It Was Never Actually Meant To Be A REALTIME Analog Tape Loop Pitch Shifter

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

lots of things i want to do with this, got lots of ideas.. but ofcourse, with every quick idea, is a week or so of swearing at a pile of electronic wires, if you enjoy this project let me know and i will take it to other conclusions

[@paulj0557tonehead]

Couldn't you use a vibrating stereo tape head(s)?

[@yxyk-fr]

"Exxxterrrrminaaaate !!!"

[@unmanaged]

bud get some rest ... amazingly awesome as always...

[@unmanaged]

sling your hand down the frets made the most bad ass digital sound ...

[@blackmoofou6385]

@@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER Love it please keep going Sam! 😊

[@KanalFrump]

omg those crunchy lofi mutilated guitar sounds. dreamlike. amazing! mate, you'd have been the king of the BBC radiophonic workshop back in the 70s.

[@robmanueb.]

If Lee Scratch Perry and the Mad Professor hadn't poached him :)

[@shayneoneill1506]

@@robmanueb. I was thinking of Frank Zappas Studio Z, that dude had some *crazy* experimental shit going on. But yeah, def Lee Scratch Perry too. Actually Jimmy Hendrix also liked working with experimental gizmos too (He had a Pedal guy that'd make him custom madness pedals)

[@R.Daneel]

Also worth a note is that a VHS tape head doesn't record a linear signal on to the tape. It's slanted because it records a series of angled stripes (helical) across the tape (E.g. /////////). I can't imagine you'd do yourself any favors trying to make a system that let's you vary the tape and head speed with helical recording... not to say the weirdness wouldn't turn into a benefit - who knows without trying. This was done to allow the tape to move more slowly while maintaining the required data rate for a video signal.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

You could theoretically do it. Like mentioned if you make the drum slant back to horizontal. It would work similarly to mine. But yes. As you say it's just an utter faff.

[@vylbird8014]

VCRs do have a control that lets you vary the tape head speed very slightly: That's what the tracking control does. It just lets you adjust for slight manufacturing differences in the tape (the stuff can stretch very slightly over enough plays) and line the head swipes up with the fields on the tape.

[@benjitheengi4447]

Wow the slashes as an example is low key genius

[@scottk3292]

I believe that you also get more bandwidth (in current produced by the tape head, not talking about audio frequency here) from larger heads and larger tape surface, just due to the magnetic charge potential. With those tiny VCR heads, I can't imagine you'd get much bandwidth, and I think your resulting sound would be pretty bad.

[@gcewing]

If the record head was the full width of the tape, it wouldn't really matter if the playback heads tracked diagonally across the tape. But I think the main problem would be that the heads and rotary transformer are designed to work with signals ranging from 600KHz up into the MHz. I doubt they would work very in the audio range, if at all.

[@beautifulsmall]

Its one of the most beautiful machines ive ever seen. It has every required element, ribbon cable trapped under an edge, unused holes, custom sharpie font. Its a joy to behold. The most important thing. It works.

[@andrewjacobs3731]

For the old people: your enthusiasm for your work is like a 21st century Magnus Pike! Another hero and inspiring guy

[@martindooley4439]

I raise you Jonny Ball

[@andrewjacobs3731]

@martindooley4439 great guy, let's get some love for James Burke too!

[@martindooley4439]

​@@andrewjacobs3731 I still don't identify as old though.....But I'm going to all arty with Tony Hart.

[@davechisholm9670]

It sort of goes, "G'doink!". When I was a lad, I wanted to grow up to be like Magnus :-D

[@eddievanbasten1751]

If noise is ever a problem, I’m sure you’d find a way to harness it and make a better noise out of it. You’re a master of noise.

[@yxyk-fr]

Yes, he's mastered the Art of Noise ! (let's stay Below the Waste)

[@iamsushi1056]

I’m rearing an internal feedback amplifier for no input?

[@donerskine7935]

This is hilarious. When I first saw Sam's machine, I thought 'there is no way that could work in real time". But Sam didn't know it was impossible, so made it work anyway!

[@chromosundrift]

Granular fever! For the record, this is pretty much how granular synthesis works. The grain in this case is the chunk of audio on the tape between one rotating read head and the next.

[@anonymoos]

Love this! Because you're using stepper motors, you could also program presets for specific harmonization effects...

