After an evening of playing around I'm still not sold on it but am warming. Key mode is a good start. I suspect doing the power on with shift and play button pressed may have cleared some odd residual settings from the previous owner. It seems a little less odd after it anyway.
There are just the eight "scales" plus chromatic. Some of them are a bit odd and many sensible choices have been missed. I guess I'll probably just use chromatic and pick the notes I want but some sensible scale choices might have made it easier to use, particularly if random could be limited to random within that chosen scale. These are what I think there is to play with
0 - chromatic
1 - major
2 - dorian
3 - 1 2 3b 5 6 whatever that is
4 - blues scale but without the all important 5th
5 - whole tone
6 - major triad
7 - 1 5
8 - octaves
I've still got a long way to go but I may tame it yet!
Shuffle seems to working and is fun. Length is still a bit odd - I'll keep playing!
Does anyone have any idea what the CV In controls? If I put an LFO into it I get a kind of warbling but I can't make a lot of sense of it.
I'll continue playing an drop a note of what I find on here. I still like the idea of the Charcot and, damnit, I've spent good money on it so I learn to like the little bastard if it kills me :-)
CHARCOT CIRCLES - anyone have one yet?
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
Well - if anyone's interested I can report - after a few days of frustration and fiddling - that I'm thoroughly enjoying the Charcot. I've stopped struggling with the Length control - I'll have a look at it and one or two other controls once I've got other, more rewarding, controls sorted.
The size and scope of the thing is pretty stunning. I think I can have eight banks of sixteen "presets" and that each presets can be either 128 notes, two switchable tracks of 64 notes, four switchable tracks of 32 notes or eight switchable tracks of 16 notes. I think I can have 1,024 sixteen note sequences in memory at any one time if I work at it hard enough. That may be more than I need!
I don't think I can programme which plays when to chain the sequences but I think I like that. It feels as if it could be a lovely performance tool (as long as you keep your fingers moist!) as it is very easy to flip between the sequences using the touch pads once you've cracked the menus.
As someone mentioned the option to save a sequence into multiple tracks to be varied from track to track would be lovely but I don't think it's possible.
The retrig function doesn't feel enormously useful - a flam or ratchet would be much more use to add variety within sequences.
I like the Transpose a lot and between transposing, turning notes on and off, changing the sequence length and selecting different sequences there's a lot of scope for performance using the touch pads. But I am having to lick my fingers a fair bit to get the touch pads to respond :-) I can live with that for the fun I'm having.
It is a shame that the documentation is so dreadful and that one or presumably both colaborators seem to have just moved on rather than working to improve and build on the Charcot (and, of course, offer the breakout box for sale) If either Studio Electronics or Eowave are still listening I'd urge them to have another look at this and see if a mark two, a breakout box and some thought out in depth tutorials might not make this a successful and popular module. It has a great deal of potential!
Hopefully I'll be able to get a YouTube video up in the next few weeks to give some sense of what it can do.
I'm off to lightly moisten my fingers again now so I can go and play :-)
The size and scope of the thing is pretty stunning. I think I can have eight banks of sixteen "presets" and that each presets can be either 128 notes, two switchable tracks of 64 notes, four switchable tracks of 32 notes or eight switchable tracks of 16 notes. I think I can have 1,024 sixteen note sequences in memory at any one time if I work at it hard enough. That may be more than I need!
I don't think I can programme which plays when to chain the sequences but I think I like that. It feels as if it could be a lovely performance tool (as long as you keep your fingers moist!) as it is very easy to flip between the sequences using the touch pads once you've cracked the menus.
As someone mentioned the option to save a sequence into multiple tracks to be varied from track to track would be lovely but I don't think it's possible.
The retrig function doesn't feel enormously useful - a flam or ratchet would be much more use to add variety within sequences.
I like the Transpose a lot and between transposing, turning notes on and off, changing the sequence length and selecting different sequences there's a lot of scope for performance using the touch pads. But I am having to lick my fingers a fair bit to get the touch pads to respond :-) I can live with that for the fun I'm having.
It is a shame that the documentation is so dreadful and that one or presumably both colaborators seem to have just moved on rather than working to improve and build on the Charcot (and, of course, offer the breakout box for sale) If either Studio Electronics or Eowave are still listening I'd urge them to have another look at this and see if a mark two, a breakout box and some thought out in depth tutorials might not make this a successful and popular module. It has a great deal of potential!
Hopefully I'll be able to get a YouTube video up in the next few weeks to give some sense of what it can do.
