Developer Fund

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gundorf
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by gundorf »

How can we proceed to transfer 200$ ?
so exciting !
_arch
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by _arch »

Good idea!

A funny upgrade for me would be :
- Multitimbrality
- Improve EG modulations (keytabs, etc.)
- Sampling and treatments possibilities
- Pitch wheel use for modulation source
- Use effect like a module with modulations capabilities (velocity, keytab, press, etc.)

Regards
david
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by david »

John Bowen wrote: Fri Nov 24, 2017 8:41 pm It’s important to know how much more owners would be willing to pay. This would affect the schedule significantly in terms of being able to get things up and running quickly. Please everyone let me know.
Here’s a fun idea - what if everyone gets to vote on order of (say top 3 or 5) goals.

$200 per round of votes. If you spend $400 you get to vote twice.

You will have to work with the DSP programmer and provided a list of realistic goals. Of course, you have to keep us all grounded and realistic and be a filter (no pun intended) making the final calls on the implementation.
Last edited by david on Sat Nov 25, 2017 10:13 am, edited 1 time in total.
John Bowen
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by John Bowen »

I don’t think votes can completely determine what we are able to accomplish, so I wouldn’t do a ‘vote for $$’ thing. It’s more fair to just have a fixed amount, and proceed from there. The software developer I’ve contacted is aware of and reading this thread, and as feature requests show up, he & I will discuss what seems reasonable and possible to do in x amount of time. Once we’ve defined the project (say, we go for the top 5 features that people list), he will have to make a rough estimate as to how much time he thinks it will take. At that time, I can then say that, OK, we will need x amount of $ to accomplish the desired upgrade, and then see if enough owners agree to the pre-payment. My suggestion of a $200 amount was my initial start point, but if the interest is that everyone wants the Top 5 features done in, say, 6 months, then we will have to adjust accordingly.
jgale
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by jgale »

As an addition to my previous post and after reading some of the comments from others - I would be willing to pay more - even $500 to get this started. A couple of additions to my previous requests:

- all DSP bugs fixed
- more modulation options for the VCA
- more envelope modulation sources

I think that we need to come up with an agreed upon enhancement list and OS release schedule (maybe start with the bug fixes and easier enhancements first before moving on the harder changes).

John
Hook
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by Hook »

is this the same developer that did 1.3.x?
John Bowen
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by John Bowen »

Hook wrote: Sun Nov 26, 2017 5:00 pm is this the same developer that did 1.3.x?
No, this would be a new software developer for the DSP part of the Solaris. That concerns new features that are in the ‘synth voice’ portion of the code, such as new oscs or filters, or other things that are handled on a per voice basis, as well as the Master FX section, which currently is the Chorus, Flanger, Delay, and EQ. The v1.3.1 OS update by Jim Hewes had to do with fixing the bugs and adding features to the Blackfin part of the code, which generally manages the system - the displays, the I/O functions, the MIDI code, voice handling, etc.. Jim has done a huge amount of work for the Solaris OS code, fixing all the bugs he could, and adding a lot of new features that have been requested, but he’s not working with the audio-related DSP code.
david
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by david »

John Bowen wrote: Sun Nov 26, 2017 5:16 pm
Hook wrote: Sun Nov 26, 2017 5:00 pm is this the same developer that did 1.3.x?
No, this would be a new software developer for the DSP part of the Solaris. That concerns new features that are in the ‘synth voice’ portion of the code, such as new oscs or filters, or other things that are handled on a per voice basis, as well as the Master FX section, which currently is the Chorus, Flanger, Delay, and EQ. The v1.3.1 OS update by Jim Hewes had to do with fixing the bugs and adding features to the Blackfin part of the code, which generally manages the system - the displays, the I/O functions, the MIDI code, voice handling, etc.. Jim has done a huge amount of work for the Solaris OS code, fixing all the bugs he could, and adding a lot of new features that have been requested, but he’s not working with the audio-related DSP code.
Are you also looking for someone to polish and finish the Mac and PC utilities for preset naming (and perhaps sample loading?), and perhaps build a VST librarian.

The Mac software is great for getting and renaming patches, but you can’t move around and re-order banks.

Updating those programs would be a nice part of this upgrade.
John Bowen
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by John Bowen »

Yes, but all of those utilities are separate from the development being discussed here. I think you are suggesting a general Developer Fund, not one solely dedicated to DSP enhancements?
david
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by david »

John Bowen wrote: Sun Nov 26, 2017 5:55 pm Yes, but all of those utilities are separate from the development being discussed here. I think you are suggesting a general Developer Fund, not one solely dedicated to DSP enhancements?
Yes. I’d actually prefer spending first on useability (library utility) and workflow (like multi and sample handling) to adding more effects and oscillator algos. But id be happy if you could do both.

If all this money is spent I hope those utIlities get polished and “finished” to speed up some of that workflow.
Hook
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by Hook »

Are there bits of utilities that could be open sourced to see if others would be willing to work on them?
John Bowen
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by John Bowen »

Hook wrote: Mon Nov 27, 2017 8:13 am Are there bits of utilities that could be open sourced to see if others would be willing to work on them?
There are few online here that have worked on editors for the PC/Windows platform - minorguy, gundorf, and qtuner. Perhaps they can respond here regarding open sourcing of their code.
Toby Emerson
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by Toby Emerson »

Yes, definitely willing to pay $200+ for a 2.0 update.

