Nooner and Renoon VST Plugins for MIDI to Virtual Control Voltage Conversion
Download

Nooner and Renoon Ranking & Summary

Nooner and Renoon Tags

VST plugin VST plugin conversion MIDI conversion voltage monitor MIDI VST virtual MIDI run VST plugins voltage calculator voltage Voltage Information log voltage voltage control Voltage Regulator input control voltage monitor voltage output voltage Control Voltage Sequencer Control Voltage control VST Voltage converter Voltage Simulation Voltage Drop Virtual Control Voltage VST parameter virtual MIDI interface voltage calculation calculate voltage voltage coefficient study voltage transformer voltage voltage divider plugins vst vst plugins free vst plugins midi conversion software

Nooner and Renoon Description

This package was developed for MIDI to Virtual Control Voltage Conversion. Nooner and Renoon are VST plugins which convert MIDI data to and from "Virtual Control Voltages". A Virtual Control Voltage is simply a VST audio signal path which is being used to carry data other than audio-frequency data intended to be listened to. As in the days of modular analog synthesizers, the patch cords and jacks don't care what the signal is, and some modules can generate or accept low-frequency control signals as well as audible-frequency signals. As an example, consider a frequency-modulated oscillator, such as Borogove's Femme. The signal on Femme's input pin modulates the frequency of its output tone. If the input signal is an audio- frequency signal, the modulation is heard as primarily as an alteration in timbre or as a secondary tone. If the input signal is coming from a low-frequency oscillator (LFO), the modulation is heard as vibrato, a wavering in the pitch of an otherwise-steady tone. In this case, Femme is acting exactly like a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) in an analog synth setup, and the LFO signal is a virtual control voltage. For one reason or another, you might find a plugin that accepts MIDI data, but you want to drive it via the audio signal path, or you might have a plugin that accepts audio signal path data that you would prefer to drive with MIDI. These two plugins are adapters between the two forms of control data. Nooner accepts MIDI events via the VST host's MIDI input system (which in turn usually accepts MIDI events from the OS's MIDI system, which may ultimately get its events from an external MIDI keyboard). It can be set to watch all MIDI channels or a single channel. Each of its 4 output channels is mapped to a single kind of MIDI event: note-on, pitch bend, channel pressure (aftertouch), or one of 63 different control change messages. When it sees a mapped event on an appropriate channel, it sends VST signal data out corresponding to the value of the received event. The 7-bit note number or controller value is mapped to the -1.0 to +1.0 nominal range of VST audio data. Optionally, the data out may be smoothed, as MIDI data rates tend to be fairly low and 7 bits of granularity is not very fine. The fast, medium, and slow smoothing options control how quickly the output value moves to match the new MIDI data. Renoon does almost exactly the opposite. It accepts signal data in via the VST audio signal path, and generates MIDI events up to 20 times per second. Unlike Nooner, it outputs directly to the OS's MIDI system, ignoring the VST host's MIDI subsystem. When Renoon starts up, it enumerates the system's available MIDI-out devices, and presents them via a VST parameter. Unfortunately the current VST plugin user interface in Audiomulch has very narrow text fields, and it can frequently be difficult or impossible to see the difference between "MIDI Yoke Junction 1" and "MIDI Yoke Junction 2", for example. Renoon has a few other differences from Nooner. Output goes to only one MIDI channel at a time -- there's no "Omni Out" to correspond to Nooner's Omni In. Pitch bend, aftertouch, and control changes may be sent, again, with the user selecting the message for each signal, but note-ons are not sent from Renoon. Finally, since Renoon can accept either audible-frequency signals or low-frequency control signals, the smoothing modes work slightly differently. With smoothing off, the exact signal value on each input port is converted to a MIDI event 20 times per second. In this case, if the signal is low-frequency (under about 10 Hz), a reasonable approximation of the low-frequency waveform will be output via MIDI, but if the signal has high-frequency content, the MIDI output data will be heavily aliased at best or effectively random at worst. In smoothing mode, the approximate amplitude envelope of the sound will be tracked instead of the waveform's exact value at any given time. With smoothing off, the nominal -1.0 to +1.0 signal range is mapped into 0-127 MIDI data values. With smoothing on, the amplitude envelope's range of 0.0 to +1.0 is mapped into 0-127 MIDI data. If the input signal is very low frequency and smoothing is set to fast, this essentially means the absolute value (or half-wave rectification) of the input signal will be output instead of the real value, which may not be what you expect.

Nooner and Renoon Related Software