DtBlkFx Revision 1.

1
VST audio effect plugin by Darrell Tam ([email protected])
User Guide
Compile date April 2008, Microsoft Windows version
This software incorporates code from fastest-fourier-transform-in-the-west 3.1.2 (www.fftw.org), portable network
graphics library code from libpng/zlib (www.libpng.org/www.zlib.net), Steinberg VST plugin SDK 2.3 and
Steinberg VSTGUI 3.5. VST is a trademark of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH. User manual diagrams
incorporate graphics from ian.umces.edu.

The Description
DtBlkFx is a Fast-Fourier-Transform (FFT) based Virtual Sound Technology (VST) plug-in for use in a
variety of audio software running under Microsoft Windows 2000 or newer.
Use it for...
Precision parametric equalizing with sharp-roll off
Set the frequencies so accurately that you can adjust individual harmonics of a sound
Frequency resolutions of up to 0.7 Hz
Harmonic based (or comb) filtering
Set a fundamental frequency and adjust the level of it and its harmonics - you can even
remove the pitched component of a voice
Active harmonic tracking - let DtBlkFx automatically track a sound and adjust the level
of it's harmonics
Various types of noise control
Change the "contrast" between loud and soft frequencies
Adjust only those frequencies below or above a particular threshold
Clip frequencies above a particular threshold
Sound smearing (phase randomizing)
Frequency shifting
Harmonic shifting by a fixed number of notes
Non-harmonic shifting by a fixed frequency
Active harmonic repitch - the pitch of your sound is monitored and shifted to a
destination note (or matched to another channel)
Various methods of mixing left and right channels
Standard Vocoding (frequency enveloping) - make your trumpet rap, string section sing
or synthesizer talk
Harmonic based vocoding - harmonics in one channel are power-matched to those in
the other (or some predefined waveforms) for a new vocoding sound
Convolution-like mixing
2 new mixing algorithms
Frequency masking
A harmonic or threshold mask may be set for any effect (apart from vocoding) - for
example only shift frequencies that are below the threshold
You can select up to 8 of the above effects to be run in series! Combining the effects in this way allows
you to make completely new and surprising sounds.
DtBlkFx is freely distributable and is covered by the terms of the GNU licensing agreement.
Some really short theory
This effect works differently to most others - instead of filtering or distorting audio data directly,
it finds the frequency spectrum via a fast-fourier-transform and then does stuff to that.

The steps are:

1. Cut input sample data into overlapping blocks
2. Transform each block to the frequency spectrum (this is called the fast-fourier-
transform)
3. Apply some effects to the spectrum
4. Inverse transformed the frequency spectrum back to sample data
5. You feel satisfied
Note: The effect must delay the audio the length of at least a block. By default it is set to 1
beat but you can adjust this down to a fraction of a beat.
The Installation
The 2 versions of DtBlkFx are
DtBlkFx - mono version
DtBlkFxS - stereo version

Windows
No installer... manually copy DtBlkFx.dll, DtBlkFxS.dll and the dtblkfx directory to the VST
plug-ins directory of your music software (e.g. c:\program files\VstPlugins). Note, leave the
DLL's outside of the dtblkfx directory just like they appear in the zip file.
If you have problems with Renoise 1.9.1 (plugins don't appear in the VST list) try deleting the
C:\Documents and Settings\<your user name>\Application Data\Renoise (actually just
deleting all CachedVsts.xml & CachedFailedVsts.xml in that directory for all Renoise versions
should work - you can do this quickly by doing a search for Cached*Vsts.xml and deleting all
found).

Macintosh
Copy the DtBlkFx.vst and DtBlkFxS.vst to /Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST - you can navigate
there using Finder by opening Macintosh HD, then Library, then Audio etc.

The effects are built as universal binaries and should run on PowerPC & Intel Macs.
The Tour
Here's the user interface from the Windows 1.1 version (currently not available on the Mac).

What is all that stuff? Read on...

Overall Params
These are the parameters along the top.

MixBack Percentage mix back of original sound. Set this to 100% to save CPU if
you don't want any effect apart from delay.

