Sharc Timbre Database

[ian-s]

While browsing the web I came across this archive from 1994. I was curious what the text based spectrum files would look/sound like so I set myself a weekend project to create a web front end.

Please only try if you have a recent browser.

Sharc HTML5 front end

If you change the url in the browser to end with .zip, you can download the original archive which contains more information from the creator.

I tried to contact Gregory for permission but was unsuccessful.

I have posted it here in case others might find it useful or interesting.

[blue hell]

Cool! Thanks for posting this Ian.

Will see what I can do with the zip as well :-)

[ian-s]

Cool, I did see references that someone had made a csound module called load sharc.

A few of the waves sound unexpectedly good for a single cycle. The spectrum data is normalized so that the loudest harmonic is at 0dB, so some waves clip after the ifft.

I can't decide between normalizing or reproducing the original wave level as stored in the contents table.

There are also some missing notes, due to missing entries in the sample set.

[blue hell]

Yeah, the the readme had some info on all that. Was thinking that maybe I could make interpolations, also for gliding notes maybe. Tested your web interface on it, and indeed heard some nice sounds.

[Antimon]

Interesting!