Guitar VSTi - Impossible?

[nuffink]

Why would anyone put all that trouble into sampling/programming an emulator when the real thing is readily available?

It requires skills. I've played guitar for almost 15 years and I still suck at it. I wanna play like Vai, Satriani, or that Swedish guy that plays really fast!

[whyterabbyt]

Emoshag quoth
Thats why I am asking... which is to say I am trying to learn.

Yes, but it appears to be that you appear not to have even the basics of synthesis or signal processing (which could have been looked at in principal first) hence you seem to be looking for someone 'to do your homework'.

However, contradicting me on every point while not making any effort to understand what I am getting at doesn't help me any.

No, you making a flawed comparison between carrying out something you didnt seem to fully understand, and something else you claim not to know at all, and deciding how 'easy' the second task should be in comparison - that doesnt help you at all.

If you're going to make flawed assumptions, and presume that something is straightfoward when you've not done any groundwork I dont actually think it helps you for us to support that assumption regardless.

And for the record, I did mark that bit as OT (offtopic). And, it appears, you're quite happy to continue with that as such.

First off, the ears can be tricked as easily, if not more, than the eyes.

Substantiate? I think many more people have been fooled by photorealistic renderings than have been fooled by synthesised versions of natural sounds.

What you are referring to in sight are called the Ghestalt Principles.

Not necessarily. The Gestalt Principle is a psychological theory concerned with grouped visual information, not a response to discontinuities and abberations in the information itself.

For example, a video with a timecode in the corner is still watchable, without affecting the 'watchability' of the video too much. If the timecode were present as digital noise on an audio track, the effect would be more severe, to the point where that track might not be considered 'listenable'.

And yes, the mind makes gross interpretations of what you see. However, the human ear doesn't hear correctly at all volumes (decibals). I believe that is called the Fletcher-Munson curve. Correct?

I think I specifically referred to discontinuities and abberations, not variations in response.

In addition, most people cannot tell the difference between plate and hall reverbs.

I suspect they can tell an artificial reverb apart from a natural


Most people cannot hear the difference in a 1:8 to 1:12 compression ratio. Most people cannot hear the difference in a +2Db boost at 4,000Hz. This is what I was getting at. Subtle changes in music, like the transition in a punched guitar track, are not heard. However, those "errors" in that guitar track do exist.

I would suggest that most people dont hear those things because they dont know what they are looking for, but that someone knowledgeable, 'monitoring' for such discrepancies would be able to hear them fairly easily. However I'd suspect that almost no-one, 'trained and monitoring' would be able to tell if, say, the shadows in one frame of a CGI film were missing, while that film was playing at proper speed.

And yet the audio discrepancy could be an event much shorter than the 1/30s of a film frame.


Sorry, I meant Fuzzy Logic.

Fuzzy logic is just a branch of mathematics. It doesnt really describe anything specific.

AI doesn't exist (it's just easy to say).

I would suggest its a term whose usage has changed to encompass more than just 'real' intelligence. I suppose it would be more accurate to call Massive a software agent.

The user gave Massive a set of parameters and the program took over.

True.

Just like, in a basic example, if you told the guitar program to only down-pick this riff at a higher velocity, it would understand what you meant if it had the appropriate example of what "down-picking harder" is.

No I dont think so. I dont think you would give your software an 'example' at all. That would require it to be capable of contextualised audio analysis, which is a whole different scale of things.
What you might be better off doing is letting a genetic algorithm tweak a set of parameters until you decide its closest, and write your software to use those parameters when you do trigger a down-pick.
But thats not quite the same thing.

I mean, thats a very superficial way to approach the problem, but I hope you all can see the way I am thinking.

Yeah, but as Ive been trying to point out there are flaws in it. You're going to have to be a lot less superficial to get anywhere constructive.

If you cut and paste the same several words, riffs, videos (all of which is esentially replaying the same original word, riff, video...etc) in the end you have a new creation.



