Photosounder Spiral CM now out and about

[Neon Breath]

It's August 14!

[Tricky-Loops]

But unusually enough for a plugin I made this thing not to use on your own creations as much as to use on other peoples music for you to learn what's going on in there musically, with their synthesis or processing or even just the nature of their instruments sound (with Spiral you can see how each instrument looks like, whether its harmonics shake around like strings or Hammonds might do, whether you can mostly see the lowest harmonics like a flute or a piano or the higher harmonics like a saxophone or a clavichord, or all harmonics like a sawtooth, or whether notes glissando between each other like many synths do or are bent or slided like on a guitar) but also see and learn about the mixing and mostly as with the full version learn about stereo mixing.

So that's why I just load it into something like SAVIHost and feed it the computer's "stereo mix", there's a lot to learn that way.

That's something which I cannot really understand...

...because I learn about other songs - arrangement, harmonization, mixing - simply by LISTENING to them (or analyzing the MIDI)...

So what advantage does it have to SEE notes as colors (and guessing the chords by looking at the color combinations?)

This visualization spiral is a VERY INTERESTING approach (as it reminds of the Circle of Fifth) but I still cannot fathom how this can help me to learn from other songs.

[A_SN]

But unusually enough for a plugin I made this thing not to use on your own creations as much as to use on other peoples music for you to learn what's going on in there musically, with their synthesis or processing or even just the nature of their instruments sound (with Spiral you can see how each instrument looks like, whether its harmonics shake around like strings or Hammonds might do, whether you can mostly see the lowest harmonics like a flute or a piano or the higher harmonics like a saxophone or a clavichord, or all harmonics like a sawtooth, or whether notes glissando between each other like many synths do or are bent or slided like on a guitar) but also see and learn about the mixing and mostly as with the full version learn about stereo mixing.

So that's why I just load it into something like SAVIHost and feed it the computer's "stereo mix", there's a lot to learn that way.

That's something which I cannot really understand...

...because I learn about other songs - arrangement, harmonization, mixing - simply by LISTENING to them (or analyzing the MIDI)...

So what advantage does it have to SEE notes as colors (and guessing the chords by looking at the color combinations?)

This visualization spiral is a VERY INTERESTING approach (as it reminds of the Circle of Fifth) but I still cannot fathom how this can help me to learn from other songs.

Well I don't know about you but when I hear a note or a chord, I don't just instantly know just what it is (if you do then you have a rare gift!). Looking at the spiral while listening to it tells me instantly what notes I'm hearing (well in a dense mix or with chords it might take some extra time to figure which note which harmonic belongs to), so that's how I learn. Play a part of a melody, see what notes it's made of, write it down, then do the same for the next part. But even if you're not trying to learn individual notes, it's complements your hearing, you can look at something, wonder what it is, then hear it, then realise you didn't realise you could hear this. There are things in a mix that your ears might just forget about. But in general seeing at the same time as hearing just gives you slight extra abilities, like better understand why something sounds the way it does (as in, "what is that effect", seeing can easily give you the answer) or just knowing why something sounds wrong from seeing it, like see why an instrument doesn't sit well in a mix because its equalisation doesn't look like it should, or it's poorly placed in stereo.

So long story short, it just makes things clearer when trying to understand music, there's less confusion, you're able to know just what's going on in your ears more quickly and reliably. If you wonder what's that interval, is it a slide or a bend, is the lady hitting any note right or just vibratoing everything within a major third (it happens, not a good sign usually), what is that tune I just whistled, is that snare drum sample in stereo, why does this instrument/sample sound different from that other one, who in that mix is out of tune, looking at the spiral helps you get the answers. It's like binoculars for your ears when squinting won't cut it anymore. Besides you don't always have MIDI to analyse .

Oh and if you sing or play a string or wind instrument it can help you hit the right notes (by giving you instant pitch feedback), or bend to the right semitone (too many guitar players land bends in the middle of nowhere, like, neither a minor nor a major second, just in between) or realise that you just cannot sing in tune (that's how I found out that I pretty consistently sing notes right in between two notes, and in my experience it's pretty hard to correct and go towards the right note without overshooting it, but maybe that's just that I should stay away from a mic, always).

[Tricky-Loops]

While I couldn't analyze whole songs only by looking at the spiral (as it currently is in the CM mag), you have some interesting ideas which could be developed further. For example, you could add some chord recognition like it is implemented in Riffstation (but much better because Riffstation only works for simple chords).

With some added features & an expanded GUI it could even be some kind of visual Circle of Fifth where notes & chords are displayed in realtime (not only with colors but additionally with the right terms).

This opens a whole new world of applications!

[A_SN]

While I couldn't analyze whole songs only by looking at the spiral (as it currently is in the CM mag), you have some interesting ideas which could be developed further. For example, you could add some chord recognition like it is implemented in Riffstation (but much better because Riffstation only works for simple chords).

With some added features & an expanded GUI it could even be some kind of visual Circle of Fifth where notes & chords are displayed in realtime (not only with colors but additionally with the right terms).

This opens a whole new world of applications!

