The Kyma Language for Sound Design, Version 4.5

continue playing the synthesizer from your MIDI keyboard and have it gradually cross fade with some
sampled sounds of flamingos squawking.
In effect, you would like the Capybara to change from an effects processor, to an analog synthesizer, and
finally into a sampler at the end, and you would like these hardware phases to overlap in time. Here is a
time line sketch of the same thing:
A/D Processing
Analog Synthesis
74
Sampler
0 5 10 15 20 25 30
If you specify this as a Mixer with TimeOffsets on the synthesizer and the sampler, and you give each
section a finite duration, then Kyma can schedule the use of resources on the Capybara in a more optimal
way:
Time Sound
0 - 5 s A/D Processing
5 - 10 s Mixer ( A/D Processing, Analog Synthesis )
10 - 15 s Analog Synthesis
15 - 20 s Mixer ( Analog Synthesis, Sampler )
20 - 30 s Sampler
We should reiterate that this is analogous to the hardware itself evolving over time; it is not analogous to
sequencing or to the notes of music notation. It is saying that the synthesizer does not exist before it is
time for you to begin playing it, that it exists for 15 seconds, and then goes out of existence once you have
finished playing it.
This is part of the power of software synthesis — that it allows you to reallocate computing cycles and
allocate them toward whatever algorithm you like. You can (literally in the space of one tick of the sample
rate clock) switch from using all of the Capybara’s resources as an effects processor to using all of the resources
to implement a polyphonic subtractive-synthesis synthesizer. The resources are generic; they are
things like how much memory is available and how many multiplications and additions can be done in
one sample clock (22 microseconds). Kyma can just as easily use the memory and the arithmetic unit to
implement a filter as it can to implement an oscillator or read a sample stored on the hard disk.
Part of the beauty of software is that everything is reconfigurable and modular, and by manipulating
symbols and graphic icons, you are actually manipulating electrons flitting across metal pathways at
nearly the speed of light, not physical masses that require manufacturing, materials, and space. The fact
that it all ends up producing sound in the air is a little bit astounding when you stop to consider it. But
we can’t spend too much time feeling astounded by computers and software, since you are probably getting
anxious to get to work and there are still a few more things to cover in this overview — like how can
we control time?
Time flies like a banana
The Capybara would not be able to implement the time-varying hardware example from the last section
if it were not keeping track of time; that is how it knows when it is time to stop one Sound and begin
computing the next one.
There are three Kyma modules that allow you to take some control over time on the Capybara: Time-
Controller, TimeStopper, and WaitUntil.
The input to a TimeStopper module is loaded into the Capybara, but the time clock is stopped until the
value of the Resume parameter becomes positive. For example, even if the input to the TimeStopper had
a duration of 1 samp (the shortest duration possible), it would last forever unless the value of Resume
changed from 0 to 1 at some point.