ORBITER ONE

A 4-channel looper including playover with effects and mixing options. This patch is explicitly designed for live performance. Its functionality is similar to well-known loopers such as those from BOSS. I paid particular attention to ergonomics. The patch is quite complex. I’ve tested it thoroughly, but I can’t yet say whether I’ve discovered every problem.

Version 1.2:
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No need to start VNC anymore. Thanks to samesimilar!

I also tried to automatically calculate and set the BPM based on the length of track 1. Unfortunately, this was more difficult than expected, so it’s been postponed…

Version 1.1:
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– Fixed several major and minor bugs (sorry for that!)
– Added Audio Buffer save and load
– Added sidechain compression for playover
– Several optimizations

Basic Operation:
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Keys 1-4 (C, D, E, F, bottom row): Cycle through the screens of Looper 1 to 4
Key 5 (G, bottom row): Playover and overdubbing screens
Key 6 (A, bottom row): Effects screens
Key 7 (B, bottom row): Mixer screens
Key 8 (C, bottom row): Settings screens

As soon as you change a section, the first screen is automatically displayed. Over time, you’ll learn how many times to press to get to the desired settings.

Encoder (short press): Activate or deactivate the clock
Encoder (long press): Return to the main menu

If “Tap” is displayed anywhere, you can set a speed with the AUX button. Or you can save or load a preset. Just look at the screen.

For a keyboard layout, it’s best to look at the PDF “Orbiter key layout.” Listing and describing everything here would be too extensive. Most of it is self-explanatory.

Therefore, I won’t go through every setting in detail, but will only explain the special features.

The patch directory also contains this manual in German and English.

Screen 1 Looper 1 – 4 Sample
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The start and end of the loop aren’t particularly easy to adjust at the moment. This is a problem when you have to work with potentiometers. But I already have an idea (inspired by Elektron) to improve ergonomics. That will probably be availabe in the next version.

Screen 5 Looper 1 – 4 Settings
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Sync: Here, provided the metronome is active (short press of the encoder), the start and recording of the sample can be synchronized to the clock. Currently, this is at a full measure (4/4) or the next quarter measure (1/4). The metronome divides a full measure into 16 sub-measures. In a future version, it will be possible to start the sample at any time (1/16 – 16/16).

Section 6 Effects
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Effects can work either individually or in a chain. If the effects are chained, the order is as follows:

Ringmod => Delay => Phaser => Reverb

However, each looper and the playover can send to individual effects. However, as soon as a looper sends to the ringmod, for example, the signal passes through the entire effects chain.

Synchronize the delay time L/R by pressing D2 (second D) and turning knob 1 at the same time.

See also Section 8 Settings; Screen 3 FX chained or unchained.

Section 7 Mixer
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All measurements are (RMS-based) in dBFS (decibels relative to full scale), as is the case with physical mixers or DAWs. I can simply do more with this than with a simple percentage display.

The first line of the mixer displays the current status of loopers 1-4 and the playback status:
#: Inactive
R: Recording
>: Playing
M: Mute

Like the individual loopers, a [>] is briefly displayed when a sample is started.

The filters (Screen 5) are global.

Section 8 Settings
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Screen 1, Clock synced, globally enables or disables clock synchronization.

Screen 2, Buffer Channels: This allows you to switch between both inputs (L/R). The default setting is to record audio only from the left channel.

Screen 2, Buffer X-Fade: This allows you to enable or disable cross-fading (50ms) in loops.

Screen 4, With buffers: this probably will be included in the next version. This is where the looper samples will be saved with the preset. There will also be a rudimentary way to create projects. Unfortunately, the options for influencing the files in the file system are very limited in Pure Data. So, I’m afraid this won’t be anything great.

Files can now be stored with the preset. File name pattern: PRESETNR-LOOPERNR.wav (e. g.: 1-1.wav => Preset 1, looper 1). You can upload your samples with this pattern and the audio files will be loaded automatically when loading a preset.

Foodswitch
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If a Foodswitch is connected, you can use it to start recording. However, you must first select the looper (C – F). The first press starts recording, and the second press plays the recorded sample directly. Once a sample is in the buffer, the Foodswitch can only be used to start and stop recording. Once the buffer has been cleared (Aux + E2 – A2), you can record again. Please also refer to the key layout.

I hope everything works. I keep finding a few minor bugs, but everything should work so far. If the patch proves useful in live use, I’ll probably purchase and integrate another Foodswitch with more features. And if the patch doesn’t work, maybe it will be a Boss RC600 after all. ;-)

I’ve attached a YouTube track/video I created for a community album. That’s basically what prompted me to build the looper. I wanted to be able to play it live. But since I don’t have a looper, I built my own. If I’d known how much work it would be, I might have just bought one.

The samples I used are included in preset one!

The full album can be found here: https://diestillealbum.bandcamp.com/album/die-stille-various-artists