Bastl Popcorn User Manual

A c ompact, but incredibly musical sequencer / quantizer / arpeggiator
– you name it! The Popcorn sequencer allows you to create a v ariety
of melodic patterns by rearranging it's 8 tunable notes with several
POPCORN
different types of control signals. It is incredibly musical when
used with rhythm sequencers such as the Knit Rider, because it
non-linear CV sequencer
1 ) 5 ) has two triggers, A a nd B, which will go 1,2,3, or 4 steps forward or
backward, depending on the settings of their dedicated knobs. You
can also address the steps with CV or 3 binary gates. You can use CV
to transpose the pitch, transpose it in quantized steps or change the
5
OFF
scale to minor or major with a g ate signal.
ON
2
6
instruction
)
2
CHROMA
Steps
)
SCALE
CHORD
o pcorn is a CV and Gate sequencer. It has 8 steps. Each step
3
7 €
has a button, a knob and an LED. One of the steps is always
ACTIVE (it has the cursor on it) and is routed to the CV and GATE
)
outputs. The ACTIVE step is indicated by the step LED with the
1
MINOR
highest brightness. The Gate Buttons are used to either set the
MAJOR
GATE (FN LED OFF) or the SLIDE (FN LED DIMMED) for the step.
In combination with the FN button, the step buttons are used to
4
8
adjust Popcorn's main settings. The Step knobs are used to set the
voltage that goes to the CV Out. The voltage from the knobs is
)
processed through the quantizer when activated.
REGULAR
CV IN MODE
PENTA/5TH
BLUES/7TH FN
CV out
) )
The CV Out is a 0-5V calibrated output that can create precisely
GATE
SLIDE TIME GATE TIME
quantized voltages (which correspond to the semitones in the
SLIDE
E E
) )
V/Oct scheme). It outputs voltage based on the KNOB position
of the ACTIVE step, processed by the quantizer. It can be also be
2 2
transposed, using the CV input.
4 TRIG A 4 TRIG B
1 3 1 3
) ) ) )
Gate Out
)
The Gate Out outputs 5V gates on each ACTIVE STEP change. The
CV IN RESET GATE OUT CV OUT
Gate goes high only when the STEP GATE is ON (LED of the STEP is
OFF when in GATE MODE). The length of the gate depends on the
Gate Time parameter. If Gate Time is fully CW the gate holds HIGH
as long as the step is active.
Reset In
) -Holding down the FN button and pressing STEP button 4
changes the mode of the CV Input (see its section).
If a rising edge of a gate appears on the Reset Input the ACTIVE -Holding down the FN button and pressing STEP buttons 5,6,7
step is set to 1. The only exception from that rule is when using or 8 changes the settings of the QUANTIZER (see its section).
the RESET OFFSET feature - see CV INPUT.
Holding down a STEP button and then pressing the FN button
will make that step ACTIVE in the same way as the Jump feature
Trigger A and Trigger B
)
on the separate gate expander module.
These trigger inputs are the key element of popcorn sequencer.
On the rising edge of a gate or trigger they advance the ACTIVE
)
step according to the setting of the TRIG knob, indicated by the
3 bi-polar LEDs. Turning the TRIG A or B knob (in GATE mode - The output CV range of the Popcorn sequencer can be 1, 2 or 5
see FN BUTTON) shows you green or red lights 1,2,3 or 4 (all of
octaves. Hold down the FN button and press step buttons 1,2 or
them ON). Green light means the trigger will advance the given
3 to select the range. 1 octave range means the output voltage
number of steps forward (e.g. if the ACTIVE STEP is 2 and there
is 0-1 volts , 2 octaves 0-2 volts and 5 octaves 0-5 volts.
is a green light indicating 3, the sequencer advances to step 5 on
the next Gate). A Red light means the trigger will go the given
)
number of steps backward (e.g. if the ACTIVE STEP step is 6 and
there is red light indicating 2, the sequencer goes back to step 4
The Quantizer enables Popcorn to output voltages that
on the next Gate).
correspond to the exact voltages of semitones (in equal
When the ACTIVE step position goes beyond number 8 it starts
temperament) in the volt per octave scheme. In other words,
back at 1.
it takes the input voltage from a Step knob and changes it to the
nearest voltage that corresponds to an exact semitone voltage.
FN Button The quantizer on Popcorn enables you also to filter semitones
)
in a musical way.
By shortly pressing the FN button, you switch between GATE (FN
To setup the quantizer you need to hold down the FN button
LED OFF) and SLIDE (FN LED DIMMED) modes.
and press buttons 5,6,7 and 8 to set what you desire.
When in GATE MODE, the STEP buttons are used to activate or To turn the QUANTIZER ON (led 5 on) or OFF (led 5 off) hold
deactivate the gates to be output from the GATE output. In GATE
the FN button and press step button 5.
mode the TRIG A and B knobs are used to set the TRIG A and B
step settings.
To select between chromatic mode (led 6 off), scale mode (led
6 dimmed) and chord mode (led 6 on) hold the FN button and
In SLIDE MODE the STEP buttons are used to activate or deactivate press step button 6. The quantizer has to be turned ON for this.
the SLIDE (slew limiter) on the CV OUT for individual steps. Also in
SLIDE mode, turning the TRIG B knob allows you to set the GATE
To switch between MINOR (led 7 off) or MAJOR (led 7 on)
TIME and turning the TRIG A knob sets the SLIDE TIME. scales or chords, hold the FN button and press step button 7.
The quantizer has to be turned on and you have to be in scale
While the FN button is held down, another layer of features is
or chord mode to be able to do this.
available on the STEP buttons and on the TRIG knobs. All labels
in non-black color correspond to the functionality when the FN
To be more specific about the scale or chord, hold the FN button
button is held down. and press step button 8. The scale can be diatonic (led 8 off)
- Holding down the FN button and pressing STEP buttons 1,2 or 3 , pentatonic (led 8 dimmed) or blues (led 8 on). The chord
sets the RANGE of the CV Output. You can choose 1, 2 or 5 Octaves.
can be root+3rd+5th (led 8 off) ,root+5th (led 8 dimmed)
or root+3rd+5th+7th (led 8 on). The quantizer has to be turned
on and you have to be in scale or chord mode to be able to do this.
See the following table for more details
Range
Chroma
Quantizer
Scale
Chord
Minor
Major
Regular
Penta 5 th
Blues 7 th
B
A#
A
G#
G
F#
F
E
D#
D
C#
C
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