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The Mighty Phobass!

P

pyrohaz

Apr 28, 2009
102
3
Cheshire, UK
#1
Hey guys, I made a post a couple of months back seeing if anyone would ever be interested in purchasing a real bass synthesizer (as in a bass guitar... synthesizer!), I don't know if basses is the correct section but ah well, move if necessary!

After going through with my idea, its finished!

At the moment, feature list is:

  • AR VCA Envelope
  • Completely touch sensitive, no such strings!
  • 12 timbres, including all simple waveforms present on nearly all synthesizers (Square, saw, triangle and sine)
  • 7-bit audio synthesis
  • Output to a 6.3mm jack (Like the majority of bass guitars!)
  • Runs off 1x 9v battery.

With the bass ever improving, i've documented the progress on my youtube channel, you can see the videos there.

It started as an ugly square based chode, but a simple video demonstrating the ideas:


I'm still to make some video's showing the VCA envelope and the low pass filter (Haven't even made the PCB for such yet!)

But I thought i'd spread the christmas joy of my project to Talkbass!

Hope you guys have the time to take a quick look :)

Cheers,
 
#2
You are obviously a very competent bass player and electronic engineer. Very impressive.

However I hear the sound produced is comparative to early '80's game console sound synthesizers.

Has applications for today's electronic pop music. Needs work to produce a true bass experience.

Please continue your development. I am anxious to hear what new inovations you create.

Great job!
 
#5
Very, very interesting and I could totally use this once I learned to play it. I cover mostly songs where the original bassline is some sort of looped sample or synth. It does have a very 80s synth sound, but add some effects afterwards (ideally, a second person with a laptop running some VSTs) and it could nail Eurotrance or techno or anything else you needed.
 
#6
I am liking where you are going with this bass. One design that I would suggest though.
Once you get it all working properly, it would mechanically feel better for the player to have
the finger board or virtual strings in line with the fretboard and neck of the instrument
as you would be if you were actually playing a real stringed bass. I am sure that would add
a realistic feel to it. Also move the electronics around a bit like the lower bottom of the body
where most basses have the volume and tone control knobs. You can then get the finger board and
neck to line up. I gotta say the sound effects are great.
 
#8
Thanks for the feedback guys!

pklima said:
Very, very interesting and I could totally use this once I learned to play it. I cover mostly songs where the original bassline is some sort of looped sample or synth. It does have a very 80s synth sound, but add some effects afterwards (ideally, a second person with a laptop running some VSTs) and it could nail Eurotrance or techno or anything else you needed.
Click to expand...
Yeh, its still work in progress at the moment, by the end I hope it to be a bit comparable to a simple analog monosynth (obviously we're not talking Minimoog here but hopefully that general area) so that would mean adding filter envelopes and lfo's and all that sort of jazz. On the other hand, playing it through a flanger pedal sounds absolutely sweet! Along with the standard distortion pedals, the triangle wave setting sounds awesome, that kind of phat asymmetrical jungle'y bass tone :P

brianerwin said:
I am liking where you are going with this bass. One design that I would suggest though.
Once you get it all working properly, it would mechanically feel better for the player to have
the finger board or virtual strings in line with the fretboard and neck of the instrument
as you would be if you were actually playing a real stringed bass. I am sure that would add
a realistic feel to it. Also move the electronics around a bit like the lower bottom of the body
where most basses have the volume and tone control knobs. You can then get the finger board and
neck to line up. I gotta say the sound effects are great.
Click to expand...
My main aim was that it was essentially playable like a normal bass without a large learning curve, unfortunately that means plectrum players are a tad screwed (Sorry!) but finger wise, its surprisingly easy! If you imagine with your left hand that your finger is on the string, and you press the correct string strip with your right hand, its much easier to play than one would think.

I'll keep you all updated on the progress, if I manage to use it in a band scene successfully, it may soon be the future of synth bass!
 
#9
Very nice. When I clicked I really expected to get a quick laugh out of the post. You've really done some serious stuff here.

I owned and tried to make musical use of the Roland G707 (i think), the funky looking guitar and monster pedal board. It never did track much better than what I see you doing. Also, I had to put up with that janky guitar while playing it! What I like about what you've done is that you did away with the problem of detecting a vibrating string's frequency and converting it to digital, and, I think, just replacing it with a contact switch setup. And it looks like a system that could be installed on any bass, as long as you are willing to leave the strings off of it.

So what I'm seeing is that scale length doesn't matter, hand alignment doesn't matter, and the fingerboard could really be one "string" wide and shaped like a wet noodle. In fact, a guy could take a 5 string bass, leave off a string on one end or the other, and have the contact pads in place of that string.

Here are my thoughts on how I'd like to see it as a product. I don't want to have to buy a whole bass since I've probably got more than one already. I'd like to buy the left hand pads, the right hand key pad, and the synth box to install on my bass. I'd like to be able to buy additional FB pads and keypads for different basses. If it's practical I'd like the synth box to be off-board like an effects pedal. A midi out would be cool for some, but I'd like to see that as optional. I think it would also be cool as a finished product (bass shaped thing) but I think it would be better to wait until any bugs are worked out.

I don't know how the creative commons license thing works, but this would be a really cool open-source project to share with some smart folks.

I'd love to buy a kit from you, either assembled to install on a bass or in kit form. I really could work from a schematic and parts list if you want to go that way with it. Let me know when you're ready. I'll send you a PM.

Congrats. This is a really nice thing you've put together!
 
#11
grisezd said:
Very nice. When I clicked I really expected to get a quick laugh out of the post. You've really done some serious stuff here.

