Parametrics Fx Maker ##BEST##

Whilst i agree that the fusion360 software model is not great for makers i think that there is a lack of good open source alternatives in this particular area. OpenSCAD can be useful be but its nowhere near the same as using a full cad package like autodesk / solidworks / solidedge. The closest i have seen to any of these is FreeCad and it cant even handle complex assemblies yet.

parametrics fx maker

Much of maker movement as well as open source hardware got started with EagleCAD (also proprietary), well before KiCad was widely considered useable for moderately complex projects. I see this as a very similar progression. Do I wish there was an open source alternative to fusion, for sure, but until then, I am ok using very powerful tools to make cool stuff. I also use this proprietary tool to publish parametric (STEP files) versions of many of my designs, whereas most projects just share not-easily-remixable .stl files.

Germany's pre-eminent 'heavy metal' amp maker - which makes super high quality high gain amps at around 2.5K - 3K a pop. Just as well for me then that they have collaborated with David Friedman's Boutique Amp Distribution to bring a number of their legendary amps into pedal format - at a very significant cost reduction! I have both the VH4 and it's 2-Channel update - the VH4-2. I also look forward to acquiring the Herbert pedal in the near future. Diezel also have the rather large Zerrer Dual Channel PreAmp pedal which I'm not really interested in.

Appears to be recently defunct now - Haller seems to have been mainly an amp maker - with some vintage-style pedals offered too - various overdrives and phasers. There are still some of these in circulation (Effect Boutique, Reverb.com), but the last social media update was back in 2013!

Oddly, this is mostly a rack-effects PreAmp and Power Amp maker - with 3 studio -type effects and a single Tiny K large stompbox style 2-channel PreAmp. I'm sure the quality of this unit is fine, but there are lots of better-equipped pedals of this type, in fact like the Top 9 BluGuitar Amp 1 above!

This originally amp-maker now has circa 17 pedals in production for guitar and bass - in mini, compact and large enclosures. The vast majority here are Overdrives and Distortions - including signature pedals both compact and extended workstations for Steve Lukather and Lee Ritenour. The standouts for me are the dual-footswitch compact Overdrive and Distortion - or the Twin Overdrive and Commander II Distortion respectively. There's also a cool line of mini pedals - XS Clean Boost, XS Overdrive and Commander XS Distortion. The enclosures for these pedals are really beautifully engineered - nice looking range of pedals.

Looks like this boutique maker went to ground back in 2013, at the time though it had a very formidable range of 11 compact and medium enclosure Overdrives, Fuzzes and Distortions - some of which crop up every now and again on the second-hand market.

The process of identifying all the German pedal builders above was a real hard slog as so many of those businesses no longer exist or have changed tac in intervening years. And several more have horribly obtuse websites with not at all user-friendly navigation. For the record, all pedal-makers should have one long listing page which displays all their pedals at sufficient scale and resolution to make out what the heck those pedals are about, and how well they are designed and put together.

Here's my take on EQ which is pretty much similar to what Jason Sadites demonstrates in his Dialing In videos on his YouTube channel.The main thing is EQ is a finalizing tool for tone, not a maker of base tones. You use it after you've crafted your main tone using appropriate amps and cab/IR's that include the right combination and placement of microphones, followed by a low/high shelf (not high/low cut) to get the overall tone to have the right mix of lows and highs before any post-amp effects such as reverbs or delays. Then toward the very end of the signal chain you use a parametric EQ to do some basic "mastering" of the tone for specific problems such as high and low cuts and taking the edge off of very specific problematic frequencies.A high/low shelf is very different from the high and low cuts you would use in the parametric EQ. It's used to accentuate or decrease frequencies above or below a specific target frequency. Hi and low cuts are about chopping off the ends of the frequency range above a certain frequency in the case of high cut and below a certain frequency in the case of low cuts.NONE of these are set in stone because it all depends on the style and sound of the song as well as the type of guitar being used as well as what kind of speaker setup you're using for output. But, for example, you might use a low/high shelf set in lower mid range of guitar frequencies at around 580 Hz up to maybe 700 Hz to slightly accentuate by maybe 0.5db above that frequency and decrease frequencies by maybe 1.5 db below that frequency in order to have slightly more body in you guitar tone and less low end rumble to get a nice crisp, well articulated guitar tone. You might then use a high cut on the parametric EQ after the effects to take the edge off of the highs above 8.5 Khz and the low bass boominess or mud with a low cut 125 to 140 Hz. Those might be more representative of a Les Paul style guitar. With a single coil guitar you might also want to take some of the twangines out with a very narrow cut of 3 or 4 db in the 4.2 - 4.5 Khz range on the parametric EQ.Again these are just general ideas, not specific. You'll have to use your ears to listen to what you like or dislike in your tone to get what fits your sound and your setup. The most important thing is to let the modeling do the heavy lifting work by making smart decisions on the amp and particularly on the cabinet/IR mic combinations and placements before final SLIGHT tweaking of the tone with EQ. Otherwise, in my opinion, the result will sound more synthetic than authentic.

In a paper published on Risk.net earlier this month, they define the choice between internalisation and externalisation as an optimisation problem in which the state variable is the inventory of the market-maker. Their model uses market parameters such as volatility and client trading activity in response to pricing to determine the optimal choice. The market-maker has full control over the prices quoted to clients and its trading activity on external venues. The underlying fair price, which informs client bids, is modelled as a Brownian motion and is influenced by market impact.

