IrcamlLab The Snail frequency-domain analyzer

[Neon Breath]

Some of you might like it... Although personally I'm not sure what to think of it, at that price... But anyway, here it is, I know some of you love those tools:

http://www.ircamlab.com/products/p2242-The-Snail/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T44UEma ... e=youtu.be

[manducator]

It does look a lot like this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cEiKMVB0wmg

[wasi]

Yeah, that's a pretty blatant ripoff and I'm not one to say that lightly. They even priced it the same. I hate it when this happens.

There seem to be some smaller improvements with some deeper engine and tuning access, but it helps when you're not just one guy trying to get by I guess. That must sting.

http://photosounder.com/spiral/

[Ivan_C]

Yeah, that's a pretty blatant ripoff and I'm not one to say that lightly.

Well the technology isn't the same at all (there is no fundamental frequency estimation at all in the Snail), the display isn't the same either (snail vs simply circular), so it's too easy to use the word "ripoff".

But indeed, the two products look similar in terms of functionalities.

[wasi]

Yeah, that's a pretty blatant ripoff and I'm not one to say that lightly.

Well the technology isn't the same at all (there is no fundamental frequency estimation at all in the Snail), the display isn't the same either (snail vs simply circular), so it's too easy to use the word "ripoff".

But indeed, the two products look similar in terms of functionalities.

I can't speak for the underlying technology, just what comes out the other side.

The "Snail" is just their way to glaze over the fact that it's exactly the same spiral display as Spiral. Photosounder Spiral is a spiral/snail shape as well, there's just no line between the octaves.

From the video they also apparently changed the waterfall display from horizontal to vertical and gave it 'bump mapped' visuals instead of the spectral colors they use in the rest of the plugin.

Manual controls over center note, transposition, window type and the tuner scale at the bottom, that's new.

It would have been less blatant if they had focused on the waterfall display and added the spiral as an aside, but building it around the spiral display is really harsh.

[Gamma-UT]

A 1992 US patent: http://www.google.co.uk/patents/US5127056

Screen Shot 2016-02-13 at 11.23.07.png

I found it via this guy's thesis, who does not seem upset that the spiroid idea is catching on: http://phd.samuelfreeman.me.uk/thesis-4-2.html

The idea of using spirals to represent pitch classes didn't seem that unusual to me and can be handy. I don't see a problem with multiple tools using it, especially when they are aimed at different uses. Do you think there should be only One True Linear FFT Display plugin?

In any case, I can't see The Snail being that much use on a full-spectrum mix compared to a single instrument with a lot of harmonics, whereas Spiral can be.

[whyterabbyt]

Yeah, that's a pretty blatant ripoff and I'm not one to say that lightly.

I sincerely doubt it, given that IRCAM is probably one of the largest audio research establishments in the world, with countless academic papers spawned there over the decades. Most of the consumer software that comes from them, in fact, has a non-consumer research pedigree and origin dating back years; in fact I'd be kinda surprised if Snail wasnt based on something entirely command-line going back a decade or two.

And its not as if the visual 'spiral' that Snail shows was something entirely new to Spiral. In fact, Spiral doesnt really display an obvious spiral form, while Snail does.

Google 'tuning spiral', or even 'spiral of fifths' you'll find plenty of historic precedence for that style of display; its hardly a coincidence that Photosounder picked that name.







KVR is a tiny microcosm of audio software aimed at consumers, but there's a much older, much deeper academic world out there, where a very great deal of the stuff that gets repurposed for consumers is actually thought up. And its not as though plugin audio developers (most of whom will have tapped into that world during their own period in academia) dont read research papers. If you see something from the academia/research side that looks like something in the consumer world, its actually far more likely that the precedent is academic/research.
(What's kind of sad is that it used to be that the 'consumer' product world (particularly in the high end hardware era) fed major research papers back (ie the ex-academics, publishing via AES and the like etc) but the plugin world doesnt seem to do that much; their advances seem to be in pragmatic, real-time implementation but that doesnt necessarily get shared the way the fundamental academic research they'll often be relying on was)

[wasi]

Yeah, the spiral/snail is a given once you decide to have a circular note/spectrum arrangement. But it's not just the spiral, it's the entire featureset. And looking at their subtle visual changes to make it just different enough to not have Spiral show up on a google reverse image search for Snail I get a feeling they knew fully well that there's another guy out there that has something doing the exact same thing.

I just feel bad for the guy, seeing as his solid but somewhat niche product probably just got crushed by an IRCAM/Centre Pompidou/French Ministry of Culture research grant.

