Doepfer

Hello
I need your help for increasing in interesting ways the functionality and possibilities of my doepfer vocoder.
I'm not very deep in knowledge of doepfer modules because my interest is focalized in to the analog vocoders.
In my Eurorack I just have:
A-129\1
A-129\2
A-129\3
A-129\3
A-129\3
A-129\4
A-129\5
A-119
Some holes are in the rack and them want to be filled!
The carrier signals will came ever from external sources, so I'm not interested in VCO modules and complementar.
Can you help me to find interesting combinations for increasing the vocoder function?
For example:
other two A-129\4 could be required for completing the slew limiter controlling, but it seems to me not a big upgrade, another A-119 sometimes had to be usefull for having one for carrier and one for formant, but I usually use an external mic amp....
Also the matrix module (3 of them will be required! if I'm not wrong) was a possibility for an easier controll of the band filters but it will not gain or ampliate the "sounds" possibilities of the vocoder.
What's about a divider? Will be it usefull in the vocoder?
Or what's about the A-128 filterbank? Or a filter?
Please give me your suggestion, for gain the flexibility of the vocoder and implement its functions, also in experimental and original way.
What do you suggest? 
Many thanks to all in advance for your reply!
Best regards.

Hi!

The great thing about the Doepfer vocoder is that the individual analysis bands 
are so easily accessible. So why not add some VCA's and LFO's and modulate some 
of the analysis bands? Or go wild, get 16 VCA's and LFO's and do it to them all!

Get a multiple and split one of the analysis bands into several synthesis 
inputs; conversely combine several bands into one with a mixer. Inverters are 
nice, so is a joystick to control some aspects.

Grab a ringmodulator or some wavefolder and do unspeakable things to one of the 
helpless analysis bands.

You said that you have no need for an oscillator but the voiced / unvoiced 
detector needs some noise inputs as well (can be external too, of course).

As for filters, a vocoder is basically a filterbank on steroids so I'm not sure 
how much mileage you'd get out of a dedicated unit. Otherwise, filters are 
great, can't have enough of them.

Have fun!

York




________________________________

From: ggtonet <cromocaone@gmail.com>
To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 2:16:15
Subject: [Doepfer_a100] Modules for increasing VOCODER functions

  
Hello
I need your help for increasing in interesting ways the functionality and 
possibilities of my doepfer vocoder.
I'm not very deep in knowledge of doepfer modules because my interest is 
focalized in to the analog vocoders.
In my Eurorack I just have:
A-129\1
A-129\2
A-129\3
A-129\3
A-129\3
A-129\4
A-129\5
A-119
Some holes are in the rack and them want to be filled!
The carrier signals will came ever from external sources, so I'm not interested 
in VCO modules and complementar.
Can you help me to find interesting combinations for increasing the vocoder 
function?
For example:
other two A-129\4 could be required for completing the slew limiter controlling, 
but it seems to me not a big upgrade, another A-119 sometimes had to be usefull 
for having one for carrier and one for formant, but I usually use an external 
mic amp....
Also the matrix module (3 of them will be required! if I'm not wrong) was a 
possibility for an easier controll of the band filters but it will not gain or 
ampliate the "sounds" possibilities of the vocoder.
What's about a divider? Will be it usefull in the vocoder?
Or what's about the A-128 filterbank? Or a filter?
Please give me your suggestion, for gain the flexibility of the vocoder and 
implement its functions, also in experimental and original way.
What do you suggest? 
Many thanks to all in advance for your reply!
Best regards.


 



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

York is right.

as the analysis module (A129/1) sends cv's to the cv inputs of the synthesis module(A129/2), you can basically use whatever dc-coupled module you can think of, to mangle the cv's coming from the analysis module.

for example, you can even use a Doepfer A187-1 vc-DSP (which is dc-coupled), to manipulate the cv's coming from the A129/1 !