I'm off to lightly moisten my fingers again now so I can go and play :-)
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MindMachine
- weekend warrior
- Posts: 8412
- Joined: Sun Aug 02, 2009 1:45 am
- Location: Santa Susana Field Lab
- Contact:
Thanks for the info. I am always intrigued by the Studio Electronics modules. I only have some utilities of theirs, but am keen to learn more about the more involved modules.
"I'm off to lightly moisten my fingers again now so I can go and play"
She'll likely appreciate that. Sweet conductivity.
"I'm off to lightly moisten my fingers again now so I can go and play"
She'll likely appreciate that. Sweet conductivity.
Visit the Santa Susana Field Lab
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Sus ... Laboratory
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Sus ... Laboratory
Thanks Badger for your input on results! I haven't touched mine in weeks but I'm gonna give it another go. Before I purchased it I saw some vids where folks really made this thing talk; I was very impressed, so I bought one.
That was the end of my impression unfortunately. I know this thing has potential, but damned if I know how to wring it out of it like I saw in the videos!
That was the end of my impression unfortunately. I know this thing has potential, but damned if I know how to wring it out of it like I saw in the videos!
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
After a bit of playing and reading the confusing "quick start" guide I think the copying you want is available (if I'm understanding you right)BillyB909 wrote: . . . and there seems to be no way to copy a pattern. You can only save at a preset level; so if you have a preset of 8 patterns with a bit of variation, you have to redo that pattern 8 times. Unless I've missed something...
I've been able to make a 16 step sequence and then save by pressing Shift and touching Save. Then I used the central knob to pick spot 1 and pressed it to save. Then I turned the central knob to spot 2 and pressed again to save, then 3 and 4. Now I have four separately saved versions of the same sequence and once I've pressed Shift and Notes I can make changes to each one to have variations on a theme. Alterntively I could have saved to spot 1, made changes and saved to spot 2, made changes and saved to spot 3 etc. Then I press Shift and Load and can choose any of the four (or up to 16) sequences in that bank by just touching the relevant touch plates.
I haven't played with the Track feature yet. As what I'm doing is based on Presets within a Bank I think each of the 16 presets within that bank can be up to 128 notes long as long as I don't want to use multiple Tracks.
Hope that makes sense. I've a fair bit on at the moment but hopefully will find time to get around to a YouTube vid soonish. It's a tricky module to master but I think it's worth it. There's a good bit available and I've reached the point of being thoroughly sold on it even if some features seem to be unreliable. The reliable features are sufficient for now :-)
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
So far I get the sense that it just takes a fair bit of time (unless your brain works in a very specific way). It can be blooming frustrating! I'm finding most things rather difficult but I am making progress gradually. I think there are probably three issues for me: the interface is rather clunky, I'm not very good at the sort of interface it uses and finally because Charcot does a lot. Doing a lot can make things complicated.Parnelli wrote:I know this thing has potential, but damned if I know how to wring it out of it like I saw in the videos!
In fairness to users there's a fourth issue which is the poor documentation. A bit of decent YouTubage would make all the difference!
I countinue to dig away at it. I'm making progress. Some things are still eluding me, others are suddenly coming clear.
Back to the twiddling - Badger Out!
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
Well - I'm still working on the "missing manual" as I've come to think of it. The Charcot is a complex little module and something in the way of comprehensive instructions would have been useful. I'm trying to get to the bottom of each control and jack. I don't know if anyone's interested or will read this but here's the start of a rather painstaking run through of what I've figured out (or think I've figured out) about Clocking and CV in. More to come about the pleasures of selecting tracks soon!
CV in. CV in seems to control the position in the 16 step sequence. If you turn off Play and don't use a clock a ramp or triange LFO into the CV in will run back and forth through the steps using CV rather than clocking. It seems to ignore whether notes are switched on or not and just plays through all of the 16 notes. Switching to forwards or backwards motion has no effect - it just does its thing regardless! It does play the pitch dialled in for each note though so has its uses. Triggering an LFO or function generator can give a quick one-off run of notes. Not the most useful of functions but I guess it could come in useful somewhere. If you've defined a last note it doesn't go past it but keeps playing the last note over and over as the voltage rises. Bit odd.
The best use of it I've found is that if your sequence is playing and you trigger a signal it creates a brief period of interesting chaos which could be quite pleasing. A long slow attenuated LFO can give some unexpected variations to a sequence. I'd put money I'll never use the CV in again having worked out what it does!
