Has anybody experimented with software like SuperCollider, Csound, or Pure Data? I want to synthesize my own ambient loops and other environmental sounds without even having to rely on open-source AI models like AudioCraft. Those are great, but I want more precise control over everything, and high-quality sample-by-sample synthesis, which avoids copyright/licensing issues or unnatural artifacts present in AI-generated 3-D/binaural/spatial loops altogether. Using CC0 sounds is great because you don't have to worry about attribution/credit stuff, but even then, you can't copyright the original sounds. Recording your own sounds is the best option if you have high-quality recording equipment, but then you have to actually hear the audio that you want to record and spend enough time in the environment as the microphone captures it, eliminate all environmental noise and microphone hiss, speech, including VoiceOver speech, and get an uninterrupted recording. So I've never been to a rainforest but I want to synthesize binaural rainforest sounds. I've never recorded an airplane engine in 3-D but why not just synthesize it on my computer? I'm also interested in physical modeling, and other more user-friendly options, if any. Mobile apps would also be great.
Comments
Have you tried SUrge XT?
I don't know that it does samples, assuming you want to manipulate audio samples. But it is an accessible synthesizer and if you haven't tackled basic synth stuff yet, it's a good place to start. It can also do sequences which you'd probably need for something like a rain forest.
I mention this because if you specifically want to manipulate sampled audio, a lot of the synth stuff carries over, e.g. filters, resonance, and so on. Surge does all of that, it's just based on waveforms, rather than imported audio samples as the base of the sound.
They are developing a sampler, Shortcircuit XT, and IIRC they are doing, or planning, accessibility work on it. But it doesn't seem super developed yet, lots of placeholders for docs and such on the site. You can apparently do it with just synths though, here's a guy with a video, but I don't think he mentions what synths he's using, maybe visually he does, I'll try to remember to get my wife to take a look and see.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhK-LHm6_b0
Surge XT
Isn't that a music-focused thing? A VST instrument to be more precise. I know it can be used as a standalone app, but what I want to do is generate whole soundscapes and other stuff. Specifically, 3-D/binaural/spatial audio.
Re: Synths.
In the rain forest example I posted, he used two synths, Phase Plant and Serum. Also a midi sequencer. The synths generated the sounds, and he used the sequencer to create the track. Surge XT would be the first part, or a possible first part anyway.
I can see two ways to do this, and I'm not sure which one you want.
1. Like the forest example, you use one or more synths to design your sounds, and then use a DAW or whatever to make your track(s).
2. You use pre-existing sounds, e.g. a wav file of an airplane or whatever, and use a DAW or what have you to make your track.
Which one do you want to do? If it's the first one, which is what I thought you were getting at since I think all of the things you mentioned are synthesizers, I mention Surge XT because, if you don't know how synthesizers work, it's a good place to start learning, there are some decent general synth lessons on Youtube, I can point you at a few.
IF you want to basically use samples instead, the second one, Surge XT still might help to learn some processing stuff, e.g. what filters do, but it doesn't do samples, I don't think. I haven't done anything with samples much, so you're probably on your own there, unless somebody else responds.
As another example, here's a guy telling you a bit about how to make bird sounds with a synth. Surge XT can do FM synthesis, I haven't tried recreating it though.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bri8fnMUfaQ
Supercollider, Faust, chuck
I work with Supercollider and have developed an AppleScript for reading its PostWindow more easily. You can visit my website to see this script and my music with Supercollider, or contact me for any questions.
In Supercollider, for sample-by-sample control, the "Demand UGen" is good. However, for sample-by-sample control, Faust and Chuck audio programming languages might be better.
I think for ambient music, it might not be needed to control each sample. Glitch music, most of the time, yes, you should apply the algorithm in each sample for innovation. But for ambient music or even the complicated music of electroacoustic music, Csound, and specifically Supercollider, which are not specific for controlling samples, work very well.
www.soheilzarrinpour.com
[email protected]
My experience
Hello,
In my experience, you're best off using a daw, such as logic pro, ableton, or reaper. If you want it totally synthesized, I'd go with SurgeXT. If you're using windows I'd recommend ableton or reaper. If you're on a mac ableton doesn't load plugins from what I've heard. If mac I'd reconmmend logic and surgeXT if you're going synth. Plus logic has a lot of its own synths. If you're going sample-based, I personally love Ableton's simpler. You can take a really rough aproximation, then use simpler's filters and LFOs, and then layer in a wealth of stock effects from ableton itself to make your soundscapes.