Bakis Sirros - Parallel Worlds / Interconnected / Memory Geist

[Doepfer_a100] group owner

www. parallel - worlds - music. com

www. myspace. com/ parallelworldsmusic

www. myspace. com/ interconnectedmusic

www. myspace. com/ memorygeist

www. DiN. org. uk

www. musicamaximamagnetica. com

www. vu-us. com

--- On Sun, 8/22/10, york luethje <ybl@yahoo.com> wrote:

From: york luethje <ybl@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: [Doepfer_a100] Modules for increasing VOCODER functions
To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com
Date: Sunday, August 22, 2010, 10:28 AM







 



  


    
      
      
      Hi!



The great thing about the Doepfer vocoder is that the individual analysis bands 

are so easily accessible. So why not add some VCA's and LFO's and modulate some 

of the analysis bands? Or go wild, get 16 VCA's and LFO's and do it to them all!



Get a multiple and split one of the analysis bands into several synthesis 

inputs; conversely combine several bands into one with a mixer. Inverters are 

nice, so is a joystick to control some aspects.



Grab a ringmodulator or some wavefolder and do unspeakable things to one of the 

helpless analysis bands.



You said that you have no need for an oscillator but the voiced / unvoiced 

detector needs some noise inputs as well (can be external too, of course).



As for filters, a vocoder is basically a filterbank on steroids so I'm not sure 

how much mileage you'd get out of a dedicated unit. Otherwise, filters are 

great, can't have enough of them.



Have fun!



York



________________________________

From: ggtonet <cromocaone@gmail.com>

To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Sunday, August 22, 2010 2:16:15

Subject: [Doepfer_a100] Modules for increasing VOCODER functions



Hello

I need your help for increasing in interesting ways the functionality and 

possibilities of my doepfer vocoder.

I'm not very deep in knowledge of doepfer modules because my interest is 

focalized in to the analog vocoders.

In my Eurorack I just have:

A-129\1

A-129\2

A-129\3

A-129\3

A-129\3

A-129\4

A-129\5

A-119

Some holes are in the rack and them want to be filled!

The carrier signals will came ever from external sources, so I'm not interested 

in VCO modules and complementar.

Can you help me to find interesting combinations for increasing the vocoder 

function?

For example:

other two A-129\4 could be required for completing the slew limiter controlling, 

but it seems to me not a big upgrade, another A-119 sometimes had to be usefull 

for having one for carrier and one for formant, but I usually use an external 

mic amp....

Also the matrix module (3 of them will be required! if I'm not wrong) was a 

possibility for an easier controll of the band filters but it will not gain or 

ampliate the "sounds" possibilities of the vocoder.

What's about a divider? Will be it usefull in the vocoder?

Or what's about the A-128 filterbank? Or a filter?

Please give me your suggestion, for gain the flexibility of the vocoder and 

implement its functions, also in experimental and original way.

What do you suggest? 

Many thanks to all in advance for your reply!

Best regards.



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]





    
     

    
    


 



  






      

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

some vocoders have a nice feature called "pause stuffing".
it can easily be replicated by patching three additional
modules like this:

http://www.selfoscillate.de/forumfiles/pausestuffing.jpg

best wishes

ingo


--- In Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com, "ggtonet" <cromocaone@...> wrote:

>
> Hello
> I need your help for increasing in interesting ways the functionality and possibilities of my doepfer vocoder.
> I'm not very deep in knowledge of doepfer modules because my interest is focalized in to the analog vocoders.
> In my Eurorack I just have:
> A-129\1
> A-129\2
> A-129\3
> A-129\3
> A-129\3
> A-129\4
> A-129\5
> A-119
> Some holes are in the rack and them want to be filled!
> The carrier signals will came ever from external sources, so I'm not interested in VCO modules and complementar.
> Can you help me to find interesting combinations for increasing the vocoder function?
> For example:
> other two A-129\4 could be required for completing the slew limiter controlling, but it seems to me not a big upgrade, another A-119 sometimes had to be usefull for having one for carrier and one for formant, but I usually use an external mic amp....
> Also the matrix module (3 of them will be required! if I'm not wrong) was a possibility for an easier controll of the band filters but it will not gain or ampliate the "sounds" possibilities of the vocoder.
> What's about a divider? Will be it usefull in the vocoder?
> Or what's about the A-128 filterbank? Or a filter?
> Please give me your suggestion, for gain the flexibility of the vocoder and implement its functions, also in experimental and original way.
> What do you suggest? 
> Many thanks to all in advance for your reply!
> Best regards.
>

nice idea! thanks Ingo!


