D16 Group PunchBOX User manual

User Manual
23 June 2016,

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OVERVIEW
Overview
Punchbox is an advanced monophonic Kick generang instrument that ulizes overlaying sound sources to produce nal kick tone;
4 generators that can play samples or synthesized sounds. In addion, it oers a number of eects for further processing. The instrument
is supplied with a substanal factory sample and preset content developed exclusively by Sounds of Revoluon and CFA Sound labels.
When the plug-in is running you can see its interface:
Puchbox User Interface
The following funconal secons are available:

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OVERVIEW CONTROL PANEL
Control Panel
Punchbox control panel
Used to manage Master Presets (presets of the enre device) namely their loading and saving. It also manages presets import / export to
exchange them between the users. It controls the default plug-in conguraon, exporng current seng to a wave le and the parameter
randomizaon.
Generators Secon
Generators secon
Controls the secon that produces the sound in Punchbox.

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OVERVIEWEFFECTS SECTION
Eects Secon
Including the Master/Limiter block, which processes the signal produced by generators before it’s sent to the plug-in’s output.
FX secon

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
Descripon of operaon
4 generators that produce the Kick tone components are the heart of the instrument. Their outputs are mixed and sent to the eect
cascade (series), and then to the plug-in audio output. The instrument is monophonic and may respond to the pitch and/or velocity
of the MIDI tones depending on the sengs.
Generators Secon
The generators secon consists of 4 independent modules (generators) which when mixed constute the Kick instrument. Each generator
has a specic funcon in the process:
• Click – Generates the bass drum’s accents; inial, short clicks.
• Tops – Responsible for the delivery of the accent’s sustain (slightly longer tones present typically in the higher frequencies).
• Tools – Addional rumbles, background sounds etc. that accompany the primary tone.
• Kick – Basic/primary tone that is the body of the bass drum.
Click, Tops and Tools generate the auxiliary components of the nal tone. They are based only on the samples. Each of them has
a substanal factory sample bank.
Kick generates the primary tone (body) component. It may serve as a Sampler or Synthesizer (with a few available alternave generator
engines that may be selected). Similarly to the other generators, Kick is also provided with substanal factory content (samples and presets).
The open architecture of the instrument allows you to import the external samples as the user resources.

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
Click, Tops and Tools Generators
Clicks, Tops and Tools generate the auxiliary/side components of the Kick tone. Each generator has almost indencal interface;
Click, Tops and Tools generators
And it is controlled with the following set of parameters:
• Acve/Solo – A LED operang in the toggle mode to acvate the specic generator or other (expect for the specic one) generators
if used with CTRL *
• Volume – The generator’s output volume from -inf [dB] up to +12 [dB].
• Smp. Start – (only for Tools, Tops) species the starng point (oset) from which the sample is played. This parameter can be set from
0% up to 100%, where 0% means that the sample is played from the beginning with the value range referring to the sample duraon.
Apple CMD in Mac OS X

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
• St. Spread – Wider or narrower stereo image of the played sample. The central posion (Normal) is a neutral seng that plays
the sample without processing.
• Panning – (Stereo) panning.
• High Cut - Low-pass lter cut-o frequency. The parameter operates from 2 [Hz] up to 22 [kHz].
• Low Cut - Hi-pass lter cut-o frequency. The parameter operates from 2 [Hz] up to 22 [kHz].
• Decay – Decay me relave to the overall sample duraon. Max means that the decay me is the same as the sample duraon.
• Tune – Relave sample tuning from -6 up to +6 semitones.
• Send (Click send, Top send, Tools send) – Controlling the proporon between the signal sent to the eect cascade and directly
to Master / Limiter (with the eect cascade bypassed). For the minimum value (0%) the whole signal is sent only to Master / Limiter
(Eects). For the medium value (50%) the generator output is sent in half to the eect cascade and in half to Master / Limiter with
the eect cascade bypassed. For 100% the signal is sent only to the eect cascade.
Each generator provides an addional Sample Management subsecon to browse and load the samples from the Factory or User content,
import the user samples and reset the generator sengs.
Generator’s Sample Management secon

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
The subsecon contains the following controls:
• Sample Name – A display with the name of the currently loaded sample, “---“ – if no sample is currently loaded.
• Prev / Next - Used to navigate through the generator sample bank, load the next or previous sample from the bank.
• Browser – Opens the Sample Browser window to browse the available sample bank more precisely e.x. by ltering the results etc.
(the funcon is described in details in the Preset Management chapter).
• Init (Prev + CTRL *) – Restoring the inial generator sengs and deleng a sample from the generator’s memory.
• Reload (Next + CTRL) – Restoring the most recently loaded master sengs (Master Preset) for the generator secon, with the origi-
nal sample loaded if it diers from the current sample.
Kick Generator
Generates the Kick tone body/base and oers a few generator engines that may be selected:
• Sample - A sampler where you can load samples from the substanal factory content and import your own samples.
• 909 – A percussion synthesizer based on kick model available in the TR-909 drum machine
• 808 – A percussion synthesizer based on kick model available in the TR-808 drum machine
• 606 – A percussion synthesizer based on kick model available in the TR-606 drum machine
• Sine - A percussion synthesizer based on the sine waveform with amplitude and frequency modulaon
Apple CMD in Mac OS X

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
A Kick generator with “Sample”, a selected generator engine
Mode allows you to select the generator engine:
Mode parameter

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
Below Mode you can nd the Preset/Sample Management secon
Preset / Sample Management secon of the Kick generator
Used to browse the Factory / User content (samples or presets) for the currently selected generator engine. This secon contains
the following controls:
• Prev / Next – Used to navigate through the sample or preset bank (depending on the selected generator engine) by moving
to the next or previous item.
• Browse – Opens the Sample/Preset browser – for more informaon on the Browser operaon please refer
to the Preset Management chapter.
• Init (Prev + CTRL) – Restoring the inial generator sengs and deleng a sample from the memory if the Sampler is used
as a generator engine.
• Reload (Next + CTRL) – Restoring the most recently loaded master sengs (Master Preset) for the acve generator engine
and loading the sample used in the master preset if the Sampler is used as the generator engine .
• Save (Browse + CTRL) – A funcon available only when the generator engine is one of the synthesizers and used to save the
current engine sengs as a user’s preset.