[wasi]

Edit: Forums glitched out on me. Seems to be happening more often.

On another note though: It's mac only, but the system requirements show windows, so be careful if you're on windows.

[A_SN]

Sorry for the necro but I just found out The Snail was even a thing.

Yeah, that's a pretty blatant ripoff and I'm not one to say that lightly. They even priced it the same. I hate it when this happens.

There seem to be some smaller improvements with some deeper engine and tuning access, but it helps when you're not just one guy trying to get by I guess. That must sting.

http://photosounder.com/spiral/

I just found out about it now. It's not the first time IRCAM gets some "inspiration" from me haha. It's fine, devs take ideas from each other all the time. I try to do it too but I find few ideas worth lifting .

Joke's on them though, it's not selling very well at all, I guess few people want a $99 tuner (although Spiral was always meant for me to learn music, not anything else, even though apparently I'm alone in using it that way). Not that they should really care anyway, they're paid by the French government.

the display isn't the same either (snail vs simply circular)]

What are you talking about, it is the same thing, Spiral is just as much snail like as Snail. How do you think Spiral is different ("simply circular"?? There's nothing circular about it, it's a spiral!).

there is no fundamental frequency estimation at all in the Snail

You mean my harmonics overlay thing? Yeah, they don't have that, maybe because it wasn't in the earlier versions of Spiral iirc I only added that two years later in 2015 when their own thing was already in the works.

A 1992 US patent: http://www.google.co.uk/patents/US5127056

To be entirely fair after I started working on Spiral in 2012 I found on KVR that a guy made some iOS app using the same principle, although as it was the case with the Snail they chose some clean looking vector graphics, which I think is a mistake, but yes I'm not the first to come up with this concept (which probably shouldn't be surprising) although I swear that I didn't get inspiration from anyone (just take my word for it).

Spiral doesnt really display an obvious spiral form, while Snail does.

What am I reading... If Spiral isn't a spiral... what is it? It seems you and Ivan_C are under the same impression, I'd like to know what it is.

Google 'tuning spiral', or even 'spiral of fifths' you'll find plenty of historic precedence for that style of display; its hardly a coincidence that Photosounder picked that name.

I picked the name because........ it's a spiral! Just like I picked "SplineEQ" because it's an EQ made with splines, I picked "Spiral" because the whole thing.... is a spiral. And a spiral of fifths is quite different since it's not continuous, it jumps around by fifths. I actually hate it when people say Spiral's chromatic circle reminds them of the circle of fifths. It's not a circle of fifths, it's a chromatic circle!! Big difference.

Yeah, the spiral/snail is a given once you decide to have a circular note/spectrum arrangement. But it's not just the spiral, it's the entire featureset. And looking at their subtle visual changes to make it just different enough to not have Spiral show up on a google reverse image search for Snail I get a feeling they knew fully well that there's another guy out there that has something doing the exact same thing.

I just feel bad for the guy, seeing as his solid but somewhat niche product probably just got crushed by an IRCAM/Centre Pompidou/French Ministry of Culture research grant.

I was already on their radar for Photosounder. However it's only a problem in principle, both Spiral and Snail have such low brand recognition, even in this market, that if someone knows about one they probably don't even know about the other. I mean even I didn't know about Snail until someone emailed me about it. If more people find out about the Snail maybe more people will find out about Spiral.

So I'm not worried about competition, I like that my ideas are spreading actually, and if people copy me that just elevates my status. What upsets me most about all this is the realisation that no one actually understands my ideas, not even those who copy me. I made Spiral to teach myself music and music theory, which worked beautifully well (I've learnt, memorised and even understood entire lengthy jazz tunes entirely thanks to it, I knew nothing before I made it), but it seems everyone else takes a much more narrow view of it, to the point that a copy of it is turned into just a tuner. A tuner! My whole concept for a new simpler way to gain insights into music turns into a tuner... No matter how many times I tell people that Spiral is meant to learn about music, it seems they just use it to figure out how to copy a chord from a sample.

Just like with Photosounder, my idea was for people to learn how certain sounds look like and use that new knowledge to create new sounds graphically with results not really possible before, but it seems overall the takeaway was "wait, are you saying I can put my face into sound??" with other people inevitably pointing out "it's been done before".

It's like if you invent a power drill and everybody thinks it's a weird hammer... "Oh yeah it's really a new approach to hammering, with the head unconventionally placed right below the handle, handle which is much more ergonomic than a traditional wooden hammer handle. We're not sure what the spinny part at the top does, but it's a nice touch. 9/10 Hammers&Nails Magazine".