Bakis Sirros - Parallel Worlds / Interconnected / Memory Geist

[Doepfer_a100] group owner

www. parallel - worlds - music. com

www. myspace. com/ parallelworldsmusic

www. myspace. com/ interconnectedmusic

www. myspace. com/ memorygeist

www. DiN. org. uk

www. musicamaximamagnetica. com

www. vu-us. com

--- On Sun, 8/22/10, selfoscillate <synaptic_music@yahoo.com> wrote:

From: selfoscillate <synaptic_music@yahoo.com>
Subject: [Doepfer_a100] Re: Modules for increasing VOCODER functions
To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com
Date: Sunday, August 22, 2010, 4:17 PM







 



  


    
      
      
      

some vocoders have a nice feature called "pause stuffing".

it can easily be replicated by patching three additional

modules like this:



http://www.selfoscillate.de/forumfiles/pausestuffing.jpg



best wishes



ingo



--- In Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com, "ggtonet" <cromocaone@...> wrote:

>

> Hello

> I need your help for increasing in interesting ways the functionality and possibilities of my doepfer vocoder.

> I'm not very deep in knowledge of doepfer modules because my interest is focalized in to the analog vocoders.

> In my Eurorack I just have:

> A-129\1

> A-129\2

> A-129\3

> A-129\3

> A-129\3

> A-129\4

> A-129\5

> A-119

> Some holes are in the rack and them want to be filled!

> The carrier signals will came ever from external sources, so I'm not interested in VCO modules and complementar.

> Can you help me to find interesting combinations for increasing the vocoder function?

> For example:

> other two A-129\4 could be required for completing the slew limiter controlling, but it seems to me not a big upgrade, another A-119 sometimes had to be usefull for having one for carrier and one for formant, but I usually use an external mic amp....

> Also the matrix module (3 of them will be required! if I'm not wrong) was a possibility for an easier controll of the band filters but it will not gain or ampliate the "sounds" possibilities of the vocoder.

> What's about a divider? Will be it usefull in the vocoder?

> Or what's about the A-128 filterbank? Or a filter?

> Please give me your suggestion, for gain the flexibility of the vocoder and implement its functions, also in experimental and original way.

> What do you suggest? 

> Many thanks to all in advance for your reply!

> Best regards.

>





    
     

    
    


 



  






      

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hi Ingo

selfoscillate schrieb:
> some vocoders have a nice feature called "pause stuffing".
> http://www.selfoscillate.de/forumfiles/pausestuffing.jpg
If I understand it right, it provides some amount of the carrier signal 
to the modulator chain. This carrier2modulator signal is compressed by 
the incoming modulator signal (e.g. voice in the standard usage).

What I do not understand: this "pause signal" will be assumingly a very 
wobbly sound, because the changes of overtone will be exponentiated bye 
the self vocoding. Does it really sound good?


And @ggtonet:

Additionally to the other recommendations I'd like to add:

You should have compressors for the Vocoder. At least one. You can use 
an external compressor or a combination of A175 Inverter and A130 linear 
VCA as used in Ingos example.

Then I suggest a second A119 Ext-In, to reassure, that your carrier 
signal is at a correct level. Typical studio line signals have lower 
level than the internal signals of the A100. If you don't adopt the 
signal level, you will have a bad signal to noise ratio.

Also I recommend a high pass filter. There are at least two usages for it:
1.) Mix a little bit of the high frequencies of the original modulator 
signal to the output. This increases the understandability of vocoded 
speech extremely (I have made the well know example for the A129 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLRgjzEjFkM with this trick).
2.) taking away a littlebit of the bottom end of the modulator input 
signal before the (recommended) compressor increases the overall "power" 
of the final signal.

Florian

hi Florian,

for the Florian Schneider electronic poem, you have used the A129 vocoder, right?

you have indeed achieved very clear results.

best regards,
Bakis.



