August 28, 2002

   Welcome to version 1.03 of the PalancarWare Neutronium VST plug-in
   for BeOS. Installation and usage notes are below.


History

   v1.03 - 03Nov2001 - LFO always resets itself when processing suspends
   and resumes.  This means that if you always start processing at the
   same place in your signal, the LFO will always process in the same
   way.  Also includes optimizations contributed by Warren Sulcs, as
   well as other optimizations.  Parameters have been smoothed.

   v1.02 - 29Oct2000 - BPM is now a whole integer rather than a floating
   point, allowing precise BPM.  Sorry, it should have been this way to
   start with.

   v1.01 - 26Oct2000 - now VST 1.0 compatible, and also usable as a send
   effect, not just an insert effect, although the plugin has no
   practical use as a send effect.

   v1.00 - 25Oct2000 - first release.


The Palancar CD-Ware License

   This product is copyright (c) 2000-2001 by Darrell Burgan, with all
   rights reserved world-wide.

   This product is not public domain. I developed all content in this
   product, with any exceptions noted below, and am the sole owner of
   the copyright.  I'm granting you, however, an almost-free license to
   use it on as many devices as needed, for any legal purpose, subject
   to these terms:

      This product is licensed as-is, without warranty of any kind. I
      disclaim all legal liability.  If you use it, you do so at your
      own risk and are responsible for ensuring it works to your
      satisfaction.  Why do I not warrant it?  I'm just an individual
      struggling musician like everybody else, and I simply don't have
      the resources to provide an adequate warranty.  My warranty
      wouldn't be of much use to you anyway.

      This license is granted as "CD-ware".  What this means is that you
      have 30 days to use this product and evaluate whether it works to
      your satisfaction, and whether you like it and intend to use it.
      If you decide to continue to use it beyond 30 days, or if you use
      it in a project from which you will derive profit before 30 days
      have elapsed, I ask you to please go to my music web site (see
      below) and purchase one (or more) of my CDs as compensation. The
      CDs are very low priced, and can be purchased from anywhere in the
      world.  How do I know whether you've done this or not?  I don't.
      This is on the honor system, folks. If you like the results of my
      hard work, I don't think a measly CD is too much to ask. If you
      use multiple products, then purchasing multiple CDs is suggested.
      Use your best judgment as to how many you ought to purchase.  But
      I do request you purchase at least one.

      If you honestly cannot afford to purchase a CD but still want to
      use this product, then please contact me and we'll figure
      something out.

      The license does not imply nor suggest ownership of this product.
      I'm licensing the product's use, not selling ownership of the
      product. The license is subject to alteration or revocation at any
      time, at my discretion, with 30 days notice given here.  I can
      foresee no reasonable scenario where this could occur, but I want
      to make clear who owns the intellectual property.

      Note also that you are licensed only to use this product for the
      purpose it is designed, not to distribute it in any way, alter it
      in any way, or use it in any other way. If you want to distribute
      it, you need to link to "http://www.palancar.net/palancarware" in
      its entirety, and should not distribute the files nor point
      directly to them from any web site.

      If you disagree with any of the terms of this license, then you
      should not use this product.  If you use the product, you have
      implicitly agreed to these licensing terms.  If you are the least
      bit uncertain about these terms or would like to explore
      alternatives, please contact me and we'll figure something out.

   Other folks' copyrights:

      Portions copyright (c) Steinberg GMBh

   Palancar music CDs can be purchased at:

      http://www.ampcast.com/palancar

   Whew!  Sorry for all the lawyer stuff, but you know how it is in
   these days of Napster and Gnutella.  I hope you enjoy this product,
   and I hope you understand that I've put far more time into it than I
   would ever hope to receive back financially under this license.  In
   other words, I'm not doing this for the money, folks...


Installation

   Simply copy the file to the VST plugins directory of the VST media wrapper.
   I've not included an installer because this installation is so simple, to
   minimize download time.


The Plugin

   Neutronium is a cool-sounding BPM-synced digital low-pass filter with
   its own LFO and user-specified min/max cutoff and resonance.

   What does that mean in plain English?  It means that you can run a
   boring bassline through this plugin and turn it into a sweeping,
   growling monster.  It means you can animate an otherwise lifeless
   synth lead.  By messing with the cutoffs and resonance, you can color
   the sound of your instruments to your heart's content.

   Like all filters, it is designed to be used as an insert effect, not
   a send effect.  You can use Neutronium as a send effect, but in this
   mode it will not affect your input signal at all.

   This is a more complicated tool than most other PalancarWare plugins.
   Or at least it has more controls than usual:

      Input Gain - this controls the amount of amplification (or gain
      cut) that occurs on the input signal before any filtering is
      performed.

      Tempo - the speed in BPM of the signal you want to filter.
      Neutronium will automatically translate the BPM value into the
      appropriate LFO rate given the sample rate of the signal and the
      number of beats (see the next control).

      Every n Beats - determines how many beats long the entire LFO
      cycle should be.  If you say 1 beat, the LFO will go through an
      entire min-max cycle in one beat, given the tempo.  If you say
      16 beats, the LFO will take sixteen beats, or four 4/4 measures,
      to go through the min-max cycle.  And so on.

      Cutoff (Hi) - the maximum cutoff frequency the filter will take
      on.  In other words, the frequency cutoff when the LFO is at its
      max.

      Cutoff (Lo) - the minimum cutoff frequency the filter will take
      on.  In other words, the frequency cutoff when the LFO is at its
      min.

      Resonance - how much resonance you'd like the filter to have. This
      ranges from no resonance (0%) all the way up to self-oscillation
      (100%).


Using the Plugin

   As mentioned, this plugin really shines on synthesized basslines. Put
   a square wave bass through this thing with some resonance, and you'll
   hear a tone any 303 owner would recognize.

   It also can be used to animate pads nicely.  Try stringing together
   two or three Neutroniums with different cutoffs, resonance levels,
   and LFO rates and you'll hear some cool sounds.

   You could even use this plugin to give a percussion line a sweeping
   resonant effect a la Led Zeppelin or something.

   A couple of tips on using the plugin:

     You can go from 1 to 32 beats with the plugin.  If 32 beats isn't
     long enough, you can cut the BPM in half to get an effective 64
     beats, or you can quarter it for an effective 128 beats, etc.

     Set the min and max cutoffs to sensible values.  For example, if
     you set the min to be greater than the max, you won't get any
     oscillation because the plugin will assume min = max.

     Setting the resonance to 100% will produce a wild almost
     ring-modulation effect.  But watch the amplitude...it's easy to get
     clipping with this much resonance.  Overdriving this filter does
     *not* produce a nice effect, sorry.

     This filter does not automatically compensate for the volume loss
     that is inevitable whenever you remove signal (like all filters
     do).  Use the input gain to adjust the volume as needed.


Support

   Due to the number of VST hosts and operating systems in the world,
   there is no way I can possibly test it with all possible software
   products.  If you run into any snags, please contact me at:

      Darrell Burgan
      PalancarWare
      darrell@palancar.net
      http://palancarware.palancar.net/
      
   For BeoS specific support, contact Xentronix at info@xentronix.com,
   http://www.xentronix.com

