I was wondering if anyone used SuperCollider and/or Max/MSP. Can someone compare and contrast the two? Is the main difference that Max is object oriented? I saw some blurb on a forum talking about how this guy used SuperCollider instead of Max because it was free, which leads me to believe the capabilities are similar. Any thoughts?
Thanks
Max/MSP vs SuperCollider
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- KVRist
- 207 posts since 25 Apr, 2004
They are both different, both have a different 'sound' and while one is free and the other is not, this is not even worth weighing unless you have no intention to spend money, then the choice is clead 
MAX/MSP is more of a visual programming environment where you connect blocks together to make a larger construct. SuperCollider is a scripting language that allows you to do synthesis and many other realtime processing, and custom GUI and graphic UI. While you are at it, take a look a Csound. It is also free, and can do a lot.
As for which is the best, you will have to decide that based on your own needs. I'd suggest just grabbing the demo of max/msp and playing with it - then checking out supercollider and csound.
They all take time to learn so don't hurt yourself trying to learn them all at once!
MAX/MSP is more of a visual programming environment where you connect blocks together to make a larger construct. SuperCollider is a scripting language that allows you to do synthesis and many other realtime processing, and custom GUI and graphic UI. While you are at it, take a look a Csound. It is also free, and can do a lot.
As for which is the best, you will have to decide that based on your own needs. I'd suggest just grabbing the demo of max/msp and playing with it - then checking out supercollider and csound.
They all take time to learn so don't hurt yourself trying to learn them all at once!
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The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. ~Mahatma Gandhi
The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. ~Mahatma Gandhi
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- KVRAF
- 1958 posts since 16 Jan, 2005 from France's Dirty South
I've been meaning to get into a deep modular environment for a while.
Posting threads like this one, reading lots of things on them etc...
What most ppl will say :
Reaktor, GREAT library with stuff you can use in your own projects. Poor documentation though.
Max, GREAT documentation, but very few patches floating around.
Supercollider, really code based if i m not mistaken, so that's not everyone's cup of tea.
There's also PureData, more or less of a free equivalent to MaxMsp.
And there will always be someone to tell you to check out something you weren't thinking about...
In the end none of this helped me, since i haven't gotten into any of them at all.
All i can say is that these softwares capabilities are so broad, you can't really go wrong with any of them.
I mean, even if you use SC for a while and decide it's not good for you, you'll have learned tons of stuff, which may not be directly applicable in another software liek reaktor, but will help tremendously at getting a grasp of how things work under the hood, what can be done, and what do YOu wanna do ; and THAT will sure help.
Just my .02
Posting threads like this one, reading lots of things on them etc...
What most ppl will say :
Reaktor, GREAT library with stuff you can use in your own projects. Poor documentation though.
Max, GREAT documentation, but very few patches floating around.
Supercollider, really code based if i m not mistaken, so that's not everyone's cup of tea.
There's also PureData, more or less of a free equivalent to MaxMsp.
And there will always be someone to tell you to check out something you weren't thinking about...
In the end none of this helped me, since i haven't gotten into any of them at all.
All i can say is that these softwares capabilities are so broad, you can't really go wrong with any of them.
I mean, even if you use SC for a while and decide it's not good for you, you'll have learned tons of stuff, which may not be directly applicable in another software liek reaktor, but will help tremendously at getting a grasp of how things work under the hood, what can be done, and what do YOu wanna do ; and THAT will sure help.
Just my .02
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- KVRer
- 12 posts since 6 Jun, 2004
First of all im biased and pretty ignorant as i've used SC for a few months and max/msp for only a week or so.
Max/msp is a graphical programming environment whereas Supercollider is more like a programming language.
I'd say it's easier to get started in max/msp as there is excellent tutorial material and you can get stuck in without having to worry too much about things like syntax. The flip side is you can achieve certain things in supercollider much more efficiently, it is free and due to the way it works collaberation with others over a network is very easy.
I'm not sure if there's anything you can't do in msp that you can in SC or vice versa, i just found SCs way of working a lot more logical and a lot less frustrating, so that's what I went for. Part of that might be that i've done a bit of programming before so nerd language doesn't scare me.
I don't think you can really say max/msp or supercollider has a certain sound as they are both so flexible.
One thing to bare in mind is that SC originated on the mac and is in it's most accessable form only on that platform. Linux is second, and windows is very much third, although it's catching up rapidly. I've found it pretty tough learning linux, emacs, synthesis theory and supercollider all at once, but i'd definately say it's been worth it so far.
