Motas Motas-6 Administrator Guide

How To…Guide
version 1.01
for rmware 0602011A / software MotasEdit v1.0.11
June 12, 2021

Contents
1Introduction .................................. 1
2Congure and control ............................... 2
2.1 Change the active parameter page without adjusting the oset values .............. 2
2.2 Adjust page oset values without changing the active parameter page .............. 2
2.3 Set the 5 fast-access patches loaded at power-on ..................... 2
2.4 Save a set of 5 fast-access patches .......................... 2
2.5 Initialise patch settings .............................. 2
2.6 Copy patch settings ............................... 2
2.7 Control using a PC ............................... 3
2.8 Update the rmware .............................. 3
2.9 Make an LFO sync to clock ............................. 4
2.10 Reset LFO on MIDI start ............................. 4
2.11 Setup the source of modulators M1–M4 ........................ 4
2.12 Control playing style for note-o events ........................ 4
2.13 Play multiple units together polyphonically ....................... 5
2.14 Using external CV/gate .............................. 5
2.15 Edit page parameters such as EG attack using rotary knobs .................. 6
2.16 Paraphonic playing ............................... 7
2.17 Use the arpeggiator without an external keyboard .................... 7
2.18 Setup custom tunings .............................. 7
2.19 Live tweaking: modify any patch parameter using MIDI CCs or rotary knobs ............ 7
3Advanced modulation ...............................10
3.1 Source options ................................10
3.2 Function...................................11
3.3 Modulation amount ...............................11
3.4 Destination .................................12
How To…Guide v1.01 page i

3.5 Copy/Reset Mod ................................12
3.6 Control of settings over MIDI ............................12
4Sound design ..................................13
4.1 Set bipolar or unipolar modulation ..........................13
4.2 Make an oscillator have xed pitch ..........................13
4.3 Create a drone patch ..............................13
4.4 Create a band-pass lter .............................13
4.5 Use phase modulation to create complex waveforms ....................14
4.6 Create wave-folding sounds ............................14
4.7 Set LFOs to track pitch for AM- and FM-type sounds ....................15
4.8 Control gain-staging and distortion..........................15
4.9 Change the EG response shape ...........................16
4.10 Use oscillator sync to create complex waveforms .....................16
4.11 ’Play’ a resonant lter ..............................16
4.12 Modulate a local LFO frequency with a global LFO or EG ...................16
4.13 Feedback audio / process external audio ........................17
4.14 Design and use custom LFO waveforms ........................17
AReal-time patch changes using MIDI NRPNs .......................19
A.1 NRPN control of advanced modulation ........................20
BMIDI Implementation Chart .............................21
CMIDI SysEx messages ...............................24

1Introduction
The synthesizer is a very powerful and complex instrument and so it takes time to fully appreciate and under-
stand all the capabilities and possibilities. It is hoped that this guide, in conjunction with the User Guide, makes this process
a little faster and easier, as well as perhaps revealing some capabilities or techniques that you weren’t aware of.
This How to… guide is intended to suppliment the User Guide available from motas-synth.uk/downloads.html.
Whereas the User Guide works through each of the features in order, this guide often takes an alternative approach where
it is explained how to setup or use the features/settings to achieve a goal. This guide also expands on some more advanced
topics that are not covered in detail in the User Guide.
We suggest that you also read the appropriate section(s) in the User Guide. If further guidance is needed please email
[email protected]
For the latest news, rmware and document updates please visit www.motas-synth.uk.
Whilst every eort has been made to ensure that this guide is as accurate as possible Motas Electronics Limited will not
be liable for any erroneous information. This manual may be updated at any time without prior notice. Please check the
website for updates.
This guide or any portion of it may not be reproduced in any form without the manufacturer’s express consent.
How To…Guide v1.01 page 1

