Max/MSP Tutorial: Building a granular synthesiser in Max with mc objects and gen~

Follow along to this tutorial to see how I build a quick and dirty granular synthesiser with Max/MSP, using multichannel objects and a healthy dose of gen~.
Greg White's KZbin video explaining granular synthesis: • Granular Synthesis EXP...
A concise article by Curtis Roads on granular synthesis: static1.square...
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/ toneparticle
/ toneparticle
www.tonepartic...

[@HIGHTDE]

hello! so, i followed this tutorial step by step but when it came to the "boundmode wrap part", it didn't came any sound on the output, what could have done that? also, all the rest worked properly, it's just that little part

[@anthonyarcana4391]

any solution to this, i get the same issue

[@tobiasghulamu3270]

i solved the issue loading a sample in to the sample buffer @@anthonyarcana4391

[@gusfring5151]

same here, i don't know how to fix it, did you find a solution?

[@phoenelai]

Coming back to do this one this weekend!

[@ikalgo5281]

Cheers man you explained your process in such a digestible way! Great tutorial

[@mathiasaugust5842]

great tutorial, thank you! my mc.gen~ does not recognize the spray and spread params, they dont show up on the attrui. they are nor shown either when i right click the inlet on mc.gen. any idea why? im using max 8

[@louiswarynski9039]

This is so great. Demystifying gen a lot.

[@lauprellim]

Great tutorial. Thanks so much for sharing!

[@Trelosolyuy]

Oh man, that's spectacular! I really wanted to have the skills for this hahaha

[@mooshrums]

I followed along and built this fantastic sounding granulator. One thing I had to multiply 3rd unpack outlet from the node interface by 128. to get it to work properly. Another thing was when I patched inside mc.gen~ and then saved my patch, I tried the patch to see what it sounded like, them tried to open mc.gen~ again and all my patching had disappeared. I had to delete and insert a new mc.gen~ object and re-patch before it worked. I lost my mc.gen~ patch multiple times doing this. Is there something I may be doing wrong? Eventually managed to complete it and save it, but still don't know what caused that to happen. Thanks for the clear and intuitive tutorial. You're a natural teacher.

[@toneparticle]

Thank you so much for this. Sorry you had problems with the contents of your gen patcher disappearing. If you save the gen patcher in the same folder that your main .maxpat is stored and then give the name of the gen file as an argument after MC.gen~, that should stop happening. I should have explained that. Also, I sped through the bit where I set up the position slider range from 0-1 with float output enabled. You could set these ranges to anything you like. But you can plug a phasor~ object directly into that range and it will act as a scrubber. Thanks for the comments man. Really appreciate that coming from the god of Falcon

[@mooshrums]

@@toneparticle Ah, didn’t know you had to save the mc.gen~ separately. I didn’t do that. I only saved the main patch. May have lost my work again then after I quit Max last night. 😜 I need to pick up my game a bit with mc and gen. I’ll be following for more vids in the future. Great job. Thanks for your kind words, but seriously, Falcon is so intuitive, and really like a modular synth by way of modulation options, it is quite easy to pick up.

[@toneparticle]

@@mooshrums Sorry you had to go through that. I have experienced that quite often too. One thing I always do is duplicate the mc.gen object whenever I make any changes, as this happens quite a lot. I will try not to skip through these things in future!

[@mooshrums]

@@toneparticle No problem. Thanks 🙏

[@paulbergel9191]

@@toneparticle ahh! so glad I read the comments -- I was just having the same problem. Had to rebuild the second mc.gen~ patch a few times. Giving all the mc.gen~ patchers names got everything working though! Thanks so much!! Such an awesome tutorial!!

[@Ch1cch1]

Hi! I'm loving the tutorial, but I found a big problem with gen~ operator (23:33) because Max gave a "faile to compile" error. How can I fix that?

[@vojkofau]

why did you record this with dark sunglasses?

[@toneparticle]

I'll let you in on an embarrassing secret : for ages, I couldn't figure out why everything looked so dark, then I discovered that my screen capture software was recording with 50% opacity. I'm really sorry 😕

[@mattkaz9604]

Spectacular tutorial.

[@toneparticle]

Thanks. Hope it worked out

[@Spearced]

Man this is excellent. You deserve more subscribers!

