Do Strings matter on DSP Modeling Guitars?

Started by Elantric, August 23, 2014, 03:28:35 PM

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Elantric

The following discussion and reply also holds true for Roland Hexaphonic COSM Guitar Modeling Systems too.

http://line6.com/support/topic/9108-do-the-types-of-strings-matter/#entry62623
QuoteDo Strings matter on DSP Modeling Guitars?

Clayman wrote>
Of course it cares. The audio you hear out of the guitar is 100% the audio you hear for your strings. It is 100% signal based audio, and the way it emulates bodies and pickups is by putting the incoming audio processed by convolution captures of the actual pickups and bodies.

It's why they use piezos, because it's the closest thing to the sound of your strings raw without the pickups coloring the tone.


In a sense, the Variax is extremely reliant on the sound of your strings. Without the piezo pickups, it cannot make the guitar sound like a humbucker, a single coil, or any of the other nuances it needs.


I actually tried acoustic strings on the Variax once, and since it's piezo and not magnetic, it will pick up the sound. The sound ended up very different. Electrics were unusable. Acoustics actually sounded better though, because, it's acoustic strings.



I actually made an audio sample demonstrating the difference between Modeling (Variax) and MIDI (synth or sampling). A MIDI guitar is what doesn't need to know the sound of the strings, but the pitch and velocity.

https://soundcloud.com/clay-man-2/guitar-modelling-vs-guitar-midisynthsampling



First clip is the Variax, second is the same clip going into Audio-to-MIDI. Third is Variax on the left speaker, and MIDI on the right.

You will hear why the Variax ( a DSP Modeling Guitar) is not a synth guitar, midi guitar, or anything like such.



https://soundcloud.com/clay-man-2/guitar-modelling-vs-guitar-midisynthsampling

https://soundcloud.com/clay-man-2/guitar-modelling-vs-guitar-midisynthsampling
QuoteFor people who don't understand that the Variax is not a MIDI, Synth, or Sampling guitar. The sound you hear is from your strings all the way through the guitar and when it goes out. It is merely digital processing.


Clay-man at 1:53:
To drive the point home, here is Variax (left speaker), Guitar-to-MIDI (right speaker)

Clay-man at 1:28:
No nuances will be picked up, harmonics, pick scrapes, anything, unlike modeling.

Clay-man at 1:10:
Realize how thin and brittle the guitar tone sounds? Because it's sampling. It reads the pitch of my notes, and replaces it with prerecorded samples.

Clay-man at 1:04:
Like I've said, palm mutes are impossible to read properly via MIDI or synthesis

Clay-man at 1:00:
Here begins the exact same audio clip fed into MIDI Guitar, a Guitar-to-midi plugin.

Clay-man at 0:54:
Even picking the strings behind the nut gets picked up. Do you understand?

Clay-man at 0:50:
Every nuance, anything you play, will show up in the signal, because it's that, the signal, merely processed through algorithms of the emulated guitars.

Clay-man at 0:44:
Pick scrapes. You get the idea. This is clearly the audio I'm playing on my guitar, not a synthetic signal.

Clay-man at 0:38:
Any harmonics are impossible on a synth guitar.

Clay-man at 0:29:
Pinch harmonics, impossible on a synth guitar