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Shark5

Electrical sounding synth based on the physical modelling of a capacitor

(836 Votes)
5.2 (Updated 11 years ago)
559.2kB
February 27, 2008
Reaktor 5 or lower

DESCRIPTION

I wondered how the waveform generated by a capacitor would sound. It should be both smooth and sharp, because it has the shape of a shark fin. One could never get such a shape from filtering the traditional square, pulse or saw. I programmed a core module that integrates an arbitrary one-dimensional differential equation in real-time, and fed it with the parameters of a capacitor circuit. Out came an oscillator that, combined with one standard oscillator and two special filters, sounded really ELECTRIC. Indeed, it is almost impossible to have this synth produce some natural sounds like flute or so. But I like that. Maybe you too...

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Version 5.2:

+ fixed unexpected behavior: Ensemble snapshots differed from the instrument snapshots (the latter included the same names but was corrupt). I copied the ensemble snapshots (one by one, urgh) to the instrument snapshot bank, emptied the ensemble snapshot bank, and set the instrument as master. Now the snapshots are shown in the host and new snapshots are stored in the instrument (and not in the ensemble). This should avoid grief, anger and confusion. (Note: you may want to check the "Linked" option near the snapshot source selector, if necessary.)

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Version 5.1:

+ fixed a bug that caused Shark to sound somewhat dull when in legato mode

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Version 5.0:

+ Polyphonic mode can now be activated in GUI
+ Revamped modulation section with improved routing
+ Improved Glide + Legato
+ Analog monophonic keystroke style (in monophonic mode)
+ Bugfixes
- Only 1 LFO
- Amp AHDSR -> ADSR
- Higher CPU load due to polyphony

The Shark is now polyphonic, but it sounds as great (or even greater) in mono, so those who don't need the poly feature can decrease the number of voices to 1, as in previous versions, to reduce the CPU load. The new old analog mono keystroke style (some call it "legato" but that's not quite appropriate) is very nice for trillers, particularly in combination with the glide function (poly must be switched off). Please report bugs or ask me if something is unclear or misleading.

Hope you enjoy the new version!

PS: For those who own Novation Automap to control their gear with the corresponding hardware (SL MkII), I have included an automap template in the zip file.

COMMENTS  (46)

