Meta Morph : Download and Install

Eigenharp
1

Overview

This topic details how to get started with Meta Morph

Status

Platform Supported:

  • MacOS - apple silicon and intel (64 bit)

VCV Rack:

  • tested on both VCV Free and VCV Rack pro

Downloading

Currently, distribution is direct from my Github repo, rather than the VCV Rack store.

You can find the current release here: download here

Documentation

including getting started, and documentation on the modules can be found on the projects wiki page here

you may also find useful videos on my YouTube channel: here

Support

Please bare mind this is a FREE open source project I develop in my own spare time, I support as well as I can, and with the time I have available… and I also have other hobbies, including music making :laughing:

if you would like to support me, for my efforts on this (and other) projects,
you can buy me a coffee via ko-fi : here :coffee:

Installation

  • download the vcvplugin file that matches your platform
  • copy this file into your rack2 plugins folder
    for apple silicon: ~/Documents/Rack2/plugins-mac-arm64
    for intel: ~/Documents/Rack2/plugins-mac-x64
  • restart VCV Rack.

where next?

I created a short video on how to patch. here
it was based on older panels but the basics remain the same.
also you will find tutorial patches in the plugin folder, see this post

note: when loading/creating new patches you need to configure the vcv AUDIO module to point to you audio interface

if you have other issues, please see my troubleshooting topic

… and of course, you can post questions on this forum :slight_smile:

New to VCV Rack / Modular?

Then, head over to OmriCohen’s YouTube channel, frankly, I cannot recommend his channel highly enough. Omri covers everything from beginners to advanced, has fantastic musical examples… and is highly entertaining too.
why are you still here?

Community edits

this is now an wiki article, so the community can edit to add clarification for new users, though please keep it ‘brief’, as no one reads wordy topics (however well meaning)
you can also post replies here, to add some clarifications or tips for getting started.

furthermore, you can edit my troubleshooting guide on the meta morph wiki

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Note that as of VCV 2.5.0, the plugin folder is now

~/Library/Application Support/Rack2
Rack/CHANGELOG.md at v2 · VCVRack/Rack · GitHub

If you are looking for it in finder and can’t see it, press CMD+Shift+. to toggle showing of hidden folders.
Also, put the downloaded file straight into the folder, and VCV will ‘install’ it and create the right folder structure.

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thanks for that…
have you tested in v2.5.x, I didn’t upgrade yet, as Id heard there were some performance issues, though some say 2.5.2 cleared these up.

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That’s on my list for today. I only got as far as getting it installed last night.
I also don’t know if I’m the best to test the performance issues, as even though I did install a very early version, and a couple along the way, it’s not a tool that I’ve used a lot. I’ll see how I go though.

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I’ll also give it a go if I get time.

performance issues, yeah I don’t know if Id notice the difference either, as its a bit unclear exactly what the problem was/is - or if it only happened with complex patches, or certain modules - really, all I know is that some users with 2.5.0 were getting some audio glitches with patches, that previously were ok.

to be clear: Im talking vcv generally, nothing to do with meta morph.
anyway, hopefully 2.5.2 cleared it up… some users did report improvements, but still a bit unclear if the issues was ‘solved’ or just improved.

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Having tried all of the default patches, they all worked for me, only getting to the mid-teens of CPU (2019 intel Macbook Pro).
I really like how responsive it is. There is a little more pressure needed to trigger notes than in EigenD itself, but reducing the slew rate even just a little bit has a big impact.
Thanks again for your work, and I’m keen to keep experimenting.
I’m trying to get used to the chromatic layout, so have made more Illuminator json files, so will put those into the patches discussion once I’m happy with them.

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what do you mean by trigger? are you using Z into gate?
if so, then this may just be that you need to scale Z up, as probably gate inputs are looking for 1v or so…

indeed slew rate is quite important, and something we can fine tune a bit.

eigenharp’s sensors are reporting at around 2khz, so when using things like midi/vst from eigend, this is a ‘non-issue’, in fact, you likely reduce this rate further… and then as midi is low-rate, synths will always slew these values to avoid stepping.

however in vcv rack, we are running at audio rate for all signals so we have a ‘mismatch’ between 2khz vs sample rate (e.g. 48khz). in many cases this ‘stepping’ is not heard.
however, some uses (e.g. filters) will often ‘amplify’ this stepping where its very noticeable.

this is why we need to slew iirc, I have a certain amount in the Eigenharp module,
but still found it useful to have some extra when using VCAs etc.

however, by definition, a few at some point will also ‘slow the response’ and you’ll feel it when playing… not an issue for pads, but not really wanted for plucks etc.
so its a balancing act.

so thats the theory of what Ive implemented, and what Ive seen/felt when playing.
ofc, theres a possibility that is a bug here somewhere, or I’ve overlooked something.
but I did take quite a bit of care in this area so I think its ok :wink:

btw: we should probably create a separate topic for these kind of discussion (which Im keen to have), so that this topic can be more about installation issues etc.