That's why I made SplineEQ, I knew people couldn't possibly miss the point of that. Maybe I should stop expecting people to understand new concepts and learn new things...

PS: Anyone else finds it funny that the French of IRCAM named it "The Snail"? "A spirale, oh tiens it rimaïdz mi of what I 'ad for leunch" Oh and I have the right to say this, I myself am French.

[Chris-S]

I'm using spiral (free CM version). Nice to read about the history.

[sandbags]

I made Spiral to teach myself music and music theory, which worked beautifully well (I've learnt, memorised and even understood entire lengthy jazz tunes entirely thanks to it, I knew nothing before I made it), but it seems everyone else takes a much more narrow view of it, to the point that a copy of it is turned into just a tuner. A tuner! My whole concept for a new simpler way to gain insights into music turns into a tuner... No matter how many times I tell people that Spiral is meant to learn about music, it seems they just use it to figure out how to copy a chord from a sample.

I would like to hear more about this please. How do you use it in this way?

I have SpiralCM which I've found somewhat interesting but mostly a curio hence why, although I have PhotoSounder and SplineEQ, I never sprung for Spiral.

But I am also going back to basics and trying to learn piano properly (so I'm having to go back to the beginning and learn scales) so I'm interested in hearing more about what you've done and how you think Spiral has affected you / helped you.

Best,

Matt

[A_SN]

I made Spiral to teach myself music and music theory, which worked beautifully well (I've learnt, memorised and even understood entire lengthy jazz tunes entirely thanks to it, I knew nothing before I made it), but it seems everyone else takes a much more narrow view of it, to the point that a copy of it is turned into just a tuner. A tuner! My whole concept for a new simpler way to gain insights into music turns into a tuner... No matter how many times I tell people that Spiral is meant to learn about music, it seems they just use it to figure out how to copy a chord from a sample.

I would like to hear more about this please. How do you use it in this way?

I have SpiralCM which I've found somewhat interesting but mostly a curio hence why, although I have PhotoSounder and SplineEQ, I never sprung for Spiral.

But I am also going back to basics and trying to learn piano properly (so I'm having to go back to the beginning and learn scales) so I'm interested in hearing more about what you've done and how you think Spiral has affected you / helped you.

Best,

Matt

Thanks for asking . I'll assume you've seen the video I made and have seen how Spiral is used to identify notes.

My idea is that the simplest way to understand music without the baggage of so many centuries of twists and turns in the development of music theory and notation is to just extract all you need to know from the music itself, the sound itself. I believe that everything I need to learn about music is contained in the sound itself, so by analysing it properly (with Spiral) I can develop my own understanding of music and music theory.

So what I first understood from that naive outsider-like approach is tonality, which means that for a group of instruments in a piece and for a certain duration (usually the whole piece) you have one note that is the root, and all the notes are best defined in relation to that note. It's the origin, and once you've identified that note it's best to identify and think of all the other notes with respect to the root. So I chose to identify the root as note 0, and every other pitch class has its own number from 1 to 11. So if you're in the key of B flat, then 0 represents the note B flat, 1 represents B (natural), 2 represents C, and so on until 11 which represents A (natural). So numbers 0 to 11 (or 12 if you must) give you the pitch class, and which octave the note belongs too can also be indicated. I like to use arrows right after each number to indicate the octave, so would be added to any note below 0, and to any note above 11.

Here's an example of how I notate music using that approach:


I guess you can see how it ties in with Spiral's approach. In Spiral you can rotate the visualisation so whatever note you want is on top (so in case of something in Bb you'd put the enharmonic A# at 12 o'clock) and then you can read every note as a number like if it was on a clock! You see a note light up at 3 o'clock, you write it down as a 3, you see a note at 7, you write 7. It's actually exceedingly simple, yet unlike standard notation it doesn't get any more complicated if you go into Arnold Schoenberg territory where all 12 notes are used, because what do you care, each note still has its own unambiguous number.

