Bent by Sinevibes

I had pre-ordered the Korg Minilogue XD and the Volca Micro Modular when they were first announced, and I got them today. Needless to say, my apartment looks like a packing material and wrapping packaging explosion went off in my living room lol and it is legit so exciting, like Christmas/birthday/Easter as a little kid level of excitement and fun that I am having as I get to know my new hardware. I couldn’t be more thrilled. If anyone is thinking about getting either, DO IT!!! :slight_smile:

With that being said, I now arrive at my point - I picked up an add-on program for the digital multi engine of the XD, and it is called Bent and it is made by Sinevibes, and it sounds so hella dope, I wanna make a clone of this that all of us can use in our patches, but I don’t even know where to begin attempting this. I wanted to bring this up and ask @robertsyrett for his thoughts, advice, opinions, etc. about how I would go about doing this, as I am not that familiar with the trig and calc functions that make some of this stuff a reality, and I know he is a killer with this knowledge and experience.

I have included a description from the first page of the doc pack that came with it below


Check out those sick waveforms, and then how it feeds the folded waves into a frequency (unless it is really phase? I cannot remember all of what makes these semi-similar concepts different, off the top of my head) modulation to a carrier wave, and the outcome sounds so dope! I have included a link to their page, where you can hear a demo of some of the presets check out Bent here. Let me know what you guys think and if anyone else has any hints or ideas how to make this a new Audulus module. I hope everyone is having a great evening! :grinning:

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You might want to check out this thread on wave folding and shaping. Here’s another about a VCA Shaper. The West Cat synth seems relevant too.

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Great! Thanks so much for the pointers. I knew we had info out there on this subject, cuz I had seen some of it previously, but not enough for me to feel like I know what I am doing. I’m still hoping for a tutorial that explains the expression nodes, and the functions that are most commonly used for each thing they accomplish, which I hope will eventually provide the much needed ‘eureka!’ moment, as explained from the very educated perspective of one of the more seasoned users (I think @stschoen was the one who originally floated the idea) but I realize that every item contributed is out of the goodness and generosity of each member’s heart, so I am not trying to rush anyone. So like I said, @Paulinko, thanks so much for the hints to start with! Perhaps I can get this concept figured out on my own, with enough research, and a few more suggestions here and there! :slight_smile:

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Have you looked at this?
https://discourse.audulus.com/t/the-audulus-expression-node/1496?u=stschoen

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Have you read the help text for the expression node?

It’s also useful to look inside existing patches to see what’s happening in the expression nodes.

If you haven’t already checked out @robertsyrett YouTube tutorials, they can be useful too.

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Congrats, that sounds like a pretty magnificent haul. I am very tempted by the volca modular, myself.


Bending Waves.audulus (83.9 KB)

Here are a trio of modules that you can use to make the waveforms you see in the posted image. It looks mostly like phase modulation and wave folding. Just remember that you can filter off top end with that sweet minilogue filter, and you will want to animate some parameters with envelopes.

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@stschoen yessir, I did! Thanks for that write up, it was very well written and informative. That stuff is important, and also a good reminder, but I am not really having trouble with those expression concepts.

@Paulinko I have read all the help text, and I am pretty well versed in expression syntax, with a background in Python programming that has helped me to quickly grasp the programming aspects of this app.

Thanks for the suggestions guys, and I’m sorry if I came across like there were not resources that were readily available. I should have been more specific. The real trouble for me, and I have looked all over for hints, but I cannot seem to find a good explanation that correlates to synthesis about how the trig and common functions (also the e constant) work, and when to use them in building, like wave shaping, PM/FM, making filters, effects, and other modules from scratch. How does one know to use the functions below in doing these things?
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I can look at the innards of something like the 303 filter in the new library, and I understand most of the expressions, but some are a mystery, and I really wish I had a better understanding of functions used within the expression nodes. In the thread that @stschoen referenced above, @robertsyrett mentioned making a tutorial series called “Know Your Expressions” or “Expression Yourself” or something like that, which is what I was referring to when I mentioned the expressions tutorial. That is the point of reference I am looking forward to most at this time, as lacking function expression understanding is the thing I find the most frustrating when trying to build new modules.

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Ah yes! That is still in the works. My apologies for the delay. :sweat_smile:

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There is no need to apologize, @robertsyrett! You are doing those videos out of the kindness and generosity of your heart for the sake of others in this community. I find that incredibly selfless and admirable, I aspire to be more like that, and I am prepared to wait patiently for whenever you have time to spare and choose to invest it in that tutorial :smiley:

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Here’s an article about the math involved in FM synthesis.

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