Internal Clock - the default clocking. To change the clock speed make sure you're in Notes mode, press shift and rotate the encoder. Clockwise for quicker, anticlockwise for slower. This doesn't work as cleanly and well on my Charcot as I think it should. I wonder if mine has a dodgy encoder. It works but not always first time and I can twiddle the blooming thing for quite a while with no effect and then suddenly - when I'm about to give up - it starts to work. All very mysterious. Perhaps I'm turning the encoder too quickly - it seems to like being turned slowly and steadily whereas I tend to be impatient and expect it to respond like a pot.
Another hidden feature seems to be that if you are in Global mode, press shift and turn the encoder it seems to work as a very course timing control BUT IN REVERSE! Clockwise makes it dramatically slower, anticlockwise dramatically quicker! I suspect that may change the timing Globally rather than just in the sequence you're working on as I have had one or two sequences suddenly and mysteriously having dramatic tempo changes when I've gone back to load them. Using both controls to try to find the extremes I've got clocks from about 7 seconds long to at least 2,000 bpm. Changing the internal tempo is a bit of a pain in the neck though so I think I'm likely to use external clocking (which allows for non-regular clocks as well as much easier control). A double click on play turns the clock off and on and acts as a reset taking the sequence back to the beginning.
Clock In - lets you override the internal clock with an external clock. Also bypasses the Play button (which baffled me to start with). You need to select and enable Synch (Shift Global followed by pressing Synch so the light is on) Otherwise you can end up with both clocks competing which creates an interesting sort of chaos! As with the internal clock a double press of Play will act as a reset and take the sequence back to step one.
Clock - is a clock out from the internal clock. Once you sync to an external clock it does nothing - neither the internal clock nor the external clock comes through it.
Having worked out what CV in and the default internal clock do I suspect I'll never use either again but I do at least know what they do!
If either of the colaborators who designed this thing are listening, next time you release a promising and interesting module, if you want it to be successful and for people to enjoy using it and write good reviews and encourage other people to buy and use it Write A Decent and Comprehensive Manual. If you can't do it get someone else to do it for you. Cryptic half measures result in dissatisfied customers and a module which is less successful than it should be. I'm no business person but am confident as a consumer that this is good advice!! It's certainly not rocket science.
Back to the twidling and head scratching
CV in. CV in seems to control the position in the 16 step sequence. If you turn off Play and don't use a clock a ramp or triange LFO into the CV in will run back and forth through the steps using CV rather than clocking. It seems to ignore whether notes are switched on or not and just plays through all of the 16 notes. Switching to forwards or backwards motion has no effect - it just does its thing regardless! It does play the pitch dialled in for each note though so has its uses. Triggering an LFO or function generator can give a quick one-off run of notes. Not the most useful of functions but I guess it could come in useful somewhere. If you've defined a last note it doesn't go past it but keeps playing the last note over and over as the voltage rises. Bit odd.
The best use of it I've found is that if your sequence is playing and you trigger a signal it creates a brief period of interesting chaos which could be quite pleasing. A long slow attenuated LFO can give some unexpected variations to a sequence. I'd put money I'll never use the CV in again having worked out what it does!
Internal Clock - the default clocking. To change the clock speed make sure you're in Notes mode, press shift and rotate the encoder. Clockwise for quicker, anticlockwise for slower. This doesn't work as cleanly and well on my Charcot as I think it should. I wonder if mine has a dodgy encoder. It works but not always first time and I can twiddle the blooming thing for quite a while with no effect and then suddenly - when I'm about to give up - it starts to work. All very mysterious. Perhaps I'm turning the encoder too quickly - it seems to like being turned slowly and steadily whereas I tend to be impatient and expect it to respond like a pot.
Another hidden feature seems to be that if you are in Global mode, press shift and turn the encoder it seems to work as a very course timing control BUT IN REVERSE! Clockwise makes it dramatically slower, anticlockwise dramatically quicker! I suspect that may change the timing Globally rather than just in the sequence you're working on as I have had one or two sequences suddenly and mysteriously having dramatic tempo changes when I've gone back to load them. Using both controls to try to find the extremes I've got clocks from about 7 seconds long to at least 2,000 bpm. Changing the internal tempo is a bit of a pain in the neck though so I think I'm likely to use external clocking (which allows for non-regular clocks as well as much easier control). A double click on play turns the clock off and on and acts as a reset taking the sequence back to the beginning.
