From the course: Learning Modular Synthesis

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Linear vs. exponential envelope shapes

Linear vs. exponential envelope shapes

From the course: Learning Modular Synthesis

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Linear vs. exponential envelope shapes

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- I'm gonna apologize upfront, this is gonna be one of the geekiest movies in this entire course. However, it's a subject that trips up a lot of people. It's the shape of envelopes, linear or exponential. Some envelope generators, as well as some VCAs, voltage controlled amps, have a separate switch for linear or exponential. What does that mean? It has to do with how the voltage changes over time and how the amplifier responds to that voltage. Linear is a nice constant rate up and a nice constant rate down. Exponential implies a rush up and then a rush back down. That curve, the exponential curve, actually matches how we hear pitch and also how we hear loudness. So, an exponential curve would actually be more natural for creating envelopes. That's why many envelope generators are actually exponential by nature. Now as it so happens, if you have an attack that rushed up, it's gonna sound weird, it's gonna sound like something playing backwards. So, envelope generators tend to actually…

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