Alien Zippers!!

Published on Jun 16, 2013 davidryle·114 videos

"WIthout the little beings from outer space, we would only have buttons.

A first try with the ribbon controller and the modular synth. The "Alien Zip" module is designed after the first Coagula dot org model. I'm using a MIDI out from it to a vst of a Novachord patch. The other sound is from the CV and Gate out to the modular synth.

The fun part is setting the amount of pitch shift for each voice. They are different so as I slide around the ribbon the notes spread apart different distances from each other. A very spooky effect.

The ribbon pitch bend amount in the vst is setup by using Midi CC#20 in Kontakt 5 as a modulator. The output of the high and low regions of the ribbon controller are pitch value 0 - 127 as per Midi spec.

The scale is controlled on the modular by a Q125 Signal Processor. There is no way to control the amount of pitch bend on the modular. It is a simple voltage amount generated by the Arduino and ribbon.

These differences make it challenging to get harmonies from both voices because the modular's response is very sensitive and wide and the vst requires a lot of movement along the ribbon to get a small shift in pitch.

The module itself uses the Arduino Uno R3 board and the software allows the user to set up the area of the ribbon controller to be used. This makes it flexible as an instrument but hard to get the scales exactly congruent to each other after a reset for calibration. I set it up so when you touch the ribbon the pitches are in tune but when you move, they spread at different rates.

All the background sounds and sequences are from the modular clocked by the Q960 sequential controller. The drum part is added later after determining the beats per minute and soft syncing to the track in Cubase. I used Addictive Drums for this."