Modor OS014 User manual

MODOR DIGITAL POLYPHONIC SYNTHESIZER
USER MANUAL - v5 for OS014

Contents
1 Getting Started . . . 1
1.1 Warning................................. 1
1.2 Connections and settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.3 Menunavigation ............................ 3
1.4 Loadingpatches............................. 3
1.5 Savingpatches ............................. 4
1.6 Playingmonophonic .......................... 4
1.7 SafetyMode............................... 5
1.8 Patchinitialisation ........................... 5
1.9 Autosave ................................ 6
1.10 Inspect actual parameter values . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
2 Overview 7
2.1 Structureofapatch........................... 7
2.2 Frontpaneloverview .......................... 8
3 Oscillator section 11
3.1 Using the oscillators . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
3.2 Oscillator waveforms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3.2.1 Sawtooth PWM oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3.2.2 Square PWM oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3.2.3 Triangle PWM oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
3.2.4 Syncoscillator ......................... 14
3.2.5 Additive harmonics oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
3.2.6 Sonar noise oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
3.2.7 Wind noise oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
3.2.8 Arcade noise oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
3.2.9 Sine FM oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
3.2.10 Sine feedback FM oscillator . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
3.3 Whitenoise ............................... 19
3.4 Ringmodulator ............................. 19
iii

4 Filter section 20
4.1 LP/HP/BP/BSfilter........................... 20
4.2 Formantfilter .............................. 22
4.3 Filterconfiguration ........................... 24
4.4 Formant filter Midi CC’s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
5 Amplifier section 26
6 Effects section 27
6.1 Chorus/Flanger effect unit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
6.2 Delayeffectunit............................. 29
7 Modulation section 31
7.1 LFOs .................................. 31
7.2 Sample&Hold.............................. 32
7.3 Envelopes................................ 33
7.4 ModulationMatrix ........................... 36
7.5 PitchModulation ............................ 37
7.6 Amplitude Modulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
7.7 Other popular modulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
8 Tempo synchronisation 41
9 Microtonal scales 43
9.1 Modor scale - quarter tones . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
9.2 JustIntonation.............................. 44
9.3 EqualTemperament........................... 45
9.4 HarmonicRow ............................. 45
9.5 Wilson Hexanies and Dekanies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
9.6 One Note Off-scale ET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
9.7 User scales - Saving user scales . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
10 Menu Reference 48
10.1Load................................... 48
10.2Save................................... 49
10.3Name .................................. 49
10.4InitPatch ................................ 49
10.5Parameter ................................ 50
10.6SystemSettings............................. 51
10.7 Formant Frequencies . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
10.8Tonescale ................................ 53
10.9ChordMemory ............................. 54
10.10SysexDump............................... 54
10.11Menuoverview ............................. 57
11 MIDI Implementation 58
11.1 Midi implementation chart . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
11.2Midicontrollerlist ........................... 60
iv

1
Getting Started . . .
1.1 Warning
Disclaimer This instrument can produce loud noises that can damage your ears and
speakers. Modor Music can never be held responsible for any damage, neither tempo-
rary or permanent, to your equipment, your ears, or the ears of other people around you
including the audience on public or private shows and/or broadcasts.
In practice Pay special attention to the extreme settings of the feedback parameters
in the Chorus/Flanger and Delay effect sections. These can result in sudden loud noise
bursts. Get accustomed to the results produced by it while playing on a low volume,
before you get surprised by it’s effect when playing out loud or during a live gig.
1.2 Connections and settings
Before you can start playing the Modor NF-1 a few connections have to be made.
This chapter is written to help you make the very first connections and some system
settings so that you can immediately start playing your instrument. By following these
instructions, you will have your Modor synth up and running in a few minutes time.
Audio Connections Connect the Modor NF-1 to an external amplifier or mixing de-
vice with an audio cable set via the Left and Right jack connectors on the backside of
the instrument. These are two mono 6mm jack sockets. The external amplifier or mix-
ing device should be switched off before making this connection, and only be switched
on after the connection has been made to prevent damage to the equipment.
On devices with serial number 170000 or higher, you can also connect headphones
to the left audio connector with a 6mm TRS-connector.
1

