I think I'm making progress with learning vcvrack. Instead of making sounds that sound "terrible", I got it making sounds that sound "merely ok" :D

I'm a little confused over whether the proper way to euro rack is to build your sounds painstakingly out of the fundamental primitives of sound design, or if the proper way to euro rack is to slap in a bunch of black box modules with names like "solar rain" and "winter light" and call it a day 🤔

@aeva why not both?

@aeva you might want to try BespokeSynth, it’s a more minimalist, abstract spin on the idea. it takes a 5 minute video to learn its interface design

@uint8_t well part of the idea of learning vcvrack is I want to learn the fundamentals before diving into the exciting and expensive world of eurorack modules. I figure it's nice hobby I can do away from the computer, in theory. Hardware synths, that is.

@aeva I’m personally approaching it with the idea of semi-randomly patching stuff to each other until it starts to sound like something new. Might be I’m earlier in the learning curve than you though, I’m sure this approach won’t yield unique sounds forever.

@neon I've been alternating between following tutorials and just messing around.

@aeva the proper way is to just do whatever you want and enjoy the bleep bloops

@wen I don't know how to do the thing I want though

@aeva in a way, a black box is a primitive

@aeva My approach (as a vcv rack user looking to buying my first modules) is to think in terms of functions and modulations. For example some LFOs might be pushed into audio frequencies and work as VCO too.

I don't know which black box modules are you referring to but it might help breaking them down into "sub-modules" with clear functions?

Interested into your experience with eurorack if you ever end up buying something.

@aeva I've found the engineering mindset of "I know what I want so now I need to learn how to make it" a bit of a curse in eurorack, actually. I've found the primitives are often not what I think they are, and their interactions turn quickly into surprises, even after I study their theory. This is frustrating if I have a very specific goal in mind. I've found I'm happiest when I sit down with a *general* goal in mind, try things to get close, and enjoy what I hear along the way.

@aeva Lots of people slap together opaque modules, skip the theory, and have great results. Personally I need some theory, and I need to balance it with sometimes setting aside the theory to just explore and listen. The "buy these modules and go" mentality doesn't work for me at all. It frustrates me that so many of tutorials are focused on bootstrapping that approach and then selling ever more opaque modules.

I've found a few resources that work better for me if you're interested.

@epilanthanomai i am interested

@aeva surprisingly, somehow I now have very strong opinions on what the "solar rain" should sound like...

@gkrnours deep

@viraptor i want to play the solar rain

@essojadojef not referring to any in specific, just seems like there's a lot of opaque stuff with tantalizing names and visual aesthetics

@essojadojef I'm probably going to buy a minibrute in a few months as my starting point since that is eurorack compatible and seems like a nice variety of functionality to start with

@aeva @essojadojef I can’t wait till vcvrack stops segfaulting on my machine 😭

@aud @essojadojef great news once it does because I pushed a change to mollytime to add it to the midi device search list :)

@aeva @essojadojef … OH. I guess that day is today. Nice.

@aud @essojadojef glory to trankind :D

@aud @essojadojef btw unlike TiMidity++, vcvrack is astonishingly low latency, which makes mollytime useful without expensive external hardware

@aeva @essojadojef AH, NICE!

I’m very happy with pipewire in this respect; it’s odd, but I’m having a genuinely good experience with all audio on linux lately. Extremely low latency, everything is working, integrates nicely with pulse’s garbage, etc. I did have to re-align a vocal track the other day but only by like, you know, a very very tiny amount and that’s the only thing I’ve noticed so far.

@aud @essojadojef alsa has never wronged more though, so I just try to do as much as I can in alsa instead.

@aeva @essojadojef I hate how much of a freaking crapshoot the whole thing is.

Are you using an audio interface? Admittedly I’m not using the actual sound card sound card since it’s all USB (even the microphone). The integrated DAC on this motherboard is, of course, like most others, static-y garbage.

@aud @essojadojef yeah. i'm using an arturia "audiofuse 2", which is supposed to be pretty good about latency

@aeva @essojadojef if I get to the point where I need something like that, I wonder if my pipewire tune will go sour…

@aud @essojadojef I don't think it's the problem

@aeva @essojadojef I don’t think so either; I just meant maybe pipewire shits the bed at a certain point or with some devices. I’d think if anything, that setup would be more likely to work.

@aud @essojadojef oh yeah that makes sense. a nice thing about the audiofuse btw is I can monitor the line in by mixing it directly with the line out from the computer into the line out to the headphones without a round trip to the computer, so I've just been using that to monitor everything coming off the synths

@aeva Fun! Did you do it by digging up one of those ancient formant tables, or twiddling with FM until it magically happened, or some other fun third way?

@Farbs messing around with FM until it sorta works out :D

@aeva the proper way is to buy more products. hypnosis voice ~buy more products~

@raeaw tbh most of the appeal is making my own modules

@aeva How are you with YouTube? I really appreciate this channel: https://www.youtube.com/@MonotrailTechTalk . He focuses on general principles and how to build really interesting sounds with general-purpose modules.

I've found a few manufacturers are pretty consistently better about offering high-quality, clear, general purpose modules over opaque flash:
* Doepfer
* 2hp

@epilanthanomai youtube tutorials for music stuff work out well for me. It's helpful to be able to hear what it is supposed to sound like.

@aeva Also, with caveats:
* 4ms (mix of simple and opaque)
* Befaco (mix of simple and opaque)
* Intellijel (mix of simple and opaque)
* Ladik (simple and clear, but sometimes too specific imo)
* Mutable Instruments (retired, but there are good clones)

@aeva Obviously there are some really amazing modules that don't try to be simple and clear. I'm not saying to stay away from them; I have several myself. I'm just saying that if I just want a solid LFO that can do LFO things without big surprises, I'm going to check those companies first. When I want something with a little more flair and surprises, there are other companies I'll look to first :-)