Awesome
SuperClean
A framework comprising of some basic utilities for use inside of SuperCollider.
Not only can you play back all of your samples without needless hassle in an environment that can grow with you, SuperClean is, in short, a one-stop-shopping-experience for folks who want:
• An MPC,
• a bunch of effects,
• some synths, and,
• a flexible routing system
for the low, low asking price of: free.
Also, on a personal note here, hey, this is what I use to make music with every day. I really love making music and, for me, this makes it way funner.
Go ahead, try it!
What have you got to lose?
Installation
Download the latest release.
Move it to your SuperCollider Extensions folder. The Extensions folder can easily be found by opening up SuperCollider, navigating to the File drop-down menu, and selecting Open user support directory.
Updating
Drag the updated SuperClean folder to the Extensions folder, which replaces the old SuperClean folder and you are done. Make sure this folder is called SuperClean, not SuperClean-something.
Origins and acknowledgements
Julian Rohrhuber built this thing initially,
then I changed some things here and there. I had a lot of help from friends along the way.
What you have here is essentially a shameless ripoff / fork of / homage to SuperDirt.
Marcus Pal initially created \fmx and \add.
mir builds on the work of David Granström, specifically EZConv
which is just amazing.
ixa builds on the work of Nathan Ho.
Huge thanks to Fredrik Olofsson for really cleaning things up with a ton of bugfixes, optimizations and adding
the absolutely life changing ability to read sound files from disk instead of RAM in SuperClean.
Requirements
- SuperCollider v3.9 or above: https://supercollider.github.io/download
- Mos def you should get the entirely essential sc3-plugins: https://github.com/supercollider/sc3-plugins/
Lean is good
I only included a tiny amount of samples inside the clean-samples folder. I did that because that's a lot of data to have to download if you're sharing a very slow wifi connection with 20 other kids who are also trying to get sat up at the same time. Also, fewer dependencies means less things that can go sideways with the install procedure. SuperClean requires no other languages or external text editors to function.
Be free to be you
Here's a way to hot swap samples into RAM as needed:
~clean.loadSoundFiles("~/Downloads/rnb");
If you're in a hurry and typing is a bore this uses fewer chars and is therefore faster:
~clean.lsf("~/Downloads/rnb");
If you don't have a lot of RAM and or you have very long and heavy soundfiles you can cue them from your harddrive instead:
~clean.csf("~/Downloads/drn");
Get your own samples in there! That's what I think everyone should do. That way you'll make this thing your own, and in no time you'll be making your own kind of weird music. This hotswapping strategy also means you don't have to wait around for a bunch of samples to load in to RAM all the time when you need to start over quickly because reasons.
Safe is necessary
Extra care has been to make sure that the filters are only able to accept values in the range of human hearing, 20 to 20000 hz.
This way the filters won't blow up. Also there is a nifty limiter that saves our ears if when things get unexpectedly
loud. This limiter can also be leaned in to on purpose yielding all manner of hawt sound. Be sure to not miss out on the
fun of sending values greater than one to amp.
Start yer engines!
If you don't have anything in your Startup.scd, then how about you put what I use in there:
// make sure you have sc3 plugins installed first
(
//var inOut = Server.default.options;inOut.outDevice = "BlackHole 2ch";inOut.inDevice = "BlackHole 2ch"; //force devices
s.options.numBuffers = 1024 * 64; // increase if you need to load more samples
s.options.numWireBufs = 128; // increase if you get "exception in GraphDef_Recv: exceeded number of interconnect buffers."
s.options.numAudioBusChannels = 2048; // increase if you get "ERROR: Meta_Bus:audio: failed to get an audio bus allocated."
s.options.memSize = 4096 * 256; // increase if you get "alloc failed" messages
s.options.maxNodes = 1024 * 32; // increase if dropouts and the message "too many nodes"
s.options.sampleRate= 44100;
//s.options.blockSize = 512; // default is 64, is good for heavy CPU taks but no input / no feedback stuff
s.options.maxSynthDefs_(10000);
s.options.numOutputBusChannels = 2; // OUTPUT CHANNELS GO HERE
s.recSampleFormat = "int24";
s.recHeaderFormat="wav";
s.options.numInputBusChannels = 2; // set to hardware input channel size, if necessary
s.latency = 0.3;
// MIDIClient.init; // Untoggle this when you want to do MIDI
// m = MIDIOut.new(0); // Maybe yours is different?
