Bending the Arc granular sampler

Overview

This repository contains three SuperCollider programs that were used in the Bending The Arc project. The Recorder is used to monitor, analyze and record segments from up to 8 input channels. Real-time analysis data can also be sent via OSC for visualization in a separate program. The Indexer creates an index of grains inside the recorded fragments according to their closest MIDI note. The Player is used with a MIDI keyboard to play several granular layers of the recorded material.

Requirements

The program has been tested on OSX, but it should be possible to run it on Linux or Windows. The following need to be installed:

• SuperCollider 3.7alpha1

• SuperCollider Extensions SC3plugins (for the Tartini class): The SC3plugins folder needs to be installed in the directory Library/Application Support/SuperCollider/Extensions/

Make sure to restart SuperCollider or recompile the class library (Language > Recompile Class Library) before starting the program.

Usage

The application has three parts divided into three patches, which need to be executed sequentially over time:

1. corpus_recorder.scd

2. corpus_index.scd

3. player.scd

Before executing the code, configure the path for recordings and index files. Make sure the server is not running before starting each script. Ideally restart the interpreter each time, or start different interpreters in separate terminal windows.

Recorder

Configure the recordings directory. You can start the application by opening corpus_recorder.scd on the SuperCollider IDE. Next:

1. Wait to press start until the meter displays the channel signals from mic input

2. Set threshold level of recording

3. Press start to start recording

4. Press stop to stop recording or wait until total number of available buffers have been recorded.

Indexer

Set "baseName" to the path and base file name for index files. Two files will be created (with temporary backup copies each backupStep files) by appending "_pitch.dat" and "_usable".dat. Run the script and watch for progress in the post window.

Player

Configure the baseName used for indexing and run. The patch will be listening for MIDI notes. Sliders can be set before playing notes for configuring the parameters of three layers.