Clock In - lets you override the internal clock with an external clock. Also bypasses the Play button (which baffled me to start with). You need to select and enable Synch (Shift Global followed by pressing Synch so the light is on) Otherwise you can end up with both clocks competing which creates an interesting sort of chaos! As with the internal clock a double press of Play will act as a reset and take the sequence back to step one.
Clock - is a clock out from the internal clock. Once you sync to an external clock it does nothing - neither the internal clock nor the external clock comes through it.
Having worked out what CV in and the default internal clock do I suspect I'll never use either again but I do at least know what they do!
If either of the colaborators who designed this thing are listening, next time you release a promising and interesting module, if you want it to be successful and for people to enjoy using it and write good reviews and encourage other people to buy and use it Write A Decent and Comprehensive Manual. If you can't do it get someone else to do it for you. Cryptic half measures result in dissatisfied customers and a module which is less successful than it should be. I'm no business person but am confident as a consumer that this is good advice!! It's certainly not rocket science.
Back to the twidling and head scratching
Hey, since I read that CC was an Eowave device I looked them up and found their page on it:
http://www.eowave.com/charcot-circles/
There's other info on there as well as some downloads, but they look like software.
http://www.eowave.com/charcot-circles/
There's other info on there as well as some downloads, but they look like software.
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
Thanks Parnelli, thanks Derp - glad to see someone's still listening :-)
I've spent a bit of time doing other bits and pieces over the last week or two and not being quite so obsessed with my Charcot Circles. I will get back to it and do a video at some point.
For now I think I've got everything sorted except for Glide and Legato. Glide makes a little bit of sense but seems to be of limited use until I can work out how to turn notes on and off with Legato. It makes no sense to me at all. I'll have another look but every time I've looked so far I've just ended up baffled and frustrated.
Length had me confused. The quick start guide says "Pad 3. LENGTH: Sets length of individual step—think of it as sustain. Press and hold a step, turn the encoder to increase the length to up to 16th steps." I let that confuse me as I thought it was adjusting the gate length within each 16th step. What it really does is extend the gate to fill over multiple 16th note steps. So I can turn off steps 2 - 8 and set the length of step 1 to fill all or part of that time span with a held gated note. It makes sense - just in the oposite way than I thought it would!
I'd be interested to hear if anyone else is persevering and getting results with the Charcot. I plan to drop Eowave and Studio Electronics a line at some point but I suspect they are up to their eyes with Namm at the moment.
Cheers
Ian
I've spent a bit of time doing other bits and pieces over the last week or two and not being quite so obsessed with my Charcot Circles. I will get back to it and do a video at some point.
For now I think I've got everything sorted except for Glide and Legato. Glide makes a little bit of sense but seems to be of limited use until I can work out how to turn notes on and off with Legato. It makes no sense to me at all. I'll have another look but every time I've looked so far I've just ended up baffled and frustrated.
Length had me confused. The quick start guide says "Pad 3. LENGTH: Sets length of individual step—think of it as sustain. Press and hold a step, turn the encoder to increase the length to up to 16th steps." I let that confuse me as I thought it was adjusting the gate length within each 16th step. What it really does is extend the gate to fill over multiple 16th note steps. So I can turn off steps 2 - 8 and set the length of step 1 to fill all or part of that time span with a held gated note. It makes sense - just in the oposite way than I thought it would!
I'd be interested to hear if anyone else is persevering and getting results with the Charcot. I plan to drop Eowave and Studio Electronics a line at some point but I suspect they are up to their eyes with Namm at the moment.
Cheers
Ian
Ian, your assiduity is admirable, and your communication is generous. But everything sort of confirms that Circles is a bullet that I'm lucky to have dodged.
Current Rack: https://www.modulargrid.net/e/racks/view/354385
Hemisphere Suite: https://github.com/Chysn/O_C-HemisphereSuite/wiki
"Man must shape his tools lest they shape him." --Arthur Miller
Hemisphere Suite: https://github.com/Chysn/O_C-HemisphereSuite/wiki
"Man must shape his tools lest they shape him." --Arthur Miller
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK
Thanks chysn, I'd like to defend my awkward little friend but, much as I'm inexplicably fond of it, I'm hard put to it to argue with you. I still think some updates and problem solving frm the makers could make it a rather fun module but given that they can't even be bothered to produce a half decent manual that seems unlikely. I'll keep banging on at it. Having told the world what a struggle it is I'm not sure trying to sell it on ebay will work well so I might be kind of stuck with it :-)
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The Badger
- Learning to Wiggle
- Posts: 11
- Joined: Mon Jan 02, 2012 7:31 am
- Location: Northampton, UK