// m.latency = 0.3; // This should match s.latency
// thisProcess.platform.recordingsDir = "/your/path/here/"; // choose where supercollider recordings end up
// scnvim
if (\SCNvim.asClass.notNil) {
Server.default.doWhenBooted {
\SCNvim.asClass.updateStatusLine(1, 9670);
}
};
QtGUI.palette = QPalette.dark; // switch to night mode for floating windows like the meter for example.
// A simple triangle wave synth in stereo with panning and a simple low pass filter
// This synthDef was written by Mads Kjeldgaard and requires the sc3 plugins
s.doWhenBooted{
SynthDef.new(\default, {
arg dur, attack=0.01, release=1.0,
t_gate=1, out, freq=442, cutoff=5500,
rq=1, pan=0.0, amp=0.5;
var env = EnvGen.kr(Env.perc(attack, release), t_gate, timeScale: dur, doneAction: 2);
var sig = DPW3Tri.ar(freq: freq, mul: env);
sig = RLPF.ar(sig, cutoff.clip(20.0, 20000.0), rq.clip(0.0,1.0));
sig = Pan2.ar(sig, pan);
Out.ar(out, sig * amp);
}).add;
};
s.waitForBoot {
~clean = SuperClean(2, s); // two output channels, increase if you want to pan across more channels
~clean.loadSoundFiles; // hot swap in samples from anywhere!
// for example: ~clean.loadSoundFiles("~/Downloads/rnb");
s.sync; // optionally: wait for samples to be read
~clean.start([0, 0, 0, 0]); // first 8 out looks like [0,2,4,6]
SuperClean.default = ~clean; // make the clean key sequenceable inside of SuperCollider
"[ SuperClean up + running ]".postln;
};
)
If you do have something in your Startup.scd, then you get to pick and choose which parts of mine you want to add to yours.
If, and only if, you are in that latter category, then proly the only part you for sure want to add in your Startup.scd (or evaluate every time you want to run some SuperClean code) in order for the below code to work on your machine is:
SuperClean.default = ~clean;
which is what makes clean sequenceable from within SuperCollider.
Here's a slightly more involved, yet still minimal version:
(
s.waitForBoot {
~clean = SuperClean(2, s);
~clean.loadSoundFiles;
s.sync;
~clean.start([0]);
SuperClean.default = ~clean;
};
)
Whatsit look like?
Here are some examples of using the Pattern paradigm within SuperCollider to control SuperClean. First there's an example of
using the fmx synth. Further down is an example of sequencing some samples I made with my Micro Modular.
// An example using fmx which is the built in four operator FM synthesizer.