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Hi there !! many thanks for this project !!
I’m testing metamorph using my Tau and the only problem is that the first column doesn’t work properly. The other three are working great !. The first one (the lowest) send inconsistent notes (sometimes two different notes, sometimes a note that I sent previously, sometimes something else).
I checked my tau using EigenD and all the keys are working fine…so is not a hardware problem…

Thanks a lot

Francisco

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can you post a simple vcv patch that shows this…
i.e with as few modules as possible.
as I need to know which module is causing the issue, things like splits etc will complicate it a lot.

the issue is, I cannot, think why the first column would act any differently to the others…
as far as the low level stuff is concerned, there is no such thing as column.they are just keys 1…N

the only thing that maps columns is the scaler and that is the thing that decides on the note.

anyway, unfortunately, I need more to go on…

as in my tests, I wasn’t seeing anything like this ( obviously, if I had , Id not have released
;))

I’ll give a another go to double check… but not sure what Im looking at/for :wink:

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UPDATE: I reinstalled metamorph and now its working perfectly BUT every time I try to add a new .scl file into the scales folders, VCV crashes… if I delete that file everything works fine again

Cheers

Francisco

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file format?
can I see a stack trace?
also can you attach the file here… so I can see it.

I use a 3rd party (open source) library to parse Scala files, so it could be that is having issues with some formats.

I tried a few Scala files without issue, but Id not be surprised if there are some parts of the file format that are not being handled or are causing issues.

ofc, it might be something else entirely but, again, without seeing an example not sure what Im looking for.
( I did try adding ‘custom’ Scala files during testing… but they were pretty simple)

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Thanks.

I’m attaching a folder with the following:

•	Crash report
•	The .scl file I’m trying to use (iran_diat.scl)
•	A picture of the patch working properly before I added the new .scl file
•	A picture of the folder where I placed the file (Scales_path)
•	The actual patch

Thanks,

you can download the folder from:
https://www.dropbox.com/t/OprjhnHzn0Eg0io1

Francisco

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yeah, so as ‘expected’ its the 3rd party lib thats having an issue parsing…
we can see here : scala::read_scl(…)

11  plugin.dylib                  	       0x10a093b1c scala::read_scl(std::__1::basic_ifstream<char, std::__1::char_traits<char>>&) + 1084

in particular : std::__1::stoul

10  libc++.1.dylib                	       0x1920f3024 std::__1::stoul(std::__1::basic_string<char, std::__1::char_traits<char>, std::__1::allocator<char>> const&, unsigned long*, int) + 488

so this means its having an issue reading the number of degrees (7 in this case)
basically its getting confusing with the ‘comment’ line

Im not sure of the exact cause… but basically what I believe is happening is.
scala spec says 2nd comment line must be the scale degree count (a ridiculous spec!)
the issue this 3rd party library is the first comment line is being read as two lines…

I suspect … this is a crlf issue…
likely files generated on windows, so have cr/lf which macOs sees as two lines

this can be fixed using the macOS command… ( * )

 tr -d '\r' < iran_diat.scl   > new_iran_diat.scl

I think this is the issue and workaround

I did also notice that Id simplified the comment line…
so if the above does not work try changing

Iranian Diatonic from Dariush Anooshfar, Safi-a-ddin Armavi's scale from 125 ET

to

iran-diat

but probably, what happened is, I tried this to fix it, but actually saved with an editor ( * ) that re-encoded the line endings… so thats what really fixed it.

sorry, I don’t think there is an easier ‘end-user’ solution… as things like TextEdit don’t re-encoding line endings… you’d have to use a ‘programmers editor’ to this. and I dont wanna get into that :laughing:

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Did my suggestion fix it ?

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Sorry Mark, I will try today.

I have Scala software in my Mac. I will try using that to modify the file.

Cheers

Francisco

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im not sure if that will save with out CRLF , but it’d be a good test to try.

if you do

od -c myfile.scl

you can look to see if the CRLF are there aka \r \n
basically, we dont need the \r
(why the hell windows still insist on using crlf post 1980s is beyond me ;))

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Hey Mark,

I just tried tr -d ‘\r’ and it works. Thanks !!!

Francisco

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