That's my two scents, hope it helps.
A few points
Surge XT is a synthesizer.
Like, you get some oscillators and knobs and things. It is literally about nothing *but* sound design. Both Reaper and Ableton have a mode where you can play notes from your computer keyboard. I say notes but it will really trigger whatever you've got loaded.
I literally posted a video of a guy making bird and bug noises with a hardware synth that does FM synthesis, and pointed out that Surge XT can also do FM synthesis.
Here's a Moog Grandmother, a hardware synth, with a keyboard and everything. Notice the musical-sounding noises.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DmlcczM6uE
Now, here's a guy doing a tutorial on how to make a helicopter noise with that same synth. It's not a very *good* helicopter noise, but my point is that he's doing something distinctly non-musical and sound design with it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-f2H_7LpAY
If you don't want to use Surge XT, don't. But I'm sorry to tell you that you don't know what you're talking about when you say it's for music and won't do what you want. Pure Data is, IIRC, pretty graphical and not accessible. CSound is pretty old, but speaking of that, here's a guy playing around with it. Skip to about a minute thirty, you'll hear him run some sample code, which generates a series of pitches.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KQHc7_OWrw
Csound has a web IDE, but it doesn't seem like you can edit text, at least I can in Firefox on Mac, YMMV. I opened the first project that generates a 550 Hz. sine wave.
https://csound.com/get-started.html
The reason I suggested Surge XT is because if you don't know how synthesis works, e.g. what an LFO is, modulation, and so on, it's a fairly straightforward environment to learn with. Most synth examples are going to be musical because most people want to do music, the CSound tutorial talks about what a "CSound instrument" is, for example.
But that's basically just a thing that makes noises. If, as an example, that guy added a lot more pitch into his helicopter design, he could make a synth bass. Or he could put some attack on the beginning to make it sound way more like a helicopter IMO, but if he took off the modulation so each sound was a single event, he could make something like a snare hit.
You can, I assume, do something similar in CSound. Sonic Pi might work, again you're going to get a ton of musical examples, but that's a programming language sort of like CSound, but it's being developed now and I'm pretty sure the guy's done accessibility work on it.
Personally I prefer way less typing, but give them all a try. SuperCollider *should* be accessible, since it uses a server client architecture and is also a programming language, IIRC, I've downloaded it but haven't played around with it yet. In theory you should be able to write its code in anything, if its own tools aren't accessible. Sonic Pi is also free, as is Surge XT. Reaper isn't free but you can evaluate it for free and there are a lot of resources to help get you started. Here's the link for SOnic Pi.
https://sonic-pi.net/
Yes, I know it says it's a live coding music synth. Again, it should be able to make nonmusical noises, which is what you want. All of the examples I've posted have literally been from things that people mostly use to make music. That doesn't matter. What matters is what it can do. If you've got a synth that can generate noise, you can make the sound of waves, for instance.
More synth demos.
Here is a guy talking about how to make a string sound on any synth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsAbrsdSk28
Notice that the first thing he does is make a slow attack on the waveform he's using, a sawtooth in this case. Now, here's a guy making ocean waves, among other things.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNF28ourXkk
If you skip to about 4:50, you'll notice the first thing he does is play around with making the attack slower. He's just using a noise oscillator, instead of a sawtooth waveform. It is literally the exact same technique. Same thing where he applies an envelope to produce the rhythmic aspect of the waves. You're using the same synthesis techniques for sound design, whether you're making a bowed string noise, or ocean waves, or whatever.
I'll again recommend Sonic Pi as something worth checking out, see the tutorial.
https://sonic-pi.net/tutorial.html
In the appendix there's stuff on writing a probabilistic sequencer, which should get you some randomness. If you don't want to use a DAW then yeah, some sort of programming would probably be your best bet. I recommend Sonic Pi because, like I said, I know he's done accessibility work on it, and it's meant for people new to coding and music. It's meant to be an educational resource, among other things, so it's fairly user friendly.
But again, synthesis techniques are synthesis techniques, whether you're designing an organ sound, or a thunderstorm. So here are a few synth tutorials.
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLFa4_po__8wMNscyFfDy6Dn-_hZdtr-jo
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDYJmRPPt877lz4PL5kwfsijoNntsFNNL