Picoloop Vita

Picoloop
Picoloop
	File:Picoloopvita.jpg
General
Author	yoyz
Type	Music Apps
Version	0.77a
License	Mixed
Last Updated	2017/04/17
Links
	Download
	Website
	Source

Picoloop is a synth and a stepsequencer (a clone of the famous nanoloop). The step sequencer play 4 tracks simultaneously, by default each track are 16 steps long, you can set the track to be up to 128 steps. Each track has a synthengine which can be a Virtual Analog, a Drum Synth, a FM synth. Each of the step can be edited on the 4 tracks. So for example, you can set a C4 note on step 0, nothing on step 1 and 2, then a D+5 on step 3 until the step 15.

A pattern of 16 steps is played repeatedly while these notes can be edited in various respects like volume, pitch, filter, lfo etc. All parameters are set step-wise, so you can make huge variation of sound on the same pattern. Each channel's patterns can be saved to file slots and are then available for new combinations. Finally, saved patterns can be arranged in a song structure.

Besides the song editor and manual loading of patterns, there are 3 different ways to modify each channel's patterns so that they form longer structures:

1/2, 1/4 or 1/8 speed
Different pattern lengths by track

Picoloop is targeted for linux/SDL compatible system. It uses SDL to render graphics. It uses RtAudio or SDL to render audio out. It uses RtMidi to send and receive midi message, today only clock.

Manual and tutorial for PC/PSP/PSVita/Pocketchip can be fetch here: https://github.com/farvardin/picoloop-manual.

Media

Screenshots

How it works

There is two pane :

the 16 steps ;
the menu which is above the 16 steps ;

On the 16 boxes, there is a moving cursor which displays the current played step. And another cursor which displays the current selected step. There is a text menu, which allows you to select channel and edit parameter. All notes in the sequencer can be edited simultaneously.

The menu mode

The menu mode changes the selected textual menu at the bottom of the screen. This allows you to choose what kind of parameter you want to change, for example, the NOTE, the OSC, the Filter... In menu mode, when you press left/right, it changes the textual menu in the bottom of the screen

</>             move backward/forward in the menu
^/v             select the track from 0 to track 3
B               do nothing
A + </>/^/v,    edit all steps at once
A               enter the edit mode
L               go to the next     16 steps on the same track
R               go to the previous 16 steps on the same track
SELECT          call menu2 or menu1 ( it cycle between the two menu )

The edit mode

The edit mode changes the current step on the 16 steps display. In edit mode, when you press left/right, it changes the current step in the sequencer.

</>             select next step
^/v             select step+4, step-4
B               enter a note in a step, it works as a cut/paste
A + </>/^/v,    edit the current step
A               do nothing
L               go to the next     16 step on the same track
R               go to the previous 16 step on the same track
SELECT          call menu2 or menu1 ( it cycle between the two menu )
START           cycle between the different parameter

menu1

The menu 1 is the first menu. It allows to modify the parameter of the synthengine of the current track. Each synth engine has different kind of parameter.

You can:

A/R : the enveloppe of the synth
Note : the value of the note trigged
OSC : the oscillator of the synth
VCO : the vco parameter for example a osc1 and osc2 mixer
LFO : the lfo parameter
FLTR : the filter parameter.

Here is the global overview of the most common parameters you will find by synth engine.

A/R :
- Amp Enveloppe
  - Attack/Release Amp / FM operator1
  - Decay/Sustain Amp / FM operator1
- Filter Enveloppe
  - Attack/Release Filter / FM Operator2
  - Decay/Sustain Filter / FM Operator2
- Trig/Amplification
  - trig time/Volume
Note :
- Choose note with "C3" "C4" "D2"
- Choose note with "dot"
OSC :
- Choose the two OSC shape of the synth, the drumsynth, the FM synth
VCO :
- VCO mix in synth mode, OP1mult/OP2mult in FM mode
- OP1amp/OP2amp in FM mode
LFO :
- depth/speed in psynth and drumsynth mode
- pitchbenddepth/pitchbendspeed in psynth mode
FLTR :
- Cutoff/Resonance
- algo/mode ( lp/bp/hp )

menu 2

The menu 2 is a more general menu. You can:

L/S load and save a pattern track or the 4 pattern track ;
BANK change the current bank which allow you to have more pattern.
PSH shift left or right the pattern of a track and add bunch of 16 step ;
MAC change the current synth engine, synth, drumsynth, dbopl (adlib fm)
FX apply fx on the current track delay
BPM change the BPM and swing of the 4 track and the step diviser of the current track

L/S menu

The top menu shows the tracks and patterns.

Save your current track by selecting an empty slow, then B+down.
Save your current pattern (group of 4 tracks) by selecting a column, then A+down.
Load a track with A+up (it will replace your current working track).
Load a pattern with B+up (il will replace the 4 current working tracks).

You can clone a track by loading it into memory, then saving it to another track.

The menu below (song position) allows you to order your tracks. You can enter it with Start key.

Define Loop start position with A+up
Define Loop end position with A+down
Change the values with B+up and B+down.

