Morph groups

Afro88 · Posted: Mon May 22, 2006 3:17 am Post subject: Morph groups

Warning: long winded excited pro-G2 post ahead.... Wink

I'm sure alot of you are using the morphs like this already, but I've just started using them this way, so this is a very interesting thing for me... and hopefully others!

I used to use morph groups solely for functional purposes - ie, stereo 3 band EQ's, resonance turning up as the cutoff rises etc.

But for the past few days I've been doing it differently. Basically I start with all 8 groups assigned to knobs, either on the panel or on a midi controller. Then one by one assign each knob to a series of parameters that does something interesting to the sound. For example, turns the pulse width up, turns up the attack on your filter env, turns the filter down on your delay and turns up your distortion a bit. I do this for each knob, differently each time of course, and at the end I'm left with 8 (or more realistically 5 or 6 knobs due to the 25 parameter limit) that each alter the sound in very interesting ways.

I've been getting great sounds this way, because it breaks the whole logical "when I turn this knob, this happens" trap that seems to zap creativity alot of the time. You end up learning how each knob affects the sound, but instead of thinking how it affects in a logical way, you think how it affects it characteristically. So instead of thinking "I'll turn the attack on the amp up to make the sound fade in", you think "I'll turn this knob because it gives it a ghoulish quality". Even better, the morphs usually intersect interestingly and unpredictably and some morphs turned up have a different effect than one at a time. It really makes the patch feel alive when you're tweaking it. I'm amazed at how much this affects synth programming - you end up approaching it in a completely fresh way and achieving sounds you never knew you wanted.

Another technique that came naturally out of the above is when you're careful with your assigning, you can assign 8 knobs that each stay within the bounds of the sound you like, but alter it in interesting ways. For example, I had a nice Daft Punk Homework era lead patch and assigned the morphs as above, and I ended up with a set of controls that alter the sound in cool ways but stay within that lead style. Then I could turn the knobs any way I like and stay within the sound I wanted. It makes fine tuning sounds alot easier, focussed and interesting. It's also great for live playing - you can tweak these unpredictable knobs to your heart's content but still stay within the bounds of your sound. How many times have you cut loose live and tweaked a little too far?

Even cooler, each patch has 8 variations, and each variation has it's own set of morph assigns, giving you 8 characters per patch, each with their own set of relevant controls.

I wish I had one of my patches here to post, but I'm not at my studio computer. I'll post a patch tomorrow morning...

On the downside, more morph parameters per patch would be really excellent, and possibly a "convert current morph levels to knob values and de-assign all morphs" function for when you arrive at your cool sound and want to assign new sound specific morphs. Clavia??

Afro88 · Posted: Mon May 22, 2006 3:26 pm Post subject:

Ok, so I got a little excited last night, but I haven't ever used morphs like this on normal synth patches - only on sequenced drum and noodly patches. Definitely useful for the usual synth instruments too.

Here's a simplistic patch, only 2 variations...

morphbass2.pch2

Description:

Bass patch with morph groups assigned to interesting functions

Download (listen)

Filename:

morphbass2.pch2

Filesize:

2.62 KB

Downloaded:

1376 Time(s)

monobass · Posted: Mon May 22, 2006 3:33 pm Post subject: Re: Morph groups

Afro88 · Posted: Mon May 22, 2006 9:19 pm Post subject:

Yeah that would be very cool. One thing that I do which could help is start with a variation then assign a morph group to knob and turn that knob up to the top. Then when programming, instead of just turning knobs and sliders, double click and assign whatever changes you do to the morph group. Cause the morph knob is turned up full, you hear the changes as you do them, so it's just like normal programming except at the end you can morph back to the original sound at the turn of a knob.