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
At the boom of the Kick secon you can nd a few common parameters (available regardless of the acve generator engine):
Kick’s common parameters
• Kick Send – Decides on the part of the Kick signal to be sent to the eect cascade and directly to Master / Limiter with the eect
cascade bypassed. For the minimum value (0%) the whole signal is sent only to Master / Limiter (Eects). For the medium value (50%)
the generator output is sent in half to the eect cascade and in half to Master / Limiter. For 100% the signal is sent only to the eect
cascade.
• Velocity – A switch that decides on whether Punchbox should respond to the velocity of the incoming MIDI notes. It is a global
parameter that aects all generators including Tops, Tools and Click.
• Keytrack – A switch determining whether Kick responds to the pitch of the incoming MIDI notes.

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
Generaon Engines
Kick generator allows you to select one of a few available generator engines. You can select them with Mode parameter. When a generator
engine is selected the interface part that refers to the generator engine is changed:
Generaon engine highlighted in the Kick secon

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
Sample
A Sampler allows to use the samples as a sound source for Kick. To use it select Sample for Mode. The Sampler
contains the following parameters:
• St. Width – Wider or narrower stereo image of the played sample. The central posion
(Normal) is a neutral seng that plays the sample with the stereo image unchanged.
• Pitch – Relave sample tuning from -4 up to +4 semitones.
• Sample Start - Denes a starng point from which the sample is played. This parameter can be set
from 0% up to 100%, where 0% means that the sample is played from the beginning.
• Level – Output generator volume.
• High Cut - Low-pass lter cut-o frequency. The parameter operates
from 2 [Hz] up to 22 [kHz].
• Aack – Amplitude’s aack me from 0 [ms] up to 200 [ms]
• Aack Curve - Amplitude aack’s curve - from concave, through linear to convex
• Decay – Amplitude envelope decay me relave to the overall sample duraon. Max means that the
decay me is the same as the sample duraon.
• Decay Curve - Amplitude decay curve - from concave, through linear to convex

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
909
909 is a generator engine that is a faithful TR909 kick emulaon - a classic bass drum used in techno since 1990s.
The panel contains all knobs used in the original device and two addional knobs expanding its sound shaping
capabilies:
• Level – Output volume
• Aack – Inial accent’s volume
• Tune – Decay me of the Kick frequency modulaon (falling envelope)
• Decay – Amplitude decay me
• Pitch – Base frequency
• Tune depth – Kick frequency modulaon (falling envelope) depth

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
808
808 is a generator engine that is a TR-808 bass drum emulaon - a classic electro sound. The panel provides the
following parameters
• Level – Output volume
• Tone – Bass drum aack characteriscs
• Decay –Amplitude decay me
• Sweep Time – Bass drum frequency change rate

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
606
606 is a generator engine that is a TR-606 bass drum emulaon - a typical short electro/hip-hop bass drum.
The following parameters are used to shape the sound:
• Volume – Output volume
• Decay – Amplitude decay me
• Tune – Bass drum tone
• Aack – Inial accent’s volume

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
Sine
Kick tone body generator based on amplitude and frequency modulaon of the sine waveform.
The rst row provides the parameters to control the amplitude envelope:
• Aack
• Hold - From 1 [ms] up to 1[s]
• Decay
The next row provides the parameters to control the oscillator frequency modulaon:
• Start Freq – Inial frequency from 5 [Hz] up to 8 [kHz]
• End Freq – Final frequency from 5 [Hz] up to 115 [kHz]
• Sweep Time – Modulaon rate from 1 [ms] up to 1[s]
The last row provides the parameters to control the amplitude and frequency modulaon characterisc:
• Aack Curve – Amplitude aack curve
• Decay Curve – Amplitude decay curve
• Sweep Curve – Frequency modulaon characteriscs / curve
The last parameter, Level, controls the generator’s output volume.

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
Generator Signal Roung - Send
By using Sends you can determine the proporon of the signal to be sent from each generator to the eect cascade or bypassed, i.e.
Sent directly to Master / Limiter. The Send parameters act as a cross-fader that determines the proporonal relaon between the signal
sent to the eect block and the signal that bypasses this block.
Send controls in the generators secon
The minimum value means that the whole signal of the specic generator is sent directly to Master / Limiter. The maximum value means
that the whole signal is sent to the rst cascade eect. The medium values determine the proporons between these two send variants.
The diagram below presents the topology of the send and direct outputs of the generators connected with the eects secon:

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATION GENERATORS SECTION
Signal ow from Generators through the FX chain
The red line refers to the sent signal ow to the eect cascade. The blue line refers to the unprocessed signal ow (with the cascade
bypassed) directly to the Limiter.
The cascade point where the direct signal (blue ow) is joined may be changed to obtain more complex topologies but it is not the subject
maer of this chapter. For more informaon please refer to the eect block descripon secon.

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DESCRIPTION OF OPERATIONGENERATORS SECTION
Randomizaon
If you lack of inspiraon some of the parameters in the Generators’ secon can be randomized. To open Randomizaon dialog click the
Random buon in the top Control panel:
Random buon