Atoms

Sample locks switch which sample plays on a specific sequencer step

Sampled breaks are made musical by pitching/time-stretching and re-ordering their component hits

Samplers can map multiple sounds to MIDI notes in contiguous (melodic) or interleaved (drum-pad) layouts

Sampling an image's pixels and sorting the resulting colours by hue, saturation, or brightness extracts its palette

Sampling from a digital ROM synthesizer may be illegal because the ROM samples themselves are copyrighted

Sampling is wavetable synthesis with the stored period extended to a full recorded note rather than one cycle

Sardine Players (Pa–PZ) are the core scheduling unit: each holds a looping pattern that runs against the global clock

Sardine turns Python into a time-aware live coding instrument by making function evaluation immediate and hot-reloadable

Sardine's live coding relies on a REPL: evaluate-and-update any code while the scheduler keeps running

saveFrame() exports sequential still images that can be assembled into video

SC server executes synth nodes top-to-bottom in the Node Tree; source synths must precede effect synths or no audio flows

Scale identification by ear trains naming a scale from its characteristic sound without analysing its intervals

scale() interprets n() numbers as degrees within a named musical scale

SDF boolean subtraction uses max(distance, -cutter) to carve one shape out of another

SDF union, intersection, and subtraction combine primitive shapes into complex ones

SDFs and immediate-mode drawing are two distinct shape paradigms: field-based vs path-based

Section-level visual intensity must be edited to match the music arrangement because no section signal crosses the AV bridge

Semi-transparent marks accumulate in visual density where shapes overlap most

Sending set to a Group broadcasts the message to all contained Synths simultaneously

Sending several parts to one reverb return places them in a single shared acoustic space

Sensory dissonance is the roughness caused by beating partials within the critical band

Separating s (sample folder) and n (index) in Tidal enables independent patterning of name and index

Session View enables nonlinear clip-based performance by launching clips in any order

Set the kick as the loudest reference and build every level relative to it, leaving master headroom, before reaching for EQ/compression

Set up vocal compression by dialing threshold to even out words, starting near 4:1

Setting a loop on a track's outro buys time to find and cue the next track

Setting an arpeggiator's gate low turns held notes into a short-gated step-sequenced bassline

Setting doneAction:2 in an envelope automatically frees a Synth when the envelope finishes

Setting LFO rise and fall curvature in cycle mode selects the output waveform shape

Setting makeup gain inside the compressor allows bypass toggling without a volume jump

Setting the loudest track to peak at -12 to -18 dBFS leaves the 20 dB of headroom needed for safe plug-in operation and mix bus summing

Seventh chords add a 7th above the triad root; major sevenths (maj7) have 11 semitones, minor sevenths (7) have 10

Shadertoy and Three.js trace their origins directly to demoscene real-time graphics practice

Shadow rays use the same raymarching loop from the shading point toward the light to determine occlusion

Shaping envelope curvature (exponential / linear / logarithmic) changes the feel and function of a rise or fall stage

Sharing mutable variables across Sonic Pi threads causes non-deterministic race conditions

Shelving EQ affects all frequencies above (or below) a hinge point; peaking EQ affects a band around a center frequency

Shelving EQ after FM distortion restores high-end lost from the tube amp and overdrive

Short decay/release and low sustain on a percussion sample give the abrupt 'clipped' snap of grime beats

Short hi-hat envelope decays keep a busy drum pattern from becoming cluttered

Short reverb or early-reflection ambience adds space while keeping a sound upfront

Shorter grain duration produces wider spectral bandwidth

Showing concrete runtime values alongside abstract code eliminates the need to mentally simulate execution

Shuffle is triplet-based (66.7% ratio) while swing is any timing offset that creates groove (52–70%)

Shuffle rhythm replaces straight eighth pairs with the first and third of a triplet, creating a swinging feel

Sidechain compression from the kick is non-optional in dub techno — it lets the kick punch through dense ambient texture

Sidechain ducking routes a control signal to a dynamics processor to carve space for a competing track

Sidechain EQ makes a compressor respond only to sibilant frequencies

Sidechain-pump has two roles: functional masking-avoidance between kick and bass, and aesthetic pump as a genre signature

Sidechaining a sustained sound to a muted kick creates rhythmic pumping without an audible drum

Sidechaining synths to the kick and snare creates the pumping that lets drums cut through

Sidechaining the bass to the kick ducks the bass on each kick hit, carving low-end space the two would otherwise mask

sin() and cos() convert angles to unit-circle coordinates, enabling circular motion and oscillation

Six oscillators from one 74C14 chip can be mixed with resistors to prevent shorts and create dense textures

Six principles govern effective reverb and delay use: space, size, distance, timing, conspicuousness, and smoothness

Size reverb is deliberately audible and implies an instrument was recorded in a larger space than it actually was

Size-restricted intros (64K and 4K) force procedural generation over raw data storage

Slightly off-grid drum timing creates human groove that fully quantized patterns lack

slow and fast scale a Tidal pattern's time by a factor, changing its speed without altering its structure

Slow in and slow out — more frames near key poses and fewer in the middle — creates natural easing