Discord3 In The Home Stretch...

We’re getting, like, totally close to having a D3 for sale. The user interface (which was something of a bear on this one) is 95% done, and the DSP is 100% done. In the above image, you can see the control layout for the P1 and P2 algorithms. Click the image for a full-sized iteration. The circles in the center section animate based upon shift settings, and the animations change shape based upon the buffer and mod settings for the left and right. Utterly pointless except as a visual reference of the state of the plug-in, but it looks cool and doesn’t cost any CPU, and that ought to be worth something.

The final algorithm complement has changed a bit. The two algos in D1.5 and D2 are actually a single algorithm with minor filtering changes. Since the filters in D3 are much more capable, we got rid of that mode. So P1 is the original Discord algorithm, modeled on the H910/H949 style shifting, which we call Vintage in this context. P2 is a different shifting algorithm entirely which we call Clean. It is sonically quite a bit different than P1; at settings within 8 semitones of the original pitch it is much more accurate than P1, but when you get out past an octave in either direction, it gets quite hollow and metallic, for extremely cool overtones and false harmonic generation.

We also added a buffer size control to P1 and P2, which enable fine tuning for specific instruments or some interesting sound design (read: FSU) possibilities. For more percussive material with short transients, you want a small buffer size, and for material with longer envelopes, a bigger window is more appropriate. The buffer size can be set in one sample increments from 32 samples to 2056 samples.

Once again, this will be a paid upgrade. US$10 for owners of any previous version of Discord (1.0, 1.5, 2), and the price of the effect is US$59.00. I’ll put up some sound files later today, and as soon as I have a working OSX version I’ll lay down the stink with a video.