Bakis Sirros - Parallel Worlds / Interconnected / Memory Geist

[Doepfer_a100] group owner

www. parallel - worlds - music. com

www. myspace. com/ parallelworldsmusic

www. myspace. com/ interconnectedmusic

www. myspace. com/ memorygeist

www. DiN. org. uk

www. musicamaximamagnetica. com

www. vu-us. com

--- On Mon, 8/23/10, Florian Anwander <fanwander@mnet-online.de> wrote:

From: Florian Anwander <fanwander@mnet-online.de>
Subject: Re: [Doepfer_a100] Re: Modules for increasing VOCODER functions
To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com
Date: Monday, August 23, 2010, 5:54 PM







 



  


    
      
      
      Hi Ingo



selfoscillate schrieb:

> some vocoders have a nice feature called "pause stuffing".

> http://www.selfoscillate.de/forumfiles/pausestuffing.jpg

If I understand it right, it provides some amount of the carrier signal 

to the modulator chain. This carrier2modulator signal is compressed by 

the incoming modulator signal (e.g. voice in the standard usage).



What I do not understand: this "pause signal" will be assumingly a very 

wobbly sound, because the changes of overtone will be exponentiated bye 

the self vocoding. Does it really sound good?



And @ggtonet:



Additionally to the other recommendations I'd like to add:



You should have compressors for the Vocoder. At least one. You can use 

an external compressor or a combination of A175 Inverter and A130 linear 

VCA as used in Ingos example.



Then I suggest a second A119 Ext-In, to reassure, that your carrier 

signal is at a correct level. Typical studio line signals have lower 

level than the internal signals of the A100. If you don't adopt the 

signal level, you will have a bad signal to noise ratio.



Also I recommend a high pass filter. There are at least two usages for it:

1.) Mix a little bit of the high frequencies of the original modulator 

signal to the output. This increases the understandability of vocoded 

speech extremely (I have made the well know example for the A129 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pLRgjzEjFkM with this trick).

2.) taking away a littlebit of the bottom end of the modulator input 

signal before the (recommended) compressor increases the overall "power" 

of the final signal.



Florian



    
     

    
    


 



  






      

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

--- In Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com, Florian Anwander <fanwander@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Ingo
> 
> selfoscillate schrieb:
> > some vocoders have a nice feature called "pause stuffing".
> > http://www.selfoscillate.de/forumfiles/pausestuffing.jpg
> If I understand it right, it provides some amount of the carrier signal 
> to the modulator chain. This carrier2modulator signal is compressed by 
> the incoming modulator signal (e.g. voice in the standard usage).
> 
> What I do not understand: this "pause signal" will be assumingly a very 
> wobbly sound, because the changes of overtone will be exponentiated bye 
> the self vocoding. Does it really sound good?


hello florian,

it can sound really good, but not with all signals.
i like to use the pause stuffing with pad sounds as
carrier and another synth sound as modulator.
the pad sound is sustained even without the presence
of the modulator, and changes dynamically when the
modulator starts playing. not the standard use, but fun :)

as always with vocoders, the result is heavily dependent
on the used signals. of course the self vocoding will
change the overtones of the modulator at the output,
but from my understanding that is intentional.
this way the vocoder will provide a vocoded sounding
signal even when the modulator is silent.
some time ago i used an electro-harmonix vocoder which
offered pause stuffing. i don't know if ems uses a
different term or method, but on the electro-harmonix
it worked that way. i think it also had a compressor
built-in to tame the wobbliness. of course my patch is
only the "simple" version. i didn't want to make things too
complicated, so i kept it as simple as possible, only
to show the working principle. it can be improved with an
additional compressor patch, but i found that this is not
always necessary, as long as you use synth sounds only.
with a human voice this is of course a different story.
a human voice really needs compression to give good results.

best wishes

ingo

> I don't really understand what's the auto pause stuffing, theorically I have
> an idea but I don't have one about how it should be sound.....


if your goal is voice processing only then the
pause stuffing patch is probably not very useful.
as florian posted, the most important thing for
voice processing is the proper condition of the
voice signal.

