inversephase

CTM 0.0.0: What a version number

Failed at getting my recap in over the weekend, because I was working hard on a new feature for the tracker: Load! And it's got a co-conspirator as well: Save! That means I'm officially at a non-negative version number, because I don't want to deal with storing negative values where I store the version of CTM that wrote the file in the tracker file. As a side bonus, I cleaned up the way songs were initialized some as a direct result of the load/save routines. Shift-Ctrl-Alt Left+Right move betwe...

CTM hits -0.2

Quick video today...

It seems like just yesterday I was musing about matching frequencies so that the sound/synth boards are tuned. Oh wait, it was yesterday! Anyway, I got it working late last night and fixed a few bugs. This doesn't really demonstrate the tuning insanely well, but at least you can see how my timing code is working out, and you can hear two boards at the same time (I've alw...

CTM development log recap

It's been six days since the tracker video (please watch it if you haven't) and I've made some reasonable progress on the tracker. Let's take a look at some of my commits, which I'll paraphrase:

While making the video, I noticed DEL didn't work right. It's because I moved some code around and that included moving the cursor according to the ADD value before the delete occurred. Now it will delete th...

Synth / CTM update: We've got boops!

I've got a lot to say, and I say most of it in the video. 

First off, thank you to all my Patrons supporting me while I develop this. It's been a lot of work, and there's still a long ways to go. Balancing life and composition with development isn't easy, and this is a milestone that I think we can all celebrate!

Definitely more to come. 

This is a public post, so a quick FAQ for non-Patrons that might just be joining us:

I've alway...

SlowTracker becomes CTM, synth update

After a whole lot of behind-the-scenes background under-the-hood nonsense, not to mention the year known as 2017, ice is back with my brand new invention.

Okay, clearly this is the same old invention, but progress has been made. Back in my "tale of two chippies" post I showed off that I had worked on more synthesizer boards, namely an Atari 2600 board (pictured here in Ghostbusters Green) and a YM2149 bo...

Patreon changes charge structure, then backpedals

Hey everyone, 

If you didn't catch the news, I had a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity after Thanksgiving where I could go to Japan, travel and room covered. There are some awesome pictures on my twitter, facebook, and instagram.

While I was away, Patreon announced they ...

Atari Cover of Mental Abrasions by Jane in Space

Here's a little something that has been under wraps for a short while... One of the guys in Jane in Space contacted me as a fan of Pretty Eight Machine (and came to a show in NYC) to meet up awhile back, and we've kept in loose contact since. A few months ago, he mentioned he was working on a single for his band's track Mental Abrasions (done on Korg DS-10), and asked if I could do a remix. 

Mental Abrasions kind of drilled itself into my head and stuck itself in the back right corner, so...

New material in Spicy Meatball

Hey!

I've been working with a guy named Cheese on various music and sound effects for a game called Spicy Meatball. This is a "first person text adventure", which is to say you use your mouse/keyboard/gamepad around to look and interact with an environment that is described to you with text and a little splash of color for good measure. It...

Wanna watch some Sega composing live?

Click that link there and let's do a chiptune!

A Tale of Two Chippies

Here's another glam shot of some sound chips and boards!

If you read my SlowTracker update, well, I'm not quite doing audio output yet, and I decided I would make use of some spare time by getting better at surface mount soldering. To that end, you can see a new board on the left sporting a YM2149 I got from Shazz/TRSi (greets!) while I was at @party.

Originally I snapped this picture "just because", but then ...

SlowTracker is Slowly Improving

With the recent progress on synthesizer boards, it's time to resume software development. I've honestly meant to do this for awhile... In the past I did do co-working jams with some of my creative friends, but one of them has been dealing with personal issues recently and the other moved away. 

Anyway, today's post is about the quest to actually get sound out of this tracker. That requires a lot of work... but ...

Connect Discord to Patreon for extra rewards

Hey all! 

I finally broke down and created an inversephase Discord "server". Right now it hasn't been advertised much, but I've gone ahead and connected Patreon to it. There's a supporters-only channel, a tech channel, and of course a general channel.

So if you're a Patron and you'd like to join up, just tie your Discord account to Patreon and you'll automatically receive an invite to a place where you can have a direct line to me and chat with other like-minded supporters.  2017-06-08 00:28:38 +0000 UTC View Post

Custom Synthesizer Adventures with the 6581 SID

Hey Patrons, it's been awhile!

How've you been doing? I've been quiet (sorry about the lack of posts), but busy. I'm preparing a sort of mega-update; I'd like to post an update every day or two with everything that's been going on, if possible. With travel coming up, I'm certain I'll have some free time... Oh! Speaking of which, I'll be up in Boston for @party in a little over a week, and I would love to see you there! Come ...

My Piece of the Pi Day

   Hello, my lovely Patrons,

As I sit here working on a mastering commission, I've been reflecting on this past week and just wanted to let you know how grateful I am that you're here. 