Arion's effects units are a Japanese made range, distributed by the same people who handle Westone guitars (among other lines) in Britain - hence you're pretty likely to find them on offer in many music shops up and down the U.K.An extensive range of units is available, including two tuners, a headphone practice amp, analogue delay, flanger, phaser, parametric, chorus, overdriver, distortion pedal and the 'Metal Master' - a sophisticated distortion unit intended to perform a similar function, no doubt, to Roland's Boss 'Heavy Metal' pedal.As with most makers' effects pedals, Arion's range have most of their basic features in common. They all offer stereo operation (via twin jack outputs) and have some useful ideas included, perhaps the best of which is a removable top-plate which clips in and out of place to reveal the battery compartment below, in which lives the usual PP3 type. Mains power is catered for via a conventional input socket for a 9 volt stepped-down transformer supply.Constructionally speaking, the Arion range is unusual in that the casings appear to be made of some form of plastic. We'd be rather worried about this aspect - especially for professional or heavy-footed use, as however much it saves off the cost price, and however advanced the plastic, it (surely?) can't be as tough as the usual die-cast metal which most (even some of the cheapest) pedals are made of.Having said that, the prices are excellent and the remainder of the Arion range's design ideas seem very good. The on/off selection is via a ribbed push-flap, the controls are large and easy to handle, and there are plenty of useful extra features on individual pedals - slider switches offering often very useful stereo or alternative effects, to name just one.All our test samples worked perfectly and, generally, to a high standard (see individual comments below). We are a bit worried about these plastic casings, though, and would like to hear from any readers who've used Arion effects for any length of time, as to how they stand up to stage use. We'll print your comments, to help other readers, of course.

In addition to the above units, we also sampled the rest of the Arion range and, overall, found them to be excellent performers on a value for money basis. The makers may have cut corners on physical strength, but they have paid you back handsomely for the money in tonal and effect terms. For the not too physically dangerous user or the more hard-up player, we'd say that they represent very good value.More details from FCN Music Ltd., (Contact Details).

The Dod 944 Chain Reaction is about as neat a multi-effects system as you could hope to find. The main module is a single unit high metal clad box, which you house in the universal 19" wide rack frame system. To this is connected a single footpedal board, again strongly constructed, which gives you on/off control of the effects, plus a few useful extras like bypass and 'infinite repeat' on the on-board DDL.The main module offers what could well prove to be a winning combination of effects, certainly from the point of view of trying to be all things to all guitarists. The first stage is a fairly sophisticated 'Heavy Metal Distortion', the second a flanger/chorus, the third a digital delay and the fourth a parametric equaliser. This combination of units in a multi-effects system seems very sensible to us because, although whether or not you like a distortion and a flanger/chorus is a matter of personal taste, one digital delay sounds a lot like another, ditto a parametric - what counts are their specs.Another point in the Dod's favour is how very sensibly it's laid out. Once bolted into your rack, the mains on/off switch is on the extreme left of the control panel, and you then run across from distortion to flanger/chorus to digital delay to equaliser, ending up with a stack of three pots which govern overall input and output levels, plus the mysteriously named 'Enhancer' - more of which anon.Despite offering four comprehensive effects, the Chain Reaction could hardly be easier to understand and use. Starting with the distortion section, this features four pots: Distortion, Level, High Boost and Low Boost. On all of the effects, a red LED glows when the section is activated by the footswitch panel. Moving on to the flanger/chorus stage, this offers you Speed, Width, Delay and Regeneration. Curiously, no specifications are given for the amount of control you have over each of these functions, so judging them was a matter of using our ears - probably fair enough, because it's what the Dod's flanger/chorus sounds like that really matters, not paper specs. Nevertheless, some specifications would have proved interesting, even simply for direct comparison against other makers' units. The digital delay, however, does have something to say for itself, if only that it runs from 50 milliseconds up to 1000 Ms. Controlling it are Delay and Mix pots (the latter blending 'dry' and delayed sounds) plus a third control labelled 'Repeats'. A red readout gives you a visual indication of the delay time set, incidentally. As you can see, simplicity of operation and clarity of purpose are major points in favour of the Dod's design - you certainly don't need a degree in astrophysics to understand and use it, and that can be invaluable (even if you do happen to have such a qualification!) when you're under the pressure of a live gig.Moving to the parametric, this too is very straightforward. In case you don't know what a parametric is, by the way, it's probably easiest to think of it as a very flexible tone control where one knob enables you to select the exact frequency you wish to adjust, and another allows you to cut or boost it. The key to a parametric's desirability lies in the way in which you aren't tied to a fixed band of frequencies, and have complete tonal control as a result. In the Dod's case the two frequency ranges covered are 200Hz-800Hz (effectively low) and 800Hz-3.6kHz (high). Each band has its own cut and boost pot, and there is an overall level control too. No figures were given to show how much cut and boost is provided, but we'd guess that somewhere around the usual 10-15dB applies, judging from the effect it seemed to have.After these four stations, a single pair of jacks offer input and output, following which you have the aforementioned overall input and output level controls and that 'Enhancer' function. To reveal all, this is really a a form of treble booster, but it can be very useful in putting back the high frequencies which effects so often seem to leach out of your sound. Oh yes, just before we finish, an LED ladder shows operating levels, while a final red LED indicates bypass on or off.While all the controls you need are sensibly placed on the front panel, the main module features a lot of useful extras on the back. What you get are eight signal ins and outs (main input and output, distortion out, flanger/chorus in/out, DDL in/out and equaliser input). From these you can patch-in any other effects you may want to use; maybe a phaser, reverb, tape echo or whatever. Finally, of course, a stereo socket is also rear panel mounted for connection of the separate footswitch panel, from which you remote control the racked unit. As far as the pedal board itself is concerned, there are six section to this, one for each effect, plus 'Infinite Repeat' and 'Bypass'. Each has an LED status indicator.