2Congure and control
2.1 Change the active parameter page without
adjusting the oset values
Engage the ’value lock’ feature value lock to pre-
vent the oset parameter from changing and then turn
the rotary knob corresponding to the new parameter
page you want to access.
Another approach is to turn the rotary knob to access
the new page and then turn the rotary knob back to
restore the setting, however it can be hard to set the value
exactly back as original which may be important e.g. when
accessing the oscillator pitch control pages.
2.2 Adjust page oset values without changing
the active parameter page
Engage the ’page lock’ feature page lock to prevent
the active page from changing. This can be useful when
you are busy setting the modulation settings on a page
but you nd that other pages need their osets tweaking
(such as lter cuto, or signal levels) but you don’t want
to leave the current page. Another use case is when want-
ing to study the oscilloscope or spectrum analyser whilst
adjusting settings.
2.3 Set the 5 fast-access patches loaded at
power-on
Pressing 1,2,3,4or 5normally
switches between 5 fast-access patches. To set these patches
rst load in the desired patches into each of the slots and/or
edit the patch settings in each slot. Then press save
and choose the save startup option. This will
save the current 5 patches in the fast-access slots to be
restored at next power-on.
2.4 Save a set of 5 fast-access patches
You may want this set of 5 patches for a live performance
to be able to quickly switch between patches, or as a set
for use with the vector morphing feature, or as a set for
use with the arpeggiator set to cycle through patches.
First load in the desired patches into each of the 5 fast-
access slots and/or edit the patch settings in each slot.
Then press sequence and then press save to
save into one of the 16 slots (2 banks of 8 sequences). Sav-
ing as a ’sequence’ allows saving of the set of 5 patches
together, even if the sequence data is empty or not used.
2.5 Initialise patch settings
When on a patch parameter page press copy to en-
ter the copy/reset/randomise page. Then press to
initialise (reset) the current patch to default settings. The
patch parameter mappings and other settings (under the
setup pages) are also reset to default values.
To reset the patch parameters only on the current page
press .
2.6 Copy patch settings
When on a patch parameter page press copy to enter
the copy/reset/randomise page.
Copy entire patch
Press the new patch preset destination 1–5to
copy the patch settings over to the new fast-access preset
destination.
Copy modulation settings to all pages
To copy the MIDI/CV modulations setting for that modula-
tion source from the current page to all parameter pages
press note ,velocity ,M1 ,M2 ,M3
How To…Guide v1.01 page 2

or M4 . The copy operation replicates the amount, sec-
ondary amount, secondary destination and unipolar mode
to all pages.
A fast way to zero a modulation on all pages
is to set the values to zero and then do a copy-to-all
pages operation
Copy global LFO settings to all pages
To copy the chosen global LFOx and the LFOx modulation
amount to all pages from the current page press
for LFOx.
Copy local LFO settings to all pages
Press or frequency for the local LFO to
copy the corresponding values to all pages from the cur-
rent page. To copy the local LFO modulation amount and
other LFO settings (e.g. single-shot mode, pitch track etc.)
to all pages from the current page press for LFO.
Copy EG settings to all pages
If a local EG is active on the current page then pressing
, , , , will copy
the corresponding values to all pages which are also set
to use a local EG. Press for EG to copy the EG mod-
ulation amount and other EG parameters (e.g. keytrack,
shape etc) to all pages from the current page and set the
EG to the same type (either local EG or global EG 1–4).
2.7 Control using a PC
Free software MotasEdit for controlling is
available from www.motas-synth.uk/downloads.html. This
software is available as a standalone executable and as a
plug-in version for use with 3rd party DAW software.
For best results always use a USB connection as the data
transfer is faster than using MIDI DIN connectors.
The MotasEdit software allows you to apply rmware up-
dates (see 2.8), control patch settings, archive
(load and save) patch, pattern and sequence settings, live
screenshots and more.
To send (i.e. control) patch settings from
the computer MIDI NRPN messages are used. For rmware
updating, archiving of data, live screenshots and other func-
tions SysEx data is used. Normally you would set
nrpn+sysex for both usb in and usb out
to allow full bi-directional functionality on setup page
14 . If you are using MIDI DIN connections then you would
need to set the midi in and midi out set-
tings appropriately.
Set the MIDI channel to match that set in the Mo-
tasEdit ( or set to any where data will be sent on chan-
nel 1 and received on any channel).
2.8 Update the rmware
Updated rmware for may be released from
time to time to make improvements and add new features.
These are available from www.motas-synth.uk/downloads.html.
The update le (MotasFirmware_vXXXXXXXX.mbin) con-
tains the new binary rmware for .
Use the MotasEdit software (see 2.7 for details) to apply
the update to Motas-6. The rmware update is sent to
using MIDI system exclusive (SysEx). Ide-
ally you should connect Motas-6 to your PC using USB. MIDI
DIN connectors can be used but this interface is much slower.
You must ensure that your is set so that
allow updates is set to yes to allow the rmware
updating process, on setup page 17 .
How To…Guide v1.01 page 3

