From gstopp@fibermux.comFri Jun 30 11:46:03 1995 Date: Fri, 30 Jun 95 11:41:59 PST From: gstopp@fibermux.com Cc: analogue@hyperreal.com Subject: Flangers (was Re[2]: Mutron Bi-Phase) Lorne Hammond at ccrelayout wrote: >Try adding just a hint of white or red noise to whatever you are >putting in. It acts like cigareete smoke in a light beam, makes the >shifting very acoustically visible. What a cool analogy! Yes I use this trick, on a flanger that I made. Hey - flanger topic - I got frustrated with all flangers because they just can't totally duplicate tape flanging. I'll explain: Tape flanging (ala Phil Spector) happens when you play the same audio signal on two different machines at the same time, and then lead or lag one playback by speeding up or slowing down the playback speed. The higher the fidelity, the better the flange. This is an effect that Tomita uses a lot - it has the characteristic flanger "sounds like yer in a tube" sound that goes something like this: ...up-up-up-up-up-up-up-up-< silence >-down-down-down-down-down... Commercially available flangers go: ...up-up-up-up-up-up-up-down-down-down-down-down.... which is due to the fact that the silence in a tape flange is the point of total signal cancellation and to do this with a delay-line based flanger (which compares the original undelayed signal to an inverted delayed version of the original) you would have to have the delay line go to zero delay which implies infinite clocking rate which is of course impossible so you never get to the total cancellation point. So I made a flanger with two 4096-stage CCD's, one of which is fixed and the other which sweeps around the delay of the first. Works great, makes tape-type flanging noises in REAL TIME. The only problem is adding feedback to emphasize the resonant point to make it REALLY "tubular" - maybe I can get some ideas from you similarly warped designers out there. Currently I feedback the final wet mix out with the signal in and it does increase the emphasis, but as you turn it up more then the fixed delay starts to resonate at a fixed tone, which screws up the tubular sweep effect. BTW using a CD player and an old TEAC R-2-R for experimenting works great - you don't even have to invert one of the sources (anybody know why THIS is?). There are two problems with this method: 1. Getting the damn machines to line up at the same point in the music in the first place is a bitch 2. Making the TEAC slow down by putting your thumb on the flat end of the capstan HURTS! ______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________ Author: Lorne Hammond at ccrelayout Date: 6/30/95 11:03 Try adding just ahint of white or red noise to whatever youare putting in. It acts like cigareete smoke in a light beam, makes the shifting very acoustically visible. Lorne