VstParam: MixBack

Power Power can be set to match or filter.

Match causes the output "power" to be amplified or attenuated to be the

same as the input "power". This means individual effect amplitudes are
relative to one another. It also means that if you remove a large portion
of your frequency spectrum then left over stuff may end up sounding
very loud.

Filter mode operates like a traditional filter where the output power may
be very different to the input power. This mode is of most use when
using DtBlkFx as a parametric equalizer.

VstParam: MixBack shared parameter, if MixBack param < 0.5 then

power is match otherwise power is filter.

Delay Since DtBlkFx processes audio in blocks it must delay the

sound to operate . Delay controls the amount of delay introduced in
music-beats.

Hopefully this isn't too painful because if you shift your audio track
forward by the same number of beats then all the timing is back to
normal. I have had quite a few "complaints" about the delay! But that is
just how this effect works!!

The maximum block size that can be processed is limited by the delay
that you specify (i.e. small delays will only allow small block sizes).

VstParam: Delay

Overlap Percentage overlap of blocks to use. A large overlap results in a smooth

transit ions between blocks but more CPU while a smaller overlap can
give interesting effects.

VstParam: Overlap
 Sync If sync is turned on then DtBlkFx will try align the blocks with the song
tempo and any parameter changes. When turned off then the position of
blocks will have no particular relationship with the song tempo.

VstParam: Shared with Overlap param (on when > 0.5)

BlkLen Specify the maximum length of block to process audio data.

If the specified Delay is less than the BlkLen specified then a smaller
block length will be used and displayed with an asterisk (*).

Longer block lengths give a higher frequency resolution but need more
delay and CPU. Short block lengths can introduce interesting artefacts.

VstParam: BlkLen

Spectrograms
The spectrograms show the frequency content of the sound before (Input Spectrogram) and
after (Output Spectrogram) processing by DtBlkFx. The colour represents the amount of
sound energy at each frequency.
Move the mouse over either to see a frequency and note display. In the mono version click
the mouse on a display to toggle whether it is paused or not. In the stereo version click for a
menu to select which channel (or both or paused) from the input or output to display. Pausing
lets you inspect it more conveniently and saves CPU.

How does it work? Each line of the spectrogram is generated from one block (or more for
small block sizes) of FFT'd data. The vertical axis is time with most recent data scrolling in at
the bottom. The horizontal axis shows frequency with 0Hz on the far left and the maximum
frequency (i.e. 22050Hz for 44.1Khz sampling) on the far right. The colour indicates the power
level of each frequency: red is -13 dB, black is -80 dB.

For the mathematically inclined... the horizontal scaling is linear over octaves (which is how
we perceive sound) instead of Hz (it is logarithmic over Hz meaning that high frequencies are
closer together than low frequencies). Since FFT's work linearly over Hz there is less
frequency resolution (i.e. wider bins) at low frequencies.

Effects
Up to 8 DtBlkFx effects can be applied to the frequency spectrum. The effects are applied in
series.
Each effect line in the user interface consists of 5 parameters as shown below.

Note that the numbers in the selected frequency range correspond to C octave - e.g. "4" is the
frequency of C-4.
FreqA / FreqB Use these to select a frequency range for the effect. The frequency is
displayed in Hertz and the selected range is shown in inverse on the
spectrograms.

For non-harmonic effects FreqA & FreqB are used to select or exclude
a frequency range to process. Set FreqA less than FreqB to include the
region between them otherwise the range is excluded.

Use the smallest possible frequency range for an effect to save on

CPU.

Right-click-drag on FreqA or FreqB to slide both at once.

VstParam: <n>: FreqA / <n>: FreqB

Amp Amplitude controls the amplitude of the selected frequency range for
effect. For some effects it controls the mix-back amount (wet to dry
ratio).

If the overall power parameter is set to match then the gain/attenuation

is relative - raising the Amplitude of the selected frequency range
effectively decreases that of the other frequencies.

VstParam: <n>: Amp

Type Type controls which effect will be run. The possible effects are
described in the next section.

VstParam: <n>: Type

 Value The meaning of value depends on which effect type has been selected.