(
Pdef(0,
Pseed(4,
Pbind(*[
type: \cln,
snd: \fmx,
dup: Pexprand(9, 99),
hr1: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) - Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((1 .. 4), inf)),
hr2: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((1 .. 4), inf)),
hr3: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) - Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((1 .. 4), inf)),
hr4: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((1 .. 4), inf)),
mi1: Pexprand(0.0001, 100.0),
mi2: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((0.0001 .. 4.0), inf)),
mi3: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((0.0001 .. 4.0), inf)),
mi4: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pshuf((0.0001 .. 4.0), inf)),
en1: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pexprand(0.0001, 0.555)),
en2: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pkey(\en1) * Pexprand(0.2, 0.666)),
en3: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pkey(\en1) * Pkey(\en2) / Pexprand(0.3, 0.777)),
en4: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pkey(\en1) * Pkey(\en2) / Pkey(\en3) * Pexprand(0.4, 0.888)),
cu1: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pwhite(0.25, 1.0)),
cu2: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pwhite(0.25, 1.0)),
cu3: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pwhite(0.25, 1.0)),
cu4: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(0, 7), Pwhite(0.25, 1.0)),
amp: Pexprand(0.3, 0.8),
dur: Pdup(Pkey(\dup) + Pwhite(2, 9), 2 / Pbrown(5, 19, Pwhite(1, 3), inf)),
legato: Pkey(\dur) * Pexprand(16, 64),
freq: (Pdup(Pexprand(4, 32), 10 * Pexprand(1, 5).round)
* Pdup(Pexprand(1, 64), Pexprand(1, 5)).round
* Pdup(Pkey(\dup), Pexprand(1, 7).round)),
cav: 1,
ca1: Pseg(Pexprand(0.25, 1.0), Pexprand(8.0, 64.0), \welch, inf),
pan: Pbrown(0.0, 1.0, Pdup(Pwhite(1, 3), Pwhite(0.01, 0.1))).trace,
atk: Pexprand(0.01, 4.0),
hld: Pkey(\dur) * 2,
rel: Pkey(\dur) * 2,
crv: 5,
sustain: Pexprand(2.5, 5.0),
])
)
).play
)
// An example of using the sampler, looks for samples in a folder called mmd.
(
Pdef(0,
Pseed(Pn(999,1),
Psync(
Pbind(*[
type: \cln,
snd: \mmd,
num: Pwhite(0, 23),
dur: Pwrand([1/12, 1/3], [9, 1].normalizeSum, inf),
rel: Pdup(Pwhite(1, 8), Pseq([1/16, 1/17, 1/18, 1/19, 1/20, 1/21, 1/22, 1/8, 2], inf)) * Pexprand(0.1, 10.0),
amp: Pexprand(1.0, 8.0),
pan: Pdup(Pwhite(0, 28), Pwrand([Pwhite(0.0, 0.333), Pwhite(0.666, 1.0)], [1, 1.5].normalizeSum, inf)),
lpf: Pwrand([625, 1250, 2500, 5000, 10000, 20000], (1 .. 6).normalizeSum, inf),
spd: Pwrand([
1/64, 1/32, 1/16, 1/8, 1/4, 1/2, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64],
[1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 32, 16, 8, 4, 2, 1].normalizeSum,inf),
shp: Pwhite(0.0, 1.0).trace,
dla: 0.001,
dlf: 0.94,
dlt: 1/2 / Pdup(Pwrand([1, 2, 3], [256, 16, 1].normalizeSum,inf), Pbrown(1, 199, Prand((1 .. 19), inf))),
rin: Pwrand([0,0.05], [9, 1].normalizeSum, inf),
rev: 0.97,
dry: Pdup(Pwhite(1, 9), Pwrand([0.25, 1], [3, 1].normalizeSum, inf)),
hpf: 40,
]), 1, 15,
)
)
).play
)
Refurbishers welcome
SuperClean will work well with lower spec computers. If you'd like to add
and remove sample folders as you go, maybe because you have a slightly older
computer that you found in the tech trash, then this is for you:
~clean.postSampleInfo; // Check which samples are loaded into ram and get some stats on those.
~clean.freeSoundFiles([\rnb]); // Remove a sample folder called rnb.
~clean.postSampleInfo; // Now, the rnb sample folder should be gone.
How does it work?
I guess you could say it's a hack of the event type. You turn on SuperClean, as you might turn on the power for a physical rack containing samplers, synths and effects like this:
(
Pdef(0,
Pbind(*[
type: \cln, // This line turns SuperClean on.
snd: \mmd, // This line plays the first sample in the mmd folder.
])
).play
)
Find more examples of code I have written using this framework in this companion repository called SuperClean-code.
Modify all of the things!!!11
Now I might not be the bestest gun slinger there is round these here parts, but I was able to get this thing corralled, so just goes to show, you can do it too!
If you do end up using this, and modifying it to better suit your needs, I'd love to talk to you about maybe including those changes here. Please get in touch with me through my site.