how to reduce latency on down shifted patches

simeon

Axe-Master
the title of this thread should really be how to DISGUISE latency on down shifted patches...

tracking forward from this discussion here - http://forum.fractalaudio.com/axe-fx-ii-discussion/57144-preset-75-latency-wtf.html

Gira said "But... If we could have a variable mix that drops to 0% only on the attack of a sound, the player could feel less latency. I have no idea about how to detect the attack of all the notes..."

which got me thinking....

so i did an experiment where i dropped a pitch block in front of an amp downtuned by a tone. i set pitch source to "local poly" and reduced tracking to about 3, which is what i would normally do.

then i dropped a volume block in parallel to the pitch block and attached the "volume" param to the adsr

i then set the adsr to open the volume parameter for 2.6ms, which is just enough to let some of the attack portion of each chord through

it seems to work ok!

now this wouldn't be any good for superfast shredding, because it's tricky to get the adsr to reset on every new note, but for slower rockier rhythm playing it seems to work fine

patch attached for your amusement....
 

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one thing i forgot to say is to test the adsr once the patch is loaded up. bypass the pitch block and hit a few chords. you should hear the pick strike. if you don't, you'll need to tweak the threshold of the adsr, so go to controllers and play with the threshold value until you hear the pick strike every time you play a new chord.
 
Have you tried this approach with downtuning 6-7 semitones? As in a baritone? For me, that is the major test of the pitch block
 
the pitch block does what it does. this won't improve it's performance. it's simply to let a bit of dry attack come through to disguise the latency.
 
Can't wait to try it. I have a -1 block in every preset, for those few songs that we drop for. The droptune pedal didnt cut it. Just felt fake. The axe2 default actually feels better than that pedal and since it saves bringing another guitar for one song, it's good enough. But-this might make good enough a little better ;)
 
I'll try it, thanks again Simeon! Should this work just as well with the Ultra? I assume it would...
 
yes, i don't see why not. set the adsr up so mode=once, attack is at min, decay is at about 2.5ms, sustain and release at min. retrig=on, threshold at about -35db. you might want to increase the level of the volume block that's running in parallel if the attack noise is too quiet.
 
It depends very much on how you set the threshold in the ADSR controller. Unfortunately, the ADSR controller has only one threshold which you can/have to cross in order to trigger the sequence AND to set it back to the beginning. It would be much easier if there were two thresholds - one for crossing from higher to lower volume (you would assign this one to setting it back to the beginning of the sequence) and one vice versa (this one would have to be assigned to actually starting the sequence).
Maybe extending the ASDR controller would be some good topic for the wish list? It not only limits the described application but many many more... What do others think?

Another ASDR shape would be to set all parameters to around 1ms and the level to 100%. But you wouldn't probably notice a difference anyway... ;-)
 
i agree.

would it be possible to achieve the same effect with the gate? i never use it, so i'm not really familiar...
 
Very clever!

I do a lot of tricky stuff about effects' mix controlled by pitch and envelope, ADSR is even better for some applications.

Thank you simeon.
 
i agree.

would it be possible to achieve the same effect with the gate? i never use it, so i'm not really familiar...

I reckon this could work.... could be better than the ADSR too...
just allow the attack through and then kill everything...

but just like the ADSR, the gate needs a 'note end' or drop in level to re-trigger

what about two gates.... one to side chain control the other???
where one is not 'heard' in the preset... it is simply a 'ghost' [so this parallel audio path never makes it to the output] used for control
 
just tried the gate and it doesn't work. the good thing about the adsr is, that it runs it's cycle even if the incoming audio stays above the threshold, so you just get a tiny slice of the attack. the gate stays open until the audio goes below the threshold, which is no good. i don't know how you'd get a sidechain to work, myself..
 
what we need may be to find a way to shape the way the gate behaves via something else

the prob though is significant....
because for example...
when speed picking or using legato, the note after the attack can be just as loud as the attack itself

so the prob list is:
- being able to detect the start of each note
- having done so, being able to only allow 1ms or 2ms to sound and then kill it

this may need a few stages of processing
I do think that some side chaining solution could unlock this....
but I need to think about how to detect / discriminate the note starts from everything

hmmmm....... I wonder if an expander [used as a ghost so it has no output] in parallel could accentuate / exagerate the note starts..
if so.. this could provide the source audio for a side chained gate
so the gate is only open for these "exagerated" note starts.. and then the gate closes [hold = 0, release = 1ms or 2ms]
the gate's thresh is controlled via the side chain


just thinking aloud...
 
This could work but only if the ghost gate can control the sound path. Maybe this is done via this ominous 'sidechaining' but I do not understand the principle...
 
what we need may be to find a way to shape the way the gate behaves via something else

the prob though is significant....
because for example...
when speed picking or using legato, the note after the attack can be just as loud as the attack itself

so the prob list is:
- being able to detect the start of each note
- having done so, being able to only allow 1ms or 2ms to sound and then kill it

this may need a few stages of processing
I do think that some side chaining solution could unlock this....
but I need to think about how to detect / discriminate the note starts from everything

hmmmm....... I wonder if an expander [used as a ghost so it has no output] in parallel could accentuate / exagerate the note starts..
if so.. this could provide the source audio for a side chained gate
so the gate is only open for these "exagerated" note starts.. and then the gate closes [hold = 0, release = 1ms or 2ms]
the gate's thresh is controlled via the side chain


just thinking aloud...

just tried this and couldn't get it to work..
getting that amount of control ended up destroying the audio..
 
it's a very fine line - the tolerances and timings are very small

the adsr thing only just about works...
 
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