Why the slightly weird, cryptic title to this post? Well, two things, I started on this on the 14th (Pi Day) so the pun was funnier then... but yeah, let me share some indie/freelance musician braindump weirdness with you all... It's the ever-exciting storytime everyone looks forward t...

Welcome, new patrons!

Hey, there's been an influx of support recently. Whether you're a long-time supporter or a new one, I really just want to shout out and let you know you're appreciated, each and every one of you.

So, everyone please give a warm welcome to Matt, JT, Kieran, René, Nikola, and Stephen, now you're in the chip zone baby!

Bad Apple video ported to BBC Micro

If you're not familiar with Bad Apple, it's a a song from ZUN's Touhou game series. It was remixed and featured in a promotional silhouette video and quickly became a meme in the demoscene as a bar for video compression and streaming. Demo groups have been actively "porting" the PV to various computers and consoles, and the results have just been insane. There are Commodore 64, Atari  2600, even TI84 calculator versions of the demo, each with its own set  of technical achievements. The...

Seminar Sunday returns! The Demoscene: US vs Poland

Today I'll be joining Polish #demoscene organizers. We'll be talking about the differences between the US and European scenes on their video livestream in about one hour.  Sorry about the late notice!  

That's 4pm eastern US time, or 10pm if you're in Poland =]    

Direct link to the channel is:  

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCO6fMhzSqgR6BmdJxaXPSlA

Is it okay to shout you out? Vote!

Hey there!

I recently livestreamed a chiptune seminar. Some of you were there for it, and some of you are here because of it. Thanks to everyone that did or could participate, seriously. It was a huge success!

I want to chop the seminar up into digestible bits and put it up on YouTube, and I'd like to shout you out at the end of the video. This entails me listing your name (as it is listed here on Patreon) in some sort of footer/tail/end card. Although I imagine the majority of ...

New Game Audio: Slime Boss

Hey Patrons! 

(update, for some reason the link to the song does not work, it is: https://inversephase.bandcamp.com/track/slime-boss)

Last year, around the time I was working on Sega Things and testing it at shows, I was also working on this cool POKEY piece for Fabraz. I'm on a big, solid list of chiptune talent for their upcoming game, 2017-01-30 21:17:50 +0000 UTC View Post

Public sneak peek: Beatdown City Stage 2 (NES)

Welp, if it's good enough for Shawn, it's good enough for me!

Just in case the video embed isn't working, http://pic.twitter.com/IPEb4PxdlH - likes and RTs appreciated!

One of the things I've been working on in the background of all of the tracker and synthesizer madness (updates on that soon!) is, of course, commissions!

Probably one of the longest-running projects I've contributed to, Beatdown City is (to be really b...

Chiptune 2: The Trackening

So, here we have a rather sparse image that is a source of excitement. If you remember the synthesizer post from earlier this year, well, I need a way to control it...so I'm writing a tracker from scratch. Sure, I could hack up an existing tracker, but I've kinda been-there-done-that with the one I use now that I hacked emulators into the back end of it. Plus, I'm ready to try some cool chiptune things that haven't...

Sega Things video in progress

Hey everybody,

I just wanted to let you know that if you haven't gotten your Sega Things download, well, you should! I'm working on a music video for the song, and once that goes live, the track will probably change from free to $1. I can of course give Patrons a download code at any time, but right now anyone can download the track for free, and all you have to do is pop over to my Bandcamp and ...

If you like Stranger Things, you're gonna want to listen to this

It looks like bandcamp links posted to Patreon are still broken, so I'm just going to drop the link to the link to my latest, which is a rework of the Stranger Things theme on a Sega Genesis / MegaDrive.

https://inversephase.bandcamp.com/track/sega-things

This song is an interesting case. Last year I wrote 2016-10-18 22:48:59 +0000 UTC View Post

Sega Things

Here's that Sega synthwave thing I've been teasing about on social media. I've got to run out for a few, but keep your eyes on your Patreon messagebox things. Download codes are coming in the next 8 hours. In the meantime, you can listen on bandcamp!

Please help me spread the word on social media:

bookface: 2016-10-17 23:39:44 +0000 UTC View Post

I'm moving to Monthly

Hey! I'm gonna keep this one short and sweet - I've gone back and forth on this a whole bunch and even posted and asked about it here and on social media.

Long story short: One of the things I've found out from asking around is that the "monthly maximum" system is too complicated for a lot of people, and they prefer to know exactly how much they're going to be spending each month on patronage, and for that to not be a fluctuating amount.

Also, while I think a per-creation Patreon ma...

Pretty Eight Machine shirt reprint

Hey Patrons! I'm doing a limited reprint of the Pretty Eight Machine shirts, and I'd like to do a cool offer for all of you that are supporting me. I appreciate you so much.

These shirts are being printed to order so if you want one, please comment or send me a Patreon message with whether you prefer the brushed "dark heather" (left) or the solid "charcoal grey (right), and what your shirt size is. I will reserve one specifically for you.

The only hitch is I need to know...