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Re: [microsound] gear questions: unfortunate newbie pandering



scott,

here are some pieces of gear, in no particular order, that get plugged into glitch-head laptops:

mixers:
not all the sounds are going to come out of your laptop. espc if you work with MAX, you will want to plug things in as well... bring the outside world into your box. mixers provide a way to keep the signals you want to process in your laptop level. if you want to work with microphones, you will need a mixer anyway... dynamic microphones (ones w/o batteries, mostly, also contact mikes) need serious gain before your laptop will 'hear' them loud enough. also, if you want to use any external effects, a mixer is essential. i recommend a small behringer eurorack. fennesz uses one with 10 tracks in (2 mono mike channels with gain, and 4 stereo inputs), 2 racks out and one effects send/return, i think. mine is twice as big. (no, i never use them all...)


continuous midi controllers:
are you a keyboard player? if so, MAYBE a keyboard controller will do you good. if you want to play piano at your gigs, that is. if not, or you aren;t planning on impressing people with your best bach, skip the keyboard and get some rotary knob continuous controllers. doepfer makes a good 16 knob controller, and also a monsterous 64 knobber that monolake uses with his max patches. peavy also, and a few others. native instruments has a great list of all of them:
http://www.nativeinstruments.de/index.php?technisch_us
continuous controllers are built for everything from tweaking synth filters to toggeling between samples in a sampler object or presets in a module. much more versitile than an old-fashioned keyboard. or maybe i'm just jaded that some people actually know how to play them.


other interfaces:
sick of watching people (like me) 'just twiddle knobs'? different types of midi controllers are also out there. vladislav delay used a midi octo-pad drum kit to trigger samples and change program parameters when he made 'anima', for example. this is especially cool for something like MAX, where you design your own instrument. why not design your own controller as well? look up 'i-cube' for starters. it allows light, pressure, bend, and other tactile and physical sensors to control midi data. then think up something we've never seen before. (a punching bag interface? a 3m tall joystick in the middle of the stage? )


sequencers:
in my quest to escape the mouse, i've looked into attaching external sequencers to a computer, partly for the big rubber buttons, and partly for the extra CPU power i get if i don't have something like cubase or logic running in the background. i won't be using it for sending notes, probably, but rather to send program change messages to switch between presets or samples in a module. also, if you have a partner or three, you can send them the exact same timing information, and keep your sets totally in sync. just a thought.....


software:
i'm not into mac, so i can't tackle this one. if you had a PC, a few things come to mind (Audiomulch, PD/GEM...) but you have that covered with soundhack and max/msp, i gather. this is something for you, though.... midi ox or hubi's loopback: allows midi apps to talk to each other inside your machine. if you don't want to use an external sequencer, this can get MAX and cubase shaking hands. these are PC programs, but maybe there is something like this for a MAC, too. (maybe MACs are so godlike that they don't need this kind of app. in which case, suggestion is retracted...)


nuts and volts:
***soundcard with multiple ins and out: look for ASIO drivers to reduce latency (ie amount of time between when you tell your machine to process something and when you hear results), and 'full duplex', to be able to process incoming sounds at the same time you are playing outgoing sounds. there's quite a bit of ascii spilled about soundcards already. i won't respill it here.
***midi port: some soundcards have a midi jack or three. most don't. midiman makes cheap and durable usb midi interfaces. shop around.


another note on controllers:
remember that whatever controllers you use, you will be designing your patches and onscreen interface around them, and ultimately your sound as well. if you have a traditional piano-style keyboard, not only will you do a lot of mousing around, but you will also be importing some very antique notions of music making into a place where they might not need to be. if you have some other kind of interface, it becomes part of your process. "how do i incorperate/(un)learn/master/improvise with/etc the drum-pad/punching bag/joystick/lightsensor/etc?" becomes just as important as the sounds you are making.


success!
derek



----Original Message Follows----
From: Scott Handley <thesubtlebody@xxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: microsound <microsound@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "\[microsound\]" <microsound@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [microsound] gear questions: unfortunate newbie pandering