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

Indeed. The best thing to do would be add midi

[@wudimusic]

infecting you with tape Hainbach created a Monster

[@wbmatter1]

Oh sure, blame a German for this mess

[@VAC-u1r]

"I couldn't find my expression pedal... so I plugged in a Theramin" ABSOLUTE MADLAD

[@NicStage]

This thing is so cool. Definitely sounds better with the wider tape!

[@Wiresgalore]

That first guitar example @ 10:00 is absolutely infectious, love that chaotic yet dreamy pitch climbs and drones!

[@piccalillipit9211]

*ONE OF THE* maddest things I have ever come across

[@chrisprobert6]

The haircut100 is allso mad!..😅

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

whats a 100?

[@bitegoatie]

@@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTERIt was a band - before your time, laddie.

[@electricsushi]

You do a great job explaining this tape delay stuff. Appreciated. AND THE Theremin CV automotive throttle was SICK!

[@Audiobungalow]

This is absolutely mental and great. Kudos!

[@HANGINGOUTWITHAUDIOPHILES]

That feedback pitch effect is just immense.

[@neurokinetik]

This is wild! Capable of some really interesting and unique effects.

[@FriesOfTheDead]

That sounds pretty good! The problem with moving the recording head closer is you still have 90 degrees on the radius between reading heads. I think making the read head wheel as small as possible and moving the record head closer would together make a good improvement. There's also a lot of distortion which sounds kinda cool, but probably not wanted, something is being over-driven.

[@ah-ray]

I'm getting into experimental tape loop designs and this is really motivating and inspiring :) you and Soaring Tortoise have become my spirit animals XD

[@nilsqvis4337]

I'm normally quite impressed by the weird shenanigans you come up with, but watching this actually had me sitting with my mouth wide open like a troglodyte. I still have difficulties actually comprehending what's even going on with this machine. It's like some strange sort of magic. Sorcery even!

[@richardlincoln886]

8:46 - sounds like an audio version of the visual effect of pointing a camera at its own output - i.e. infinite echoes fading up/down. Very cool machine :) I love the enthusiasm on this channel.

[@tungtobak]

That's the classic each echo get's pitched one step further-effect, Earthquaker Devices made a whole pedal based on this concept, check out their Rainbow Machine. Much much cleaner since it is digital of course.

[@thirstyCactus]

Nancy here, Negative Nancy. The stepper motor noise I was referring to would be a sort-of frequency modulation, not an amplitude / noise-floor type dealy. When finished, play in a sine wave and listen to the output. You'll likely hear a bit of modulation. If not, that will be a win for micro-stepping! Just meant to bring it up to help avoid a potential pitfall. Not meant negatively, in fact, I have nothing but respect and admiration for all that you do! After so many videos, I guess I shouldn't be scared to try it.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

Indeed! I hadn't included it but having tested it before doing the video with the wheel the flex in the tape takes it up. Remember play head is at the slackest point. If there is an issue like you say it could be easily circumnavigated by putting the tensioner on the top of the machine instead of the bottom

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

I know of the issue you speak of it's why I was hesitant. But after thinking of this and that. Like a lot of things. I think it can be remedied 👍

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

It is a bit of fun anyway! Always open to ideas :) thanks for the pointers!

[@thirstyCactus]

@@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER I'm interested to see how this turns out! Very cool concept, indeed!

[@ChipGuy]

I have messed around with slip rings in the past. Their nose comes only through resistance variations. There is also a thermal EMF component, but only when the entire thing is being cooled down or heated up. The more current flows the noisier it gets. For your application there should not be any slip ring noise at all.

[@King_Dugga]

You've successfully recreated listening to HF radio during a solar flare. Congratulations!

[@jamesinc87]

The range of this instrument is amazing, awesome build man!

[@Lazored1]

one of the top coolest things youve made! i want to see more of this!

[@AlienDelon]

Wow! This world definitely needs this as a product! Would buy this in a second!

[@blackmoofou6385]

so bloody clever and it sounds amazing loving these tape head builds!

[@AdamMiller-m2h]

I love this. I feel like I nerd out this hard on tones. It's really cool to see someone else nerd out so hard on their own jive

[@kaisersozeh7845]

This is excellent, genuine innovation. A useful addition for the next iteration, a way to switch in a quantiser for the rotating drum's speed. I suppose you would have to factor the tape speed, but the ratios would always be the same. Knowing the pitch of the sound input, defining the key with the quantiser, you could harmonise with more than just octaves and fifths. Or just quantising to semitones in addition to using an expression pedal. Great stuff!

