Designing Sound: Science-Fiction – Max Patches

This is the seventh and last set of example Pd patches ported to Max from Andy Farnell’s Designing Sound book. It includes robot sounds, a transporter sound and an alert.

Download Sound Design Practical Series – Science-Fiction

If you haven’t already, be sure to download the Sound Design Practical Series helper files

Designing Sound: Lifeforms – Max Patches

This is the fifth set of example Pd patches ported to Max from Andy Farnell’s Designing Sound book. It includes some wonderful insect sounds along with sophisticated footsteps, bird and mammal calls.

Download Sound Design Practical Series – Lifeforms

If you haven’t already, be sure to download the Sound Design Practical Series helper files

Designing Sound: Machines – Max Patches

This is the fourth set of example Pd patches ported to Max from Andy Farnell’s Designing Sound book. It includes some of my favorite patches for creating clicks, electric fan and engine sounds.

Download Sound Design Practical Series – Machines

If you haven’t already, be sure to download the Sound Design Practical Series helper files

Designing Sound: Nature – Max Patches

This is the third set of example Pd patches ported to Max from Andy Farnell’s Designing Sound book. It includes some excellent fire, water and electricity sounds, among others.

Download Sound Design Practical Series – Nature

If you haven’t already, be sure to download the Sound Design Practical Series helper files

Designing Sound: Idiophonics – Max Patches

This is the second set of example Pd patches ported to Max from Andy Farnell’s Designing Sound book. It includes a nice bouncing sound algorithm and some good bell tones.

Download Sound Design Practical Series – Idiophonics

If you haven’t already, be sure to download the Sound Design Practical Series helper files

Designing Sound: Artificial Sounds – Max patches

I enjoyed reading Andy Farnell’s excellent Designing Sound book a few years ago. While working through the Practical Series examples he provides, I decided they would be more useful for me as Max patches. When it comes to coding and algorithms, I also know that I learn better by going slowly and working step-by-step, so I decided to port the patches from Pd to Max.

A few disclaimers and caveats:

  • Many of these patches rely on abstractions that Farnell or I created. Download the Sound Design Practical Series helper files
  • Some of these patches require gen~, particularly to realize the rzero and rpole filters.
  • Filter topologies differ between the programs. My goal was to get something working in Max, not necessarily to exactly match Parnell’s Pd patch. Therefore, some patches could benefit from a close comparison with the Pd version and from tuning by ear.
  • Not everything initializes properly. Consult the text for reasonable starting values, or experiment to find your own.

Download the Sound Design Practical Series – Artificial Sounds