5.13.2 Advanced Sound Controls
The soundcard output from fractint is a tad more versatile than the
simple tones of the PC speaker. This comes into its own when playing
sounds based on fractal orbits, producing results from haunting chordal
pulses through to unearthly arpeggios.
The voices used to generate notes on the sound card have variable
Envelopes (p. 141) and can be played polyphonically so we have three
parameters to vary the sounds produced:
POLYPHONY=nn
This controls how many different note are allowed to sound at once,
voices are assigned cyclically as notes are played: i.e. after the first
orbit is calculated a frequency is assigned to the first voice and that
note is triggered on. Fractint then waits for one orbitdelay period,
calculates the next orbit, assigns a frequency to the second voice, and
triggers it on. This continues until the number of voices sounding is
equal to the polyphony value whereupon the first selected voice is
triggered off and the note allowed to decay. That probably all sounds
horrendously complex but just think of it as playing the organ, holding
down each new note for as long as possible but with the polyphony value
controlling how many fingers you have.
WAVETYPE=nn
WaveForm 0: Sine WaveForm 1: Half-Sine
| /^\ | /^\ /^\
|/ \ / |/ \ / \
Ä/ÄÄÄÄÄ\ÄÄÄÄÄ/ÄÄ Ä|ÄÄÄÄÄÁ-----ÁÄÄÄÄÄÁÄ
| \ / |
| \_/ |
WaveForm 2: Abs-Sine WaveForm 3: Pulse-Sine
| /^\ /^\ | /^| /^|
|/ \ / \ / |/ | / |
Ä|ÄÄÄÄÄÁÄÄÄÄÄÁÄÄ Ä|ÄÄÄÁ-------ÁÄÄÄÁÄÄÄ
| |
WaveForm 4: Sine - even periods only
| /^\ /^\
|/ \ / \
Ä|ÄÄÄÄÄ\ÄÄÄÄÄÂ-----------ÁÄÄÄÄÄ\ÄÄÄÄÄÂÄ
| \ / \ /
| \_/ \_/
WaveForm 5: Abs-Sine - even periods only
| /^\ /^\ /^\ /^\
|/ \ / \ / \ / \
Ä|ÄÄÄÄÄÁÄÄÄÄÄÁ-----------ÁÄÄÄÄÄÁÄÄÄÄÄÁÄ
|
WaveForm 6: Square
|-----¿ Ú-----¿ Ú-----¿ Ú-
| | | | | | |
Ä|ÄÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄ
| | | | | | |
| À-----Ù À-----Ù À-----Ù
WaveForm 7: Derived Square
| |\ |\
| | \ | \
Ä|--__ÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄ\------__ÄÄÄÄ|ÄÄÄÄ\------
| \ | \ |
| \| \|
ATTACK=nn
This controls the time taken for a note to hit full volume after being
triggered on. Low values give a punchy percussive sound while long
values give a softer bowed sound. If attack time is set too long and
orbitdelay is low then notes are played too fast to ever achieve any
volume and the net result is low or non existent output. To put it
another way, if orbitdelay is low then this value should be low also.
DECAY=nn
This controls the time taken for a note to die down to the sustain
level. Setting this time too low may produce a rhythmic click between
notes. The attack and decay values don't allow much fine control.
SUSTAIN=nn
This controls the volume level at which a note is held.
SRELEASE=nn
This controls the delay in time for releasing a note. A release value
of 15 seems to equate to 'never let the note release' on the machine
used to develop the sound card drivers. But, as ever, with other
manufacturer's emulations your mileage may vary.
VOLUME=nn
It is possible to adjust the volume of an FM synth card. This has no
effect on the PC speaker.
ATTENUATE=none|low|mid|high
On an FM synth card it is possible to attenuate the high pitched notes.
The default is none. The low value attenuates at 1.5 dB/octave, the mid
at 3.0 dB/octave, and the high at 6.0 dB/octave.
SCALEMAP=nn/nn/nn/...
The scale map list is a way of controlling which notes are played by
fractint and only has any effect if note quantisation is switched on in
the basic sound parameters screen. It can be very useful when the
polyphony is up and the chords you're getting are more like dischords.
:-)
The way it works is this: When a sound is played with frequency
quantisation on its frequency is rounded to the nearest 'proper' note on
the musical scale, this note number is then looked up in the scale map
table and substituted by the note indicated in that entry of the table.
The end result of this is that, for instance, using this sequence of
numbers as a scale map:
2,2,4,4,4,7,7,9,9,11,11,11
Will ensure that fractint uses only the black notes on the keyboard,
just the sharps and flats for a vaguely oriental feel (to my western
ears anyway :-) ).
The above probably appears to be sheer gobbledegook at first reading,
sorry, but if you keep at it you'll unlock this powerful feature for
keeping your fractals melodic. (Unless you're totally turned on by
microtonal frequencies in which case forget all this quantisation
nonsense and tune in to the true sound of chaos!)
The passes=1 setting (Drawing Method (p. 86)) almost always works best
with sound.