Waldorf Wave Emulation

[n1nj4]

John, or anyone in the know, how much Zarg Quantum Wave type functionality will be included in the Solaris? I'm very much interested in getting as close as I can to the functionality of the Waldorf Wave or any of the Microwave series.

[John Bowen]

John, or anyone in the know, how much Zarg Quantum Wave type functionality will be included in the Solaris? I'm very much interested in getting as close as I can to the functionality of the Waldorf Wave or any of the Microwave series.

Not too much. The 8 stage Looping Envelope is 'inspired' by the one in the Wave, but we've added a few extras in the keyboard Solaris. Another module I planned on having from the Quantum Wave is the Shaper, but unfortuntely this did not get coded yet.

The Quantum Wave is a multitimbre synth with 4 parts. For its initial release, the Solaris will not be multitimbral.

What I can say is that the Solaris keyboard reproduces the Waldorf interpolation scheme just the same as the original, which is not the case with the Quantum Wave plug-in for Scope. When I was brought in by Hans to work on the plug-in at his studio, we set up his Waldorf Wave in the room with a Scope system, and once I had everything ready for a one-on-one comparison, I immediately knew that the Scope version was not going to be able to re-create the hardware Wave sound, because of the difference in playback interpolation. I went out and asked Hans to come into the room, so I could play for him the differences before I proceeded with the project, because I wanted him to know right from the start what was and wasn't going to be possible.

john b.

[n1nj4]

Will the 'stepped/smooth' interpolation option from the Microwave be added at some point?

Are user wavetables possible?

Do you plan to add the Shaper?

Thanks,

N.

[John Bowen]

Will the 'stepped/smooth' interpolation option from the Microwave be added at some point?

Are user wavetables possible?

Do you plan to add the Shaper?

My original specification had all three of these items. Unfortunately, we ran out of time & money to continue paying for development of the software, having to put it into production now....but I hope in the near future to get these things done.

[n1nj4]

So all are planned for future updates?...Or is it more of a maybe?

[John Bowen]

All are planned, yes.

[n1nj4]

All are planned, yes.

Cool.

[urge]

John,
Could you explain the different interpolation schemes and how they affect the sound?

[John Bowen]

John,
Could you explain the different interpolation schemes and how they affect the sound?

Yes, as I understand it, the smooth interpolation switches through the wavetable files at zero crossings, whereas the stepped interpolation switches without regard to the phase of the waveshape. The original PPG used the stepped method, and this is what we have implemented in the Solaris. The difference is that, when you sweep through a wavetable this way, you will hear pops or clicks as the waveshapes change, since they may or may not be switching at a zero boundary in the output. (It may also be the case that the smoothing function is crossfading shapes, as you would hear with Vector Synth joystick movement.)

[qtuner]

If you take two waveshapes or in this case a set of samples and just glue them together with out any interpolation your create a "corner" in the wave shape. Corners contain lots of high frequency information. This is where the pops come from. If you look at the fourier transform of a square wave, you can see all the high frequency content. interpolations in some cases will actually change the signal in the frequency domain to prevent this popping and clicking. I college I built a realtime pitchshifter on a dsp prototyping board and getting the pops and clicks to go away was very difficult. Thanks for allowing me to remember this.