[@natemaynatemay]

Got it working--thanks so much!!

[@motelflamingo]

Great project! Thanks!

[@laurinbaumann]

nice tutorial but i would have loved some more detailed explanation to many of the used objects. i didn't understand much tbh

[@itslanelane4899]

Great Tutorial Maaan thnks a lot! I 've a question: Is the background music around 9 minutes yours? whats the track name? I want to know moree!

[@bios.3D]

Hey :) Thanks a lot for your great tutorial(s). I'm wondering if you could point me in a direction regarding an approach where each grain is corresponding to a fixed channel, so that i could make individual audio processing per grain before the mixdown ?

[@toneparticle]

facebook.com/groups/maxmspjitter/permalink/10163007076864392/ Thanks for watching. This was quite a good thread. I've been building something which allows 8 channels of live input and per grain parameters such as size, pitch, channel, panning, position and reverse probability with a single gen~ instance but it's quite CPU-heavy so best have a look at some of those package options first

[@miguelalexandresimoesneves8660]

Great stuff! But how would you use it into JUCE? Could I just add param and messages and it would work when I exported it?

[@diogomarques8]

Great video! How do i do, if i want to create multiple granulators in the same patch (multiple Gen~ granular / multiple buffers)?

[@kalubandali2241]

awesome stuff, thanks mate

[@gabrielfynsk2250]

Hey man, just sent you a message on IG. Managed to get almost everything in order minus the panning and the polyphony? Loved the video, thank you

[@TomuG3]

awesome content!

[@daghesan]

If you could just record the video with a higher brightness...

[@toneparticle]

Sorry - took me ages to figure out, but I had OBS recording with 50% opacity.

[@Trelosolyuy]

Mine isn't working. When I turn on the DAC, just like you did at 21:20, it doesn't work. Don't know what I've done wrong, but I have already tried it twice :(

[@toneparticle]

Ah no! Sorry about that. Have you saved the actual gen patch and given the Mc.gen~ the same name as an argument? I skipped through that part in the vid but it's pretty important 🙃 feel free to send me a screenshot of your patch on Instagram

[@Trelosolyuy]

@@toneparticle Thank you for your attention man! I just tried naming and saving the patch, but still got no sound. I'm gonna send it to your IG if you don't mind :) Thank you again for being so attentive!

[@Onokio]

@@Trelosolyuy YO! Don't forget to load a sound into the "buffer~ smpl"! If you're not hearing anything, it's likely because the second "mc.gen~" has nothing to granulize.

[@piercarlociraselli2248]

@@toneparticle hi have the same problem... the mc.gen is identical to yours but when I turn on the dac nothing is coming out

[@jimmyaggett9337]

@@piercarlociraselli2248 hi did you manage to solves this? Struggling myself.

[@christophertimm4141]

Hi. Love this video!! I wanted to ask: Im still getting clicks after adding the latch object? is there something that I'm missing here?

[@toneparticle]

Could be any number of things. Feel free to send the patch to via my website or Instagram

[@yourlifemasterycoach]

Very gray and hard to see on my computer.

[@anthonyarcana4391]

hi after making the second mcgen with position and grain i dont get anymore any sound from it, until then i get the initial clicks. so lets say at min 21 of the video i dont get any sound, any idea why, the video is brilliant anyway

[@toneparticle]

Thanks. I suspect its because your mc.gen~ has imploded. Has everything disappeared inside it?

[@anthonyarcana4391]

@@toneparticle still everything in place as i can see, maybe i can send you the file somehow? not sure why you yt keeps deleting the link

[@toneparticle]

@@anthonyarcana4391 you can send it to me via my website

[@anthonyarcana4391]

@@toneparticle cant find any contact form, i have added you on IG and messaged there, thanks for the help!

[@siri8936]

hihi! The same happens to me! did you resolve it??

[@leopatissier-baudel3557]

I tried, but really, that's tuff for my skills! No audio signal get out of my mc.gen~ object, so nothing appears on the scope. How is it possible ? And, what's the background sounds ? In particular the one at around 10 mins. Rly nice ambient stuff.