It is possible to apply an older rmware ver-
sion but this is not recommended especially since
newer serial number units may not
function correctly with older rmware. It is recom-
mended to always update to the latest rmware
available.
2.9 Make an LFO sync to clock
Only the 4 global LFOs can be synced to MIDI clock. First
ensure that the LFO pitch track is set to off
then edit the frequency of the LFO down all the way to
zero (using the rotary encoder and/or ) and then
turn the rotary encoder anti-clockwise to further re-
duce the value until the tempo-sync options are shown.
When set to synchronise to the clock the display will show
a metronome indicator and the LFO period value (down to
as fast as 32 triplet). The icon displayed is sin this mode.
Now set the clk source to ext midi ,
ext clk or internal to choose external MIDI
clock, external CV/gate or internal clock.
2.10 Reset LFO on MIDI start
Set lfo sync seq to on so that the LFOs are
synchronised (reset) when the sequence or pattern is re-
wound to the start, play started or a MIDI START real-time
message is received. This feature is useful when control-
ling from an external sequencer and you
want the LFOs to be synchronised with the track.
2.11 Setup the source of modulators M1–M4
To setup the sources of the 4 global modulations M1–M4
that can be applied to each parameter page access
setup page 7. You can freely choose from many
MIDI CC controllers, MIDI aftertouch, MIDI pitchbend, CV/-
gate signals, MIDI note value, MIDI velocity and even the
output from the global LFOs and EGs.
You could setup 5 independent LFOs to mod-
ulate a single parameter page by assigning global
LFO2, LFO3 and LFO4 to global modulators M1, M2
and M3. These, together with the page global LFO
set to LFO1 and the page-local LFO gives a total of
5 simultaneous independent LFO signals! A simi-
lar trick can allow 5 independent EGs to modulate
a single parameter page.
2.12 Control playing style for note-o events
On the setup page 1you can set the
track note-off modes. Sometimes you may
want the oscillators to update pitch after note-o events
when multiple notes are held, depending on your playing
style. If you hold a note down and play another note on
and o then with track note-off set to
How To…Guide v1.01 page 4

pitch then the pitch will jump to match the note held-
down (which note depends also on the individual oscillator
note-tracking options), otherwise it won’t respond to the
note-o event.
In mode p+eg , additionally the EGs can re-trigger on
the note-o event, although this also depends on the EG
gate/trig setting too (set to every to ensure
always re-triggers, for example).
2.13 Play multiple units together polyphonically
Multiple units can be operated so that they
play together as a polyphonic synthesizer. Up to 16 units
can be operated together in this way. In this mode called
’polychain’ each new note is played by the next unit in the
chain (and if the end of the chain is reached then starting
again from the beginning of the chain). This is sometimes
called ’round-robin’ voice assignment and allows true poly-
phonic playing (unlike the simpler note-stealing method).
Each unit should be assigned a unique number in the chain
and every unit in the chain needs to be set with the total
number of units in the chain for this to work in the normal
way. Of course, if you want things to behavely dierently
you do not have to adhere to this rule!
The ’polychain’ algorithm runs independently on each of
the separate units and so in fact it is not
required that the units are daisy-chained to each other.
However, this is the easiest way to set things up and allows
editing of patch parameters on the rst unit in the chain
to be transfered automatically to the other units along the
chain to maintain the ’polysynth’ operation.
The normal setup of ’polychain’ would have the rst unit
in the chain connected to an external MIDI controller (or
computer) via USB or MIDI DIN to receive the played notes.
This rst unit needs to forward the MIDI controller data to
the second unit and so its midi out should be set
to thru+all so that the MIDI controller data (note
on/o etc) will be merged with the internal controller data
(to allow patch editing) and sent to the next in the chain.
All the units need to operating on the same MIDI channel
and so the easiest way is to set channel to any
for all of the units.
The remaining units in the chain need be connected to the
previous unit in the chain with a MIDI DIN cable and to have
midi in set to nrpn or nrpn+sysex (to
allow patch editing data from the rst unit) and midi out
set to thru to simply forward the data from the rst
unit only. The last unit in the chain, of course, does not
have to midi out set at all.
Finally, of course, all of the audio outputs from each
need to be mixed together using an exter-
nal audio mixer.
2.14 Using external CV/gate
Normally is played and controlled using MIDI
but external analogue CV (control voltage) signals can be
used too. There are 4 external CV/gate inputs and each
input can be assigned to a number of roles. The oset
and gain can be independently adjusted for each input for
compatibility with a wide range of external equipment.
Set the mode to cv pitch to allow the CV signal to
control the basic pitch of . This will override
How To…Guide v1.01 page 5