So the other thing you also learn quickly from the approach (or any approach because it's super obvious stuff) is scales and diatonic function. So if you take a natural minor scale you'll notice a clear pattern, if you set the root to 0 correctly then you'll see notes always happen at the very same places, which are 0, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8 and 10. And it's always the same no matter the tonality, once you find the root and put it right on top in Spiral (and therefore at 0 in your notation) then everything looks the same, no matter if it's D minor or Bb minor. So very quickly you see patterns emerge, things that you recognise instantly across pieces because they share the exact same or similar sequences of numbers. You'll find at 0, 3 and 7 happen together a lot (a minor triad), but then again so do 2, 5 and 8, you'll find that 0 and 7 are quite clearly the most important notes in everything (and that's how you quickly associate numbers with diatonic functions, you know 0 is the tonic and 7 the dominant (even if you don't know the name, you'll know what 7 means to you), 5 the subdominant and so on, because it's always the same thing. So as you gain experience with that approach you find that each number has its own unique meaning, and you learn how to use them (for instance you learn that 6 is to be used carefully and preferably only in certain cases, like going up from a 5 to a 6 instead of the expected 7, or hit a 6 that slides to a 7, or you learn that ending on a 2, or going up towards 12 only to end up short on an 11 is an interesting way to end with some good tension), whereas each note as you know them by name doesn't really mean anything really.

So that's what the numbers do, an individual note outside of a context means nothing, it's just a random note. But because the numbers notation give you a context (a relationship to 0) the numbers carry a meaning that dramatically help you in gaining insight into which someone has chosen this note.

It also helps you remember things more easily, once you've learn that a major triad is 0-4-7 that's it, you know it all, you don't need to wonder what it's like depending on the tonality, it's always the same. It also makes doing math more easily, for instance you want a major triad but transposed up a fourth (+5), you just do +5 which gives you 5-9-0. And importantly as shown in the handwritten sheet above when you have to play the same parts but with a transposition, you don't need to learn anything over again, you don't even need to think about it (okay maybe you do on a keyboard, because keyboards make transposition a bit more hairy), you just play the same numbers but from a different starting point. And also it makes learning scales very easy, I already listed the numbers for a natural minor scale, then you can quickly remember that a harmonic minor scale replaces the 10 with an 11, that on top of that a major scale also raises the minor's 3 to 4 and 8 to 9, or remember any exotic scale as numbers, for instance a double harmonic is 0 1 4 5 7 8 11. And if you play let's say some jazz that uses all 12 notes there's no problem, and you still get to recognise diatonic functions, so it still makes sense.

So going from there you can understand more fancy concepts, for instance you might realise that while the main instrument is play a good old minor scale the contrabass seems to be using 7 as its own 0, which is how you figure out that some instruments aren't quite sharing the same scale but might be a fifth away for instance. Or numbers get weird for a few bars and everything seems to be raised by 1 for that time.

So that whole approach allows you to do away with some very unwieldy aspects of music theory and notation, such as weird note names that change depending on the key and scale, everything having its own name when you can just think of it in simpler numeric terms, like, I know 0-3-8-10 is a chord, I know where I've seen it, I know what it does, do I need to know if it's called "minor augmented 6/3 dim7" or who knows what in the hell, knowing that these names are just tortuous way of describing the exact same thing the numbers do, or a notation that seeks to make everything simple as long as you stick to a simple A minor/C major scale then everything gets progressively complicated. It does away with every unnecessary complication really, and I don't think you lose very much, you don't need to be told if a 6 represents a diminished 7 or an augmented 5, you can figure it out on your own from the context.

I also wrote this which pertains mostly to notation http://music.stackexchange.com/question ... 0088#30088

I mostly play the guitar (and a bit of violin, which in terms of logic is a lot like a guitar), I suppose it's less convenient for just playing piano because on a piano it's more helpful to think with absolute fixed note names, even if it doesn't help you understand what's going on at all. I thought of a potential solution for that, piano keys both black and white are about equally spaced where they meet, so you could have a paper with notches at every width of an average key (about 13.7 mm), and you could slide it left and right to set the key of your piece to line up with 0, and then you could see which note number each key of the keyboard represents. You can even keep it simpler by only having on that paper (which I would fold into toblerone kind of shape and have it cover 3 octaves) the kind of scale you use the most (or since a toblerone would have 3 sides you could have a different scale for each, minor, major and idk... chromatic?), so for a minor scale your paper would read:

Code: Select all

0 2 3  5  7 8  10 0  2 3  5  7 8  10 0 2 3  5  7 8  10

I don't have a piano anymore so I never got to try that idea, but I think it could work.

[whyterabbyt]

I

Spiral doesnt really display an obvious spiral form, while Snail does.

What am I reading... If Spiral isn't a spiral... what is it? It seems you and Ivan_C are under the same impression, I'd like to know what it is.

Its not that obviously spiral, in fact it looks more like concentric circules. Overall I think it looks more like an iris, because of the stroma-like patterning/colouring.

And a spiral of fifths is quite different since it's not continuous, it jumps around by fifths. I actually hate it when people say Spiral's chromatic circle reminds them of the circle of fifths. It's not a circle of fifths, it's a chromatic circle!! Big difference.

