Introduction to the Sketchpad#
If you would rather jump in and play around, without first going through some of the basics, you probably want to look at Your First Song instead of here. If you are still here, let's begin!
We've all been there: You pull your new shiny from the box, plug it in, turn it on, watch the pretty colours swirling for a few seconds. You are told you are welcome, and then find yourself staring at a screen you haven't seen before. Don't worry, we're about to fix that.
The first screen you see on Zynthbox OS is called the Main page, the central hub from which you control your musical creations. You can navigate between the five main pages of the Zynthbox OS by tapping F1, F2, F3, F4 and F5, for Main, Library, Edit (for Synth and FX and Samles respectively), Sequencer, and Song respectively. To understand it fully, though, we have to be a little abstract first, and look at what precisely a Sketchpad is.
Screenshot
Screenshot of the main screen goes here (screenshots go in when we've got a bit more stability of the look)
Auto-saving
While you work, you might reasonably forget to save, and oh no now the power went and you've lost everything. Hours of work, down the drain! But not with Zynthbox: We auto-save your progress, and should you end up powerless, you won't lose your creation. Just start the thing back up again, and you'll be right back where you were.
The Sketchpad#
In short, a Sketchpad is made up of ten tracks, each of which has five looping clips with notes in the form of midi. Those clips play into a sound setup on the track, which is made up of up to five each of virtual instruments, samples, and effects.
Clips#
Each of your Sketchpad's tracks has five clips on them. These clips contain the midi information for your instruments, and can be toggled off individually. You edit the midi information for the clip by tapping the little preview (the clips are empty by default, and will look like a little grey square), which will show you the sequencer. Each clip can have up to 128 steps, which all have the same length can be changed for each clip. By default, each clip is 16 steps long, and step is a quaver, or in other words a quarter of a beat, or a 16th of a bar.
Multi-clip
By default, your track will allow you to play all five clips at the same time, but you can select not to allow this for each individual track. Open up the track settings, and untick the Allow Multiple Enabled Clips option.
Track Modifiers#
The track can exist in a number of different ways that modify that default state, as well:
Track Modes#
- Sketch:
- This is a track's default mode. In this mode, your clips play into the track's Sound setup, sending the midi notes from the clips directly to those instruments.
- External:
- In this mode, your clips play to an external location. This can be either another track in the same Sketchpad (where that track's style will be obeyed for the clips), or to some piece of equipment connected to your Zynthbox device via for example usb or a 5-pin MIDI connector.
Track Styles#
The Track style defines the overall routing method for midi and audio on the track when in Sound mode.
Graph?
Maybe a little simple graph to show each of these would be helpful...
- Everything:
- This is the default style. With this style, all five clips will play their notes to all the instruments on the track at the same time. Each instrument then plays its sound into the effect in the first slot, and that then in turn plays its sound into slot 2, and so on for all five slots (so, a serial effects bus).
- To use a commonly used term for this method of sound design, this means that for each track with the Everything style, you have a layer synth with five virtual instrument layers and five sample based instruments.
- One-to-One:
- Enabled by ticking it on that main page. With this style, each clip will play their notes into only the slots with the same position as the clip (so, for example, clip a would play to synth slot 1 and sample slot 1, clip c would play to synth slot 3 and sample slot 3, and so forth). The instruments (the synth and sample for each clip) then in turn plays into the effect in the slot with the same number. So, in short, one-to-one has a fully parallel style of routing.
- To use the same description as for Everything style, your layer synth now has a single virtual instrument layer, and a single sample based instrument, and one effect, but each track has five of these layer synths. External midi controllers (keyboards and the like) will play to the instruments associated with whatever your currently selected clip is.
One-to-One and External
The main limitation of the One-to-One style is that you only have a single clip per instrument. This is fine in many cases. However, you can set up an instrument setup in One-to-One style on one track, and then if you decide down the road that no, you really need another variation of that clip, you can use another track targeting the one in One-to-One mode, and then the clips on the new track will behave as though they are just more clips on the old one.
The Header#
The header is visible across all pages on the system, and allows you to see and control the state of Zynthbox.
Screenshot - just the header panel (remember to include some music being played, so it is clear what the v/u meters and the active note display look like)
From left to right, the first button in the breadcrumbs bar there is the Menu button. Tap this to toggle display of the main menu (through which you can navigate to other parts of the system directly, and also access the system's Settings panel - you can also activate it by pressing the Menu button). Next is the name of the current Sketchpad, followed by a (*) if there are modifications since you last saved. Tap it to see options for your Sketchpad. The next button shows your active scene, and tapping lets you switch to another. After that is the Track, which again, tap it and you can switch to another track. After that you will see the currently selected slot, and tapping on this will switch to the Library (same as if you were to press F2). Finally in the breadcrumbs bar is the preset for the currently selected slot, and tapping this will take you to the Edit page (same as if you were to press F3).
Following the breadcrumbs trail is the Record button. Press that to open the Recording Popup which will let you record midi into whatever the currently selected clip is (or press the ⏺ button). After that is your play/stop button. If you are not running playback, you can press this to start playback, and vice versa.