If its different in the end, its a creation. Sorry, I was a composition minor.

Yeah, but it'll be a derived creation rather than a completely new one, and, technically, you might not even necessarily be able to show it to anyone, depending on te source of the material you use (c.f. copyright law)

With Massive, they didn't create the motions, but they did use the motions to create the fights.



Basically, I am trying to figure out what I need to start reading on, because if you say "Learn signal theory and advanced mathematical algorithms," I still have no idea where to begin. But it sounds like I dont stand a hope in hell, right?


Actually, I'd suggest you get hold of a demo of Tassman4, and see what you can do in the context of a realtime software environment which has the 'components' (such as string and plate resonators) available for you to use. At the same time, I'd get hold of a couple of the classic texts on audio synthesis ( Curtis Roades 'Computer Music Tutorial, say), and hit the music-dsp archives for tutorials on DSP basics, as well as check the researchers who have already been mentioned to you.
Then you could move to an environment like MAX/MSP or PD, or SynthEdit, and start to build your own components for them at lower more customised level if necessary, as the final step before going into pure code.

[texture]

The other option is to create a robot hand and attach it to a guitar, and then get the software to play the real guitar, using the robot. You could add a certain degree of randomness to the playing.

[Emoshag]

Guitar is crap, cheap, and monkeys can play the damned things.

Why would anyone put all that trouble into sampling/programming an emulator when the real thing is readily available?

It's not like buying and miking a piano, for christ's sake.

-S.

There is a huge difference in being a guitarist and being a musician. IMHO.

I can play the guitar... quite well. However, I found after using samplers and synths that I approached my playing and writing style quite differently. That being said, I am the type to imagine what I could create if I used a 'synth' that was a guitar.

Also, I live in a place now where I can't use my 800 full stack, my SVT and 8x10, or my kit. So for the purpose of writing music, these tools would be invaluable.

[The_Hidden_Goose]

The whole point of having a guitar synth for me would be to do things with it that the guitar on it's lonesome couldn't do.

If I want a guitar I'll get my hoousemate or brother to do it. My last few tracks have ALL been based on guitar, but when I tried for ages to get the sound I wanted with guitar sims it just wouldn't work. Got my bro' in, recorded it on a knackered and slightly wobbly dictaphone (i wanted it dirty ok!) - even shook the dictaphone slightly during recording to get it more wonky. Was perrrrrfick!

Long live the guitar player! Especially the free ones!

[Lawnmower Of The Damned]

Yes, there are many reasons for a guitar VSTi. A real guitar (A decent one anyway, not a Hondo or a Squire) will set you back AT LEAST $600. I've spent a lot more than that on guitars, but non-guitarists are not going to spend that much if guitar isn't their true passion.

Many of the people here are a 1 man (Or woman) band, and many of them don't play guitar, but they can play keyboard. It just makes sense for these keyboardists to stick with what they know.

And Emoshag, don't lose hope. There's a lot of stuff that you'll need to learn before this is done, but if it was easy, would it be worth doing? Do as much research as you can, and don't be afraid to ask about the details. Those little things that no-one has ever bothered to model before are likely the reason no guitar sim has ever sounded quite right.

Things like the finish on a guitar. A heavy laquer finish on a guitar will block some of the higher-end frequencies from resonating. On guitars like vintage Strats this was pretty common, though really rather inexcusable on the part of such a huge manufacturer. That means that if a guitar sim is supposed to sound like a vintage Strat, and the high-end isn't rolled-off, then guess what? It's not going to sound a whole lot like a vintage Strat.

There's also the alteration of the impedience of the pickup's output from guitar cable length and type. Hendrix used relatively short cables, which kept his impedience low, which kept his high-end in tact.

When the impedience of a pickup gets higher, it bleeds more signal to it's ground wire, but due to the way electrical signals work, the high end hits the groundwire first. So low impedience equals more high end, high impedience equals less high end.

