High quality audio morphing effect plugin, why it doesn't exist yet?

[tanabarbier]

I agree with a lot of what cron said, it is more a compositional gesture, a type of montage, to me, that an VSTable effect, as it is highly material dependent.

As I see it there is the FFT way, that sounds a bit vocodish, the kyma way (I don't own it so listening to the exemples and the video)that almost sounds good, but a bit cheesy to me indeed, and the good ol'fashioned way that is fades and EQ and everything that comes in handy with those two particular sounds that you are trying to morph, of course it is a lot of fun and does sounds really good if you make it good but I don't see that becomming a plugin...

I do prefer to get my hands dirty for the time being.

[monas]

also it just came to my mind again that there's IRCAM Tools Tracks CS, which does realtime cross synthesis. I have a demo on my computer, but i never used it much. maybe i should revisit it.
IRCAM stuff is usually top-notch in sound quality, but the bundle is quite expensive.

http://www.fluxhome.com/products/Plug_ins/ircam_trax

plus, the original soundhack app does it. but not in realtime.

[monas]

I think morphing is more a skill than an effect.

actually morphing is a well defined term in computer music as a kind of cross synthesis where spectral features of two sources are interpolated in the spectral domain. so it's most definitely an effect.

[whyterabbyt]

also it just came to my mind again that there's IRCAM Tools Tracks CS

mentioned it on page 1, got ignored

[monas]

mentioned it on page 1, got ignored

sorry, i missed that somehow.

[Neon Breath]

also it just came to my mind again that there's IRCAM Tools Tracks CS

mentioned it on page 1, got ignored

Yep thanks for mentioning, it's an interesting plugin (tried it already in the past) but again, it's phase vocoder which crosses two sounds more than morphing them in time.

[cron]

I think morphing is more a skill than an effect.

actually morphing is a well defined term in computer music as a kind of cross synthesis where spectral features of two sources are interpolated in the spectral domain. so it's most definitely an effect.

Well yeah, it's well defined in so far as practitioners tend to understand the outcome you're describing when you use the word, but I wouldn't say it's a well defined (or definable) process at all. It's not something like convolution which is a simple mathematical process that's the same every time. There are hundreds of ways to achieve a morph which don't involve the frequency domain (I take it that's what you mean by spectral domain). The Kyma morph in the iPad example sounds like a time domain granular thing to me.

Tana nailed it for me by calling morphing a form of montage. In a sense, a morph from one sound to another is too dramatic a compositional gesture to entrust to a single slider for me!

[highkoo]

a morph from one sound to another is too dramatic a compositional gesture to entrust to a single slider for me!

I agree.
I tend to automatically think about it terms of a 2D visual morph.
When doing those points are selected and paired between the two images, and the morph basically draws the line between them.
And I think by doing sensible pairing, not only do the start and end of the morph 'make sense', but all those points in between will tend to make sense too.
Like, in face morphing- You connect the eyes on each image. So, even if the eyes are not anywhere near the same place on the 2D plane in each image, they will track with the morph (along with all the other pairs) in a way that seems sensible. If you paired an eye with a nose, it would not look so good.

When I think about that, and try think about some analogous process for audio, it is totally mindblowing that the Kyma examples sound as good as they do.
(Especially those touchpad ones. Im guessing tons of background set up work.)

I imagine some fifty-adjustable-band EQ looking plugin that has a hundred sliders with threshold markers, for each sound.
So you match up some freq bandwidths and some amplitudes and it makes a 'path' for each band's morph. Messy.

[Harry_HH]

I think morphing is more a skill than an effect.

actually morphing is a well defined term in computer music as a kind of cross synthesis where spectral features of two sources are interpolated in the spectral domain. so it's most definitely an effect.

Exately, no matter if we are talking about audio or video.
According to "cron"'s philosophy, e.g. John Landis had to use the same technology in the "Black or White" morphing scene than one of the most famous early example of morhing trick when Maria was transformed to Robot in Friz Lang's Metropolis 65 years earlier. Althoug Metropolis has unbeatable charm, you have to admit that morphing has developed since. Of course you need "a skill" although you use technology no matter how advanced, but the same concerns all the effects (an other story is that today when we have all kind of audio effects available everywhere, the relative ability/skill to really use and understand tech has decreased) , eq, compression, reverb etc. You can achive quite a nice reverb by shouting in corridor, or you can animate the whole thing manually in stead of digital technology and get a very good result as e.g. Stephen R. Johnson did in the Peter Gabriel "Sledgehammer" (all these examples represent the state of art techology of its time), but the modern technology opens new possibilites every day. AND WE WAN'T THAT F**** MORPHING PLUGIN, you deaf developers! H.

[Neon Breath]

Fascinating inputs guy really, cool infos. Never expected to go that deep into the subject!

[Liquidclear]

I've got some great results with the free Jez Wells stuff, particulary Shapee.

http://jezwells.org/Computer_music_tools.html

Or just do a cross-fade and be done with it.

[tweiss2000]

Sound morph can be compared to picture morph, it's not voodoo.
Read this easy to read 2 pages of basic stuff:
http://music.columbia.edu/cmc/musicandc ... /05_06.php

In my understanding there is no need to handle"fifty-adjustable-band EQ looking plugin that has a hundred sliders with threshold markers".

But there is no up-to date plugin to satisfy lust for sound morphing.

[monas]

but I wouldn't say it's a well defined (or definable) process at all.

At least what i described is how for example Dr Boulanger uses the term in his audio programming book and Dr Eric Lyon uses it in his PD externals. I understand that you don't like how it sounds, but that's a different question.

Of course there's no magic knob in morphing that makes things sound awesome. it's all about the source sounds you use and how you incorporate it. and some other kinds of "morphs" can of course be achieved in different ways as well.

listening to the examples, I am pretty sure that what i described above is what's technically happening there. I think it all uses some form of phase vocoder. The iPad/Kyma example is the only one where i am not quite sure. It sounds kind of granular like cron said, but i still think its a spectral effect. the original page where the video is posted mentions the terms "spectral" and "resynthesized" a lot. i think the realistic sound of it is due to kymas excellent sound engine.

[mandolarian]

When I think about that, and try think about some analogous process for audio, it is totally mindblowing that the Kyma examples sound as good as they do.
(Especially those touchpad ones. Im guessing tons of background set up work.)

Funny, even though they're likely the best thus far, for me, the Kyma ones don't sound very good at all. Like a low rez granular process, they manage to morph the life force out of all the samples.

High quality morphing seems to be beyond our current understanding/technology. Hopefully in the future these spectral distortion techniques will move beyond the novelty stage. Or more likely, the low quality morph will become the next T-pain effect and available to all smartphone/tablet composers for only 99 cents.

[Harry_HH]

but I wouldn't say it's a well defined (or definable) process at all.

At least what i described is how for example Dr Boulanger uses the term in his audio programming book and Dr Eric Lyon uses it in his PD externals. I understand that you don't like how it sounds, but that's a different question.

Of course there's no magic knob in morphing that makes things sound awesome. it's all about the source sounds you use and how you incorporate it. and some other kinds of "morphs" can of course be achieved in different ways as well.

listening to the examples, I am pretty sure that what i described above is what's technically happening there. I think it all uses some form of phase vocoder. The iPad/Kyma example is the only one where i am not quite sure. It sounds kind of granular like cron said, but i still think its a spectral effect. the original page where the video is posted mentions the terms "spectral" and "resynthesized" a lot. i think the realistic sound of it is due to kymas excellent sound engine.

What will say with this? What is the added value to the thread's subject you will bring with this? I'm very pragmatical hands-on guy, so please tell me. H.