** 1 page review / 724 words **

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Snippit Synth

More beefy sounds from the Electronic Cow? Shiuming Lai makes a ruling on this new sample-synthesis tool...

Electronic Cow's infectious enthusiasm for all things musical is apparent - observe its rapidly expanding range of weird and wonderful programs by designer, programmer, musician and writer, Danny McAleer.

Following in the footsteps of Sound Chip Synth and MIDI Arpeggiator, comes the interestingly-titled Snippit Synth. In a similar vein to Sound Chip Synth, Snippit is intended for generating sound samples but, the major difference here is the technique used. While Sound Chip Synth produces sounds modelled on those typical of the ST's Yamaha YM2149 programmable sound generator, Snippit is based on a radically different approach known as granular synthesis.

The physicist, Dennis Gabor, first described the theory of granular sound representation in his paper, "Acoustical Quanta..." circa 1947. In essence, the acoustical quanta he describes, is the limit at which an isolated sonic event becomes indistinguishable to the human ear as such.

A single event in Snippit consists of two complete cycles of a preset waveform, of which there are four to choose from. Sounds can have up to four "chunks", basically four distinct phases each with its own unique parameters. These govern the number of events (grains) per chunk, their distribution over the given time (for example, even, or with a bias towards the start or end of the chunk), fundamental frequency and dispersion limit for frequency sweeps. Yet more buttons determine the direction of the sweep and its shape.

Yes, it is definitely quite hairy to begin with and, gets several times worse if tuning is brought into the equation - more of that later! Like real synth programming, it takes a lot of experimentation to get a particular sound, and even then it may not be the "right" one, because the synthesis model will not allow it. However, an enormous potential still exists due to the number of parameters which can be tweaked.

The master disk includes example sounds which show how versatile Snippit can be, especially the FM-synth string and analogue style bass, which are very nice indeed. More complex sounds are within reach by use of all four chunks. Cross-fading between chunks is variable between 0 - 50%.

Danny has anticipated Snippit will appeal to a wide audience, including professionals so samples can be generated in 16-bit resolution and dumped to another device via MIDI. Tracker musicians may also find Snippit useful. For use in either of these applications, there's a basic problem of tuning which remains to be overcome. To use a sample as a musical sound obviously requires it to be correctly tuned but while the fundamental frequency is clear as day, all the other parameters can, and do, totally change the perceived pitch. Until Danny works out the horrendous maths behind it, samples currently have to be retuned by ear! I understand a resampling program is currently in the works, but I feel some kind of resultant frequency control within Snippit is necessary.

As far as the program itself is concerned, no major gripes. It's intuitively laid out, very stable and works quickly. Possibly the worst thing is the sliders - they have a large range so setting a particular value can be long-winded. Input edit fields are planned along with a whole host of extra features - remember this is only the first release!

Overall Snippet is a useful, well-implemented program. It's by no means a replacement for a full-blown professional synth, more of an interesting additional source. In common with most modern GEM software keyboard shortcuts and ST-Guide hypertext help files are included. I look forward to the forthcoming updates.

** Product box **
Product name: Snippit Synth
Publisher: Electronic Cow
Tel: +44 (0)1426 281347
Email: Electronic_cow@dial.pipex.com
URL: http://dspace.dial.pipex.com/town/terrace/electronic_cow/cownet.htm
RRP: £16.00 + £1.50 P&P
Requires: Any Atari, STe or above for sample playback, 1Mb memory, 640x400 resolution (ST high) or higher
Pros: Snappy operation, user-friendly
Cons: Lack of tuning and envelope shaping
Score: 83%
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Electronic Cow maintains its reputation for slick user-interface design
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Economise on disk real estate by saving sounds as patches
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If you've got an SDS-compliant sampler look for this dialog
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Visit the Electronic Cow web site for updates, information and some freebies