User Guide

70
Module: Resynator
The idea behind Neuron models
While the classic analog synthesizer offers just a few
basic waveforms for purposes of sound generation,
the resynator features a sophisticated sound model
at this bottom-line level of sound shaping. The
underlying principle is comparable to that of many
modern-day PCM synthesizers that use samples
rather than basic waveforms. However, Neuron’s
models are far more advanced and versatile than the
fixed sound bite that is a sample, which does not
allow invasive sound sculpting.
Neuron sound models are created via adaptive sound
analysis and linked to individual parameter sets. And
as parameter names like small, warm, cold, and
torsion would attest, every parameter addresses
some kind of tonal property.
Model parameters
A model’s parameters are a combination of musically
meaningful values. As discussed above, accessing
the key musical attributes of a sound poses
tremendous obstacles. Courtesy of adaptable
algorithms, resynthesis has the power to blast
through this performance barrier:
Following a basic classification, the neural synthesis
engine detects the formative parameters of a sound,
categorizes them in groups, and assigns them to one
of two parameter levels that we call scape and sphere
(more on this later). How "freely" or "abstractly" the
neural synthesis engine defines the parameters of a
sound is determined during the process of model
generation.
This analysis yields parameter sets that are loaded
into the resynator along with the sound (which in
the process of model generation is transformed into
a model) and placed at your fingertips. The stick
controller lets you modify these parameters in real-
time. That is tantamount to performing open-heart
surgery on the very essence of what makes a sound
sound like it does.
And that makes Neuron the first synthesizer to
parameterize audio source material on the fly.
Because this base material can be any conceivable
audio event, you have an inexhaustible supply of
sonic goods at your disposal at this early stage of
sound generation.
Neuron.book Seite 70 Montag, 23. Dezember 2002 2:28 14