hexinverter vcNOIZ on Indiegogo

hexinverter's vcNOIZ is now on Indiegogo. You can find a video of it in development here and an audio demo here. You'll also find a link to demos at the bottom of the Indiegogo page. The following is the description captured for the archives:

"hexinverter.net's vcNOIZ is a unique exponentially voltage controlled noise oscillator for analogue synthesis. It creates absolutely crunchy sounding Commodore 64-esque noise

It will be available in DIY ("do it yourself) form (Eurorack, MU, universal) as well as Eurorack assembled SMT modules.

Full Description:

vcNOIZ is a gritty sounding voltage controlled noise source. The best way to imagine it is as a noise VCO. The frequency of the noise is both linearly and exponentially controllable by analogue control voltage signals. It creates positively raunchy C64-esque digital noise and sounds great for hihats and other sounds as well!

By patching vcNOIZ into a VCA and EG you can create crazy warping noise pads to layer with your other sounds. You can use a percussive envelope and generate awesome sounding hihats. You can also use it as a random gate source for clocking things by using the DC coupled output -- the sky is the limit!

It is a very unorthodox VCO that is capable of generating very interesting timbres you have not heard before.

It differs in tonal characteristic from simply putting a white noise source through a low-pass filter, because a filter will actually round off the edges of the square waves generating the noise and therefore reduce the intensity of the sound. With vcNOIZ, the actual rate at which the noise is being generated is altered by voltage control, and thus, you get to keep the raunchy sounding sharp edges of the noise. In short: it sounds pretty cool :)

It will be available as a DIY project and complete module from the hexinverter.net online shop after this campaign ends, but I need your help to do a production run of these modules. I have done some number crunching and it just won't fit in anytime soon if I am to fund it entirely myself on a university student's very limited budget!

There are no microcontrollers used in this design, so it will fit right at home in any analogue purist's setup as well. It is comprised entirely of CMOS logic and analog opamps, so does not suffer from CV aliasing or any other issues present in a microcontroller-based design.

Features:

Inputs:

- Expo. response CV input (-V to +V)
- Linear response CV input (-V to +V) -- great for audio rate FM, as the audio demo shows. It sounds positively gruesome!
- Clock input (square wave, positive logic)

Controls:

- Pitch control (to tune base frequency, just like a VCO)

Outputs:

- Base frequency noise output (a little smoother sounding than the divisions) [audio coupled]
- Sub octave /4 output (gritty sounding) [audio coupled]
- Sub octave /8 output (gritty sounding) [audio coupled]
- Base frequency DC coupled gate output (for when wanting a random gate when using a slower clock/pitch rate)
- Internal clock output (there was an extra opamp, so I figured this could be useful)"

via Hex Inverter on The MATRIXSYNTH Lounge