Question: Wave-phasing on the PC engine, how feasible is that?

[Michirin9801]

As of Delek's new prerelease of Deflemask 12.1, wave phasing appears to work!    At least better than it did before!  you still get the default minor HuC6280 pop once in a while, but NOTHING like it was before.

Also (and this is a biggie) the bug where you switch from notes to samples and you're samples are locked at 1 volume is gone!  now i'm free to switch a channel from one to the other at my leisure.   YAY!

This new version is pretty good, but you missed the pre-release of version 12.0.0 mate, that one was the best! It used its own custom window for opening instruments and wavetables, you could easily 1-click the wave you wanted and test it on-the-fly without closing the window, and when you found the wave you wanted you could just select it and be done...
Since version 12.0.1 they've changed it to the traditional Windows "Open File" window, and it sucks, you have to select the wave and the instrument you want before you can test it, so every time you want to load a new wave you have to click "Load Wave" then select your wave and click "Open" and THEN test it, and if it isn't the wave you wanted you have to do it again, and again, and again, until you find the wave you want... Yeah I know that I'm supposed to remember what each instrument sounds like based only on their file names, but I'm too lazy for that, and the old window was SO much faster and more convenient! I wish they'd bring it back...

Thankfully I haven't deleted my favourite old version of the tracker, so I can easily make my songs on that version and just open it up on the new version whenever I need to export a .hes file, that said though, with Huzak existing and all it's gonna be kinda pointless to even use Deflemask's .hes export, thus rendering any new version of the tracker that doesn't contain the PC engine CD add-on or the noise mode envelope pointless to me...

[fragmare]

As of Delek's new prerelease of Deflemask 12.1, wave phasing appears to work!    At least better than it did before!  you still get the default minor HuC6280 pop once in a while, but NOTHING like it was before.

Also (and this is a biggie) the bug where you switch from notes to samples and you're samples are locked at 1 volume is gone!  now i'm free to switch a channel from one to the other at my leisure.   YAY!

This new version is pretty good, but you missed the pre-release of version 12.0.0 mate, that one was the best! It used its own custom window for opening instruments and wavetables, you could easily 1-click the wave you wanted and test it on-the-fly without closing the window, and when you found the wave you wanted you could just select it and be done...
Since version 12.0.1 they've changed it to the traditional Windows "Open File" window, and it sucks, you have to select the wave and the instrument you want before you can test it, so every time you want to load a new wave you have to click "Load Wave" then select your wave and click "Open" and THEN test it, and if it isn't the wave you wanted you have to do it again, and again, and again, until you find the wave you want... Yeah I know that I'm supposed to remember what each instrument sounds like based only on their file names, but I'm too lazy for that, and the old window was SO much faster and more convenient! I wish they'd bring it back...

Thankfully I haven't deleted my favourite old version of the tracker, so I can easily make my songs on that version and just open it up on the new version whenever I need to export a .hes file, that said though, with Huzak existing and all it's gonna be kinda pointless to even use Deflemask's .hes export, thus rendering any new version of the tracker that doesn't contain the PC engine CD add-on or the noise mode envelope pointless to me...

Damn!  Why did Delek remove that "preview" feature?  It's super useful previewing the instruments.

You know what I think would be greatly useful?  The ability to give waveforms little nicknames within the wavetable dialogue, so you can better remember what each waveform is for.  That definitely occurred to me before.  Also, the ability to copy/paste waveforms and the ability to "bump" the waveform left/right so that wraps.  Or flip the waveform on the X/Y axis.  That stuff would be useful.  The way I work, anyway, it would be.

And, yes, Elmer's driver is definitely coming along quite nicely.  It'll be a godsend for game-optimized music/sounds.  And I think you came along to this forum at just the right time to be the guinea pig for new versions haha 

[Michirin9801]

You know what I think would be greatly useful?  The ability to give waveforms little nicknames within the wavetable dialogue, so you can better remember what each waveform is for.  That definitely occurred to me before.  Also, the ability to copy/paste waveforms and the ability to "bump" the waveform left/right so that wraps.  Or flip the waveform on the X/Y axis.  That stuff would be useful.  The way I work, anyway, it would be.

