ahhhhh...General Services...
Hi All
--- In
ComputerVoltageSources@yahoogroups.com, "Gary Chang"
<gchang@...> wrote:
>
> Hopefully, if this group succeeds, we may see many encarnations of
> devices that utilize microprocessors in dedicated duties in modules -
> not just programs that utilize generalized interfaces that we need to
> reprogram each time that we go to do something.
Because i'm used to writing software , GP programmability is of vital
importance to me but Gary makes a cogent point here. If a user isn't
going to write (and DEBUG) code, then that serial port is just takin'
up knob space! At a minimum though, somebody in the supply chain will
need a 'station' through which these critters pass to get their
personalities assigned ...
am i a complex envelope ?
an LFO??
a quantizer?
do i slew?
hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
i don't have any ready answers but it opens up a lot of questions
> The sheer beauty of the Triple Morphing Filter is how it tricks you
> into programming it -
Process is a fundamental issue
patchcords limit my compostion/improvisation choices...
just like frets limit my bass playing. They don't preclude vibrato or
glissando ... they force a particular set of characterictics on the
workaround i have to use to achieve these gestures. Then, they impart
a bonus in a delightful click if i learn to whack the string against
them hard,fast and just so with my thumb.....
y'all are clever folks ... you get the idea-
The tension between unfettered imagination and the highly fettered
realm of acoustic physics∗∗∗ is one of the main batteries in the
creative process.
Anyone who's worked with the UBER-DAWs out there can tell you about
the paralyzing peril of option-glut. (or you could just read Stephen
St. Croix's column in "Mix" Magagazine, if you can't afford one of
these perilous systems... )
Quirks, and 'poorly designed' features of instruments inspire artists,
the EMS pegboard, no CV on the minimoog resonance, no delay on the
"A" of the ADSR.... we've all got a favorite foible.
this is the danger of over-engineering, if an instrument does
everything the player will spend all their time DOING everything and
never finish SOMETHING.
this is one reason i don't tweak my stuff to the n'th degree...
n is infinite !
and the unborn souls of 10,000 unfinished ProTools projects cluster on
my shoulders like the chains on Marley's ghost!
In fairness to the engineers, there must be balance, if not for the
brilliant and steady attentions of the folks with slide-rules the
Steinway piano would still be a zither.
But with software things can get out of hand TOO EASILY.
How 'bout a piano that sings with pipes too ... the mighty wurlitzer
bolted on to the back!!!! and a built-in LIGHT SHOW!!!
Gary makes a good point....
General Purpose is not inherently superior to single (and perhaps even
slightly idiosynchratic) purpose.
in fact some of those bugs just might be FEATURES
in the right hands
-doc
(∗∗∗which includes electrons marching around in stately audio
frequency processions)