Not An Issue, more an piece of info.

[Clockmender]

I was put onto your work here by someone on Blender Artist. Brief background, I have developed a set of nodes for MID integration with Blender, with live input and animation from MIDI files, this lead to integration of sound, using Sounddevice, then this guy told me about your work here.

Seeing the other comments, I guess you weren't going to develop it further, so I have taken the AUD stuff and built a set of nodes to work in Animation Nodes. For Blender 2.79 at the moment, but I will convert them over to Blender 2.8 AN 2.1 in time, after I have finished testing everything.

You can see what I have been up to here: https://blenderartists.org/t/were-in-the-midi-audio-daw-real-time/1142160

Updated link to correct one...

Hope you don't mind me playing with this, but it all seems to work very well in AN, if you want more info, just let me know and I will be happy to talk about it. All the sound nodes are on my AN fork, under the master/nodes/daw directory.

Thanks for all you did to get me started on this project.

Cheers, Clock.

My test node tree in B2.79 all the yellow nodes are my new ones:

[neXyon]

Hi! This looks great! Unfortunately, I can't access the blenderartists thread to read more about it:

Sorry, you don't have access to that topic!

[Clockmender]

So sorry, wrong link, here is the good one:

https://blenderartists.org/t/were-in-the-midi-audio-daw-real-time/1142160

Just one more question, how does the threshold function work, any number I put in threshold other than 0 seems to do the same thing... Bits on the DAW are near the end of the thread.

EDIT:

I have converted all to Blender 2.8, AN 2.1, and all seems to work better, with more AudaSpace options available, These nodes for 2.8 are not on my GitHub yet, I need to finish testing...

[neXyon]

Thanks for the link. Thresholding is pretty easy [1], basically:

if sample >= threshold
  sample = 1
else if sample <= -threshold
  sample = -1
else
  sample = 0

[1] https://github.com/neXyon/audaspace/blob/master/src/fx/Threshold.cpp#L22

[Clockmender]

Yes, I understand that, but if I put a value in of 0.001, or a value of 1, I get the same sound played, i.e it always sounds the same whatever value I enter.

This is my node code:

import bpy
import aud
import os
from bpy.props import *
from ... base_types import AnimationNode
from ... events import propertyChanged

class thresholdSound(bpy.types.Node, AnimationNode):
    bl_idname = "an_thresholdSound"
    bl_label = "SOUND Threshold"
    bl_width_default = 150

    def create(self):
        self.newInput("an_FloatSocket","Threshold","threshold",minValue=-1,maxValue=1)
        self.newInput("an_SoundSocket","Sound I","snd")
        self.newOutput("an_SoundSocket","Sound O","sound")

    def execute(self,threshold,snd):
        self.use_custom_color = True
        self.useNetworkColor = False
        self.color = (1,0.8,0.5)
        if 'aud.Sound' in str(snd) and threshold > 0:
            snd = snd.threshold(threshold)
        return snd

[Clockmender]

Ignore this on Threshold, now it is working if I use low values for threshold, like 0.16 for example.

I have no idea why it did not work earlier.

EDIT:

It seems to be a balance between Volume and Threshold that produces the correct sound. Sometimes there is no sound at all, sometimes just a click, but play with the values and it works fine.

[Clockmender]

So next question then, if you don't mind, is there any way I can make an LFO (say at 20Hz) and multiply another normal sound by this new LFO sound to modulate it? Mixing it, as I tried in the image above, does not work.

[neXyon]

Unfortunately not, there is currently no modulation effect. It should be quite simple to implement it though. Do you know a bit of C++ and want to give it a try?

[Clockmender]

What I know about C++ could be written in 100mm letters on a postage stamp... Never even looked at it. I suppose I could learn, but at my age....

Somewhere recent I read that you ADD the normal sound to an LFO sound to get this effect, not multiply it. So now I am also confused. BTW I now have a Drum Machine working, see latest post on my BA thread.

Thanks for the reply!

[neXyon]

If it was adding, then just playing them back at the same time would do the trick, because adding is exactly what happens when you play two sounds at the same time. I added a modulate() effect to the python API which does multiplication instead of addition, maybe that's what you're looking for. It should be available in any blender 2.8 build made from the master branch starting today.

[Clockmender]

You Sir are a star, thank you so much!

I will try the "adding" method with an LFO and see what it sounds like, then get a build of Blender with your new "modulate" function, when its available.

BTW, I have now built an automatic Arpeggio node that sequences sounds together in runs from 3 to 9 notes, using frequency lists from my "chord" function. So for up to 5 counts it just rises, then it rises and falls. For example a count of 8 for C major plays C E G B C B G E. The node uses your join() function to add all the notes into one sound and limit() to set the durations.

My sequencer automatically sets one frame to be say 1/16th of a Beat, so frames are always multiples of Beat divisions. My setup node sets Beats Per Minute and smallest note division (up to 1/64th) to set parameters in the project. To get decimal fps of 29.33, for example, I set fps to 2933 and fps base to 100.

Thanks again for all your efforts and help with AudaSpace. If you want any of the node files, none are on my GitHub yet for 2.8, just let me know, and I will provide them. I intend to get the nodes on my GitHub as soon as reasonable testing has been completed.

EDIT:

If it was adding, then just playing them back at the same time would do the trick

Nah, does not work... I will wait for the modulate() function.

[Clockmender]

Simply Brilliant! Thank you so much.

So pleased with Modulate function - works really well with frequencies less/equal to 30Hz.

[Clockmender]

This takes it to a whole new level, adding LFO, Mod frequency (either by frequency, or note name) and lets you mix the three things together:

🥇 to you!

[Clockmender]

I'll close this now, thanks for all your help. I now have an FM Synthesiser working in Blender 2.8 thanks to your new modulate() function. BTW I noticed you have changed the square() function so it is now a separate oscillator rather than a wave "squarer" - this is also a good development.

Cheers, Alan.

[Clockmender]

Could you explain this in a bit more detail please:

I am not sure what values to enter here as integers are required for format, container, codec, etc.