[@scottmartin356]

Thanks!

[@northtustinsteamworks5172]

Genius move tying the audio jacks feedback in to the arduino and modulating the stepper motors!!

[@digitalsouthofficial]

You're so smart, capable, and funny! inconceivable!

[@dewildedame13]

Just a few seconds in and already I am intrigued, awesome content as usual

[@VictorAnderssen]

Now this is an interesting way of performing auto-tune or speech synthesis with analog components! // Electrical engineer

[@satibel]

it's not really autotune, since you're not using the pitch of the input to shift the output. (if you sing off key it will stay off key) you could probably make one with it though depending on the difference in pitch between the input and control. and since there's quite a bit of a delay, you basically have ages to adjust the control. (you could use another shorter loop of tape to adjust the delay needed for the phase detection)

[@FrankPSF]

OMG, I WANT ONE!!! Thanks for sharing your brilliant insights. Great build my friend!

[@karllindberg]

This is probably the coolest device you've come up with so far! Would love to see it developed into a VST!

[@juhanaleiwo]

The sequencer control is awesome!

[@ares395]

'Cuz I'm rubbish at making things so the tolerance being bad is fine' Mate IF only I could adapt this attitude. Everything I do must be perfect while I'm bad at doing things which leads to a loop. While you say you are bad at making things but you do amazing.

[@RayIrv]

Wohaa ... I was only listening to the video with my wireless headphones without paying attention because i had to search for something in another room. After 10 minutes i HAD to pause. It was like having a fever dream. 😵‍💫

[@CashMattock]

3:24 - this video was one of my faves of yours. I would really love to see an evolution of this. Really cool concept 👍👍

[@blackmoofou6385]

There must be a market for selling some of these lo-fi loopers once perfected at the right price or in kit form. I think you're on to a winner and being a guitar player this is I think the best thing you've ever made Sam it's insane!

[@satibel]

you could also probably get away with the cheapest steppers and uln2003 drivers, then it's basically an arduino, 2 uln 2003, the electronics for the tape audio and some connectors for the jacks.

[@blackmoofou6385]

@satibel True but tape heads and motors are cheap and you lose the lo-fi-ness of it all. I'd buy either tbh if it sounded like it does in this video.

[@schollls5973]

Somewhere in deep space someone is sobbing at the beauty that this transcended melodic machine is making, you can really feel the emotion around the 16:57 mark in the video, this may be the albums single.

[@niekdriesschen3376]

hahaha fucking sick dude!! thats kraaazzzyyy i made a few times a ''pitch shift delay'' by putting a pitch shifter in the feedback loop of a tape echo, that sounded really cool, and usable, reminds me a little of some sounds u got there. but have to say man, i think you're the coolest bloke on the internet my man! dig all the the energy and motivation u put in to this stuff! cheers

[@ChocloManx]

this is so god damned cool!!!! one of my favourite things you've done. It's messy and beautiful

[@TheGaryHughes]

We need more guitar playing on here!

[@AveragePicker]

I am so over and done with tape but this...keep piques my interest in it again ...

[@davechisholm9670]

This is such an utterly bonkers idea, it's brilliant! I just lost it completely when you started feeding in varying voltages from other gear. You should definitely explore some extensions to this project, MIDI would indeed be an obvious one to complement the CV control. Another mad idea might be to build a second head mechanism (perhaps smaller diameter as someone suggested) but *ADD IT to the machine rather than replace the existing heads*, running the head motors at 2 independent speeds against the same tape loop - with independent outputs that could be summed, inverted, and maybe even fed into a ring modulator? Oh and thanks for the belly laugh reminder of the Theremini!

[@mikestckl6939]

congratulations ! you made a fully analog version of the rainbow machine haha

[@dcurry7287]

Around 13 minutes in you've got a lovely Shpongle vocal sound!

[@PeteJohnson1471]

And it was 10 foot taallllllllllllllllll ;-)

[@thatdudewiththething]

I like that i'm now in the negative nancy club, because i suggested a servo- or DC motor. Probably the easiest membership i've ever gotten 😆

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

hahaha all in good fun! i hope i backed up my reasoning for stepper motors for you.

[@schlaflabor1]

an absolutely lovely device!! The idea of adding MIDI sounds wonderful and its basically just a few lines of code, isnt it?

[@codelicious6590]

Wonderful wonderful!! Crazy mad science! I absolutely Love this!