1.2. CONNECTIONS AND SETTINGS CHAPTER 1. GETTING STARTED . . .
Don’t mistake the left- and right-audio connectors for the sustain- and volume pedal
connectors next to it. These don’t output audio signals, but bear a weak electrical
tension that might damage your audio equipment in some cases.
Midi Connection To play the instrument, it should also be connected to an external
keyboard or (computer) sequencer via a midi connection. Connect the midi-out output
of this external midi source to the midi-in connector on the backside of the Modor
NF-1. On devices with serial number 170000 or higher, there’s also a Midi-over-USB
connector.
Power Connection Finally, the Modor NF-1 has to receive power via the power con-
nector. Connect the adaptor, and turn the volume knob (POW/VOL) on the upper left
corner of the front panel clockwise to get the instrument running. Theoretically, any
center-positive 9V DC-adaptor with 9W power (1000mA) will be sufficient, but there
are many DC-adaptors around providing unstable or even plain wrong electrical ten-
sions. Only use the DC-adaptor delivered with the Modor NF-1 or refer to a specialised
electronics dealer. Damage to the instrument caused by using a wrong adaptor is ex-
cluded from any warranty regulation.
Setting Midi Channel Finally the instrument has to be set to the right midi channel
such that the channel numbers of the external midi keyboard and the Modor NF-1
match. Look up in the midi source device on which channel the midi data for the
Modor is being transmitted, so that we can set the same channel on both devices.
You can find the Midi channel setting in the System Settings menu. Quickly push
the MENU button 6 times to access the System Settings menu (see §1.3 below for
more info on menu navigation). Next, select the system parameter ”Midi Channel” by
turning the SELECT data encoder, and set the correct MIDI receive channel with the
VALUE control [1-16]. Next press MENU again or press NO/DEST to leave the menu.
2

1.3. MENU NAVIGATION CHAPTER 1. GETTING STARTED . . .
1.3 Menu navigation
The menu of the Modor NF-1 exists out of 10 menu items. When the MENU button is
hit you enter the menu, and the first menu item is shown on the upper display line. A
black dot starts running from right to left over the display. By pressing MENU again
before the dot reaches the left side of the screen, the next menu item is selected. If you
stop hitting MENU, after about 1 sec the black dot reaches the left side of the display,
and you enter the indicated menu. Following menus can be entered:
1. LOAD: Load a patch from internal memory
2. SAVE: Save a patch into the internal memory
3. NAME: Give your patch a name
4. PATCH INIT: Initialise the patch
5. PARAMETER: To adapt a few parameters that have no dedicated frontpanel
knob
6. SYSTEM SETTINGS: To set some global system parameters
7. TONESCALE: A number of microtonal options
8. FRMFRQ: Set the formant frequencies of the formant filter
9. CHORD MEMORY: Set up chord memory to play chords with a single key
10. MIDI DUMP: Dump a single patch, a patch bank or the complete patch memory
using Midi Sysex messages
Next, after entering a certain menu, data can be selected and altered using the SE-
LECT encoder and VALUE control. Sometimes you need to validate your choice by
pressing the MENU button again, or you might need to approve or cancel your choice
by using SRC/YES or DEST/NO. While in the menu, on any moment you can press
DEST/NO to cancel and leave the menu. A full item-by-item reference of the complete
menu can be found in chapter 10.
1.4 Loading patches
Hit the MENU button 1 time and wait 2 seconds to enter the LOAD menu. You should
see the following screen: On the first line you see ”LOAD” to indicate you are in
the LOAD menu, on the second line you see the active patchbank and -number and
patchname (of course, possibly with another patchnumber and patchname as in the
example below).
You can now scan through all the available patches in the Modor’s memory using
the SELECT and VALUE controls. You can also fast forward through the patch banks
using the MENU button. Confirm your choice with SRC/YES.
3

1.5. SAVING PATCHES CHAPTER 1. GETTING STARTED . . .
You can push DEST/NO at any time to cancel the load operation and return to the
patch you were using before. This way you can listen to the patches in the memory
without loosing your actual work, and compare your active patch to any patch in the
Modor NF-1’s memory.
Remark: If the ”Load Preview” option in the SYSTEM SETTINGS-menu is OFF,
you won’t hear the patches in memory until you actually load them.
1.5 Saving patches
Saving patches goes identically to loading: now press the MENU button twice within
one second to enter the SAVE menu. Select a slot in the memory using the SELECT
and VALUE controls. This slot will be overwritten with the actual patch and patchname
if you now hit SRC/YES to confirm.
When you play the keyboard during the save operation, you can hear the patch in
the Modor NF-1’s memory that’s about to be overwritten. This way you can check
which memory position can be overwritten before actually doing it.
Hitting DEST/NO at any time cancels the save operation and exits the menu of the
Modor NF-1.
1.6 Playing monophonic
A patch can be set to polyphonic, monophonic or mono-legato modes. This setting is
saved with the patch and restored when a patch is loaded.
Polyphonic You can play up to 8 notes simultaneously. When playing more than 8
notes, the notes that are already in release are dropped first to make room for a
new note, than the oldest playing note.
Monophonic Only one note can be played, the last played note always has priority.
When a note is released, and the previous note is still being pressed, this note is
retriggered.
Mono-Legato Same as normal monophonic, but now the envelopes continue instead
of being retriggered when playing legato notes. Also Portamento only works on
legato notes.
Poly/mono/legato modes are set in the PARAMETER-menu. Use the menu button
to go to this menu, and use the SELECT-encoder to select the Mono/Poly option. Set
the desired playing mode using the VALUE-control.
4