Niether one is wrong, it's just a matter of preferance. Not modeling such things however, would be to pretend that impedience doesn't matter. And I assure you, it really does have a pretty big impact on the overall sound.

[Sleek Month]

Also, I live in a place now where I can't use my 800 full stack, my SVT and 8x10, or my kit. So for the purpose of writing music, these tools would be invaluable.

Get a sansamp and shaddup. If you're really a purist, get a tiny tube amp and shaddup!!!

There is a huge difference in being a guitarist and being a musician

Yeah, "musicians" smoke cloves.

Yes, there are many reasons for a guitar VSTi. A real guitar (A decent one anyway, not a Hondo or a Squire) will set you back AT LEAST $600. I've spent a lot more than that on guitars, but non-guitarists are not going to spend that much if guitar isn't their true passion.

Oh, now that's just bullshit.

I draw the line at spending over $500 on an electric guitar unless it's something really special, like a built-from-the-ground-up custom job.

After 5 bills, it's all just gloss and binding, and we live in the wonderful land of really great $200 guitars these days.

If you can't find a good one for that, then you need to reexamine your priorities. I think you'll find that people who spend $2000 on an electric guitar are all a bunch of twats.

...I could easily put together a great guitar recording rig for under $500, including amp, guitar and a nice large-diaphragm condenser.

...and I'll blow away your synth guitar with it.

There's stuff that guitars do that is wholly interface-based that synths just ain't going to get up to with anything like the present technology.

...simple crap, like bending one note in a chord, or running a series of picking harmonics down the same note on the same string, or the basic not-all-at-one-time attack...or muffling one note while the others ring.

There are no people so feeble that within one year of applied trying, cannot learn to play guitar for at least the purposes of recording.

...and a year goes by like nothing...

-S.

[FlounderEye]

Anybody ever run their keyboard through their buddy's guitar amps? With all the knobs turned in the right direction it sounds quite a bit like a guitar (especially when playing arpeggios).

I should mention that I tried making a robot arm once to play keyboard for me, but then it built a second robot arm, and soon they built a third and fourth. I had to cut power to the house before it got out of control.

[Emoshag]

$500 dollars for an amp, a guitar and a "nice" large diaphragm microphone? Where to you steal your shit from? Cause I price that out to about $4,500, roughly.

I have played enough guitars, recorded with enough "nice" microphones (really nice microphones), and thru just about every 100w head made... and for $500 dollars you'd be better off buying lessons, cause no one in "1 year of applied trying" can possibly be capable of playing "for at least the purposes of recording."

[Sleek Month]

Sounds like elitist snobbery to me.

-S.

[Sleek Month]

...okay, that's too easy.

Get a mexican fender for $200. Tweak it a little to taste. Grab a rode NT-1 for $100. Get a vintage tube amp for another $100.

If you can't get a sound out of that, the fault doesn't lie with the gear.

I'm going with a $200 class a tube amp for the apartment, myself...

I, too, have a garage full of useless bullshit...I have the JCM 800 rig, a 5150 rig and a randall rig, with variuos cabinets with different ages and wattages of speakers. For country I have an excellent Crate, (beautiful edgy clean tone), and for direct I have the Tech21 trademark 60 and sansamp.

...which is all irrelevant, but since you gave the "I have impressive names on my crap so I'm important" list, I thought it'd be fun to go there, too.

All the big gear is useless for recording at home. Get a small amp, a good mic, (I prefer condensers on guitar...whoever came up with using dynamics should jump down a giant hole and f**k themselves...), and stop worrying about emulation.

If you care as much about tone as you act like you do, the emulation will never do it.

-S.