The swiki is a good place to start if you want more info on supercollider.
Max/msp is a graphical programming environment whereas Supercollider is more like a programming language.
I'd say it's easier to get started in max/msp as there is excellent tutorial material and you can get stuck in without having to worry too much about things like syntax. The flip side is you can achieve certain things in supercollider much more efficiently, it is free and due to the way it works collaberation with others over a network is very easy.
I'm not sure if there's anything you can't do in msp that you can in SC or vice versa, i just found SCs way of working a lot more logical and a lot less frustrating, so that's what I went for. Part of that might be that i've done a bit of programming before so nerd language doesn't scare me.
I don't think you can really say max/msp or supercollider has a certain sound as they are both so flexible.
One thing to bare in mind is that SC originated on the mac and is in it's most accessable form only on that platform. Linux is second, and windows is very much third, although it's catching up rapidly. I've found it pretty tough learning linux, emacs, synthesis theory and supercollider all at once, but i'd definately say it's been worth it so far.
The swiki is a good place to start if you want more info on supercollider.
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- KVRAF
- 10134 posts since 16 Dec, 2002
check this out too, which someone posted in another thread
http://www2.siba.fi/PWGL/
its the newer crossplatform version of this
http://www2.siba.fi/soundingscore/pwsynth.html
though I dont think it covers such broad ground as Max or supercollider
http://www2.siba.fi/PWGL/
its the newer crossplatform version of this
http://www2.siba.fi/soundingscore/pwsynth.html
though I dont think it covers such broad ground as Max or supercollider
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- KVRist
- 75 posts since 5 Mar, 2004 from London, UK
Well, PWGL's not as stable as Max/MSP since it still is in beta (but already vastly more stable than SC on my Windows XP computerVariKusBrainZ wrote:though I dont think [PWGL] covers such broad ground as Max or supercollider
), but keep in mind one can extend it by writing new objects (in Lisp or even apparently in C++ -have a look in the documentation/programming/PWGLSynth folder-). This should theoretically allow PWGL to cover a pretty broad ground! -
- KVRAF
- 10134 posts since 16 Dec, 2002
true, though I was meaning more straight out of the box......and yeah, beta, but pretty stable and the documetation isnt bad. I love the interface. When I tried out VSXultra I wished there was an audio app that had a similar interface and here it isMies wrote:Well, PWGL's not as stable as Max/MSP since it still is in beta (but already vastly more stable than SC on my Windows XP computerVariKusBrainZ wrote:though I dont think [PWGL] covers such broad ground as Max or supercollider
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- KVRist
- 75 posts since 5 Mar, 2004 from London, UK
Ah, I understand now - Yet,once I got my head around the various mouse+keyboard combinations (rickclick, rightclick+shift, 'v', 'd', etc.) I started realising there are quite a few objects immediately available.VariKusBrainZ wrote:true, though I was meaning more straight out of the box......
Erm, I wouldn't go that farthe documetation isnt bad.
The tutorials are great but I've grown used to the luxurious Max/MSP help (I know, spoilt kid 
)Having said that, the 'd' key helped me a few times.
Very neat and gorgeous!I love the interface
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- KVRian
- 556 posts since 30 Aug, 2005
I've used both pretty extensively. First off, SuperCollider is definitely object oriented, so no, that is not the main difference.Is the main difference that Max is object oriented?
Oddly enough, since Max/MSP isn't a programming language, per se, I'm not sure it could technically be considered "object oriented", but I guess the idea is similar.
The main difference, I suppose, is that Max/MSP is graphical whereas SuperCollider is a programming language. Personally, I find SuperCollider to be more powerful, but I'm pretty comfortable with coding. If I weren't, I would probably find Max/MSP to be more useful. When I have used Max/MSP, I tend to find myself spending way too much time tidying up the damn wires. Jitter, though, is awesome, and is unrivaled by SC3.
One oft-cited way of showing SC3's power is to produce an array of, say 100 Oscillators, set to random frequencies. It's like, 3 lines of code in SC3, but it would take awhile to do in Max/MSP.
There have been many arguments in the past that SuperCollider "sounds" better than Max/MSP. Part of that is because, until somewhat recently, Max/MSP didn't have bandlimited oscillators, resulting in aliasing, and giving it a colder sound. Anywho, that argument is probably a few years out of date, though. I haven't really compared the two head-to-head recently.
If you're going to use SuperCollider, signing up for the mailing list is an absolute must. It's very active, and many of the people on there are extremely helpful.
