Chipslapper for Reaktor
Chipslapper is a new instrument for Reaktor, here’s what the maker has to say about it:
Sure, the world probably doesn’t need another simplistic, single-osc Reaktor synth, but I made this specifically to mimic the behaviour of so-called ‘chipsamples’ in ProTracker, FastTracker2 and similar trackers.
Traditionally, since the late ’80s, tracked chipmusic has been created by looping short (~32byte) samples which the tracker automatically uses as pitched instruments. Effects are applied using hex commands and more advanced trackers had extended instrument options which emulated the behaviour of basic synths.
Anyway, purely for my own work, I wanted to have a straightforward, cross-platform means of composing using my old tracker styles/technique in newer DAWs like Ableton Live. If it’s useful to any other afficionados, great – but most people will just find it to be a very dull synth that looks like a Reaktor beginner’s project 😉
Features etc:
- Drop the polyphony in Reaktor if you want to emulate XM channel-count limitations, or switch to mono and use the severely restricted delay controls to mimic pattern-delay.
- Vibdepth (pitchmod vibrato) behaves in the FT2 way, with sweep delaying the effect and phase allowing you to turn the triangle waveshape into FT2’s two optional sawtooth shapes.
- Pan has a Random Range control which, when twiddled, means each successive noteon event will be given a random pan position within that range. This is the closest I can be bothered to get to FT2’s pan envelope, as it wasn’t synced with the song anyway…if you want proper panning envelopes for phrases of notes, do them in your DAW!
- One thing which definitely doesn’t appear in FT2 or PT is the pulsewidth modulation. However, I often use a bank of around 8 squarewave samples with varying pulsewidths and then cycle through them over the course of a melody line: the pulsewidth mod emulates *that* trick, which in turn was always supposed to emulate pulsewidth mod 😉
- Chip Waveform – draw it yourself. This is a bit flakey and doesn’t seem to save the shape if you switch waveforms to something else and then back again.
- Chip Sample – I’ve included a single small looping sample which *hopefully* gets included with the .Ens (if not, I need to figure out how), but the idea is just to load in a short sample and then play it like an instrument. Because Reaktor isn’t as limited as PT/FT2, it’s slightly less fun to use…but you can experiment with longer samples too and play around. ‘Select’ chooses between samples in the sample map, so I guess you could load in a tonne of samples and then automate the Select knob in your DAW to get a wavetable thing going on…
- Arpeggiator – There isn’t one. Real musicians write their own arpeggiations; proper oldschool chipmusicians, even more so 😉 But if you’re really keen on abdicating compositional responsibility, your DAW probably has an arpeggiator built in as a MIDI effect. Go nuts!
Download it here.
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