best wishes

ingo

Hi Bakis

> for the Florian Schneider electronic poem, you have used the A129 vocoder, right?
> you have indeed achieved very clear results.
Yes, it is the A129/1 and 2. The carrier source was my Roland JX-3P. I 
spoke in a Sure SM58 through my Yamaha console; and recorded it to an 
Fostex 280 cassette tape (or maybe I already had an ADAT). The playback 
signal was split then into a direct signal and a side chain signal. The 
direct path went in one channel of a Yamaha CL2020 compressor, then in 
the EQ of my mixer, where the higher frequencies were increased, and low 
frequencies dropped. Then from direct out of the desk again in the other 
channel of the compressor. The output of the compressor was fed into an 
ashley noise gate. The side chain signal I mentioned before was fed into 
the sidechain of the noise gate. The output of this signal then was fed 
into the A119.

Then again the signal was split:
One path direct into the modulator input of the A129.
The other path into the A122 Highpass.
The output of the Vocoder and the output of the A122 went into a A138 
Mixer and from there they were recorded to DAT.

The A122 is set at avery high frequency, so that it sounds like a whisper.

A you can see, if I do vocoder sound, then a lot of effort goes into the 
quality of the microphone signal.

Florian

Thank you all for your suggestion
really nice hint here!

I'm convinced about a second A-119, one for carrier and one for formant.
Also the high pass filter is a nice idea but if I had not bad understood the
voice through the filter will be directly to the output and not in the
A-129\2 mixed with the usual formant.... and about compressors I'm using
just one external compressor for the voice. Do a second compressor will be
usefull for the carrier in your experience?
Increasing the understandability of vocoded speech is one of my global
purpose.
I don't really understand what's the auto pause stuffing, theorically I have
an idea but I don't have one about how it should be sound.....
Here you can listen some of my vocoders (but it was not made with doepfer, I
had not it at that time):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyAzVod64YY


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

indeed.
many thanks for the detailed info!


Bakis Sirros - Parallel Worlds / Interconnected / Memory Geist

[Doepfer_a100] group owner

www. parallel - worlds - music. com

www. myspace. com/ parallelworldsmusic

www. myspace. com/ interconnectedmusic

www. myspace. com/ memorygeist

www. DiN. org. uk

www. musicamaximamagnetica. com

www. vu-us. com

--- On Mon, 8/23/10, Florian Anwander <fanwander@mnet-online.de> wrote:

From: Florian Anwander <fanwander@mnet-online.de>
Subject: Re: [Doepfer_a100] Re: Modules for increasing VOCODER functions
To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com
Date: Monday, August 23, 2010, 10:49 PM







 



  


    
      
      
      Hi Bakis



> for the Florian Schneider electronic poem, you have used the A129 vocoder, right?

> you have indeed achieved very clear results.

Yes, it is the A129/1 and 2. The carrier source was my Roland JX-3P. I 

spoke in a Sure SM58 through my Yamaha console; and recorded it to an 

Fostex 280 cassette tape (or maybe I already had an ADAT). The playback 

signal was split then into a direct signal and a side chain signal. The 

direct path went in one channel of a Yamaha CL2020 compressor, then in 

the EQ of my mixer, where the higher frequencies were increased, and low 

frequencies dropped. Then from direct out of the desk again in the other 

channel of the compressor. The output of the compressor was fed into an 

ashley noise gate. The side chain signal I mentioned before was fed into 

the sidechain of the noise gate. The output of this signal then was fed 

into the A119.



Then again the signal was split:

One path direct into the modulator input of the A129.

The other path into the A122 Highpass.

The output of the Vocoder and the output of the A122 went into a A138 

Mixer and from there they were recorded to DAT.



The A122 is set at avery high frequency, so that it sounds like a whisper.



A you can see, if I do vocoder sound, then a lot of effort goes into the 

quality of the microphone signal.



Florian



    
     

    
    


 



  






      

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

second A119 for an external (not from A100 vco's) carrier would be, of course, needed.

also, yes, the high-pass filtered signal (from the modulator/voice) would go directly to the final output, mixed with the vocoder output.

compression would be useful for your modulator voice input mostly.

not very useful for the carrier signal, unless your carrier signal is quite wobbly and with many peaks...