the MIDI note control of pitch, and will bypass any tuning
setup.
To trigger the EGs using CV/gate inputs set the mode to
gate+ or gate- to trigger on rising or falling volt-
age, respectively. The trigger point threshold is adjusted
by setting the oset for that CV input.
CV/gate can also control the tempo when set to clock+
or clock- , in this case the clk source should
be set to ext clk on setup page 3.
The cv smoothing parameter applies a low-pass
lter to the CV/gate signals which smoothes out and de-
lays the response to input CV (except when used for gate
or clock signals). This can be useful to lter out noise or to
add a delayed eect. When set to 00 there is no smooth-
ing.
To set the oset and gain for each input access
setup page 11
The raw input CV/gate signal for each of the 4 inputs is
shown on the display as a dimmed horizontal bar. Under-
neath this bar is a brighter bar showing the current resolved
CV/gate signal, after the oset and scaling adjustment.
For gate signals this will be zero or full width correspond-
ing to gate o or on respectively. This feature allows eas-
ier setup of the oset and scaling required for each input.
2.15 Edit page parameters such as EG attack
using rotary knobs
Whilst on a parameter page engage page lock and
value lock . Now the rotary knobs allow real-
time editing for many of the parameters for that page. See
the table below which shows what is controlled from each
rotary knob. For example turning lpf-1 will
now control the EG attack.
This feature is useful for live editing of the page patch pa-
rameters, and for faster more immediate editing of the
patch parameters using the rotary knobs.
Rotary knob Control function
osc-1 Note mod amount
pitch osc-1 Velocity mod amount
osc-1 M1 amount
osc-1 M2 amount
pwm osc-1 M3 amount
osc-1 M4 amount
osc-2 Note secondary amount
pitch osc-2 Velocity secondary amount
osc-2 M1 secondary amount
osc-2 M2 secondary amount
osc-2 M3 secondary amount
sub osc-2 M4 secondary amount
osc-3 LFOx waveform
pitch osc-3 LFOx frequency/tempo
osc-3 LFOx level
osc-3 local LFO waveform
pwm osc-3 local LFO frequency
osc-3 local LFO level
mixer EG delay
lpf-1 EG attack
lpf-1 EG decay
lpf-1 EG sustain
hpf EG release
hpf EG level
lpf-2 EG shape
output Page oset
master pitch global LFO1 frequency
phase mod osc-2 global LFO2 frequency
phase mod osc-3 global LFO3 frequency
mixer global LFO4 frequency
How To…Guide v1.01 page 6

2.16 Paraphonic playing
is a paraphonic synthesizer. The 3 VCOs
can separately be congured to track pitch independently,
and EGs can be applied to control the mixing of the VCOs,
but ultimately their outputs are all mixed together and
pass through the lters and nal output together. This
is in contrast to a true polyphonic synthesizer where each
’voice’ is fully independent all the way through to the nal
output.
There are many ’avours’ of paraphonic operation. The
simplest and often most eective is to set each of the 3
VCOs to track incoming notes in modes highest ,
middle or lowest respectively. With this setup
when one note is played all VCOs play the pitch of that
note. When 2 notes are held 2 of the VCOs play the high-
est note and the 3rd plays the lowest. When 3 notes are
held each VCO is set to a separate pitch. This allows easy
playing of 3-note chords with the benet of a rich sound
on 1-note playing (as all 3 VCOs then combine).
For true polyphonic operations multiple units
can be operation together, see section 2.13.
2.17 Use the arpeggiator without an external
keyboard
The arpeggiator has a mode that can play without trigger-
ing from an external source. Set mode to h-int
which means ’hold-internal’ then the notes played can be
edited on page 3 of the arpeggiator setup.
Either xed chord formations can be chosen (12 types such
as major ,minor ,aug …) or custom-dened notes
can be set. Up to 8 notes can be specied.
2.18 Setup custom tunings
A ’tuning’ is the mapping between the played note and
the resulting pitch (frequency). The tuning will be correct
when no modulations are applied to the master pitch page
and the individual VCO pitch pages and the osets are set
to zero semitones. If note modulation is applied then devi-
ations will occur which can be useful way to detune accord-
ing to note played. Note that the tunings are only used for
MIDI playing of – when using CV to control
pitch there is no such mapping in operation (the pitch is
directly controlled by the CV voltage).
You can choose from 32 built-in preset tunings and from a
further 32 user-dened tunings that you import (via MIDI
tuning commands). Make the selection from
setup page 12 .
2.19 Live tweaking: modify any patch parameter
using MIDI CCs or rotary knobs
All of the parameters can be controlled us-
ing NRPN MIDI controller data but this can be ddly to
setup and use with some external hardware. The MotasEdit
software does use NRPNs to control and read the param-
eters to allow full, bidirectional high-resolution control of
all parameters.
A simpler method can be employed using standard MIDI
CCs (continuous controllers) from CC #1 (modulation wheel)
to CC #24 using a pameter mapping system. This mapping
is necessary because there are far too many parameters
in each patch to allow full control from the
limited number of CC controllers. The mapping system al-
How To…Guide v1.01 page 7