[Funkybot79]

Emoshag, that just depends on what you want to do with the guitar doesn't it? I've been playing guitar for at least 8 years now and could care less about playing Satriani, Vai, Van Halen, etc. Most of the songs I play and write with my guitar (including leads) could easily be taught to someone with only a few months experience so that it could be played passibly well. Does this make me a crap guitar player? You'd probably think so, but chops don't impress me, songwriting and melodies do. No one's saying you'll sound like Vai in a year anyway, but you absolutely can play guitar passibly well in a year. Anyway, I'll take guys like Steven Malkmus and Spiral Stairs from Pavement over somoene like Satriani any day of the week, and they're not at all flashy and quite sloppy. But damn is it good...

And if anyone disagrees with this stuff go to a Guitar Center on a Sunday and listen to these jag offs who think they're guitar gods shredding away at obscene volumes. Sure it may be fast, and occasionally even impressive to some extent, but god is that terrible.

BTW cheap passible recording rig for about $500: Squier Strat, Line 6 Pod. Should suit most people's guitar needs around here and sounds passible. If it's not your bag Emoshag, that's cool, but don't be a snob. Especially when it comes to guitar playing, to quote Thom Yorke "anyone can play guitar."

[Funkybot79]

Hey Sleek, have you tried out the Blue Ball yet? I just got one and have been using it on my Twin and it beats the pants off an SM57, and sounds a lot more like a condenser than a dynamic. Really nice, open sound with a smooth top end, and to my ears doesn't have the harshness I associate with condensers (which can be good for that Strokes kind of sound).

Anyway fantastic guitar mic and only $99.

[Sleek Month]

Hey Sleek, have you tried out the Blue Ball yet?

Nah. When I find something I like, I usually stop looking. I got the rode about a year and a half ago, and I love it for vocals, electric guitars and acoustic instruments, so I haven't really tried anyhting else.

I'm building a little isolation cab for my living room right now, and I wouldn't mind having one mic that would just live in there, though, so I may get anothe mic soon.

I actually saw the Who the other day, and they're using some sort of large diaphragm condensers (In shock mounts, even) on Townsend's rig, and the guitar sounded great...(I wish the performance was as good as the guitar sound...)

I have no Idea how they're doing that without feedback problems, though.

-S.

[Emoshag]

BTW cheap passible recording rig for about $500: Squier Strat, Line 6 Pod. Should suit most people's guitar needs around here and sounds passible. If it's not your bag Emoshag, that's cool, but don't be a snob. Especially when it comes to guitar playing, to quote Thom Yorke "anyone can play guitar."

I have recorded with Drew Marzewick, who recorded one of the Pavement records, and I am a huge fan of Pavement. I am NOT into virtuoso or fusion guitarists either. However, you must admit that even playing "sloppy" like anyone from Pavement or their kin, they aren't sloppy. They are playing that way on purpose.

However, I am making the point that what I consider nice is not cheap. That isn't being a snob. Thats having expensive tastes. My main band, the one I did all the big tours in, recorded its final record using Peavy Rages for the guitars. But I have a particular style of playing are recording.

And in both, $500 dollars doesn't get you much.

If you'll note, I didn't start this anrgy little tangent. I was merely defending my style of playing and recording in addition to trying to explain that I know I am not a signal theory guru... but that doesn't make me stupid. Just uneducated in signal theory.

But to reiterate, it is NOT my bag to play a crappy guitar with a amp simulator. I own a beat up Fender Tele and a Squire bass along with a Bass POD Pro and a Vetta II head.... and they don't compare. So is it a "snob" thing to do if I say I prefer the sound of Josh Hommes guitar tone over Trent Reznors guitar tone? Am I permitted to think one is better? Both guitarists are quite good, but one has much better gear.

If this isn't true, then why bother going to a studio to record. A boombox should be just fine, correct?

Again, I am not trying to start an arguement. I started this thread on trying to figure out how to go about making software sound like a guitar, not to talk about who is a better person than who based on what they say they like in a guitar setup.

All the big gear is useless for recording at home. Get a small amp, a good mic, (I prefer condensers on guitar...whoever came up with using dynamics should jump down a giant hole and f**k themselves...), and stop worrying about emulation.

-S.

Who said I was recording at home?