Well SpiralCM is pretty basic, it only has one knob after all! What I aim to do with Spiral is to make it easier. Stereo pan colouring is part of it, as it helps you distinguish between instruments in a stereo mix which in turn helps you focus on one instrument. To help you focus further you can 'window' a section of the stereo pan, meaning you can obscure what doesn't have the pan of what you want to focus on. You can also record a part of the sound (using a sort of recording button) then play it back slowly/freeze it and take your time fiddling knobs and looking at frequencies to try to figure out what's going on (this is particularly useful when analysing chords).

Of course it will help a lot to be experienced recognising harmonics, for example knowing what the main harmonic 'branches' look like, knowing that if you see two stacks of harmonics that see to be related and that they seem to be either 5 or 7 semitones apart then one (always the same) is unison/octave stack and the other one is the fifth stack, well knowing this helps you a lot when you have two notes played at the same time and it looks like a butterfly (like with a major third) or a thin triangle like with a perfect fourth. I'll make videos explaining all of that when I'll be done with coding and releasing Spiral, but for now all you need to know is that the two most recognisable 'branches'/stacks of harmonics are at 0 and 7 o'clock from the note they represent, then you have the branch at 4 o'clock, then the one that's almost at 10 o'clock but a bit flat (when you see all those four at once it looks a bit like a crooked cross/plus sign, with 4, 7 and 10 o'clock branches seeming to be at about right angles), then there's a whole bunch of closer spaced harmonics which make things more complicated (occurs with instruments that lack low harmonics and are strong in high harmonics like saxophones, clavichords, certain electric guitars etc...) which is why I will implement a cursor controlled overlay that will help you match up the harmonics to find the note.

I will not add automatic note or chord detection as this is bound to suck worse than a newbie's ability to do just that. Pitch detection is like voice recognition or OCR, those things are bound to always be worse than human capabilities, so in Spiral they would be just a waste of time. You can try feeding complex mixes with chords and what not to Melodyne DNA (which I'm mentioning because it probably has the best pitch detection out there, no reason I should be able to make a better one) and it will trip over itself and give you lots of false positive and false negatives. The thing about pitch detection is that until now we were kind of short on convenient ways to analyse notes by eye. Spiral aims to fix this, it aims to be the best way to see what's going on in sound, and probably the best way to know what's that note or what's that chord. And remember that if you have trouble identifying notes in a dense mix, you always have the option of just whistling what you hear into the spiral (although in that case usually I just prefer trying to figure it out on the guitar the old way, unless I'm too puzzled).

By the way it only works as a circle of fifth thing if you mean it this way: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/c ... ar.svg.png it wouldn't work in a CGDEAB kind of way as this couldn't come from a continuous spectrum (no continuity between C and G for instance). But again, the recognisable fixed shape of harmonics makes it simple enough anyway.

[A_SN]

If that's of any interest here's the incomplete interface as it exists now.



There lacks a knob in the lower right corner to change the chromatic circle and turn it into numbers (probably a thing only I care about) and the top row is the one for the recording/freezing/time-stretching, very incomplete. Also there lacks a band in the stereo pan section showing the pan colours gradient with dark lines (something reminiscent of an absorption spectrum) to represent how much of what in the spectrum is where.

[Tricky-Loops]

I think by looking some hours at the psychedelic colors of the visualization no LSD is needed any more...

[A_SN]

I think by looking some hours at the psychedelic colors of the visualization no LSD is needed any more...

A great selling point! "Think of all the LSD money you'll save!"

...but what if you took LSD and stared at this thing at the same time

[Numanoid]

...but what if you took LSD and stared at this thing at the same time

According to this very good BBC documentary, one can under the influence smell colour, so probably wont need to buy cologne

[VariKusBrainZ]

Sweeeeet!

Thats one app that deserves to be called Iris !
Shame Izotope got there first.

I can imagine this going wilder than Melodyn DNA

[Tricky-Loops]

...but what if you took LSD and stared at this thing at the same time

According to this very good BBC documentary, one can under the influence smell colour...

So I could even smell my songs with the Spiral LSD edition?

[softska]

If that's of any interest here's the incomplete interface as it exists now.



There lacks a knob in the lower right corner to change the chromatic circle and turn it into numbers (probably a thing only I care about) and the top row is the one for the recording/freezing/time-stretching, very incomplete. Also there lacks a band in the stereo pan section showing the pan colours gradient with dark lines (something reminiscent of an absorption spectrum) to represent how much of what in the spectrum is where.

Looks lovely, but will you consider an option to rotate the graph (e.g. A at 12o'clock rather than C)?

[bftucker]

Just in time from a Zinio email post:

"As a special reward for being a Zinio fan, here's a $10 Zinio voucher which can be used on any purchase on Zinio.com, including our Back to School top offers below...Your Zinio voucher expires on Sunday 8/25 at 11:59pm PST"

I Used mine for a free copy of the latest Computer Music.

Looking forward to playing with Spiral (I am a Winamp Milkdrop 2 user). Check your spam folders.

[xx JPRacer xx]

no LSD is needed any more...

Sorry but you don't know what you're talking about! LSD will always be needed! It' something tha..... Oh, sorry I must go, my pink elephant friend is waiting for me!

[Panphobia]

ETA for the full version ?

Also, any chance of some sort of built in midi visualization as well? I am a sucker for midi vis stuff. There are a couple of spiral midi vis out there already, but one more will always be nice. Especially something coded to work with a modern OS.