Hey guys, I’m writing a user manual for some software I’m publishing. It’s a software synthesizer design toolkit, for making your own software synthesizer in your programming language of choice. Of course, in order to make your own synthesizer, you must know how one works.
My goal in writing this user manual is not only to document my code, but also to teach how synthesizers actually work, so that anyone can make their own. That’s where this post comes in. I need inspiration on what exactly it is people don’t already know about them, and what all the hot topics are.
I’m happy to actually explain these things in the comments below!
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For somebody who has no idea about them at all:
When I was a kid in the 80s, a “synthesizer” was an electronic keyboard. Now, a “synthesizer” is a mess of knobs and buttons that looks more like a drum machine than a piano.
So, uh… my Q: “what’s a synthesizer?”
That mess of knobs and buttons has been around since the '50s — longer than the more compact '80s synths: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modular_synthesizer Because of their size they are usually considered studio gear and not stage gear, which may also explain why the more compact synths were more visible earlier, because you rarely got to look into studios then compared to now.
To answer your question: A synthesizer (when talking about sound) is an instrument that generates sound by creating waveforms and possibly combining them in different ways to achieve different sounds. Typically they come with filters and envelopes, that further affect the resulting sound.
Fantastic question! A synthesizer is a device that generates audio signals. I remember reading somewhere that they were sometimes referred to as “noise machines”, in regards to I think the Minimoog specifically. A drum machine is a type of synthesizer, as were the electronic-keyboard-having synths of the past.
And I thought “Wait a second I know the synthesizer, why don’t I use the synthesizer, Which is the sound of the future”
-Daft Punk
Are you sticking to only softsynths / digital, or also going into analog?
I ask because I have previously struggled with explaining why plugins and dsp stuff works the way it does (why is “saving my settings” called a patch?) without going into a long winded history lesson.
Either way, super cool!
I think I know a fair bit about both the history of synths and how they work, so if you need someone try bounce ideas off of don’t hesitate to write.
Thank you so much for the offer! I’ll mostly stick to soft synths, but I don’t mind going into the history a little bit to explain terminology and whatnot. There’s a surprising amount of overlap between analog subtractive synths and software subtractive synths anyways.
Techniques to avoid aliasing. Difficult topic to do well though.
This looks very interesting and I look forward to reading it.
Will this make me the next Aphex Twin?
Not if it makes me the next Aphex Twin first! :3
