This document describes a new guitar synthesizer called trueContact that allows guitar players to control digital sound synthesis plug-ins in a natural way. It uses a hexaphonic pickup and MIDI control messages to map guitar playing techniques in real-time to parameters of soft synth plug-ins, modifying tones. This provides guitarists with an intuitive way to access exotic tones from the synth realm while retaining their style of play.

1. > Concept trueContact
Etienne THUILLIER
etienne.thuillier@polymtl.ca
NEED +33 6 13 03 49 82
BRING true guitar playing into digital sound synthesis PRO V ID E elec t r on ic m u s ic ian s an
realm without sacrificing style nor virtuosity accoustically grounded controller
! Increased expressiveness through synth-realm ! Intuitiveness
tonal control ! Versatility
! Exotic guitar tones ! Spontaneousness
! Simplified design process of new guitar effects/
tones
SOLUTION : trueContact... a high-end stringed synthesizer using soft-synth plug-ins
1 LOAD any soft synth plug-in 3 TWEAK synth parameter to modulate
! current or future output’s tone in real-time, notably :
! whatever the underlying synthesis technique ! time-frequency enveloppes of
components of ongoing notes
! attack sharpness
2 PLAY guitar like you will 4 EXPERIENCE a "touching the string sounds
! natural control of ouptut sound like touching the plug-in's tone" effect
! any playing technique / any style
! from noisy / atonal to clean / melodic
! no « detection parameter » tweaking needed
1 10010
3
2 Soft Synth
Host
trueContact trueContact
Detection Synthesis MIDI tone control
M3i's Laser messages
pickUp MIDI Audio signal output
pitch control
messages
Hexaphonic pickup trueContact rythm and
audio signals (X 6) ornamentation control
signals (time continuous) 4
! Absolute sentitiveness - even the slighest ! Absolutely glitchless
contact of a string translates in the synth sound of
the output ! Very low guitar to output sound
latency
! True faithfullness - all contacts are faithfully " guitar to output onsets < 6 ms
translated to the output whatever playing " guitar to output pitch
technique is used : modulations ~ 1 ms
" Appoyando/Tirando/Shredding, " whatever the string’s pitch
" Strinking/Slapping/Palm-muting,
" Rythmic ornamentations/Pick-slides/
Rubbing/fret buzzes,
" Hammer-ons/Pull-offs/Slurs/Slides,
" Bends…
© E. Thuillier 2011