LenB
3 years ago
As of 2021 and with Reaktor 6, most of he presets on this synth play a semitone flat. Other than that, which can be managed, the sound remains excellent!
CC lines of the acid
12 years ago
I'm sorry for the crappy English, only with an interpreter. downloaded your second ensemble, always cool these oscillators. And the sound is different from most ... I will look at the long white threads in this web :-) Thanks for the ideas!
CC lines of the acid
12 years ago
guys hit hard a normal thing:-0 Thanks Kim!!!
jace cavacini
13 years ago
nice new GUI. still sounds neat. it's one of the few ensembles i actually spent some time making my own bank of sounds for. thanks!
jace cavacini
15 years ago
Excellent sound! Very powerful, lively and charged!! Randomizes nicely, too! THANKS!
Terone Bullock
15 years ago
I really like this one great gui
paul chauncy
15 years ago
Wonderful sound, wonderful interface and I find the randomize feature invaluable for discovering the range of sound it's capable of. A real gem Thank you
Martin Sovinz
15 years ago
Hello, i just doenloaded this synth and will give it a try. One things allready for sure, the gui is great!
Kim Joris Boström
15 years ago
OK - new upload. Sorry for this.
Kim Joris Boström
15 years ago
Another attempt, without brackets and quotation marks. The text should read: ... of the host tempo - in beats per second.
Kim Joris Boström
15 years ago
DAM! What the heck is going on?
Kim Joris Boström
15 years ago
Ha! Also my correction did not upload correctly. Seems the upload server cannot deal with text containing brackets. The text should read: "
Kim Joris Boström
15 years ago
Sorry for the intermediate 3.0 update: The LFO section was still not optimal. Now I think I've found a good and working solution. See the explaining text above. I don't know why the text is corrupted. The ending should read "...
Carlo Pearson
15 years ago
Thanks for the update! I really love this synth. Thank you!
Michael Knowles
15 years ago
It's awesome, thanks.
Christine Webster
15 years ago
cool and the random creates a lot ofa nice noisy stuff !
Chet Singer
15 years ago
Very cool, and very innovative, Kim! The knobs make it a very flexible oscillator. The sound is deep and fat. And I love the scope display you included.
Kim Joris Boström
15 years ago
Jason: very precious soundscapes you make! Just flying on those previews at your site... phantastic!
Jason Bundy
15 years ago
Hi Kim! Thanks for a great synth! I used it on Mother Sky's "Shewstone" (a 40 minute long form drone). http://www.motherskysound.com http://www.jasonjbundy.com
Aaron Zimmermann
15 years ago
really really great synth! use it more and more all the time.
michael huckaby
15 years ago
AMAZING DESIGN.
Robin Barklis
15 years ago
I find myself muting Osc 2 because the one you've made sounds so great - thank you.
Oliver Saherwala
16 years ago
Very good ! Nice sound! Thx!
Kim Joris Boström
16 years ago
Glad to hear that, Michael! I find it endlessly cool that Reaktor ensembles can be recycled so easily in so many ways. I'm really curious about your "ensharked" instruments, so if you happen to upload one, please let me know...
Michael Barker
16 years ago
Just wanted to say thanks again - I love this instrument. I've also been playing with the capacitor macro (and your filters) in other instruments with (to my ear) great (electric) results. Thanks so much for this - and 2.3 is a great update, it just gets better and better!
ant stewart
16 years ago
excellent, I am tempted to convert all the switches into always on mode and then playing music using all the snapshots simultaneously on a crossfader!
Kim Joris Boström
16 years ago
Maaan, I'm just dying! Just checked it out --- it's simply AWSOME! You've created the Shark's (wildest) dream... so much more than a "randomization" .. wait.. got some underwater screams - have to run... Thank you, Rick!
Rick Scott
16 years ago
danke maestro for this engine which i used as the basis for intonaruMori II.
Haris Custovic
16 years ago
Just downloaded this tryed it for 5 min and its awesome. Thanx a lot Kim.
Aaron Zimmermann
16 years ago
WOW! proof that fat-sounding reaktor synths can compete with the fatness of massive! really great synth man! i'll be on the lookout for future releases from you.
Michael Barker
16 years ago
I think this synth, with it's sawing electric character, sounds fantastic - I can't stop playing with it - and as Kimmo pointed out above, it also sounds great in poly (tweak the presets obviously). I like the Gui, but will probably strip it down to save on screen real estate, as this a synth I expect to use quite a bit over the next while.
Jamie Maloney
16 years ago
This is what core was made for! What a wonderfully unique synth.....it's so great to see something this new and useful pop up! This is an excellent response to naysayers that state that Reaktor doesn't have any more tricks up it's sleeve.
Kim Joris Boström
16 years ago
Oh yes, the knobs are taken from Bernd Keil's collection "KN knobs 011". Great stuff! Guess it's quite some work to make these designs, thanks Bernd!!!
Der Einmeier
16 years ago
didn't give it a try yet, but where a the knobs from..? like 'em very much, especially i do love the way you implemented these knobs touching other gui-parts slightly: very nice design.
Kim Joris Boström
16 years ago
Just uploaded version 1.1. Older Snapshots should be (almost) compatible. Hope you like the additional functions and the new skin..? Thank you all for so much encouraging!!! @rick: I'm very interested in your randomization function. If you happen to create one for the Shark, would you please let me know? Should be uploaded for everybody.
Ashley Marians
16 years ago
great sound. thankfully someone can get their head creatively around core to produce something simply creative such as this.
Thomas Young
16 years ago
Thank you, I agree, its a great sound
Christopher Soulos
16 years ago
Actually very good. I'm constantly surprised. I'm kind of glad Reaktor sounds like Reaktor. It's what makes Reaktor. And that's why we all like it.
Ernst Collin
16 years ago
this synth makes a great sound!
Michael Dörfler
16 years ago
sounds really good, kim! i´m glad that there are people spending time on building better or different sounding oscilators and filters. this expands the spectrum of what you can do with reaktor and proves all the people wrong saying that "reaktor always sounds like reaktor..." thank you :))
Kim Joris Boström
16 years ago
I'm very glad you like it! It was quite some work to get the ODE running so that the capacitor would not overload or run out of sync. Particularly the anti-aliasing was difficult. At last, I found some trick, but it does not work for extreme "sym" and "asym" values. I didn't find any free documentation on anti-aliasing in the web, does anyone have a link or a pdf or something? @rick: that might be cool indeed, especially for the noise department! Ah, and I forgot to mention the "tube" overdrive, which has come out of some theoretical reasoning; I don't know how "realistic" it sounds, maybe it doesn't, but for the Shark it seems to do its work. Any feedback or improvements are very welcome! Kim
Kimmo Kivelä
16 years ago
It seems to work poly aloso, just give more voices, but it consumes RAM so careful. Really good deep classic sounds.
Chris R Gibson
16 years ago
Very cool concept and implementation. Thanks Kim. and to Rick: "i'm afraid i'm going to need to add randomization/randomation to this. ;-)" The world would simply not be good and right if you didn't ;-)
Rick Scott
16 years ago
very cool. i'm afraid i'm going to need to add randomization/randomation to this. ;-)
Paul Harding
16 years ago
it sounds just like a valve radio distorting between stations wonderful i love this synth. thanks kim first class and a solid 10
rainer Ehrenberg
16 years ago
klingt sehr gut, danke rainer
now