Next to these buttons is your output meter. This will show two horizontal bars, giving you an idea of what the levels are for the audio your Zynthbox is creating. To the right of those bars is the current BPM, and underneath the BPM value is the current playback position in the format Bar.Beat. To the left of the playback position will be a listing of notes being handled by the system, with a small letter ahead of it to signify where those notes are coming from (I: for notes coming in from a midi controller like a keyboard, and S for notes coming from the system itself, either the mini keyboard or the clips).
The area described by the above paragraph can be tapped, which will display the Global popup.
Knobs and Buttons
- ▶ toggles playback
- ⏹ while recording will stop the recording, but leave playback running
- ⏹ during playback will stop playback
- ⏹ while playback is not running will cause the system to send out an "All Notes Off" midi message on all tracks (which will stop any ongoing note, for example if you have a sound with an extremely long release and just want the sound to stop)
- ⏺ will display the Recording Popup (⏺ it while the popup is open will start recording with the current settings)
- Alt+⏺ will start recording immediately with the current settings
- Metronome+⏺ will start recording with a one bar count-in
Sketchpad button
Perhaps this should function the same as pressing the Sketchpad button, just accessible from everywhere? Right now it just shows the file system location of the sketchpad, which seems less useful...
Scenes
The breadcrumbs bar includes a dropdown for scene selection. Probably hide that?
The Global popup#
This is where you control the global settings for your system. BPM, Delay, and Reverb amount are saved with your Sketchpad, and the main system volume and the click settings are not.
Screenshot - just the global popup
The four knobs will each control what their labels suggest.
You can also tap the centre of the BPM knob to tap in your tempo, by averaging out the time between the most recent four taps.
For the two global FX, you can change the parameters by tapping the centre of their knobs to display their Edit page, where you can adjust them the same way you would for any FX in a track's slots.
In addition to the four main knobs, you also have three further entries:
Click is your global metronome, which can be either turned on or off, and using the slider beside it, you can control its volume. Being a very personal sort of thing, this setting is stored for your device, rather than with the Sketchpad.
Stop All Notes will send out a midi panic message to all tracks (useful for example if a piece of external gear has ended up with stuck notes, or if you have notes with extremely long release that you just want to stop right now). This is equivalent to hitting the ++Stop++ button when playback is not running.
The bottom row displays how much of the DSP is currently being utilised. This will fluctuate greatly as you use Zynthbox, however, unless it hits 90% or more, things are likely fine.
Knobs and Buttons
- Bring this up from anywhere by hitting the Global button, and hit it again to hide
- Big Knob controls the master volume
- Knob 1 controls your BPM
- Knob 2 controls the overall global FX 1 (Delay) amount
- Knob 3 controls the overall global FX 2 (Reverb) amount
- Alt +Big Knob controls the Click volume
The Tracks Sidebar#
Screenshot - the sidebar (with a bit more of the screen, to show it's an overlay) with some reasonably filled-out Sketchpad's information, otherwise it looks a bit empty
Swipe in from the left anywhere on the system to show the Tracks sidebar, is designed to let you easily see an overview of your tracks and switch between them, as well as quickly manage the current track's clips, without returning to the Main page. It shows your ten tracks in two columns, and the clips for the current track in a column next to those. The currently selected track and clip are displayed with an outline, and you cap tap them to switch between each.
Knobs and Buttons
- Bring this up from anywhere by hitting the Mode button, and hit it again to hide
The Mini-grid#
Screenshot - the mini-grid (with a bit more of the screen, to show it's an overlay)
Swipe up from the bottom of the display anywhere on the system to show the Mini-grid, which is a pad-style key pad, which shows two and a half octaves of notes in a grid, as matching the key and scale settings for your current clip. Unless changed, this means you will get a chromatic scale (that is, all twelve notes) for two and a half octaves, from a C2 to a G4. You can adjust which notes are shown by using the Octave up/down buttons on the left hand side, and to hide the mini-grid again, press the Hide button in the bottom left hand side.
The Main Page#
The top section of the main page contains an overview of your Sketchpad's ten tracks, in the form of ten columns. Each column displays an at-a-glance view of the state for that track.
Screenshot - just the top section here
The header is the track's name (which you can set in track settings), and underneath that is the track's mode, where the background is the track colour (also set in track settings).
The cell underneath displays an overview of the track's state, dependent on mode. In Sketch mode, it displays a grid of three rows of five cells, signifying the sound slots: Green means the slot is filled, and a dark gray means the slot is empty. In External mode, the field displays the midi channel the track will output if targeting external gear, or if playing to another track, it displays the destination track's ID. Tap this section to switch to the track.
In the bottom, you have a letter for each of the clips on the track. The letter is white if the clip has notes and is enabled (that is, if you will hear anything from that clip), otherwise it is dark gray. Tap this section to switch to the track, and display the Clips tab.
Bottom Bar#
The bottom bar on all pages contains four buttons. On the Main page, the leftmost button is Sketchpad, which shows you the options for saving and loading sketchpads, creating new ones, and Get New Sketchpads, which lets you download sketchpads others have shared on the Zynthbox Store. The Mixer button will toggle the Mixer.
