyra Build - part 3

Part 3 of the Lyra 8 Build

Part 1  of the Lyra build is here
Part 2  of the Lyra build is here
Part 4: Making the Lyra Panel face plate

Building the lyra is very different from what I'm used to.

It's a bit like soldering an SMD board with through hole parts.
The pots and switches  are wired to pads, .... not into holes in the PCB as you would usually see if you were building a Eurorack module.

The separation of the synth into a control pcb & the main PCB should make trouble shooting easier. I first started connecting the pots to the PCB with left over resistor wire, but in hindsight, insulated wire would be better. ... less chance of shorts.

Lots of cleaning up to do post soldering.

This is the keyboard.

Closeup of the rear of the keyboard section.

Connecting the upper and lower boards.

I'm using insulated ribbon cable and making my own headers.

Make nine 12 pin ribbon cables.
and one 5 pin cable (for the in-out board.

 Lot's and lots of wire stripping. :-)

There are 3 boards to connect ... don't forget the in - out board.

This connects in two spots . One to the main  board, and another to the control / pot board.

tHE shields

tIME TO plug everything in

tHE in/out board connects to your DC power source

tHE case is a bit rough ... just some recycled timber.

will need to tidy up after its fully tested.

Part 1  of the Lyra build is here
Part 2  of the Lyra build is here
Part 4: Making the Lyra Panel face plate

Han Van Pass - Vietnam

Hai Van Pass is about 20km long. The mountain pass is part of the National Route 1A in Vietnam. 
It's part of a mountain range (Annamite Range) that juts into the East Sea of Vietnam
It was made famous by the guys at top gear.


They did one of their hilarious episodes in Vietnam.

The road joins the city of Da Nang and Lang Co in Hue Province.     WE traversed the road by bus. travelling from Hue    

The road itself is ancient ...dating back to the 14th century. Back then it was the boundary between the Champa and Dai Viet Kingdoms. 

You can still see the grand gate at the summit of the pass. This was the border crossing between the two kingdoms. 

There are lots of  hairpin bends on the road.
But the dangers are compensated for by spectacular views.
You'll see steep mountains, plunging into the ocean, deserted sandy beaches and lots of untouched forest.

The name Hai Van translates as a ‘Sea of Clouds’ in Vietnamese

This spot, is roughly half way from the top to bottom of Vietnam on a map.
It marks the junction between the colder North & the warm tropical south.

During the Vietnamese-American War, this pass connected the war-ravaged cities of Hue and Da Nang. It must have been a very sad spot. The gate is riddled with bullet holes.
Today, most of the traffic uses the Hai Van Tunnel... bypassing this road.
So its relatively peaceful and quiet (by Vietnamese standards).

The Hai Van Tunnel was built in 2005. It is the longest tunnel in Southeast Asia.

From the summit you see the city of Da Nang in the distance.
We stopped there for some pork buns & baguettes.

For more travel postcards click here:

http://djjondent.blogspot.com.au/2015/03/travel-postcards-index-my-travel.html

Deluge Sound Editor - Grid shortcuts

The grid or matrix shortcuts seemed confusing to me at first, but once to start using then , its gets easy and fast. Much better than menu diving.

 The grid is broken up into sections.
Broardly, the synth engines are on the left,
Distortion, filters & EQ are in the middle,
& Modulation and Effects on the right.
The pic is current for firmware Version 3.0
It may change with new firmware updates.

The groupings from left to right are:


1. Samples
2. Oscillators 1 & 2 - subtractive synthesis.
3. FM - includes FM 1 & FM2 plus parts of OSC1 & 2
    (Osc 1 & 2 are the carriers. FM 1 & 2 are the modulators)

Distortion
Filters (High Pass & Low Pass)
EQ - Equalisers

Master
Voice

Envelopes
Sidechain
ARP
LFOs

MOD FX (Chorus, Flangers, etc)
Reverb
Delay

Modulation Amounts

Steps to access the grid:
1. Enter CLIP mode
2. Press the Synth button
3. Press Shift + PAD
 or
 3. Press Audition + PAD
 4. The PAD will flash white while in focus.
 5. Press [BACK / UNDO] to cancel selection.
 6. Turn the select knob to adjust the parameter.
 7. Press Save + Synth to save the preset.
 8. Press Save again to confirm.


The LED display will show you the value or the setting of the parameter you have picked.

Links
+ Synthstrom
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Please let me know if there are any errors or omissions

Making Acid on a Deluge

Learning to make some acid with a Synstrom Deluge is a good way to start understanding the Deluge's sound structure.

Firstly a brief comparison between the Roland TB-303 & the Synstrom Deluge.

The 303's specs are:

1. Monophonic

2. Just 1 oscillator : switchable between Sawtooth or Square waveforms with a tuning control pot.

3. A single filter - 3 pole , 18dB/oct lowpass resonant filter 

    with controls for cutoff, resonance, and envelope amount

4. A single VCA with control pots for Decay time and Accent intensity

5. Two Envelope Generators.(one for the VCA & one for the filter). Looks like they are simple
     two stage attack- decay EGs. (Not ADSR).

     a. VCA Envelope:  Sharp Attack, and a long Exponential decay. 
         I understand the attack & decay is fixed??

