Part five!

Interactive Sound Environments: Blog part five

I have started to record my own guitar samples for my project via a DI box, I will have possibly 5 - 6 velocity levels for each sound, I will be recording at the moment all the strings by basic plectrum picking. 

The reason I am choosing this way of getting samples is because I want to only get the original sound of the guitar and not the sound of an amp, I want it like this because my project will be mainly only about the natural guitar sound so the users can create music by either playing on a keyboard or drawing in notes of the 'piano roll' option.

After that the users will be able to use my programme with other programmes so they may add their own effects such as distortion, amp cabs ect.

Below are pictures of my set up for recording my samples.

 

I had to make sure all my strings were new and perfectly in tune for recording my samples. Once all my files are up and running I will be creating a item on Max MSP 6 to make it playable on a midi keyboard and create something to make velocity work with it also. Then I will create an option so the user may open this using any software they like to create more sounds with my samples.

Part four!

Interactive Sound Environment: Blog part four

Today I have made my fourth prototype of my virtual guitar, The image below shows my fourth prototype with a working fret board which you can play by click on frets or playing via the keyboard. I did have a loop buttion but I deleted it because I found it very annoying.

I have one problem with this prototype at the moment, where i'm too sure how to get my audio files to be set up automatically without me having to important them every time I reopen the prototype, I would also like create a 'Piano roll' option very similar to the logic pro 9's version so then it will become very easy and useful to use in a studio situation.

Basically if can not play the guitar are you are struggling with a solo, you can know use this and will get clear guitar sound with full options to edit and control the instrument, I will not be creating any effect for my virtual instrument because the device can be used with any music software so you will be able to use your own effect.

I would love to discover how to make my virtual instrument understand sheet music and guitar tabs which will be "AWESOME!", for my next prototype I will be adding pitch harmonics, slides, palm muting, chucker chucker technique, string scratching, hammer ons-offs, whammy bar, finger and plectrum picking, chords, string types, guitar types, pick ups and so on...

I will also be creating an ADSR option so you will be able to manipulate every single guitar sample if you wanted, I may add a recordable option on here maybe or I may leave it for you can record is via another music software, it would help with the CPU usage if I didn't, I will let a few people around with my prototype and see what they think about a recording option. If I have time later on this year I will make a tuning peg option so the user will able to change the tuning of the guitar by dragging a mouse up and down the pegs, I will create soon a tuning option which you can choose in a menu what preset tuning there are to choose from, at the moment the guitar is only in the tuning of 'E'. 

Here is a video clip of my prototype working...