VstParam: <n>: Value

Effect types
The effect type is selected from the Type pop-up menu for each effect position.
There are 2 categories of effects as described below: Normal and Masking.
Normal Effects

Filter Parametric equalizer - adjust the amplitude of the frequency range specified.
This does not use the effect value control.

Some of the other effects have this capability too but will tend to use more CPU
if this is all you want to do.
Contrast Contrast changes the dynamic range of frequencies present in the sound.

Positive contrast results in the reduction of noise and softer frequency

components. Small amounts are useful for reducing distortion and un-muddying
sound. When applied heavily only the loudest tones remain but can end up
sounding like nasty audio compression on dodgey web videos.

Negative values flatten the frequency spectrum and increase noise. Small to
medium amounts are useful for adding "body".

Smear Randomizes the phase of the spectrum data which results in a flattening of the
sound envelope. Sound smearing can be used to remove loop clicks and give a
sustain effect.

Similar to reverb in other plugins except that outcome is both forwards and
backwards in time!
Thresh
Boost or reduce frequency components with an amplitude above or below a
particular threshold (set by the effect value) within the selected frequency
range.

You can get a similar sound to contrast. In previous versions of DtBlkFx this
was known as "Weed".
Clip Clip frequency components greater than a particular level (set by the effect
value).

Resize The resize effect takes the selected range(s) and resizes them about the centre
of each range.

The effect value controls the amount of resize and whether to reverse in time
and/or frequency.

Squeezing the spectrum (resizing less than 100%) results in a pitch shift
towards the range centre and also slows down the sound in time. Expanding
the spectrum (resizing greater than 100%) tends to make the block repeat.

For some fun try in combination with the masking effects.

Resample Resample is just the same as what resample normally does - it changes the
pitch and speed together.

When used with long block sizes (>300msec) you can hear the segment of
sound being repeated. If you use it with medium sizes (say 50msec) it becomes
more of a pitch shifting effect.

It is easy to get lots of clicking and popping with this effect - one way to remove
is to set a threshold mask for less than 40% (say) followed by a 100% smear
afterwards. Check the resample preset for this.

Shift Modify the pitch of the selected spectrum.

ShiftConst

Shift changes the pitch by a constant number of notes while ShiftConst shifts by
a fixed number of Hertz .

The constant shift mode may be similar to frequency modulating effects or

listening to single-side-band CB radios. It tends to give a metallic quality as the
sound loses its normal harmonic relationships.

Shift resolution is affected by the block length - longer lengths result in higher
shifting resolution.
HarmShift Harmonic frequency shift by a constant number of notes (HarmShift) or to a
HarmRepitch
particular note (HarmRepitch). The stereo version of HarmRepitch can also
pitch match the left channel to the right channel - this is displayed as
right+notes in the effect value.

These effects will only work correctly on single voice or single note sounds (i.e.
a chord won't be properly pitch shifted). HarmShift is similar in function to Shift
except it will generally do a better job for a single voice sound.

DtBlkFx shifts the frequency spectrum in blocks that are aligned to harmonics of
the sound (shown in alternating pink & blue). The fundamental frequency
(centre of the first block) is automatically set to the loudest tone below 1/8th of
the sample rate (i.e. 5.5Khz/F-8 at 44.1Khz sampling).

Use the AutoHarmMask effect (described later) in the effect position

immediately previous to control harmonic width and all/even/odd/between
setting (refer oto the HarmFilt diagram) . In this case the fundamental is
found from the loudest peak within the AutoHarmMask FreqA/B range (instead
of below 1/8th of the sample rate).

Note that the DtBlkFx's spectrogram display will not show the harmonic ranges
as equally spaced as shown above because of the way it spaces the
frequencies (logarithmic).
HarmFilt HarmFilt (Harmonic Filter) is a comb filter that allows you to modify amplitude at
regular intervals or harmonics but leave the gaps between unchanged. You
can use this to control the amplitude of a particular note or to produce
interesting sweeping effects (similar to "phasing"). Be sure to set the effect Amp
to be non-0 dB (e.g. try -inf or +40 dB) to make the effect do something.

