u-he

hakey · Post by **hakey** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 8:53 am

Is there any way we can have the point at which the amp envelope release cuts to zero pushed back a little?

On an analogue synth the fade to silence (or noise floor) is imperceptible - with Diva the sudden drop off can be rather obvious, particularly with longer release times.

(I hate to mention it, but lowly Synth1 manages the imperceptible fade to silence thing, so it really shouldn't be beyond Diva.)

Sendy · Post by **Sendy** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 5:33 pm

Raise your noise floor.

hakey · Post by **hakey** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 5:35 pm

An illustration:

Rather than fading out, as Synth1 does, there's a sudden increase in the rate of attenuation for Diva at about the -50dB mark. Up until that point the rates for both are closely matched.

Urs · Post by **Urs** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 5:36 pm

It should be at -108 dB IIRC and thus inaudible... can you send a preset where we can reproduce a click or anything?

- Urs

Urs · Post by **Urs** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 5:41 pm

Ah... I think what you experience is "snappy envelopes". The envelopes are not fading exponentially towards zero, but towards something a bit below zero. This creates a faster-than-exponential curve.

I would assume that this is done so that there's less chance for a bleed through in analogue VCAs. it's like making really sure that a released note turns off at some point.

hakey · Post by **hakey** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 5:45 pm

Sendy wrote:Raise your noise floor.

Would require a higher noise floor than one would expect from even the ropiest analogue synth.

hakey · Post by **hakey** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 5:54 pm

Urs wrote:Ah... I think what you experience is "snappy envelopes". The envelopes are not fading exponentially towards zero, but towards something a bit below zero. This creates a faster-than-exponential curve.

I would assume that this is done so that there's less chance for a bleed through in analogue VCAs. it's like making really sure that a released note turns off at some point.

Ah, okay. If it's replicating true life behaviour, obviously I haven't got a leg to stand on. I retract my complaint.

Would be nice to have an unsnappy slow fade version, though. I've heard analogue audio examples where the fade out is imperceptible (it was trying to replicate one that made me aware of it).

Sendy · Post by **Sendy** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 7:18 pm

It doesn't sound that bad to me. I set the release to 75%, played a note on the default saw patch and turned up my monitor volume as the note decayed, and at the end there was something of a 'hasty' end fade but it didn't snap shut like a gate and it happened at a very low level.

Perhaps some options to tweak the envelopes might be possible to program?

Speaking of which, I'd LOVE it if the quantize option on the digital envelope wasn't a switch but a knob or slider, so you could choose how much the envelope was quantized. Quantized envelopes can create some really cool "synthy" artificial effects.

hakey · Post by **hakey** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 7:37 pm

Sendy wrote:It doesn't sound that bad to me.

It's not a 'bad' sound. It's more a sound or behaviour that isn't possible. I dare say it matters very little - doesn't seem to have been noticed by anyone else.

spacecult · Post by **spacecult** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 9:59 pm

Sendy wrote:It doesn't sound that bad to me. I set the release to 75%, played a note on the default saw patch and turned up my monitor volume as the note decayed, and at the end there was something of a 'hasty' end fade but it didn't snap shut like a gate and it happened at a very low level.

Perhaps some options to tweak the envelopes might be possible to program?

Speaking of which, I'd LOVE it if the quantize option on the digital envelope wasn't a switch but a knob or slider, so you could choose how much the envelope was quantized. Quantized envelopes can create some really cool "synthy" artificial effects.

By how much i'm not sure if you mean how many values available (how much it is quantized) vs. how steppy the signal is between values.

You could use the mod panel instead (or also) to quantize the env. Then you can adjust how the envelope is quantized (from, i'm assuming, two values up to enough to not be noticeable?).

If you wanted you could also try to then lag the quantize to smooth out the steps/glide between values in varying amounts, but this would act to warp the envelope signal itself also and the envelope warping effect would get pretty heavy after a certain point. Still, should sound interesting anyway.

Maybe someone else could think of a better routing?

Anyway, using quantize on envelopes or lfos in the mod panel will certainly let you take diva's sound back to more rudimentary digital signal control as found in williams arcade machines or whatever and etc.

maybe i said that right.

Sendy · Post by **Sendy** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 10:19 pm

Yeah, the quantize module is a fantastic addition and was one of the neat surprises in Diva (most devs would haven't gone this far into experimental modular territory, IMO), it has a sort of plateau around zero, which can disturb the rhythm of an LFO, but luckily envelopes don't pass through zero.

The problem here is if you want a quantized volume envelope, you need to plug the quantize module into the Amp modulation, and I've tried the obvious ways to do this to no avail. It's still cool that you can make quantized pitch/filter envelopes, etc, though. Considering this isn't a chip/digi-synth it just goes to show how versatile Diva is.

Sendy · Post by **Sendy** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 10:22 pm

hakey wrote:
Sendy wrote:It doesn't sound that bad to me.
It's not a 'bad' sound. It's more a sound or behaviour that isn't possible. I dare say it matters very little - doesn't seem to have been noticed by anyone else.

Copy that. I didn't mean "bad" asin it's true meaning, just bad asin an awkward drop off at the end of the envelope like I've heard in some synths (sounds like there's a gate on the outputs).

It certainly sounds like the envelope gets almost to the end and someone comes in and 'hurries it along' for the last portion of the fade. I can't say I'd have noticed it without turning the volume way up, though. (Good job I have my windows sounds disabled, if one of those had gone off at that volume I'd have hit the roof!).

spacecult · Post by **spacecult** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 10:29 pm

Sendy wrote:The problem here is if you want a quantized volume envelope, you need to plug the quantize module into the Amp modulation, and I've tried the obvious ways to do this to no avail.

I thought about mentioning that you couldn't modulate the vca directly that way, but.... you can plug it into the amp modulation on the main page?

right, not working as expected. hmmm....

spacecult · Post by **spacecult** » Sat Sep 21, 2013 10:44 pm

spacecult wrote:
I thought about mentioning that you couldn't modulate the vca directly that way, but.... you can plug it into the amp modulation on the main page?

right, not working as expected. hmmm....

Yeah, looks like you have to turn the volume mod knob down all the way to get full functional range. I guess I assumed up, but down makes more sense. Still slightly disoriented about how this part is working. Not totally grasping the signal flow here...

lfos work fine, and that's what i've always used here, so, umm, unidirectional envelopes thing i'm not gelling with?

(anyway, hope all this stuff will be made more straightforward somehow in the 1.3 arp and/or sequencer, fancy but 'regular guy' style modulation would benefit diva greatly, especially now that it has sort have taken on an ultimate v.a. workhorse mystique).

3ee · Post by **3ee** » Sun Sep 22, 2013 1:04 am

Maybe Urs was going for envelope release VS voice count (in a kind of non perceptible manner) since Diva is kinda hungry on the CPU.

I haven't really noticed a problem with the release but what hakey is describing makes sense... need to investi_gate

u-he

KVR Audio

Dive amp env release? Zebra too.