         (In the Devil Fish decay can be altered between very short, normal and infinite sustain.) Robin W.

     b. Filter Envelope. It's main job is to drive the filter frequency.

         Fixed attack time (3ms?). Decay is exponential. The decay time is controlled by the Decay knob, 

         but the knob is partially bypassed on accent steps. 

         Robin W (Devilfish) describes it thus:

         "On accented notes, this is shorted out and MEG (the filter envelope) runs to the relatively 

          short time which is the same as when the Decay pot is fully anti-clockwise.
          (The Devil Fish provides independent control of MEG time for
            both normal and accented notes.) "

6. Sequencer . 

    The sequencer is impt. ...We need a glide function. where notes can overlap one another.

7 Control knobs. There are 6 of these.

    Pitch, Cutoff frequency, Resonance, Envelope Mod, Decay, Accent.

    I think they are all important
    So what do the 6 knobs actually do?
     a. Tuning ..VCO Pitch ... obviously
     b. Cut Off Freq ... effects the Filter of course
     c.  Resonance   ... effects the Filter of course
     d.  Envelope Mod ... This controls & limits the amount the filter EG effects the cutoff & res

     e.  Decay ..... controls the delay time of the filter EG
     f.  Accent .... a bit complex ... read Robin Whittle's article.

 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  So on the Synstrom Deluge we need these ingredients:

 1. Single Oscillator.
     a. Monophonic.
 2. Two Envelopes
     a. A simple decay based envelope for the filter
     b. An Amp envelope
 3. Filter (The original 303 has a18dB/oct low pass resonant filter
     with controls for cutoff, resonance, and envelope amount)
     The deluge has a 12dB or 24dB LPF filter {and a Drive filter (24dB per octave with saturation)}
 4. VCA
      The original 303 had control pots for Decay time and Accent intensity
 5. Accents & Slides
     Acid glide (use legato/ portamento and overlapped MIDI notes). ??
 6 Control knobs. There are just 2dedicated gold parameter knobs they control

     Cutoff frequency, Resonance.

     Maybe I can also map Envelope Mod, Decay & maybe pitch or accent to Custom 1, 2 & 3.

    

Extras:
 7. Delay
 8. Reverb
 9. Distortion
 10. Unison or a phaser
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Deluge has a cool shortcut Grid which provides quick access to the sound parameters.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Steps:

1. Press Shift + Synth ... this creates a new synth
2. Shift + Type (Osc 1) (level is at default 50)
       The 303 has both Square & Ramp waves.  I prefer the saw tooth. ... sounds more agressive.
       You can use the analog or digital waves but I like using analog.
       Although the 303 was only capable of producing one voice we
       can always double up to create a thicker sound later in the process.

3. Use the Analog Saw or Square
    To Change press Shift + Type/shape

4. Envelope1 is already the Deluge's default VCA envelope.
     It needs to be configured as a basic attack/decay envelope
     Settings: Sustain at 50 (full). Zero attack., Zero decay, Zero release

  5. Map the LPF frequency to Envelope 2
    a. To Select frequency:
         Shift + LPF Frequency tab (the tab will start flashing)
    b. to Map the envelope amt to Frequency
        Shift + MOD amount Env 2

       (both tabs are now flashing.. though the MOD pad is flashing faster)   

 5c. Map the custom 2 gold knob to the MOD amt pad.
        +Press Custom 2 button
         +Hold down Learn
         +Turn the top gold parameter knob

   

 6. Envelope 2 settings:
     Fixed attack time (zero). Decay is very important.
     A = 0
     D = decay knob (map this)
     S =15 to 20
     R = 0
    The envelope decay time (for the filter on the 303) is controlled by the 303's Decay knob.
    We can map Custom 3 to do this.
         +Press Custom 2 button
         +Press Shift & Decay tab (of envelope 2)
         +Hold down Learn
         +Turn the lower gold parameter knob

  7  go to Polyphony mode.
       Shift + Polyphony tab
       Set to Legato (use select knob)

9.  Add portamento
     Shift + Porta tab
     Use select knob to adjust to taste (about 4 is nice)
     For the slide to occur, the notes on the sequencer must overlap.

10. Accents
      To add an accent to a note.
       + hold down the note tab in question with one finger
       + Turn the Left/right knob. This increases the velocity of that note. Turn it up to 127.

  11. Adding slides
        Add overlapping notes by making longer tails

   12. Maybe change the filter slope ?
         The default is a 2pole. Try the 4 pole. (The 303 used a 3 pole).
        
Links
+ Synthstrom
+ Tinyloops
+ Realworld Interfaces

-------------------------
Please let me know if there are any errors or omissions