PSH menu

Increase the track size (16 steps block) with A+UP
Decrease the track size (16 steps block) with A+DOWN
Increase the track size (1 step) with A+RIGHT
Decrease the track size (1 step) with A+LEFT
Navigate into the new steps (move the position by -16 or +16) with the LEFT and RIGHT SHOULDER (or TAB and BACKSPACE on PC)

Controls

- SELECT            : enter menu and move between menu
- ENTER             : Start key/enter a menu
- A key             : insert note/delete node/copy note
- ESC+ENTER         : quit

Depending on the current menu selected : A/R, OSC, VCO, BPM, LS, etc.

- B key + up        : change value up
- B key + down      : change value down
- B key + left      : change value left 
- B key + right     : change value right

Usage

file named dataP<%d>T<%d>.pic store information about saved pattern. This file will be created when you store file in the "L/S" menu.

Debug

You need two file font.bmp and font.ttf which are located next to the source.

Debug Ps Vita

Read https://tai.henkaku.xyz/ you need to go to this website, then use the vita exploit on your ps vita at this url http://henkaku.xyz/go/ Here your ps vita should have the "beta exploit".

You need to have psp2shell compiled from https://github.com/yoyz/psp2shell it's a from from https://github.com/Cpasjuste/psp2shell but it should be at the right commit level.

Compiled psp2shell so you have a psp2shell binary Compiled the kernel and user module and put it on your ps vita in ux0:/tai Then build picoloop for your psvita with -DDEBUG_PRINTF, it should work

grab your core file in the ux0:/data directory, the last core

use vita parse core from here : https://github.com/xyzz/vita-parse-core install it as root using the pip as root :

pip install -r requirements.txt

then $ zcat psp2core-1510435186-0x0000092601-eboot.bin.psp2dmp > psp $ python /home/peyrardj/build/vita-parse-core/main.py psp picoloop_vita.elf

You can also push the eboot.bin binary directly in the good location with this command

psp2shell> put eboot.bin ux0:/app/PICOLOOP1/

Enable audio (loads snd_bcm2835)

dtparam=audio=on

better audio

audio_pwm_mode=2

Recompile the lastest SDL2 because the shipped one on raspi3 is not good. So please install SDL2 as usual, then before launching picoloop source this on your shell with the right path to the "new" SDL2 library export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/home/pi/SDL2/lib/

Changelog

V0.77abcd

a : introduce lgptsampler for vita and raspberry pi
b : introduce lgptsampler for windows, stuck on psp
c : fix the crash on clang++, need to fix all int myfunc() { } without return 0; in the bracket...
c : lots of valgrind
c : move to RtAudio 4.1.2 to 5.0
c : update to lastest psp2shell on vita
d : avoid an insidious graphic bug on vita on display_graphic_loadsave()
d : avoid a weird behaviour in lgpt on vita with resonance which crash the app when it is tweaked
d : this version work on opendingux, psvita, windows, fail on psp
e : lots of changed here, mostly on raspi3_ILI9486_RtAudio_sdl20 basically, this screen and raspi3 works on midi on this version, the tag is for this one

V0.76abc

a : first port on psvita thanks to #henkaku team
b : re add polyrithmic in PSH,
b : fix bpm speed ( slightly higher )
b : STOP the sequencer with A+B in BPM and START the sequencer wih A+START in BPM
b : fix ps vita LTRIGGER and RTRIGGER
b : fix the SELECT+UP/Down to change volume, but not change the track
b : MAX_PATTERN_BY_PROJECT update to 128 for all platform, but not PSP, opendingux, gp2x
c : introduce a SELECT+RIGHT|LEFT to speed up reduce the tempo on the main menu a little like elektron box

V0.75abcdef

introduce mmc start message there was only the mmc_stop handled
remove a lot of duplicate code in XXXUserInterface, because it was really needed
a add the resid engine
b export DUMP_AUDIO=1 now export a wav file
c add SDL2.0 compatibility and keep SDL1.2 as default because it works

V0.74acd

add pocketchip platform, which is a "kind of variant" of raspberry pi 1, thank to garvalf from chipmusic.org
fix a PatternElement.cpp issue related to a value not initialized
shift track to the left and to the write in the song "orderlist"
fix a bug with the note tuning which appear from 0.71 to 0.74

V0.73

add a midi delta option in the [BPM] menu to move the sync signal in time, it is a kind of "midi delay" but doesn't work exactly the same way
add a 'osc scale' which allow to change oscillator one or oscillator two pitch to make basic chord with two note
rework a bit BPSynth on opendingoo to allow to remove some bad FixedPoint behaviour
fix first buffer audio generation of pbsynth which lead to an audio glitch

V0.71

improve realtime of mda drum synth, now quite useable, but need to be improved

V0.70

add a readme.html in the repo
fix some glitch on the screen from 320x240 to 640x480

V0.69

add midi in sync on linux/windows
add midi out sync on linux/windows
midi on windows add issue with latency
windows can run MDADrumSynth, still with issue with the latency

External links

Github - https://github.com/yoyz/picoloop
VitaDB - https://vitadb.rinnegatamante.it/#/info/191