Track#
The Track tab lets you control the way your track sounds.
Screenshot - just the Track panel
At the top, you see the track's name, and then a series of buttons: The little pencil icon opens up Track Settings, and the following buttons let you switch between track modes.
In Sketch mode, you have the toggle for One-to-One style underneath that top row.
You then have your grid of instruments and effects. The white outline shows which slot is currently selected, which decides what is affected when you twist a knob.
In Sketch mode, this shows your Synths, your Samples, and your audio FX. Tapping a slot will select it if it is not already selected, and tapping a selected slot will display a popup with options relevant to that slot.
Notes on popups
I have created a proposal for what to do about the slot popups, which also affect the contents of this part of the documentation, so i'm holding off on writing it just now...
In External mode, slot 1 shows which device the track would capture audio from, slot 2 shows the midi channel used when sending things to external hardware, and slot 3 shows which destination this track has for the clips' midi information (by default this is the 5 pin midi connector, but you can also select other tracks, and any bit of gear you have connected via USB which has a midi input). If you have set the track to capture audio, the slots underneath shows the audio FX for the track.
external mode order
the order is off here, really wants to have slots 2 and 3 swapped around
The row at the bottom displays first a summary of your currently selected instrument. For synths and FX, this means the plugin used, the current bank, and the preset in that bank. The Favorite button allows you to (un)mark the current preset as one of your favorites. For sample slots, it displays the name of the sample above the outlined area, and the sample's waveform inside. When you play a sample (either using a keyboard or a clip), a small blue dot will show which part of the sample is being played.
To the right of the summary you get a preview of your currently selected clip. The name of each clip is displayed above the preview area, and the current clip is underlined. When playback is running, a blue line indicates which part of the clip is currently being played if the current clip is enabled.
Knobs and Buttons
- The Big Knob selects the current track
- Knob 1 adjusts the current slot's volume (for slots where that makes sense)
- Knob 2 adjusts the current slot's filter cutoff (for instruments which have one)
- Knob 3 adjusts the current slot's filter resonance (for instruments which have one)
- Alt +Knob 1 adjusts the current track's volume
- Alt +Knob 2 adjusts the current track's fx send 1 amount
- Alt +Knob 3 adjusts the current track's fx send 2 amount
Track Settings#
Screenshot - just the Track Settings popup
Use this popup to set the name of your track, the track's colour, and whether it should be possible to have more than one clip enabled on the track at the same time.
If you clear the name, it will automatically revert to T and the track's number. The colour is selected from a pre-defined selection.
sequencer target track
The option currently in the track settings popup, but wants to move to be an option in the External mode view of the Track
Clips#
This tab displays an overview of all the clips in your Sketchpad for all tracks, allowing you to enable and disable them easily and quickly. Tapping a clip will make that clip current (and switch to its track if that track is not already the current track), and if you tap the current clip, you can toggle it between enabled and disabled. During playback, activating and deactivating clips works in a manner that is quantized to the bar, which helps you ensure that things run in time with each other rather than with some difficult to rely on offset.
Knobs and Buttons
- The Big Knob selects the current track
- Knob 1 adjusts the current track's volume
- Knob 2 adjusts the current track's fx send 1 amount
- Knob 3 adjusts the current track's fx send 2 amount
Synths, Samples, and FX#
These three tabs function essentially the same, by showing you the slots of each type together for all ten tracks. You can interact with them in the same way you would on the Track tab; that is, tap a slot to select it, and if it is already selected, you will open the popup for that slot. The sidebar displays the currently selected slot's details, and lets you change its gain by using the slider underneath the name.
Knobs and Buttons
- The Big Knob selects the current track
- Knob 1 adjusts the current track's volume
- Knob 2 adjusts the current track's fx send 1 amount
- Knob 3 adjusts the current track's fx send 2 amount
Mixer#
Screenshot - the mixer panel displayed in context (as the layout might look slightly weird out of that context)
The mixer panel lets you adjust, as you might expect, the mixer values for all the tracks, as well as the master output level (which is the same as what you see in the Global popup
Each track has the following mixer values:
The track volume, which is applied post-FX, adjusts the output volume for the track. You can adjust this from -40 dB (non-inclusive, setting the volume to -40 will effectively mute the track), to +20 dB.
The track pan, which is applied post-FX, moves the output of the track in the stereo field, between left and right.
Each track can further be Soloed (which will result in only the soloed track being allowed to make sound, and only one track can be soloed at a time), and Muted (which will result in the track not making any sound, and any number of tracks can be muted).
Finally, each track has two Send effect values, which define how much of the track's pre-FX audio is sent to the two global effects. To adjust those two effects directly, use the Global popup.
Mixer from Anywhere
To get directly to the mixer from anywhere, you can just hit Alt+F1 on any page to immediately switch to the Main page and display the mixer.
Knobs and Buttons
- Toggle the mixer when on the Main page by hitting F1
- Knob 1 adjusts the current track's volume
- Knob 2 adjusts the current track's pan
- Alt +Knob 2 adjusts the current track's Send FX 1 amount
- Alt +Knob 3 adjusts the current track's Send FX 2 amount