Background

The first thing that inspired me to make aVoon was mind maps. When I make mind maps I tend to rely on circles, squares and other basic geometric forms, connect them with lines and add words to explain something that isn’t obvious from symbolic meaning, i.e. being a certain geometric form, the forms position and connections.

In aVoon basic geometric forms, connections and movement resemble an animated version of those mind maps.

Another case that made me want to do aVoon is the traditional container approach to software development, e.g. in a DAW each track is self contained and has certain parameters that can be adjusted. Those parameters are often represented by a knobs position or a discrete number, which is totally fine for a lot of things, but now I want something more flexible and easy on the eyes.

I want something that convey more meaning about the overall state of the app, not limited to discrete info like track one has a gain setting of 1.2 and is panned -1.00001. I want info that in a glimpse tells me how everything relates to everything else without getting vague or blunt.

aVoon

In short aVoon is an attempt to make a generic interface for anything that fits. Like a pair of pants for work. It is not a suit, dress, shirt or whatever. It is work pants with circles, words and lines on it.

The prototype looks like this:

aVoon resembles a mind map with circles that are connected or not, and that move around by themselves or not. (The text at the bottom of the images are debug info, and will change appearance as aVoon matures.)

I want to keep aVoon as simple as possible, and allow users to bring their own semantics to the circles to help convey meaning about something specific. I will use aVoon as front end to granulation, as a spatial controller and as a map for Stompstock (look in the blog archives for more info about Stompstock [guitar effects on screen]).

Currently aVoon knows how to move the circles around, how to respond when circles collide with a window edge, how to connect the circles, how to let you drag circles around, how to send OSC-messages and bundles, how to add and remove circles, how to stop motion and get it going again. It also knows how to load a soundfile and chop it up, but that is just for debugging. It is written in C/C++ and is currently Mac-only.

Hope you like the looks of it. I do.

It will be out in a beta version soon.

cheers Arve.

After switching to Apple a year ago, my computer life has become easier as expected. Every mac user on this planet would say off course, every Windows user might say something like ok, but (…). But it is not the ease of OS X that astonishes me the most. It is that the ease of the OS has translated into some of the programming tools. I still have Windows running under VMware for programming electronics and for using Samplitude, but OS X will be my main platform for programming productivity tools, as long as the client accept an Apple among the Windows.

Two Apple tools that can save your day:

Applescript is a time saver. End of story. Another story about applescript that has to be told and retold is the semantic syntax….. If all computer languages was semantic, then programming would be something that everyone could do without having to spend a lot of time learning how to think cryptic to do something easy.

Automator is a familiar concept for anyone used to MaxMSP Jitter, Pd, Bidule, Quartz Composer and so on. Make a program in a few minutes, distribute as standalone and your computer has become a little more easy to use (maybe…). Plug and play a program.

Cheers
Arve

So this is the Stompstock beta version.

It is intended for testing of the ….avols modules that I’ve written about before. Obviously I will write a longer text about this system when it is ready for intensive testing as a finished product, but for those who are interested I hope that these tiny posts about Stompstock is somewhat interesting and I will keep posting as new features gets implemented. On the list is preset morphing, mapping module for timed events, a granulation module and hardware. The hardware is on the drawing table, and will be there until I am sure it is flexible, scalable and has a splendid artwork.

I really like this drive. It growls at the low end, smoothes the middles and tames the treble. It is basically what I have wanted in my signalchain for a very long time. I’ll post audio examples along with those other modules when everything is finished at version 1.0. It will not be long now.

Operation: The gain controller goes from zero to noise and the cutoff balances the trebles. The volume keeps everything at the right side of too loud. I like it and use it on vocals as well. I like singing through this thing as the drive is easily controlled by the loudness of the voice.

Cheers
Arve

Very well. There is no other reason than Samplitude and a few programming tools for the occasional MCU, for me to ever get into Windows nowadays so that was it for VirtualBox on my computer.

Then I installed VMware and everything was fine. VMware let me run Samplitude on Windows while checking email, skyping and surfing while programming Max/MSP tools for my Goldwasser on OS X. And performance seems to be good enough for me. Happy days until something comes up wrecking the horizon. Until then I enjoy my Samplitude and could not be less bothered. I really like this virtualization thing.

cheers
Arve

Things added from 0.2 are:

• Preset handling finished
• Edit stored presets
• Edit sound range (time) and normalize + store as new file
• Listen to unprocessed sound when editing buffer content

Things to come (list will expand):

• Build new track from selection
• The “My Screen is My Re-patcher” system as a effect pool for each track
• Open Sound Control

Cheers
Arve

So this is the expanded family in beta < 0.5:

Biggest change is that the re-patching of signals from input to output has been added and works as it is supposed to.

I have also added a meter out and bypass in each module. This is as true bypass as true bypass has ever been and when a module is bypassed it is toned down (as you can see in the Delavols).

Preset handling is separate from the modules and allows morphing between presets.

TODO:

• Implement user interface for preset handling (selection and morphing and a system for mapping of hardware controllers to the preset system.
• Make a ring modulator module (updated 07.06.2008)
  
• Make an overdrive module
• Make a reverb module.
• Make a VST-host module

This system will be for sale. Pricing is TBA.

Cheers
Arve

I had me another go at the problematic disk. And it got stuck again. This time I tried to mouseclick and eject (button) at the same time, and lo and behold, the disk came out. Maybe this is a familiar trick not appearing in my Google, so I keep it here at my blog so that I will not forget it. Restarting is always tedious so I hope this mouseclick-eject routine was not another one timer……