Bakis Sirros - Parallel Worlds / Interconnected / Memory Geist

[Doepfer_a100] group owner

www. parallel - worlds - music. com

www. myspace. com/ parallelworldsmusic

www. myspace. com/ interconnectedmusic

www. myspace. com/ memorygeist

www. DiN. org. uk

www. musicamaximamagnetica. com

www. vu-us. com

--- On Mon, 8/23/10, Mort Cinder <cromocaone@gmail.com> wrote:

From: Mort Cinder <cromocaone@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [Doepfer_a100] Re: Modules for increasing VOCODER functions
To: Doepfer_a100@yahoogroups.com
Date: Monday, August 23, 2010, 11:15 PM







 



  


    
      
      
      Thank you all for your suggestion

really nice hint here!



I'm convinced about a second A-119, one for carrier and one for formant.

Also the high pass filter is a nice idea but if I had not bad understood the

voice through the filter will be directly to the output and not in the

A-129\2 mixed with the usual formant.... and about compressors I'm using

just one external compressor for the voice. Do a second compressor will be

usefull for the carrier in your experience?

Increasing the understandability of vocoded speech is one of my global

purpose.

I don't really understand what's the auto pause stuffing, theorically I have

an idea but I don't have one about how it should be sound.....

Here you can listen some of my vocoders (but it was not made with doepfer, I

had not it at that time):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyAzVod64YY



[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]





    
     

    
    


 



  






      

[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]

Hi Mort


 > just one external compressor for the voice. Do a second compressor
 > will be usefull for the carrier in your experience?
A compressor for the carrier is recommended in the case, that the
carrier is not a signal with continous level. Examples: a strings or 
organ sound is continous, it does not need compression. A sequence of 
strummed guitar chords has many different levels and compression is 
recommended.

 > Increasing the understandability of vocoded speech is one of my global
 > purpose.
I recommend NOT to use very modulated or chorus'ed sounds as carrier. To 
My experience a single VCO sound with a Pulswave of 75% Pulswidth but no 
PWM is perfect. If you want to have chorus like effects, then put the 
chorus effect only on the voiced part of the signal, but not on the 
unvoiced part. The easiest way to achieve this will be again the 
highpasss filter, that should be mixed with the vocoder sound after the 
chorus.


Florian

Thanks Florian for sharing your knowledge.
I thought that maybe buyng the HP filter only for the use you mentioned in
the vocoder is a little wasted....(?). If I just have one in the doepfer
synth architecture I can use it also for the vocoder in the way you
explained: do you think it will worth the purchase only for this use?
I can also use the high pass output inside the A-129\1 for this purpose or a
sampled HPfiltered version of the formant..... in the first case I lost the
modulation of the filter but I think it is in a little range, in the second
case I just have to sinchronizing two recorded audio....
But I don't know if the result is the same you have in mind. I tried one
time the HP output of the A-129\1 but I was experimenting really a lot at
that time for have a right perception of the result! I'll try soon
again.....
My best regards.

2010/8/24 Florian Anwander <fanwander@mnet-online.de>

>
>
> Hi Mort
>
>
> > just one external compressor for the voice. Do a second compressor
> > will be usefull for the carrier in your experience?
> A compressor for the carrier is recommended in the case, that the
> carrier is not a signal with continous level. Examples: a strings or
> organ sound is continous, it does not need compression. A sequence of
> strummed guitar chords has many different levels and compression is
> recommended.
>
>
> > Increasing the understandability of vocoded speech is one of my global
> > purpose.
> I recommend NOT to use very modulated or chorus'ed sounds as carrier. To
> My experience a single VCO sound with a Pulswave of 75% Pulswidth but no
> PWM is perfect. If you want to have chorus like effects, then put the
> chorus effect only on the voiced part of the signal, but not on the
> unvoiced part. The easiest way to achieve this will be again the
> highpasss filter, that should be mixed with the vocoder sound after the
> chorus.
>
> Florian
>  
>


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]