trying to start coding audio synthesizers

[Sean Kemper]

hi guys, like the title states, I'm interested in learning how to write the software for audio synthesizers. a friend of mine started on the hardware side for them and, as i have no experience with this type of code, i was looking for any advice or books you guys would suggest looking into! thanks in advance!

[Disch]

Can you be more specific as to what kind of audio synthesizer you're talking about? Tone generation? Chiptune style simple waveforms (square/triangle/etc), FM synth, waveform samples?

A brief summary of what the program you want to write would need to do would help.

I have some experience in this area, and while I don't know of any books to recommend really, I might be able to answer Qs.

[Sean Kemper]

i dont really have any specific questions right now. im just really interested in the subject and wanted some general advice and some good places to start, maybe a buddy who wouldnt mind helping out with some more specific questions later on down the line :D

[Sean Kemper]

i guess i should also say the these synths are going to be analog. so nothing like the vst's for ableton

[Disch]

these synths are going to be analog

Not sure I understand what you mean ... and not sure you know what analog means. Analog synthesizers are typically called "musical instruments" and have nothing to do with computer software. =P

</wiseass>

wanted some general advice and some good places to start,

Can't really give you on-point advise because I'm still a little uncertain of exactly what the actual goal is.


Assuming you're talking about basic tone generation... the first steps I would take is:

1) Learn to stream sound. Start by loading a file and streaming it (several audio libs can do this... BASS is a popular, easy to use one)

2) Generate a basic sine wave and stream that instead of the audio file.

3) Make frequency/amplitude of the sine wave configurable to play any tone.

4) Do something like mapping keys on the keyboard to play a specific tone (pressing 'A' plays A.. 'S' plays A#... something like that)

[Sean Kemper]

http://www.davesmithinstruments.com/products/mopho/
thats an analog synth. and the software part is programming what you want it to do and uploading it to a chip in a microcontroller.

and ill look into the second part of your post. thanks!

edit: i accidentally a word

[Disch]

http://www.davesmithinstruments.com/products/mopho/
thats an analog synth.

Yeah I actually started googling it after I posted (probably should have done it before... but oh well). Interesting stuff.

But anyway... I guess that means I don't have experience in this area. Only in digital synth. Sorry =(

and ill look into the second part of your post. thanks!

Well... that was all digitial synth related. I'm pretty sure none of it would be applicable to analog synth.

[Sean Kemper]

hmm... ok. well no worries! thanks anyways