Here are a few things on my wishlist:

- VST editor / Librarian
- alternate FM mode (Is it actually phase modulation? The type of typical FM in most synths)
- unison panning spread (a way to spread out the unison voices in the stereo field for really wide / fat sounds )
- more filters / oscillators. I would really like to hear some new modern NI Massive style wavetables with smoother transition between the waves. The virus has cool "Granular / Formant" oscillators with lots of controls. Something like this would be really neat for Solaris. Filters: double notch, phaser filter, and more LP/BP/HP styles would be welcome something a little sharper/agressive sounding like the virus filter (Solaris I find most of the filters to be "warm" "fat" & " smooth" which are great in their own right).
- more fx / insert fx (distortion types, reverb, compressor etc..)
- multi-timbral mode seems to be a popular suggestion and I think that would be very useful (especially if the VST editor was possible and this was integrated)
- panning in the mixer level (not sure if this is possible)

Also I'm not sure what percentage of users frequent the message boards here, it's possible many would be interested but might miss this discussion.
normanion
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by normanion »

Hi John!

I'm super excited to see this thing going, as I was ready to propose the same thing, but someone did it first. I'm willing to drop 200 to 300 USD.

Regarding those that are not willing to pay, I don't feel unfair and am on naive side believing in decency. I might be wrong, but seeing as things go on this forum, I believe that ones that are not going to chip in, have good reason, and the only handicap I would do, is to release OS for everyone not paying at later date, with possibility to pay between first period and free release. But! (i) Not more than anyone else and like (ii) between current and new branch let the price decrease until cost reaches zero.
I'm thinking about Price = First price * (1-Telapsed*Tcoefficient) until price reaches zero. This will be good moment to stop supporting first branch of software. Until then it might be more expensive to maintain two lines. There's no other way I could see that would be fair for those, who already invested in this art of engineering and for some reasons (might be even overlooking this forum thread). Is it OK to leave parts that should be done in first place (like envelopes setting response) to those additional supporters?

Priorities:
1) Multitimbral (on DSP side)
1 b) Multitimbral handling from the instrument, but it's probably outside DSP - keyboard split or layers, for example A+B on the left side of keyboard and C+D+E on the right side. That could be powerful.
1 c) regarding multitimbrality, in case there would be some assumptions, I would like that each sound would be like isolated Solaris, so the timbres (parts/layers) would not share sequences or arpeggios, therefore - in above case - I could play arpeggios with my left hand and fiddle with my right hand or reverse or anything between. Even better: different modes, when arpeggio can be isolated or shared or hybrid (? - shared at the split keyboard part, but split between keyboard parts). But if I had to choose only one, I prefer former.
2) Effects parameters as modulation destinations.
3) Envelopes responding to knobs in real time. When I twist a knob, I would love to hear how envelope is changing in currently playing note. Right now it affects only following notes.
4) Roland Filter. I love this sound and it ticks my sonic G-spot. I could pay extra for this one!

Less important for me, and harder to achieve as they require a lot of research and data collection unless some company sells or gives their work:
1) Reverb (too many to pick one, but I'm sure that majority will pick one that's nice to play with)
2) Tape Delay with multiple heads.
3) Tape Saturation with wow and flutter and tape age like in Strymon El Capistan but in real time.
When I look at the three above, I think that El Capistan has good algorithms for spring reverb, tape delay and sound shaping.
Most of the above can be done with external effects, but I love the possibility to recall all effects and their settings when loading patches.

Future proof code - maybe modular one? - seems like a good idea. Not sure it can be done in this environment tho.

The rest of wishes that I have are outside of DSP programming scope.

P.S. Jim, the Man that gave so much time and work to our community, without anything in return... I would love to send you some small gift and therefore I need your address. And also: John, yours would be appreciated too.

P.P.S. When things get settled, please, John, drop me an e-mail, since I'm not a frequent guest at this page. I suggest doing so for everyone else and also informing other owners about this thread. This might speed up data collection and expand group of interested users.

P.P.P.S. As I read more in this thread, I see that some people are willing to pay more. I could raise my input to 500 USD, but thats in two or more months after Christmas, and only in necessity (like barely hitting financial target, fixed price at this point, etc.). And only under condition, that Europe will be in good economical shape. ;-)
John Bowen
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Re: Developer Fund

Post by John Bowen »

So...a few points for everyone to know:

1) Adding new oscillator or filter types can very possibly mean a reduction in the polyphony from 10 to 5 voices. Would that be OK?
2) FX parameters cannot be modulated in the current system. The FX chip is separate from the ‘voice’ chips, where all the EGs and LFOs reside. The only way to modulate FX in the Solaris would be to add modulation LFOs and EGs into the FX block. Not sure about MIDI Controllers or joystick & ribbon, but I expect these would be also difficult.
3) Current analysis says that the arpeggiator and sequence modules would have to be single per MultiSet. I’ve asked about having at least 2 separate arpeggios going, so we will see.
4) Difficult to say at this time if it’s possible to have 4 separate Master FX running, or if we have to do the same thing as with the arpeggiator and sequencer (where there’s only one Master FX setup for the Multi). I know almost everybody else has tons of FX sends and so on - the Solaris is a little different in that not everything is running on the same chip. We could definitely expand the number of effects, though.

Right now we are trying to decide the best way for the UI to handle displaying and editing MultiSets. Voice handling and output assignments will be looked into next.

I greatly appreciate all those who have posted their responses here - please continue to do so , and please spread the word to other Solaris owners to come check out this and the other topic about new hardware.
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