The above diagram shows the possible frequency ranges selected by the
effect (semi-transparent red squares). The fundamental frequency corresponds
to which ever FreqA/FreqB control has a lower frequency while the other
controls the maximum frequency limit. The effect value sets the width around
each harmonic and which harmonics you want to modify - all, dd, even or
between.

Note that the DtBlkFx's spectrogram display will not show the harmonic ranges
as equally spaced as shown above because of the way it spaces the
frequencies (logarithmic).
AutoHarm AutoHarm is similar to HarmFilt except that the fundamental frequency is
automatically determined as the loudest tone below 1/8th of the sample rate
(i.e. 5.5Khz/F-8 at 44.1Khz sampling). Use this to automatically track a pitched
sound and change its amplitude.

The harmonic width and all/odd/even/between setting is controlled by the effect

value (see HarmFilt).
Triangles These effects change the timbre of a pitched input sound by power matching
Squares harmonics to various built-in envelopes. Like AutoHarm, HarmShift &
Saws HarmRepitch these effects only work as described on a single voice or note and
Pointy the fundamental is automatically determined from the loudest tone below 1/8th
Sweep of the sample rate (i.e. 5.5Khz/F-8 for 44.1Khz sampling)

The effect value varies the harmonic envelope according to a built-in sequence
of envelopes.

Use the AutoHarmMask effect (described later) in the effect position

immediately above to control harmonic width and all/even/odd/between setting
(refer oto the HarmFilt diagram) . In this case the fundamental is found from
the AutoHarmMask FreqA/B range while the HarmShift/HarmRepitch FreqA/B
range specifies the inclusion or exclusion range.

Effects marked DoNotUse don't do anything - they are called this because I
DoNotUse
may put an effect there in future.
Mask Effects
Mask effects don't change the sound in anyway by themselves but affect which frequencies
a normal effect immediately following will be applied. For example if you set the first effect as
ThreshMask and the second effect as Contrast you can now choose to apply Contrast only to
frequency components above or below the threshold.
Masks will operate with any other non-mask effect unless specifically noted.
Note: A normal effect can only have one mask (i.e. if you set 2 masks in a row then the first
mask will be ignored).

HarmMask HarmMask is the masking version of HarmFilt and allows you to

apply any normal effect to the harmonics of a particular note.

AutoHarmMask AutoHarmMask is the masking version of AutoHarm and has the

same effect value meaning.
ASubH1Mask These effects are all variants of AutoHarmMask differing in that
ASubH2Mask the fundamental frequency is taken as 1/2 (ASubH1Mask), 1/3
ASubH3Mask (ASubH2Mask) or 1/4 (ASubH3Mask) of the loudest frequency
component within the selected range.
ThreshMask Thresh mask is the masking version of Thresh and lets you apply
the following "normal" effect to only frequencies above or below a
particular threshold.
Stereo Only Effects
These effects are only available in the stereo version of DtBlkFx because they require 2
channels to operate

Vocode Vocode mixes the two channels by taking the frequency envelope of the left
channel and applying it to the right channel (with the result in both the left and
right).

Example: feed voice into the left channel (red spectrum) and some strings into
the right (blue spectrum). DtBlkFx will mix the voice and the strings to produce
talking strings (which is just just what we need).

Vocode takes the frequency envelope of the left channel and applies it to the
right channel. It operates by dividing the spectrum into a number of blocks
(controlled by effect value) and adjusting the amplitude of each block from the
right channel so as to power-match with the corresponding block in the left
channel.

When FreqA < FreqB then processing on the right channel is limited to that
range while the entire spectrum is used from the left channel. If FreqB < FreqA
then the entire spectrum of the right channel is processed while the envelope
from the left channel is limited to the FreqB-FreqA range.

Mask effects are not supported and will do nothing.

HarmMatch HarmMatchLR & HarmMatchRL match the power from each harmonic in one channel to
LR
HarmMatch the corresponding harmonic in the other resulting in a different type of vocoding.
RL
HarmMatchLR uses the left channel as a reference and adjusts the right channel to
match while HarmMatchRL goes the other way (right is reference, left is adjusted). Both
versions of the effect output the adjusted channel on both left & right channels (i.e.
reference is not output) and always set the overall output power to match the left
channel.