Those ideas are bloody genius!
Granted, the idea to copy and paste waves is something that popped up in the suggestions thread in the Deflemask forum a couple of times, heck Famitracker has that feature for the N-163 and the Disk System, you'd think it would be a no-brainer to add to deflemask but NOPE! It's not there...
The others, while not exactly necessary, would REALLY come in handy!

[fragmare]

I guess in response to the topic now, since the new Deflemask release, is that wave phasing on the PCE is about THIS possible. 

First loop is Genesis using three channels.  Second loop is PCE using ONE channel.

https://soundcloud.com/user-716572978/wave-phase-demo01

It's still a bit dirty sounding because i'm still working on volume enveloping the pattern loop for it, and the lower underlying note is starting to get lost because i need to create a couple more waveforms for the thing, BUT...

This is recreating THREE of the Genesis PCM channels on ONE single PCE channel by changing waveforms on-the-fly and frequently.

I think with some more work, I could probably make it nearly 1:1 to the Genesis three channel version.  I don't really notice a lot of crackling or popping when played in Mednafen, either, which is nice. 

[Michirin9801]

Very nice ^^

[esteban]

A: It is feasible.

[spenoza]

I don't think Mednafen is going to pop the way real hardware will.

[fragmare]

I don't think Mednafen is going to pop the way real hardware will.

Not any more than Bloody Wolf, or any of the other games that use wave phasing.  They sound alright to me.  I can live with the default popping of the HuC6280.  It's not that serious.  The previous version of Deflemask was the main issue here.

BTW, take 2 on the wave phasing.  added a few more waveforms and got the low note to come through a bit more.  a couple of the high notes are twangy sounding, and i'm sure this could be remedied with more waveforms and/or finer control (i'm just switching waves every row in Deflemask).  I could cram the entire pattern block into one HUGE instrument, where each note of the block is an arpeggio change within the instrument, and get waveform switching every 1/60th, but that would be a massive PITA.  Not that doing it this way wasn't, I'm just not about to start the whole tune over with 1/1 timing.  Just these two loops were many hours of work... and it's about as good as i can do by-hand.

Anyway, here it is: 
https://soundcloud.com/user-716572978/wave-phase-demo02

I think what's needed for this, or at least high quality phasing, is an app that will take a WAV file and resample it to 1860 or 1920Hz or whatever, and spit out each 32-sample chunk as a line of decimal values from 0-31 in a text file.  Or better yet, spit out sequentially named DMW files! 

[Michirin9801]

Anyway, here it is: 
https://soundcloud.com/user-716572978/wave-phase-demo02

It's better, but I think the end of the loops sound a little weird...

I think what's needed for this, or at least high quality phasing, is an app that will take a WAV file and resample it to 1860 or 1920Hz or whatever, and spit out each 32-sample chunk as a line of decimal values from 0-31 in a text file.  Or better yet, spit out sequentially named DMW files! 

Something similar does exist, but it's not for the PC engine, but for Famitracker's expansion chips which support wavetables, there's both an Audacity Nyquist plugin that will take whatever piece of audio you select and spit out either a 4 bit wavetable for the N163 chip, or a 6 bit wavetable for the Disk System, you can find it here: http://famitracker.com/forum/posts.php?id=4270

But then there's an even better solution, that's a Lua-based WAV loop sampler for the N163 chip for Famitracker by HertzDevil, it will literally take a sample and convert it into sequential wavetables, but here's the catch, you gotta know how to run Lua scripts, and I don't...
Either way, here's the link: http://forums.famitracker.com/viewtopic.php?t=1147

I know these aren't for Deflemask, but they can be pretty useful, I've got a load of wave-phased "samples" that I got just by copying the wavetables directly from Famitracker songs that used wave-phasing on the N163, right into Deflemask!

[fragmare]

Anyway, here it is: 
https://soundcloud.com/user-716572978/wave-phase-demo02

It's better, but I think the end of the loops sound a little weird...

I think what's needed for this, or at least high quality phasing, is an app that will take a WAV file and resample it to 1860 or 1920Hz or whatever, and spit out each 32-sample chunk as a line of decimal values from 0-31 in a text file.  Or better yet, spit out sequentially named DMW files! 

