Module Reference · Glitch & Destruction

FLAGSHIPA new kind of granular — The Golden-Ratio Series

Golden Swarm

Golden Swarm chops the signal into grains - 10 to 500 ms, up to 50 per second - and rebuilds it as anything from stuttering fizz to oceanic ambient wash. Five grain engines (including time-stretch and cloud diffusion), spray, jitter, blur and pan spread shape the texture; freeze locks the buffer and loops the moment forever.

The golden-ratio layer is the signature: Phi Pan places grains across the stereo field on the sunflower-seed golden angle so clouds never clump, Phi Timing and Fib Density re-time triggers on golden-ratio intervals and Fibonacci burst/cycle patterns, Phi Span breathes grain lengths across powers of phi, and Phi Pitch snaps transposition to the golden 833-cent ladder instead of the chromatic grid. The classic safety net stays too - scale quantization (chromatic, major, minor, pentatonic, selectable root), feedback that re-consumes the output, and Scan sweeping a buffer up to ten seconds deep.

Golden Swarm module editor with the current image-based knob interface
GOLDEN SWARM MODULE SCREENSHOT INCOMING
ACTUAL UI · GOLDEN SWARM MODULE CLICK TO ENLARGE

Why it hits different

The GhostWare take.

  • Golden-angle panning and Fibonacci timing - texture that never clumps or loops.
  • Phi Pitch: an 833-cent golden ladder as an alternative musical grid.
  • Feedback plus scan makes it a self-playing texture engine.

In the shot

Reading the panel.

  • 1
    GRAIN FIELD

    Every live grain plotted as it fires.

  • 2
    SWARM FIELD

    The phyllotaxis spiral: live grains on the golden-angle sunflower map.

  • 3
    GRAIN COUNT

    Active grains out of the 64-voice pool.

  • 4
    GRAIN DECK

    Pitch, texture, cloud, scan, filter, scale-snap - plus the gold phi controls.

Control Showcase

Every control, explained.

30 controls, named exactly as they appear in the plugin.

Grain Size 10 to 500 ms (default 100 ms)

Length of each grain: short is granular fizz, long is smeared tape-like texture.

Density 1 to 50 /s (default 20 /s)

How many grains fire per second.

Position 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Where in the capture buffer grains are read from.

Spray 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Randomizes each grain's read position for cloudier textures.

Pitch -12 to 12 st (default 0 st)

Pitch shift applied to every grain.

Texture

Grain window/engine: Hann and Triangle are smooth, Rect is choppy, Stretch time-stretches, Cloud diffuses.

HannTriangleRectStretchCloud
Freeze on / off

Stops the buffer from recording so grains loop the current moment forever.

Smooth 0 to 100 % (default 50 %)

Crossfades grains into each other for a smoother cloud.

Mix 0 to 100 % (default 100 %)

Blend between the untouched signal and the processed one. 100% is fully wet.

Jitter 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Randomizes grain timing so the texture never sounds mechanical.

Blur 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Softens grain attacks into a wash.

Cloud 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Spreads grains across time into an ambient cloud.

Pitch Lock on / off

Keeps grain pitch locked while position moves, for clean time-stretch effects.

Reverse Prob 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Chance that any grain plays backwards.

Pan Spread 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Randomizes grain positions across the stereo field.

Buffer 100 to 10000 ms (default 2000 ms)

Length of the capture buffer grains are drawn from.

Scan -200 to 200 %/s (default 0 %/s)

Automatically sweeps the read position through the buffer at this speed.

Pitch Jitter 0 to 12 st (default 0 st)

Random pitch offset per grain, in semitones.

Feedback 0 to 95 % (default 0 %)

Feeds the granular output back into the buffer for evolving, self-consuming textures.

Filter

A filter on the granular output: low-pass, high-pass or band-pass.

OffLPHPBP
Cutoff 20 to 20000 Hz (default 16000 Hz)

The corner frequency of the filter.

Q 0.3 to 8 (default 0.707)

Width of the filter: low values are broad and gentle, high values are narrow and surgical.

Transient 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Lets the dry attack transients cut through the cloud.

Quantize

Snaps grain pitch to a scale - Chromatic, Major, Minor or Pentatonic - so pitch jitter stays musical.

OffChromaticMajorMinorPenta
Root

Root note the quantize scale is built on.

CC#DD#EFF#GG#AA#B
Phi Pan 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Blends grain panning toward the sunflower golden-angle sequence, spreading the cloud evenly with no clumps.

Phi Timing 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Re-times grain triggers onto golden-ratio intervals for organic, never-repeating rhythm.

Fib Density

Fibonacci trigger patterns: Burst fires grain clusters in Fibonacci counts, Cycle breathes the rate through a phi ladder.

OffBurstCycle
Phi Span 0 to 100 % (default 0 %)

Varies each grain's length across powers of the golden ratio for a self-similar texture.

Phi Pitch on / off

Snaps grain pitch to the golden 833-cent ladder instead of the chromatic grid - an otherworldly but consonant tuning.