One Synth Challenge #133: Cheeze Machine 2 by 2getheraudio (z.prime Wins!)

[zarf]

... wondering the usual 'is it in the spirit of OSC to use this' question

AB-SO-LUTELY! OSC is all about pushing a synth to it's bounds! If a synth can make that sound, it's fair game!

You sure about that?
OK - fair enough - I'll go with that then, cheers

[RuediRena]

Cheeze Machine 2! What a tempting one that is. So we are back in the game after quite a long time.

Here is our first approximation:

https://soundcloud.com/ruedirena/stahl1 ... n-progress

Wonder where this will end.

[tomx2188]

Aaaah, this synth is an interesting one.
The pro preview thing had me confused as well, thanks for pointing out how to see that

I tried some things with that in mind, turns out even the presets that aren't marked as pro preview seem to have some hidden parameters. Turning all available knobs etc to the same positions yields different results depending on what preset I start out with

[Carl_saved]

Quite unusual for a synth to depend on what preset one starts with. Looks like from our perspective, choosing preset = sound design choice (with the main drawback that upon preset choice, all other parameters are lost )

[empphryio]

Good to know! I was wondering...

[exponent1]

Does this thing have a manual somewhere? I searched but didn't find one. There are some parameters that I don't understand how exactly they work such as MP, Shape and Touch etc. Also, what is the MW assigned to? Filter env. amount?

If someone has any insights, please do share!

[Taron]

Stupid naming for sure...
"Touch" seems to be Velocity influence.
"MP" seems to be Aftertouch influence. 100% means that aftertouch controls modulation. 0% means it modulates by itself.
Shape seems to depend on the preset, like whatever waveform set the pro designer has assigned to the Shape value.

But that goes for all these dials, I think. Check through the presets and play with the dials and you will see.
Again:
- Touch is Velocity influence. Try it!
- MP is Aftertouch. If your keyboard has aftertouch, you can try it per preset!
- Shape is waveform transformation, likely by pro design and nothing you can "know". Try it!

All assignments have the same dilemma. You can't know it unless you have the pro version or the patience to try it per preset.

[ELEX]

Ah, yes, this working from presets thing is decidedly suboptimal. Feels like I'm browsing presets and turning down knobs half the time. Btw, a bit of googling revealed that the lady behind 2getheraudio also founded SONiVOX, who also apply this principle. Helps in selling expansion packs, I suppose.

Now then, the main reason for posting, concerning usage in REAPER.

I'm experiencing the following phenomenon:
- After turning a knob, the buttons in REAPER's FX-window ( +, param, etc ) freeze.
- Closing and reopening the FX window unfreezes them.
- Folding out the reaper-preset list ( more conveniently ) also unfreezes them, but only temporarily.
- Because closing one of those menus then freezes them again.
- Until the reaper-preset list is unfolded again... etc.
Really strange thing.

[RuediRena]

For example, if you go to 'Rupert Overtone Pad' - the last one in the Pads category, 2 things happen: 1) You get a sound that is very different to anything you can normally create (in this case, resonance for a start) and the UI changes slightly - in the middle at the top where there is the 'Cheeze Machine 2' logo, some extra text apprears on the right that says 'Pro Preview'.

I'll try to shed some light on this.
First go to the Cheeze Machine Pro site. Scroll down to where you get some kind of visual manual page - and you see that indeed in this version the filter is changed to 4-pole low pass including resonance and drive controls.
Now how to access these under the hood of CM2? Here is how:

Select Rupert Overtone Pad from the preset menu.
Then change its name to whatever you like (let's say 'mytestpatch') by right clicking its name in the patch display. This will create a new patch in your user preset folder that sound identical to the original.
Now left click into the patch display. Choose user presets > show user presets folder. There you open mytestpatch.qbqp in your favourite editor.
Then search for the following code:

Code: Select all

"instanceName":"4-pole multi",
				"isSealed":false,
				"parameters":[1.00000000,0.00000000,0.00000000,1.00000000,0.00000000,0.60000002,0.90000004,0.25000000],

The second parameter from the right (0.90000004) is resonance and you can change its value to see what happens. I suppose 1.0000000 is the maximum.
You can also paste the whole missing block of code (more than the above) into the gap of some other patch and get editing access to the pro filter. Just do a comparison between patches as I did. Likewise with everything else if you are not afraid to guess and do some trial and error.

HTH
Ruedi

[ELEX]

@RudiRena

Thanks for the above. I would never have thought of that.

[doctorbob]

yep Rudi, just what I have been looking at … getting a bit of extra/different resonance can certainly help.

I see a "Random" parameter lurking in there too … wonder what that does ????

dB

[RuediRena]

I see a "Random" parameter lurking in there too … wonder what that does ????

By looking at the CM Pro gui I suppose it might be one of the random phase switches of the DCOs top left. I was also wondering but didn't experiment yet.

And by the way, did you notice the noise control in the mixer section?

[doctorbob]

Didn't see the noise control … which "pro" preset features this??? Maybe we can get into that and make some noise for percussive fx/instruments …

Nice to see you back in the frame again

dB

[IV!]

However, this takes an interesting turn! We don 't use the Pro version, but we edit its parameters from the outside And most importantly, in this case, it is difficult to determine whether this violates the rules of using the synthesizer, since it itself contains a dual meaning like a Trojan horse.

[zarf]

Yeah, it's an unusual one. For me, if we are diving into the guts of it to gain access to 'pro' features, makes me wonder why we didn't just use the pro version in the first place like z' suggested

Don't get me wrong - I've go no issue with what you folks are exploring, it's interesting and creative (Just a bit too time consuming for me at the moment)