[@LtJerryRigg]

You make the coolest stuff dude, props!

[@DUKE_of_RAMBLE]

Huge _Boards of Canada_ vibes once you started playing with the guitar! 😮

[@shipofthesun]

The rotating tape heads are both impressing and amusing me.

[@StackOverflow80]

Man, that's really awesome, keep on going! I think those factory made pitch-shifters were made for pitch-shifting of existing tape recording. Which must have been pretty cool, to put on any existing tape and pitch shift it. I am not aware that real-time tape pitch shifters ever existed, but it's possible. You can put AC bias to recording head, which will improve sound quality significantly. Just use recording electronics from some boombox. The tape tranport and rotating head drum should also run smoothly, which I don't think the stepper motor does.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

stepper motor runs smooth enough, hence mentioning in vid, the slack in the tape is more than enough, also it has got an ac bias already. thanks!

[@MagicalMysteryWeed]

You should sell that pitch-shifter! Start a Kickstarter project, that's my advice!

[@CausticCatastrophe]

this is properly mad sam. what a delight :)

[@Lu_Woods]

I miss my Ibanez HD-1000. Nice build Sam!!

[@njones420]

Aww that mini brought back some memories ... had one in Snapdragon-yellow with a black roof, though not a clubman.

[@snorkherder]

Well done Sam but to truly find the "New Sound" you must open the Door of Kukundu ! 😁

[@raguhmuffin]

I love the background Sam mocking the negative comments. Prove them all wrong Sam! Bring back “you don’t know what your doing Sam!” You don’t know what your doing Sam! Neither do I that’s how we learn!

[@zoey_cairns]

I love the pitch shifted delay, it's like an Eventide harmonizer

[@padders1068]

Mad genius at work! 🙂😎❤

[@HairySalamander]

This is so sick! It's basically an analog rainbow machine

[@bjornlohmander7431]

This! Was! Amazing!! 🤯 on a sidenote, I tried another (similar) tapehead amplifier kit but didn’t got it to work very well either. Maybe it was because my heads were 1/4” and the circuit was for 1/8”… no idea. But if you come up with a simple read/write circuit I would love to see a video on it! Again, super awesome video!!!! 🔥

[@22222Sandman22222]

Wow, that CV is really responsive. Good idea to use stepper motors! A little modern touch to the ancient technology.

[@hello_ben]

The bit at 9:30 sound like its from a 70s/80s sci-fi radio drama on the bbc. Like you're anouncing the descruction of earth for a hyperspace bypass

[@CompoundBoy]

I love the horror sounds form his voice. 12:34 HUHH! A microcontroller; A computational device on look mum no computer 😯😯😯😯😁😁

[@mrbell2827]

Look Mum Only A Few Computers 😂

[@ggppjj]

Oh man, i can only imagine the possibilities for like a D&D game with a fallout 1-style "master" machine character with many voices. Gotta try to recreate this, it sounds so fun.

[@frozenwalkway]

may the machine spirits bless you

[@seedmole]

Nice, the physical version of so many puredata example patches I spent time trying to figure out. ~ 7:30 yeah exactly, glandular sisteris I mean granular synthesis.

[@jmm8476]

Damnit! Me too! In Max. I read about Wendy Carlos using one of these tape granulizers years ago (eltro information rate changer) and fantasized about building the real thing. Yeah right. Closest I got were some max patches. And even those… just basic granulizers. Not a real emulation. A few years back you couldn’t find much at all about this specific application in its real world tape format, but I do have a pdf of the original Eltro manual, ha ha.

[@daviddawkins]

Some definite Dark Side of the Moon vibes with the sequencing add-on...

[@dillipphunbar7924]

There's a fine line between genius and insanity. Sam is able to modulate this line ;loop it; time stretch and downsample it; invert, flip and erase it. Dr Sam and the Multiverse of Madness.

[@Masheeable]

Please make the "That's gonna be too noisy" music track to go on the same album as the "you stupid plonker" track. Seriously these are musical productions you need to make.

[@treelineresearch3387]

I think your approach of 3D printing your own 4-head drum is the way to go, mostly because cassette tape heads are still being manufactured while VHS heads are not. The VHS machines that aren't in a landfill are starting to get collectable, I haven't seen a stack of VCRs in a thrift shop for a decade. Cool effect, I am curious how the tone would change if driven by stepless servo motors or brushless motors driven by 3 phase sinewaves. There's definitely a robotic, techno feel to the steppers from the discrete tape and head movements, and I'm guessing stepless drive would have a more dreamy, floaty mellotron vibe. Both could be great effects in different situations.