[@toneparticle]

Yeh it might take a few watches to get your head around it. I certainly had to practice it several times. Make sure you save the actual gen patch and then give the Mc. Gen~ object in your main patch the same name as an argument. Things just disappear when there are bugs. I'm sorry for not going over that detail more clearly. Let me know if that works then. The music is just some unreleased tracks that I made recently

[@Onokio]

Don't forget to load a sound into the actual "buffer~ smpl" btw! (That may help) If you need help doing that right click the "buffer~" and open up the help file.

[@toneparticle]

@@Onokio THIS! very important. The easiest way is to simply drop a sample onto the actual buffer~ object. Double click the object to check it landed safely

[@EstebanRV]

In case this is still useful, I just found a solution for this, at least one that worked for me. You need to actually load a sample into the buffer~smpl object you create n the beggining. You can drag and drop one directly into the object from the max file brower (maybe even from the OS file browser directly)

[@nikoskanelakismusic]

Is it posible for this patch to work using live signal instead of buffers and if yes what should we change to make it happen?

[@minothi]

Hi! Im 26 min into your video. Going over the patch comparing and making sure its identical, I still get allot of clicks. Especially when moving the POSITION slider. I wonder if you or anyone could explain to me where this might happen so I can investigate further.. Amazing video btw. Thanks allot!!

[@toneparticle]

Cheers man. Think I resolve the sources of clicks later on. Not at my laptop at the moment. Will let you know later. Maybe share your patch in a reply

[@minothi]

@@toneparticle Hi. Thanks allot for quick reply. Will check in later on. You did fix the clicks already in the video, and your sound is without clicks, but mine is still with :-) Not sure how to post the patch in here..

[@minothi]

I left out an object. SO much less clicks, but there are still some clicks. Could I send you the patch on email for you to look at perhaps?

[@toneparticle]

@@minothi oh cool. Sure. Send it to [e-mail]

[@toneparticle]

@@minothi or maybe send a screenshot as well

[@glugblub7524]

great bro

[@piercarlociraselli2248]

i have a problem with the mc.gen... i write all th path inside the mc gen but when i save and i close the main patch the mc.gen returns to its original form ( 2 in and 1 out).... any suggenstions ? @toneparticle

[@toneparticle]

Sorry that's happening. I've been there! Before this happens it might be worth duplicating the patch and moving it to a corner of your patch. Try again and don't turn on the ezdac until everything is complete. Have you saved the gen patch in the same folder as your main .maxpat? Give the mc.gen~ an argument "@gen thegenpatch.gendsp". See if that works

[@dianeschuh5046]

@@toneparticle thank you so much! had the same problem and it *does* work with naming the mc.gen and everything, also for those with the same problem don't forget to add a soundfile in "buffer~ smpl" ! thanks again for the great tutorial!

[@jamescarey1616]

My scope won't display anything from the mc.phasor~ @chans 30 , any ideas anyone as to why that might be

[@toneparticle]

Is your ezdac activated?

[@jamescarey1616]

​@@toneparticle no it wasn't thank you, always the most simple things

[@jamescarey1616]

@@toneparticle Although I've gotten to 21:35 in the video and have no clicks now, is this because i need a sample?

[@crash936]

How did you learn all this :)

[@nojusticeanywhere]

somehow my second mc.gen~ that everything is plugged into isn't working and I've looked over the work several times. I don't know what's wrong.

[@toneparticle]

Not working as in not making a sound? Is there a sample in the buffer?

[@nojusticeanywhere]

@@toneparticle oh. Yes I guess I haven't added a sample to the buffer yet, but the grain from the first mc.gen isn't coming through when it's being tested, unless that also requires a sample?

[@toneparticle]

@@nojusticeanywhere Sorry for the slow reply. Feel free to send me the patch here or on Instagram if you still haven't sorted it out

[@nojusticeanywhere]

No worries, I did wind up getting it working, I was just unsure on the formatting of naming my buffer and directing to the samnple file, but I appreciate your assistance!

[@toneparticle]

@@nojusticeanywhere Glad you got it working!

[@runner0075]

Hi, does it work on live input?

[@toneparticle]

Yes - you can use poke~ to record live input into a buffer and granulate in the same way you would with a sample

[@runner0075]

@@toneparticle thanks I will try that way..

[@runner0075]

@@toneparticle ot works quite well, in live mode, with poke, thanks!