Subscope Theremin

Thank you Thierry....Thank you Fred....I still have a lot to learn as a player, and I think I have not yet gotten to the point where I am limited by my instrument....The limitations are mainly my own....So I'll keep practicing for now...

In the meantime i have been working on appearance and features resulting in the voicematic 120 in respect to Leon Theremins 120th birthday in 2016.

https://youtu.be/WKdQOVXIutQ

Thanks so much for your video Dominik!  Nice to see you "in person"!

Nice panel layout, did you use a laser to do the lettering?

I particularly like the pizzicato feature operating in the zero volume region, not sure I would have thought to do that.

Dewster, thanks for embedding the video.

Yes, there is a fablab in town and fortunately they have a laser among their tools. Crazy machine.

Velocity ('pizzi-control') has been found more or less by chance while experimenting. And well, at least me being quite happy with that feature. It instantly felt like normal behaviour simply following the given emotion.

Dominik,
seemed to me that the noise is simply added to the pitch waveform (simple arithmetic addition). Nothing more complex (like the modulation/multiplication). Is that so?

Ilya, exactly. It's a simple two-channel OpAmp mixer (pitch and noise) before the VCA. Which provides one with something like old scool analoge drum-machine percussion or noisy shellac recordings or resembles wind instruments..

Dominik, what the secret linearizing gas you use in 120 model?

Ilya, it is not really a secret but (you name it) a long term process in observing and probably refining a common hartley oscillators manners :)

Dominik, I've been trying to implement the pizzicato volume thing you demonstrate above with some success, but I haven't been able to get it to a point that I'm happy with.  You're almost certainly doing it on the exponential side of things, and I'm trying to do it on the linear side.  I differentiate the signal to get velocity, only take positive differences (rectify), scale it (strength knob), and then present this to a leaky accumulator, the leak of which gives the decay (rate knob).  It works and everything, but I find that I can "pump up" the accumulator with repeated quick movements of my hand, which I don't like because it temporarily moves the audible threshold around.  Does yours display this kind of behavior?  Are you rectifying velocity?  Any tips you might give me?

Also, like ILYA, I'm kind of curious as to the pitch field sensitivity and linearity of your designs.  Are you using a series EQ coil?  If not, I assume the sensitivity and linearity are pretty much fixed?

You should write a book, I for one would definitely buy it!

Maybe it's because of the angled pitch antenna. 

http://www.thereminworld.com/files/photos/16058/angled_antenna_hand_capacit.jpg