[@bugradio]

Between Murphy's Law and Occam's Razor, there lies Sam's Postulate: "The most effective solution is nearly always the one that is just good enough." Put that on a shirt! (And in a few textbooks.)

[@return2sender791]

Damn when you first plugged the guitar into it it sounds a lot like this pt2399 circuit I was experimenting with awhile back. Maybe its time for me to get rich haha. Awesome video. That thing is bonkers with the sequencer.

[@WildLeafCruncher]

That is full analog pitch shifting echo! I will definitely build one for myself! Also, I suggest using dc motors instead of steppers. Steppers usually move in pulses, and that speed modulation transfers onto tape - unless you especially want that extra warbly sound, of course. And dc motors are actually easier to control - PWM regulator will do the trick even w/o the MCU.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

I address all of the questions of why I use stepper motors and will stand by using stepper motors in the video :D. Steps are very small in microstepping and definitely taken up by the give and slack in the tape

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

You don't get warble from stepper motor stepping in this application. The positives of steppers outweigh any negatives. From tests

[@WildLeafCruncher]

oops not seen that fist time actually, strange! usually every mechanical vibration makes it to the tape, every freaking one of it! good that it works, that thing is just from another world, fascinating!

[@FORRESTtheunoriginal]

Such a fascinating machine! Now I'm real interested if one could make something like this, but for video. And maybe add an adjustable delay, like surely you could have the delay be on a moveable arm so you can add more or less of it. I feel like something like this added to like a live streaming setup, where the audio and video get fed through these to the streaming pipeline would make for a fun gimmick. And if you can digitally control the distortion, I think one could have like Twitch Chat control it.

[@kendokaaa]

17:30 really sums up this channel

[@Krantz984]

Now, THIS is something that should be made into a plugin.

[@kassemir]

It's honestly wild to me how well the scale worked with the CV on the earliest examples.

[@PoetryInNoise]

This is kind of like a wonky, analog EQD Rainbow Machine. I love it.

[@nicmcv6925]

Melted my brain. Excellent

[@dustcombo]

If you havent’t yet done that, I humbly suggest going over the playback side before the recording. Record a tape loop on a calibrated machine, disable the recording head and adjust head tilt and playback eq. After the playback is adjusted, it’ll be much simpler to adjust the recording side.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

That won't work. This is not the same head tilt as another machine

[@NachtbrakerNL]

Sir, you are a treasure!

[@GRAHAMAUS]

It still sounds like you're recording with no AC bias on the tape, hence the gross distortion. Maybe that's what you want, but I feel its too many effects at once! Tweak the bias (or add some!) to get rid of the distortion and you have a winner. Bias is simply a 100kHz or so sinewave added to what's going to the record head, pretty easy to arrange. Make its level variable so you can find the sweet spot for the tape you're using.

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

i have been recording with bias in both videos

[@GRAHAMAUS]

@@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER How come so much distortion then?

[@LOOKMUMNOCOMPUTER]

@@GRAHAMAUS , dunno im just driving it. sounds better

[@tomahzo]

Incredibly cool! Especially loved the CV control! Someone build this and sell it. Take my money! ;D

[@lyman360able]

wow this thing is awesome nice job!

[@FrootyRecords]

Very very cool indeed! , an adjustable drum entry and exit roller might be good to fine tune the tape angles? also take a look at a Revox B77 schematic for record/replay electronics :) genius to use stepper motors. cv control actually works because you did this!

[@DJDeon0]

Insanely cool! Now make a 2" tape version😁

[@kommunismusarbeiterjonny]

Really not needed here when you just listen to old records recorded with 2" 16 you already got double the width than what one track has on those and they sound fine

[@unaby_unaby]

11:46 There's so much fun, incredible machine 🤪

[@TheDistur]

That mad musical lad is at it again.

[@Nukle0n]

Really getting into the Musique Concrete kinda sound now!

[@augurkur]

I had a Roland Space Echo in my youth. Very similar but also had reverb.

[@kittensondxm]

thanks for all the science and funny sounds

[@DavidCaldwell1]

slip rings were used for flying video heads on open reel 1/2" helical-scan video tape recorders for 20 years (and various other formats) at a way higher bandwidth and lower gain than audio tape heads