Pockyplocky is a synthesizer that aims to produce sounds inspired by tuned percussion instruments such as xylophones. It uses modal synthesis to achieve this and offers a number of fixed timbres that can be customized with parameters. It is available as a CLAP plugin (althought adding VST3 support is easy).
Pockyplocky is ready for use in the sense that if you know how to compile it, you can use it to make sounds. Personally, for my tastes, I kind of think that maybe the sounds are relatively nice maybe. I hope that didn't come across as overly confident or arrogant. Having said that, the sounds might change in the future and there's as of yet no "stable" release.
It should probably also come with some better building and usage instructions.
- Volume - How loud the output is
- Decay - How long notes ring out (0.1s to 2.0s)
- Timbre - Choose from 8 different instruments
The exciter is what starts the sound. We can start a note with a sharp percussive attack, a mallet strike of configurable hardness or a breath. These options can also be combined. A little bit of breath can add extra dimension to the sound of a Xylophone, for example.
- Strike - Sharp, percussive attack
- Mallet - Softer, more musical attack, responds to dynamics in playing
- Mallet Hardness - How hard the mallet hits (soft to hard)
- Breath Level - Add breathy noise to the sound, can make each note played subtle different, combines well with second voice, can also add brightness
- Breath Attack - How quickly the breath builds up (0-200ms)
- Breath Attack Shape - How the breath attack curves
- Breath Decay - How quickly the breath fades (1-500ms)
- Breath Decay Shape - How the breath decay curves
This synthesizer generates harmonics to simulate various timbres. A mode has a frequency, amplitude and decay. The modes are generally fixed by the timbre selected, but can be slightly customized by these parameters.
- Fundamental Balance - More fundamental tone vs more harmonics
- Sparkle - Causes higher harmonics to sound for longer (or shorter when negative) relative to the fundamental tone
- Wave Folder - Add harmonic distortion and complexity, can help lower notes have more body
- Wave Folder Amount - How much distortion to apply
- Second Voice - Add a detuned second voice for thickness (make-sound-nice)
- Second Voice Detune - How much to detune the second voice
- Second Voice Stereo Spread - How wide to spread the voices in stereo
The synthesizer includes 8 different instrument sounds:
- Xylophone - Classic wooden xylophone sound
- Bass Xylophone - Lower-pitched variant
- Metal Pan - Metallic percussive sound
- Glass Marimba - Glassy, crystalline timbre
- Piano - Piano-like percussive attack
- Wood Blocks - Wooden block percussion
- Steel Drum - Caribbean steel drum sound
- Metal Cup and Badminton Racquet - Surprisingly pleasant
RUSTFLAGS="-C target-cpu=native" cargo xtask bundle pockyplocky --release
cp -r ./target/bundled/pockyplocky.clap /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/CLAP
You need a DAW (such as Reaper, or Bitwig) to use this synthesizer. It does not currently have a standalone or web version.
Currently Pockyplocky does not come with a UI... uh... I mean, Pockyplocky is by design a headless plugin. It will use the default parameter UI as provided by the DAW.
This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 - see the LICENSE file for details.