The Instrument

Pulsarets is a pulsar-synthesis engine in a Windows 64-bit VST3 shell. Pulsar synthesis — formalized by Curtis Roads in Microsound — sits between granular synthesis and additive synthesis, producing tones by stacking short waveform bursts (pulsarets) with deliberate silences between them. The burst rate sets the perceived pitch; the burst envelope sets the timbre; the duty cycle between burst and silence sets the metallic / vocal / grainy character that's the technique's signature. Pulsarets distills that whole architecture into a five-control surface plus pitch grid: spin up an oscillator, snap it to a 128-step pitch ladder, slip the detune off-grid by a hundred cents either way, then sculpt the bursts with decay, position, feedback, and dry/wet. The result has the resonant clarity of an analog synth and the textured, almost-spoken articulation that only burst-based synthesis produces.

The 128-step pitch slider on the left is the heart of the instrument. It quantizes to a full MIDI piano range starting around C-1 (≈8 Hz, the subsonic register where pulsars behave more like a steady click train than a continuous tone) and climbing through every semitone up past 10 kHz. The readout shows you both the note name with cent offset (F#1 +10c in the screenshot) and the absolute frequency (46.53 Hz), so you always know exactly where you are. Tap SNAP and the slider locks to chromatic intervals; release it and you can sweep continuously through the steps for glissandi and pitch envelopes. The detune slider below adds ±100 cents on top — a full semitone of fine adjustment that's perfect for chorusing two Pulsarets instances against each other on adjacent tracks.

The four knobs underneath shape the burst itself. DECAY sets how long each pulsaret rings before silence — short values produce clicks and grit; long values fill the duty cycle completely and start to sound like a saw or a vowel formant. POSITION offsets where in the burst the envelope peaks, so you can slide between front-loaded attacks and rear-loaded soft entries. FEEDBACK routes the output back into the next burst's seed — at low values it adds a subtle harmonic shimmer; at high values it builds into self-oscillating drones that pulse against the burst rate. DRY/WET crossfades against the unprocessed input, so Pulsarets functions as both a tone generator (100% wet) and a textural effect on whatever you route through it. BYPASS takes everything offline for instant A/B comparison.

The Controls

• PITCH (128 STEPS)Full MIDI piano range, chromatic by default. Reads as note name with cent offset and absolute frequency in Hz.
• DETUNE±100 cents fine tune. One full semitone of slip in either direction — perfect for chorusing two instances.
• DECAYBurst envelope length, 1 ms to 2 sec. Short = clicks and grit; long = vocal formants and saw-like sustain.
• POSITIONWhere in the burst the envelope peaks. Slide between hard front-loaded attacks and soft rear-loaded entries.
• FEEDBACKRoutes output into next burst's seed. Adds shimmer at low values; self-oscillating drones at high values.
• DRY / WETCrossfade against unprocessed input. 100% wet = pure tone generator; lower mixes turn it into a textural effect.
• SNAPLock the pitch slider to chromatic steps. Off for continuous sweeps; on for in-key playing.
• BYPASSHard-bypass the whole engine for instant A/B comparison with the dry signal.

Architecture

Acquisition

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