GENERATORS

Sytrus - Working with the Harmonics Editor

The operators in Sytrus contain a feature rich harmonics editor where you can define the oscillator shape with 128 harmonics, either drawing the harmonics manually or by analyzing external samples.

Basic Harmonic Editing

This graph allows you to enrich the operator shape with frequencies that are harmonic to the operator base frequency. After the mix is calculated, the shape amplitude is normalized to 100%.

The first top row sets the amount of harmonics mixed with the shape (order increases from left to right). Left-click and drag inside the row to add harmonics to the shape. Right-click and drag to draw 'lines' inside the graph. Alt+click to reset the harmonics levels to neutral position. The scale of the amplitude levels is logarithmic, which helps with you need to add small amounts of a harmonic to the oscillator.

You can notice some of the harmonic levels are darker - they mark the octaves offsets for editing convenience (+1, +2, +3 octaves etc.).

NOTE: Please note that the full number of harmonics in the editor are 128, which you can access with the horizontal scrollbar at the bottom of the graph (only the first 60 harmonic levels are visible at a time).

The second row sets the harmonic phase (time offset in the range of one oscillator cycle). These parameters have meaning only if the corresponding harmonic has a level higher than 0.

• ALL / ODD / EVEN - At the bottom of the graph you can notice three switches. They allow you to quickly lock the odd/even harmonics so you can edit the rest. To edit all harmonics, click ALL.
• SMOOTH - The smooth command applies smoothing to the levels in the harmonics editor (averaging the levels with the neighbors). When the odd/even harmonics are locked, only they will be smoothed (however, still all harmonics are considered when computing the average values to apply.
• Additional Commands menu - Click the arrow at the bottom right corner for a set of useful commands related to working with the harmonics.

Additional Commands menu

• Convert shape to sine harmonics - The default shape as set in each operator's shape settings is a sine shape. This makes working with harmonics easier and more predictable. You can use this command to convert an oscillator with non-sine shape to the closest version represented with a sine wave. If the shape is already a sine, this command has no effect.
• Analyze Shape File - You can analyze ("import") an external sample as an oscillator shape using this command. Please note the following restrictions: the sample needs to be an oscillator shape ("single cycle" sample), as opposed to sample playback in samplers. Also, keep in mind that no actual wave sample is importer. Rather the harmonics of the sample are analyzed and imported as harmonic settings in the harmonic editor. If the sample is too long and/or complex the import might not be accurate.
• Transpose One Octave Up - This command "multiplies" the position of the harmonics to shift them up with an octave. Keep in mind information is lost in this manner (for all harmonics and the high end which go out of range /above 128'th harmonic/).
• Shift Left/Right - Shifts the harmonics one position to left/right.
• Attenuate Gibbs Phenomenon - Applies techniques to attenuate the gibbs phenomenon as a preprocessing step applied to the harmonic levels. There's also a runtime "gibbs attenuation" option you can use, found in the Main Panel. The "gibbs phenomenon" causes "wiggles" (ringing) around the point of transition in oscillators with sharp transitions (discontinuous line). You can learn more about gibbs phenomenon on the internet.
• Copy/Paste - Allows you to copy the harmonic settings for an oscillator and paste it on another oscillator. The paste has several modes: Replace - the "classic" way to paste - the old data is replaced by the clipboard; Add - sums the existing harmonics with the clipboard; Subtract - subtracts the clipboard levels from the existing levels; Multiply - Multiplies the existing harmonic levels with those in the clipboard; Blend - sums the existing harmonics with the clipboard at 50%;