The fundamental frequency (centre of the first block) for each channel is
automatically set by the loudest peak within the FreqA/FreqB range. The effect value
controls the harmonic width and all/odd/even/between setting. Refer to AutoHarm for
more information - as with all other harmonic effects these only work as described for
single voice sounds (although it will do interesting things on chords).

Use AutoHarmMask in the effect position immediately above to allow individual control
over channel 1 & channel 2. The AutoHarmMask settings (FreqA/FreqB & value) refer
to channel 1 while the HarmMatch settings refer to channel 2 - this means you can set
different fundamental search ranges and harmonic settings for each channel.

ThreshMask and HarmMask are not supported and will do nothing.

The above diagram differs from what you will see in the spectrogram because of a
different frequency scale (logarithmic).
CrossMix CrossMix combines the left & right channels by multiplying the frequency
components (time-convolution) of the selected range(s).

The value controls the ratio of left to right mix and which channel will be output
for all other frequencies.
WarpMix WarpMix produces an output by warping and combining the frequency spectrum
of the left and right channels as follows:

1. Divide the spectrum of each channel into segments of equal power (the
number of segments is determined by the Amp percentage in for mode-1
WarpMix)
2. Resize each segment to a frequency and width intermediate to both channels
(determined by the effect value)
3. Add the resized segments together using a ratio determined by the effect
value

The effect value also controls what mode WarpMix should operate in. Mode-1
proceeds as shown above while Mode-0 divides the spectrum into as many
segments as there are frequency bins.
Reducing CPU usage
DtBlkFx can be quite hard on your CPU! How can you reduce it?? Try these...
Reduce the overlap as much as possible - for example 85% overlap uses quadruple
the CPU as 40% overlap!
Use the mono version of DtBlkFx where ever possible - it will use around 1/2 of the
CPU
Set the MixBack to 100% if you don't want any effect to be run (but keep the delay)
instead of tweaking effects to do nothing
Turn off "inactive" effects by setting both frequencies to the same (for example, 0 Hz)
Set the smallest frequency range possible for each effect, particularly at the top end
(the very top octave corresponds to 1/2 of the total processing for an individual effect)
Try to use block sizes between 512 and 16384 samples
Turn off Sync if you don't need it, particularly on larger blk sizes - extra blocks may be
processed on each beat if it is turned on
Increase the delay so that full blocks can be processed - forcing DtBlkFx to process
partial blocks will use more CPU (BlkSize is marked with an asterisk on the user
interface )
Close the user interface if you don't need it or at least pause the spectrograms
- generating & scrolling the graphics eats CPU

Tutorials
I agree this would be good... If anyone wants to write some, please do!
Have a look through the presets for some hints.

Other stuff
All of the graphics components (32 bit portable network graphics format) for the user interface
and the presets are stored in the dtblkfx directory. Feel free to customize!
DtBlkFx is freely distributable and is covered by the same terms as the GNU licensing
agreement. This is an interim version and the source isn't quite fit for consumption but if you
really really want it I will make it available. The Mac version was made with X-code & the
Windows version with Microsoft Visual C++ Studio 2008 express edition.

The Fastest-Fourier-Transform-in-the-West (version 3.1.2) is used to perform frequency

transforms. Many thanks to everyone that made FFTW (please see
http://www.fftw.org/fftw3_doc/Acknowledgments.html) libpng/zlib (please see www.zlib.net and
www.libpng.org/pub/png/libpng.html) and VSTSDK/VSTGUI (please see
ygrabit.steinberg.de/~ygrabit/public_html/index.html).

I plan on implementing the following stuff in a future version of DtBlkFx

setInitialDelay()
Param Morphing (actually largely implemented but needs more stuff in the GUI)
 More spectrogram controls
Maybe a rewrite for a "modular-synth" style architecture

Contact
Please send me work featuring BlkFx, customized user interface graphics, bug reports,
comments and suggestions.

Author Darrell Tam

Email [email protected]