Would you find a modeling pickup useful?

P

Per

Member
(To mods: Please delete this post if this is not acceptable here. It is about something that might be turned into a business but isn't currently one. I work as a software engineer at Google.)

We're all fans of modelled guitar amps and effects. If a modelling guitar pickup of Fractal-esque quality existed, would you be interested in using it?

I have some ideas for how to build an ultra-low noise guitar pickup that is hi-fi enough to work as a platform for very high quality pickup simulation. It could simulate pickup types and pickup positions (bridge, neck, some combo, phase flip etc). Form factor wise, it would be installed in the bridge pickup slot, come in tele, strat and HB versions and look more or less like a normal pickup. No permanent modifications to the guitar or ugly external gizmos. It will probably require a special guitar cable which connects to a small stompbox with a jack output. The stompbox could potentially have a midi out that sends messages when knobs move on the guitar if people are interested in that.

Compared to similar existing products, I think the two main selling points are higher sound quality and that it works on any guitar, not just ones that are built for that system.

This does not currently exist. Making it a reality would be a pretty large undertaking so before I invest too much into it I'm trying to see if more people than just me would be interested in using such a thing. What do you think? No?
 
Sounds like you are a guitar player so you have heard of GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome). I think people would be interested in it, especially people who are not playing through modelers. A percentage of those tend to be traditionalists who look askance at anything invented since 1962. ;- ). I myself would be suspicious that it would sound as good as a traditional pick up. Also, when I think of pick ups, I am thinking of getting the ones that sound best in any particular guitar and then sticking with that. The idea of changing them on the fly to shape tone never occurred to me, because it's not available. Thinking about it, it does seem useful. It would be very complicated to use with Fractal equipment though as you would need to constantly adjust the input pad for different outputs. I myself wouldn't want to bother with that.
 
It's an interesting idea, however, without knowing how you would model all the various aspects of a PU (resonance frequency, impedance) I'd be hesitant spending money on it until I had seen a demo.
 
Many have tried it, in both pickup and whole guitar form, with varying levels of success. A good version that managed the same volume level when switching would be interesting to me.
 
lqdsnddist said:
For me it would be a “no”, because wanting to have different pickups gives me an excuse to own more guitars....
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There is that... Good point.

There is a day coming where we will have the Swiss army knife of sound. Fractal and some kind of modeling pickup would cover a lot of ground sonically. Not sure that would be as much fun though.
 
Thank you for the responses so far, this is exactly the kind of thing that I was hoping to hear!

Volume matching should be a fixable thing. Not sure I can do much about losing the excuse to own many guitars ;-) I'd still argue that you could use multiple guitars, the pickup is not all there is to a guitar.

One reason that I would want this kind of product is that I just can't be bothered to haul multiple guitars to gigs.

There will definitely be demos before I ask anyone to shell out money. I'm less worried about failing to build something that sounds great. If that fails I will know early enough to cancel before it's cost a fortune. The nightmare scenario is to succeed in making it and that after all is finished it turns out that nobody cares, because by then a lot of time and money will have been spent and there is probably nothing I can do to fix it.
 
By definition, I think you'd need a totally different physical design to do true pickup modeling. In other words, it's not going to be something that can be retrofitted -- it needs to see/hear the string at various physical positions, and it needs to interact with the guitar in a way that's beyond DSP. I would not be interested. Just use PRE EQ and you'll probably get "better" results. My bet is on something laser-based, a long time from now, maybe in conjunction with physically modeled guitar strings which have only a symbolic relationship to the actual string being played. Me? I'll stick with a Strat.
 
IF it really worked, I'd be interested.
The same way I am interested in the Fishman Fluence. But I have not made the jump because the Fluence can't be installed in my Parker.
But I am a one (OK 2 ... maybe 3) guitar guy and I'd like to be able to have a pick up that can really model various pickups.
I just don't see how you can model the pickup position. But then again, I certainly could not predict the Axe FX either!
I'd be in.
 
As someone who hauls five guitars (four guitars and a guitar synth) to gigs, something like a good pup modeler would make my gigs easier. I've tried the Variax route, and it just didn't cut it, much like my POD XT Live didn't cut it. Pickup modeling on the level of Fractal's amp and effects modeling would be of interest to me, assuming the cost was relatively affordable.
 
Per said:
We're all fans of modelled guitar amps and effects. If a modelling guitar pickup of Fractal-esque quality existed, would you be interested in using it?
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Do you mean build a SIM1 XT-1 directly into the pickup? I can see one advantage of the existing SIM1 is that you don't have to modify your guitar.
 
GlennO said:
Do you mean build a SIM1 XT-1 directly into the pickup? I can see one advantage of the existing SIM1 is that you don't have to modify your guitar.
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Yes, or a Keyztone Exchanger. These pedals are definitely easier to use, but their sound is not very accurate. The idea with this product is that its sound should be near indistinguishable from the real deal, that's what I hope to get to at least.
 
I'd be interested for sure, I currently have an Antares ATG luthier kit installed in one of my guitar and I'd surely consider a similar less invasive alternative, as long as it also has the same excellent alt tuning capabilities.

There's someone already working on something similar though, take a look at cycfi.com

Patzag said:
I just don't see how you can model the pickup position
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It's pretty easy if you have six discrete signals coming from your strings, all you need is a comb filter.

The hard part is compensate for the nulls caused by the position of the real pickup if it's more than a few millimeters away from the bridge..

More on this here: https://www.cycfi.com/2014/07/virtual-pickup-placement-part-1/
 
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Welcome, and hope you can do better than the various (and Variax) attempts at this...I was just playing my axe that has the EOL Antares Guitar Autotune onboard..the tuning is stellar, but the pickup sims pretty much bite it.
 
Admin M@ said:
By definition, I think you'd need a totally different physical design to do true pickup modeling. In other words, it's not going to be something that can be retrofitted -- it needs to see/hear the string at various physical positions, and it needs to interact with the guitar in a way that's beyond DSP. I would not be interested. Just use PRE EQ and you'll probably get "better" results. My bet is on something laser-based, a long time from now, maybe in conjunction with physically modeled guitar strings which have only a symbolic relationship to the actual string being played. Me? I'll stick with a Strat.
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Physically modelled strings, now that would be something! :hearteyes: You'd probably have to do something like that to accurately model acoustic guitars. But as you say, that sounds pretty hard to pull off.
 
DLC86 said:
More on this here: [redacted]
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Yes. That article is mostly based on one by J. Donald Tillman. I can't yet post links, google for "Response Effects of Guitar Pickup Position and Width" and you should find it. Tillman also has a very cool interactive demo for how this plays out, google "Tillman PickupResponseDemo"

There is more to pickup modelling than the frequency response but this is a key part of it.
 
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