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SuperCollider - A real time audio synthesis programming language

7 points by toni 17y ago

anigbrowl 17y ago
I am a huge fan of such tools and have been using various different ones for a long time. Supercollider is one of the best...but like Max and Pd, it really needs a graphic makeover. It is possible to do this without compromising flexibility, as proved by Reaktor and even more impressively, by SynthMaker, which manages to provide (relatively) quick audio gratification from an engineering standpoint but is also hacker friendly (just add a code module and hack away inside your own scope). SC is for certain the most open and extensible of all these systems, though, and is certainly more fun to get to grips with than CSound. However, I wonder to what extent the code-first audio environment is really useful for learning, teaching, or hacking about with audio synthesis. Certainly one wants quick access to the code level if one is serious about DSP; on the other hand, these kinds of environments are not such a good way to get a feel for audio, since th code level puts a big layer of abstraction between you and the sound. The 'knobs, switches, and modulation cords' approach used by most commercial products may seem quaintly nostalgic for the days of big analog modulars, but it's actually very efficient. There's also ChucK, which I haven't got around to playing with but really like the look of its clean code, and Impromptu (ditto) which looks awesome but is evil because it only runs on Mac and I'm a PC. By the way, Ableton's Live (a very very capable audio workstation package) will be getting Max/MSP integration later this year, which is a Big Deal if you like low-level synthesis. Sorry for the long post, this used to be my professional area but I could never figure out how to make money out of my love of producing quirky and interesting sounds :-/
- jules 17y ago
  > I could never figure out how to make money out of my love of producing quirky and interesting sounds The thing that immediately came to mind while listening to these SuperCollider examples is sounds and music for computer games.
  - anigbrowl 17y ago
    Yeah, but I don't really know any game programmers, ads for sound designers were rare, and when they did exist they wanted you to have a degree or so (which I don't). So I went into film sound instead, then to producing. I have no idea how all the people who do 'sound installations' and so forth (most of which don't engage me very much) get famous enough to charge high $. I'm not really the self-promoting type, though.
- anigbrowl 17y ago
  Follow-up; the latest version of Max (5) is a lot more usable. I was thinking of v4 when I wrote the above.

7 points by toni 17y ago

I am a huge fan of such tools and have been using various different ones for a long time. Supercollider is one of the best...but like Max and Pd, it really needs a graphic makeover. It is possible to do this without compromising flexibility, as proved by Reaktor and even more impressively, by SynthMaker, which manages to provide (relatively) quick audio gratification from an engineering standpoint but is also hacker friendly (just add a code module and hack away inside your own scope). SC is for certain the most open and extensible of all these systems, though, and is certainly more fun to get to grips with than CSound. However, I wonder to what extent the code-first audio environment is really useful for learning, teaching, or hacking about with audio synthesis. Certainly one wants quick access to the code level if one is serious about DSP; on the other hand, these kinds of environments are not such a good way to get a feel for audio, since th code level puts a big layer of abstraction between you and the sound. The 'knobs, switches, and modulation cords' approach used by most commercial products may seem quaintly nostalgic for the days of big analog modulars, but it's actually very efficient. There's also ChucK, which I haven't got around to playing with but really like the look of its clean code, and Impromptu (ditto) which looks awesome but is evil because it only runs on Mac and I'm a PC. By the way, Ableton's Live (a very very capable audio workstation package) will be getting Max/MSP integration later this year, which is a Big Deal if you like low-level synthesis. Sorry for the long post, this used to be my professional area but I could never figure out how to make money out of my love of producing quirky and interesting sounds :-/

jules 17y ago
> I could never figure out how to make money out of my love of producing quirky and interesting sounds The thing that immediately came to mind while listening to these SuperCollider examples is sounds and music for computer games.
- anigbrowl 17y ago
  Yeah, but I don't really know any game programmers, ads for sound designers were rare, and when they did exist they wanted you to have a degree or so (which I don't). So I went into film sound instead, then to producing. I have no idea how all the people who do 'sound installations' and so forth (most of which don't engage me very much) get famous enough to charge high $. I'm not really the self-promoting type, though.
anigbrowl 17y ago
Follow-up; the latest version of Max (5) is a lot more usable. I was thinking of v4 when I wrote the above.