1.7. SAFETY MODE CHAPTER 1. GETTING STARTED . . .
1.7 Safety Mode
When loading a preset from the NF-1’s memory, the frontpanel control knobs are in
a position that doesn’t correspond to their actual sound parameters. When you turn a
knob on the frontpanel, the sound suddenly changes to the value of the frontpanel knob,
and this change can be very abrupt!
No problem as long as you aren’t touching these control knobs, or if you are on your
own, experimenting with the NF-1 in your home studio. But of course, this can be very
annoying in certain cases, for example when playing live. When accidentaly touching
one of the frontpanel controls, the sound can suddenly change very drastically. That
might give the Modor NF-1 a very unreliable or unstable ’feeling’ on stage or while
jamming in the studio! Imagine what happens when accidentaly turning the coarse
TUNE control, making the NF-1 suddenly go completely out of tune!
Therefore, a safety mode has been installed in OS004 and following OS versions.
When this Safety Mode is activated, the sound parameters do not change when turning
a frontpanel knob, until you are passing their actual value. This setting can be found
in the SYSTEM SETTINGS menu. Activate the menu by pressing MENU 6x, and use
the SELECT-encoder to select this setting. Change it using the VALUE-control.
When Safety Mode is activated and you turn a knob on the frontpanel, a ’<’ or ’>’
is displayed when the parameter change is blocked, which indicates at what side you’ll
find it’s actual value. This safety block is released when you turn the knob passing the
actual value, and the ’<’ or ’>’ dissapears. So, if you want a parameter to change, you
need to ’go get it’ at it’s actual setting and turn it up or down to a new value. This way
sudden changes of the sound are prevented.
1.8 Patch initialisation
How to reinitialise the actual patch? If you want to start building up a new patch com-
pletely from scratch, this might be helpful. Quickly hit the MENU button four times to
select the PATCH INIT-menu and wait one second to select it (the black dot reaches the
left side of the screen). You now get three options when turning the SELECT-encoder:
• Initialise
• Frontpanel
• Autosave
Select one of these, and confirm with SRC/YES (or cancel with DEST/NO).
5

1.9. AUTOSAVE CHAPTER 1. GETTING STARTED . . .
When you choose Initialise, you get a very clean and simple ’Init’ patch consisting
of a sawtooth wave on OSC1, the other oscillators have their volumes at zero. The
lowpass filter is fully opened and has no resonance, and the amplifier envelope just has
a gate-function. No effects are added to the init sound.
When you choose ’Frontpanel’, all the parameters are set according to their front-
panel control. All non-continuous parameters (such as waveform, filter type, lfo wave,
...) remain unchanged during a Frontpanel Init. Furthermore, only the parameters of the
oscillators and envelopes that are active (have burning led inside their selection switch)
are set to the frontpanel positions. For example if OSC1 is active and OSC2 and OSC3
are inactive, the parameters MOD, MOD LFO, MOD ENV, TUNE and FINETUNE are
only set to their knob positions in OSC1. Those of OSC2 and OSC3 remain unchanged.
1.9 Autosave
Sometimes it may happen that you loose your work, due to a sudden power cut, ac-
cidentally loading a patch, ... In that case you can reload the Autosave-data in the
PATCH INIT-menu. When you don’t touch the NF-1 for about 1 minute, all data are
automatically saved. This is indicated by a small A -in the upper left corner of the
screen. If you want to reload the autosave data, get into the PATCH INIT-menu (4x
MENU button) and select ’Autosave’ with the SELECT encoder. Press SRC/YES to
load these data.
1.10 Inspect actual parameter values
Sometimes you’ll want to know the actual value of a parameter, without changing
it. For example to investigate how a certain patch is built or how a certain sound is
produced. If you turn a control while keeping the DEST/NO-button pressed down, the
value of this control will be shown on the screen. If you turn the control in the OSC-
or ENV-section the values for all 3 oscillators / all 4 envelopes are shown.
6