The polyphonic portamento chalenge

[jprykiel]

I would try to do that with that buffer idea in PlugData if a MPE controller to play it isn’t an option…

I just googled for PlugData, but I'm afraid it's beyond my skills, plus I'm visually impaired and I don't believe I could use it on my own.
If someone is willing to help, please contact me in private.
Thanks in advance,

[jprykiel]

Hi all.
Divisimate combined with 8 instances of a monophonic synth made my dream come true. It's a fabulous piece of software and I encourage everyone to try it.
https://www.divisimate.com/

Now, the only thing I'm missing is a synthesizer that would have more choices in portamento modes. All the ones I know have rate and time. Rate means that the speed will be constant no matter the distance between notes, and time means speed is proportional to the distance. I would like to have something in between which would be more musical.
Also, synths like Surge XT have 3 portamento curves, log, linear and exponential. Are there any synths that has more?
Thanks for your advice,
Cheers,

[EvilDragon]

What would be in between constant rate and constant time? There's no other way to calculate how to arrive at the destination pitch, to my knowledge... It is what it is.

[Urs]

nvmd

[EvilDragon]

[Urs]

But to answer the question, one could easily crossfade between "rate it takes to reach a semitone in a certain time" and "rate it takes to reach an arbitrary interval in a certain time". You'd just need to set a reference interval for constant rate, and determine how long this takes to get to the current interval, and crossfade that rate to whatever you want. You could even make portamento shorter for larger intervals, if that made any sense, musically...

[jprykiel]

What would be in between constant rate and constant time?

I don't know how it is technically doable, but let me try to explain this is a sensation:
in constant time, if you set the right glide time for an Octave, sliding between 2 notes one tone apart will sound too short, and almost unnoticeable.
And in constant rate, if you set the right glide time for an Octave, sliding between two notes a tone apart will sound too slow, and will have this kind of
wailing effect.
the Yamaha DX7 had an answer to this question. I don't know how they did it but it was incredibly musical. Unfortunately, it's virtual emulations, while very good at reproducing FM synthesis, has overlooked this particular characteristic. But it sounds to me like the musical truth is in between these 2, no matter how it can be done.

[jprykiel]

nvmd

Sorry, what did you mean?

[jprykiel]

But to answer the question, one could easily crossfade between "rate it takes to reach a semitone in a certain time" and "rate it takes to reach an arbitrary interval in a certain time". You'd just need to set a reference interval for constant rate, and determine how long this takes to get to the current interval, and crossfade that rate to whatever you want. You could even make portamento shorter for larger intervals, if that made any sense, musically...

I think you're right. Though as I was saying, the Yamaha DX7 arbitrary setting was an absolute dream for me, but it can always be better. That's why I think a slider between constant time and constant rate would be the easiest way a user could deal with this, as well as a slider between log linear and exponential curves. It is something a violinist or a vocalist does naturally of course, and a synthesizer player can do it to, with an instrument like the continuum or the seaboard. But with a normal keyboard, the system has to find a compromise which is not easy.

[Urs]

nvmd

Sorry, what did you mean?

Sorry, I misread EvilDragon's question in the post before and wrote something unrelated. When I realised my mistake, I quasi-deleted my post by using "nvmd" as shortcut for "nevermind".

[EvilDragon]

Plogue OPS7 most definitely reproduces the DX7 portamento perfectly. It might be constant time, but I don't recall exactly. However, OPS7 is a bit perfect reproduction and does it exactly like hardware does.

Sounds to me like you want to adjust the glide time depending on interval size. At that point just gliding each note yourself on an MPE device sounds like the best way to go.

[jprykiel]

Shall try OPS7.
I knew about FM8, DX7V by Arturia, and another freebie I forgot the name of, but not this 1.
Still, hope someone implements what I suggested one day.