I owned and tried to make musical use of the Roland G707 (i think), the funky looking guitar and monster pedal board. It never did track much better than what I see you doing. Also, I had to put up with that janky guitar while playing it! What I like about what you've done is that you did away with the problem of detecting a vibrating string's frequency and converting it to digital, and, I think, just replacing it with a contact switch setup. And it looks like a system that could be installed on any bass, as long as you are willing to leave the strings off of it.

So what I'm seeing is that scale length doesn't matter, hand alignment doesn't matter, and the fingerboard could really be one "string" wide and shaped like a wet noodle. In fact, a guy could take a 5 string bass, leave off a string on one end or the other, and have the contact pads in place of that string.

Here are my thoughts on how I'd like to see it as a product. I don't want to have to buy a whole bass since I've probably got more than one already. I'd like to buy the left hand pads, the right hand key pad, and the synth box to install on my bass. I'd like to be able to buy additional FB pads and keypads for different basses. If it's practical I'd like the synth box to be off-board like an effects pedal. A midi out would be cool for some, but I'd like to see that as optional. I think it would also be cool as a finished product (bass shaped thing) but I think it would be better to wait until any bugs are worked out.

I don't know how the creative commons license thing works, but this would be a really cool open-source project to share with some smart folks.

I'd love to buy a kit from you, either assembled to install on a bass or in kit form. I really could work from a schematic and parts list if you want to go that way with it. Let me know when you're ready. I'll send you a PM.

Congrats. This is a really nice thing you've put together!
Click to expand...

Thanks a lot! I see what you're saying actually, originally I had designed it as a stand alone project but thats a very good thought about how people may be more willing to convert their own basses into an electronic bass format. While on the topic of midi, I was considering that as one of the future revisions! Kind of offering the product in either stand alone synth format or midi format. I think midi would be pretty cool though, i'm not too sure of how the midi protocol really works as of yet (Always time to learn! I didn't know sample table synthesis before this project haha) The only problem being that at the moment, there is no form of digital velocity sensing (as the VCA is analog and not on the chip) Unfortunately, at the moment due to the fact i'm only using a 16MHz arduino, 7bit synthesis seem the limit as even now, the upper frets sound a tad out of tune! I'll keep you updated on the progress though, with me having uni, it may be summer until the next major revision though!

grisezd said:
Say, what do you get when you touch more than one pad with the left hand? Glitchy madness? That would be cool.
Click to expand...
That is exactly what you get! Some frets allow you to do pulloffs but the majority have a fit and end up playing a note well higher upon the neck that you want! While playing it, you have to make sure that your finger is only on one fret at a time or it ends up sounding really glitchy, as seen in a couple of the vids. None the less, really fun for playing glitchstep and all them crazy genres haha
 
#14
Myself, I'd have no need for Midi, at least not in the forseeable future.

So, you're using arduino? I guess I figured you were going all analog. Very cool. So are the four right hand and 20ish left hand pads discrete inputs to the arduino? Also, are the FB pads simply one per fret, or is there something more complicated going on?

Sorry for all the questions, but I'm really interested in this concept.
 
#16
grisezd said:
Myself, I'd have no need for Midi, at least not in the forseeable future.

So, you're using arduino? I guess I figured you were going all analog. Very cool. So are the four right hand and 20ish left hand pads discrete inputs to the arduino? Also, are the FB pads simply one per fret, or is there something more complicated going on?

Sorry for all the questions, but I'm really interested in this concept.
Click to expand...

Yep, arduino I found was the easiest way to keep the tuning accurate(ish), even though most musicians seem to hate the thought of digital, none of you guys seemed to query the analogueness of the sound which is good! The fret pads are one per fret but since my arduino has limited inputs (only an Uno!) I have multiplexed them from 20 down to 5 (just using a high impedance decimal to binary converter), hence why they glitch if multiple ones are pressed!

The four right hand pads are connected directly to the arduino and read as a binary port, e.g. string E is read as 32, A is 16, D is 8 and G is 4. When none are active, the arduino reads a zero. This is also a high impedance section.

I'm happy to answer! Ask away :)
 
#18
SBassman said:
Really interesting stuff. Great work.

I think the innovation is in the interface, not necessarily the tone generation. I think you need to be getting a patent submitted on the interface.

Very cool.

:bassist:
Click to expand...

Totally agree. I've been interested in this stuff for quite a while and haven't seen something this straightforward, working so well at such an early prototype stage.
 
#19
pyrohaz said:
Yeh, its still work in progress at the moment, by the end I hope it to be a bit comparable to a simple analog monosynth (obviously we're not talking Minimoog here but hopefully that general area) so that would mean adding filter envelopes and lfo's and all that sort of jazz. On the other hand, playing it through a flanger pedal sounds absolutely sweet! Along with the standard distortion pedals, the triangle wave setting sounds awesome, that kind of phat asymmetrical jungle'y bass tone :P
Click to expand...
Exactly, I think you're going in the right direction. Putting some basic filters onboard would be great, but I think just a few basic off-the-shelf stompbox effects can make it sound like a synth in a 2012 or 2013 hit instead of a 1980s one.

If you were in Poland I'd be seriously offering to test-drive this for you at a gig playing electro, reggaeton etc.
 
#20
pklima said:
Exactly, I think you're going in the right direction. Putting some basic filters onboard would be great, but I think just a few basic off-the-shelf stompbox effects can make it sound like a synth in a 2012 or 2013 hit instead of a 1980s one.

If you were in Poland I'd be seriously offering to test-drive this for you at a gig playing electro, reggaeton etc.
Click to expand...

Haha! I'd love to give you a go but the distance might be a bit inconvenient. I'm borrowing a couple of pedals off my mate in the near future with hope so maybe an update video about using it with pedals will be made.

As for now! I've got the third update video which is the inclusion of the Hold switch and VCA. Take a look if you want :)

 

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