Something similar does exist, but it's not for the PC engine, but for Famitracker's expansion chips which support wavetables, there's both an Audacity Nyquist plugin that will take whatever piece of audio you select and spit out either a 4 bit wavetable for the N163 chip, or a 6 bit wavetable for the Disk System, you can find it here: http://famitracker.com/forum/posts.php?id=4270

But then there's an even better solution, that's a Lua-based WAV loop sampler for the N163 chip for Famitracker by HertzDevil, it will literally take a sample and convert it into sequential wavetables, but here's the catch, you gotta know how to run Lua scripts, and I don't...
Either way, here's the link: http://forums.famitracker.com/viewtopic.php?t=1147

I know these aren't for Deflemask, but they can be pretty useful, I've got a load of wave-phased "samples" that I got just by copying the wavetables directly from Famitracker songs that used wave-phasing on the N163, right into Deflemask!

Yea, it's that damn twangy-ness making it sound weird.  It really needs another waveform or two, but damn... my patience only goes so far.  Doing each waveform by hand is REALLY time consuming.  Not only that, but often times if you change the waveform, you'll need to go back and change the note for that line too.  It's hours and hours of work and verifying just for two pattern blocks... i thought to myself, "there HAS to be a better way".

Those apps sound PERFECT... if only they did 5-bit.  An app like that actually sounds pretty easy to make and sure someone will crank one out if people keep producing PCE chiptunes.    I could probably take the one that spits out 6-bit samples and go in and manually crunch em down to fit.  I'm sure an app like that would output a LOT of redundant or nearly-the-same wavetables that could (and probably should) omit, keeping only the wavetables you need to get the sound you want.  But it would DEFINITELY make wave phasing a LOT easier and more efficient.

Whatever I do, I'm definitely going to fix the first and third note... the twang makes it sound like when one of those huge Cicada bugs starts to make noise.  And anybody who lives in the midwest will tell you that's not a pleasant sound.  At least not musically haha

[Michirin9801]

Those apps sound PERFECT... if only they did 5-bit.  An app like that actually sounds pretty easy to make and sure someone will crank one out if people keep producing PCE chiptunes.    I could probably take the one that spits out 6-bit samples and go in and manually crunch em down to fit.  I'm sure an app like that would output a LOT of redundant or nearly-the-same wavetables that could (and probably should) omit, keeping only the wavetables you need to get the sound you want.  But it would DEFINITELY make wave phasing a LOT easier and more efficient.

The first app has a PCE option, but it's locked for some reason... Maybe someone who knows how to make/edit Nyquist plugins for Audacity can re-activate the PCE option, but as it stands, I'd recommend you to use the 4 bit variation instead, it's gonna be a lot easier and there's gonna be a lot less guessing, the sound might even come off as more accurate, also I believe the Disk System uses a string of 64 6 bit values, but I could be wrong...

[fragmare]

Screw all that, I just had a buddy code-up a small stand-alone app a few minutes ago that works using SoX (cmd based freeware).  Testing now.  Results seem promising so far.  Will bundle and distribute soon. 

[Michirin9801]

Screw all that, I just had a buddy code-up a small stand-alone app a few minutes ago that works using SoX (cmd based freeware).  Testing now.  Results seem promising so far.  Will bundle and distribute soon. 

Oh that's even better! Looking forward to that ^^
(Hopefully there's a drag 'n drop variant)

[fragmare]

Yea, here we go.  PSG voice sample being playing on channel 1...

PSG Sample HES File

PSG Sample DMF File

And here is the app I used to dump all waveforms.

PCE Chipify app by Zeromus

Fair warning, it's 1860hz, so it's going to be a little rough sounding... it's supposed to be a guy saying, "Goddamnit!"

Anyway, if it's good enough to create shitty sounding samples, that means it's good enough to create waveforms to decently replicate complex 2 or 3 part modulated or corrupted notes and such too.

Sadly, Deflemask is still limited to 32 waveforms, so 0.567 seconds of audio is the most you're going to get  :/

P.S., if you're running this on the older revision HuC6280, you WILL notice an audible buzz accompanying the sample from the waveform-switch pop happening every 1/60th.  The HuC6280a has no buzz.

[Michirin9801]

It sounds like s***, but I can see this thing being pretty useful if used correctly!
Welp, gonna try some trumpet sounds sooner or later, we'll see how it sounds...