help!! poly evolver sequencer seems to be inverted!!

matttech · Joined: Jul 09, 2009 Posts: 11 Location: uk

i have an annoying issue:

the sequencer's control over adsr times seems to be inverted - so that, if you have the attack set at 0, turning up a step on the seq has no effect. however, if you set the attack to a higher value, turning up the knob on a certain step makes the attack shorter. WHY????it's all backwards. none of the other sequencer functions are backwards (well, out of the ones i've tried so far...)....so, the filter/pitch will go higher with a higher knob position.....but envelope times go DOWN

obviously, if you start off with an attack at zero and try to modulate it from the sequencer, it has no effect when you turn the knobs up, as it is trying to make the time even shorter (which is impossible). so you have to turn up the attack time on the adsr, and then for all the steps where you want the attack to be at zero, you have to set the knobs at +99....and for all the steps you want it longer, set the knobs at 0. this is barmy....

helpppppppp!!!!!!!!! my students are gonna be seriously lost (i have to teach this next year)

i can get round it by using one of the "modulators" slots and selecting a sequencer row as the source ....and sending it to control an adsr time, but set to "-99" (rather than +99)....this undoes the inversion and higher knob positions produce longer times

Antimon · Posted: Thu Jun 09, 2011 11:25 am Post subject:

Just tried it out on my PEK - yeah it works as you say. A higher value on a sequencer step makes an envelope time shorter, if it is set as the destination for that sequencer. So you'll have to turn up what you're modulating to notice an effect.

Just the way it is. What kind of students are you tutoring? If they've never messed around with sequencers I don't see why this should be less intuitive than the other way round, though the optimal way would be to have each step able to go negative I guess.

/Stefan

matttech · Joined: Jul 09, 2009 Posts: 11 Location: uk

matttech · Joined: Jul 09, 2009 Posts: 11 Location: uk

blue hell · Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2011 4:56 am Post subject:

Clavia used to have that on the NM Classic, ADSR modulations going up shortened the time for AD and R, but would still let S go up. Actually I thyink there to be some logic in this ... in that when you take the control for pitch and apply that to AD or R modulation higher pitch would make shorter notes - which is sort of what happens on natural instruments too.

Anyway, they changed that for the G2 and I still think that they made a mistake there.

Antimon · Posted: Fri Jun 10, 2011 5:20 am Post subject:

OK, if you put it that way... Wink

I can see the point in having it this way though, in the absence of negative values in the sequencer. Say you want to vary a sequence between having no or little release to varying release times - you can do that with this setup, just tweak the general VCA release knob (for example). If sequencer steps made release times longer insteda of shorter you wouldn't be able to do it. I personally can see a greater use of this behaviour than if you could only tweak release times upwards, with VCA release at full resulting in all notes having endless release time (which is less useful than no release time, but maybe that's just me).

I guess the DSI design here involves a simple sequencer with as few controls as possible, and if it doesn't do the job for you you can always use a mod.

Maybe the answer to your problem is that an Evolver isn't the best synth to teach syntesizer basics on. Smile

/Stefan

Edit: I should have included a quote - this is a response to three posts up