Quoting Anthony Kozar : > >> The ultimate example of complexity--a bow driving a string. Or >> something I thought about today as my daughter was playing in my >> nightstand--a wooden cup with a lid filled with pennies that she likes >> to shake. Just imagine synthesizing *that* with an adsyn bank... > > I think that adsyn would certainly be the wrong tool for this task. See > instead the PhISM opcodes based on techniques developed by Perry Cook. > (bamboo, crunch, shaker, sleighbells, etc.) I'd like to see the hardcore work that folks have used these with before I put my faith in them...just from the manual examples, most seem rough and unfinished to me. >> My current interest--and please chime in, any gurus who know the >> secrets!--is to recreate dynamically evolving instruments, using >> samples, but showing no looping artifacts. [...] >> But there's the rub--in 'hiding' >> the loop artifacts by overlaps, I got an unrealistic, unwanted >> (although attractive in it's own right) chorusing effect, and my >> question of how to realistic reproduce a *single* instrument sound >> that dynamically changes while having no artifacts of looping remains >> an open one. > > These are generally considered inherent limitations in sample-playback > techniques -- and became the impetus for much research in physical modeling > instead. Acoustic instruments ARE very complex as you pointed out and no > sample-looping, additive synthesis, or other analysis-resynthesis techniques > can compensate for the fact that a sample is just one static snapshot of how > an instrument responded to one set of "input parameters." The attack is > typically full of all kinds of transients that you do not want to > pitch-shift or time-stretch. And these transients vary greatly depending on > articulation. The "steady-state tone" of a real instrument is usually > anything but a steady harmonic spectrum. Yup. > Have you tried any of the Csound physical models that are floating around > out there? Yes, and ditto, I'd love to see who has put enough faith in them to work with them in a large scale musical context...the most impressive quasi-realistic acoustic instrument work I've seen is still mostly sample-based to my knowledge. what you say about transients is true, so I should correct myself--multisamples. Obviously, using one sample for the range of an entire keyboard does not give anything close to realism, although some of the sounds might have interesting characteristics in their own right. >> if the manual's demo .csd files are an illustration of their greatest >> power, I remain disappointed. > > I would instead assume that the manual examples illustrate the least power > of an opcode. They are typically designed for maximum clarity and show the > simplest, functional manner of using an opcode . You're probably right...it might be nice to see a 'simple' and a complex 'gee-whiz-that's-a-mind-blowing' sound for most opcodes in the manual at some point, so people can both get their feet wet, and see the true potential, if any, of a given opcode. >> One obvious way to do achieve my goal of realism is to multisample the >> hell out of the instrument, and have *no* looping, but just 'diskin' a >> sustained sound for every sample.... (This is the 'mellotron' >> approach ...) > > I love mellotrons, but a mellotron flute always plays 'G' with exactly the > same nuances. Again, samples are probably not the ultimate solution for > "dynamic realism". This approach can be mitigated somewhat if there can be some randomness driving amplitude and pitch fluctuations of the sample. > I don't typically try to imitate acoustic instruments with Csound (or > conventional keyboard synthesizers for that matter). This is certainly a good point. Although I emphasize my current interest in sampling, I go back and forth in my focus, and I am a lover of the weird newness possible with pure electronics. > I am more interested > in synthesizing unique sounds, so I cannot really help with any Csound > examples of realistic imitations. The Horner/Ayers book and the work of > Perry Cook is where I would start my research if I wanted to imitate > acoustic instruments. The Horner/Ayers 'horn chapter' has the best sounding example in the whole 'CSound Book' (the Strauss "Eulenspiegel" excerpt) if you ask me...musical, warm, and not jarring in the least. And nice realism to boot.