Isomorphism FTW

For fans of synths, pianos, organs or keyboard instruments of any sort.

Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by pierstitus »

The Striso board is now on kickstarter! And I, the creator, now also on this forum. I'll also make a separate post in news.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/st ... iso-board/
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

Striso has done really well...£20K pledged of £22K goal so far, and 8 days to go. Hopefully it'll get there; will be interested to see how it develops.
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by Martin Walker »

Excellent progress - oh, and like you I DO like the earlier box prototypes ;)

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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by pierstitus »

I really do like the box myself too! And looking forward to experimenting with other self contained versions, and I hope to see more people build instruments with the Striso board as base.
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by Martin Walker »

Hi pierstitus, and welcome to the SOS Forums! 8-)

Apologies for missing your previous post - it's always great to have the project creator on board :thumbup:

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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

I'm pleased to see that the Striso has reached its funding target. Piers has been baking to celebrate.

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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

Just discovered this lovely rendition of a Bach piece on Accordina.

https://youtu.be/XKGiDYlIQ6k?t=90

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(Richard Galliano...I like. Great name too.)

https://youtu.be/ux6bUcfKrTI?t=1927
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by ManFromGlass »

Update on Lumi keyboards.
UPS finally delivered my Lumi keyboards. So far I like them, almost full size keys, feel pretty good to play. Much better than those tiny keys on other small units. I’m not a keyboard player by training so have no muscle memory of weighted keys etc. I grew up with unweighted synth keys. The general build is of some kind of plastic that feels tough but I would want to protect them during travel, rather than just throw them in with the other gear.

At first I missed a pitchbend and mod wheel but without them the compact size is actually a bonus. The light show is amusing and if I were to use the units for triggering samples and other things the ability to colour keys to remind me of splits etc is a nice option, but I haven’t tried that yet. The lighted keys add cool factor which can be inspirational for writing music in the dark! Triggering through Bluetooth shows latency when triggering percussion or patches with sharp attack. For precision work I would connect using the included cable or learn to play ahead of the beat.

Now the unfortunate part - there were some tolerance build issues in the Mexican plant. When you connect 2 together (I bought 2 so I could have 4 octaves) the first one is supposed to automatically turn on the others as you link them together. Mine don’t so back to Roli they go. So far Roli are being helpful about this. No idea if I have to pay for shipping. I sure hope not. Due to the current plague it took 3 months for the units to show up. I hope it’s not that long again as I want to be using these. I may do another update when the new units show up.
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by The Elf »

ManFromGlass wrote:So far Roli are being helpful about this.

Glad your experience differs from mine. I'm having the devil's own job trying to get my 6-month old Seaboard 49 replaced...
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by ManFromGlass »

Oooh. Perhaps I spoke too soon.
That’s not right about your keyboard. It’s not an inexpensive unit. I have the smaller one. What went wrong on yours? Just in case mine has the same issue.
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by The Elf »

The silicone surface has gradually become detached from the surface underneath. It began with a couple of notes in the middle of the keyboard and has now spread to all but the top and bottom handful of notes.

It's now at a point where the surface moves about a quarter of an inch before contact is made, and a couple of notes at the lower part of the keyboard have begun playing spurious notes on their own.

I also have the smaller 25-note version and that one is absolutely fine.
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

I just discovered an introductory video on the forthcoming Lumatone by the polychromatic adventurer Dolores Catherino. I was interested in her comments on how it's the first microtonal instrument she's looked at which does away with a chromatic overlay. I wasn't sure I needed one but she's convinced me. (There's a recent performance here.)

Naturally she had to come up with a new system for scoring these microtonal pitches in colour to match the keyboard. Obvious.

Image

Image
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

Not really a fan of the Joyst JV-1, but I'm a chronicler. We're meant to be impartial. So...

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Kickstarter

The walnut edition isn't so bad.

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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by Martin Walker »

BJG145 wrote:The walnut edition isn't so bad.

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Now that's positively tasty! 8-)

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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by ManFromGlass »

Impartial? Me? Never! I am guided by what I perceive as inspiration potential and a bit of fun factor!
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

Polyhedra have released a new isomorphic keyboard app called Formkey.

https://www.formkey.app/

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(Other software options include Musix Pro by Shiverware, and the free sequencer Hexcel for Reaktor.)

PS

Since the image links in the original post are now broken, I wonder if a moderator might be kind enough to replace them with working ones such as these.

https://img.audiofanzine.com/images/u/p ... 188192.jpg

https://www.woodbrass.com/images/SQUARE ... H+S+BK.JPG
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by zenguitar »

Just worked through the thread and the links in the OP are working fine for me.

Andy :beamup:
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

...thanks Zen. When I look at this in Chrome, the first post looks like this...

Image
...missing the image for the Rainboard and the small Dualo. In Firefox, the Rainboard shows but the small Dualo still doesn't.

Actually those two replacement URLs I posted above don't seem to work any better, but I've put them on Imgur and they work from there with img tags.

https://i.imgur.com/6rEdPjJ.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/4pa998x.jpg
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by zenguitar »

The second one wasn't working when looked again. So I've replaced both as requested and they appear to be working fine now for me.

Andy :beamup:
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

:thumbup:
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

Here's a video from yesterday with Mike Battaglia playing a bit of Herbie Hancock in 31-TET on the wonderful microtonal Lumatone.

https://youtu.be/gKT3W2aF4LA

This thing has 280 analogue keys which work with Hall effect sensors. I picked up a couple of these on eBay and have been trying to figure out the mechanism with Arduino...no luck yet, it's a work in progress...
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by Drew Stephenson »

It's amazing how quickly my mind goes from 'equal temperament sounds weird' to 'that sounds really harmonious'.
Seems to take about 30 seconds to reset.
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by BJG145 »

This was today's project. The gadget du jour is an Axis 49; currently practising this on buses and trains.

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They're out of production, but I thought I'd try and make a copy of one. So today I started by modelling one of the buttons.

Image

Image

It's only a small start, but I'm quite pleased with that so far. :)
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Re: Isomorphism FTW

Post by Martin Walker »

Wow - is there nothing you won't tackle Ben? :shocked:

(answers on a postcard please to the usual address)

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