That 'big difference' is in the data being visualised, not the type of visualisation.

I just feel bad for the guy, seeing as his solid but somewhat niche product probably just got crushed by an IRCAM/Centre Pompidou/French Ministry of Culture research grant.

I was already on their radar for Photosounder. [/quote]

Why? For commercially implementing the same sort of paradigm from their 80s/90s academic software like UPIC and Phonogramme etc that Atomogen and Metasynth had already commercialised?
Kinda doubt it.

So I'm not worried about competition, I like that my ideas are spreading actually, and if people copy me that just elevates my status.

But the ideas were already in circulation, even implemented commercially, before you did anything with them. Metasynth was doing an 'image-based approach to sound creation and editing' for years before Photosounder existed, despite your claims, and even that wasnt the first of its type; UPIC and Phonogramme existed well before that. CurveEQ did bezier splines way before you made SplineEQ, SpectraTune was doing spiralised spectrogram type displays at least 15 years ago.

just found out about it now. It's not the first time IRCAM gets some "inspiration" from me haha.

Seems to me you're taking credit for 'inspiration' for things which existed a long time prior to your own implementation.

[A_SN]

I

Spiral doesnt really display an obvious spiral form, while Snail does.

What am I reading... If Spiral isn't a spiral... what is it? It seems you and Ivan_C are under the same impression, I'd like to know what it is.

Its not that obviously spiral, in fact it looks more like concentric circules. Overall I think it looks more like an iris, because of the stroma-like patterning/colouring.

Well it is a spiral, nothing else! Put a frequency sweep on it and that much will be clear. Think about it, if it was anything else you'd have to see breaks. I guess what fools you is that unlike anyone who tried doing this either before or after me I had the brilliant idea of having adjacent octaves merging together, which is a good idea because every harmonic might have another harmonic one octave above itself, so by merging together it kind of fuses the whole thing into a coherent object. I tried having sharp boundary between octaves and it looked good but it really made it much harder to see how the content of adjacent octaves were related.

So I'm not worried about competition, I like that my ideas are spreading actually, and if people copy me that just elevates my status.

But the ideas were already in circulation, even implemented commercially, before you did anything with them. Metasynth was doing an 'image-based approach to sound creation and editing' for years before Photosounder existed, despite your claims, and even that wasnt the first of its type; UPIC and Phonogramme existed well before that. CurveEQ did bezier splines way before you made SplineEQ, SpectraTune was doing spiralised spectrogram type displays at least 15 years ago.

I know! But being the first never mattered. Leif Ericson was the first European to reach the Americas, but yet he had precisely no influence on later explorers. He could have stayed at home and very little about world history would have changed. If Amerigo Vespucci went to America it was all because of Colombus had just gone there. So there's no point in saying "but Ericson was first! He even had a colony there!" because being first doesn't matter, all that matters is the chain of influence. And in the case of Spiral you never know for sure, but the IRCAM guys presented an early prototype in november 2013, a few months after mine was published in a large circulation magazine. That proves nothing, but I don't think about it like a magistrate, I think about it with heuristics, there are several reasons to think they knew about what I did, and why shouldn't they! But again, it doesn't matter, I'm more upset that they made a tuner out of it..., but it just tells me that if researchers from a prestigious institute do exactly what I already did then I should call myself a researcher too! Same work same title. I think in those cases where it seems obvious enough but nothing proves it then both views are valid. It's like Bill Cosby, you can think he didn't do any of it because there's no evidence at all, but really though, it's pretty obvious... So there's no point arguing about it, I choose the self-serving view and it's probably the right one anyway, I just don't know that .

I never claimed that there was anything special about SplineEQ's curves though or that anyone copied that, I was well aware that similar things existed before it. In fact I was aware of it before I made SplineEQ, I think.

I don't remember what I claimed people copied from Photosounder though, I only clearly remembered that a guy took inspiration from my icons and keyboard shortcuts (of all things!!) and another my gradient... Oh and one was very nice he said on his webpage that he took inspiration from me and just links to my Photosounder webpage even though he's selling his similar program too!

just found out about it now. It's not the first time IRCAM gets some "inspiration" from me haha.

Seems to me you're taking credit for 'inspiration' for things which existed a long time prior to your own implementation.

I do, and there's nothing contradictory about it, does that make sense to you? See, it's like, I took up skateboarding because I saw it in Back to the Future, even though skateboarding existed long before 1985. Michael J. Fox didn't invent skateboarding, but he can claim credit for inspiring me to take it up. I love analogies, I have the best analogies.