{"id":1972,"date":"2026-06-09T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pcjv.de\/?p=1972"},"modified":"2026-07-24T17:28:27","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T15:28:27","slug":"synthedit-modules-and-tools","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pcjv.de\/?p=1972","title":{"rendered":"SynthEdit modules and tools"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Here is a confession right away: I have never actually used SynthEdit to make music. But I was fascinated by how it worked \u2014 a modular environment where third-party modules (SEMs) plug into a visual synthesis graph. So I did what I always do with fascinating architectures: I took it apart and built for it. The results live under <a href=\"\/?page_id=306\">SE modules<\/a> and <a href=\"\/?page_id=802\">SE Tools<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<!--more-->\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Modules<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">After translating the SynthEdit SDK to Delphi, I ported a large slice of my open source DSP code into <a href=\"\/?page_id=442\">SEM modules<\/a>: audio file oscillators, tanh approximations (ten of them, each a different trade-off between accuracy and CPU), a 25-piece trigonometric math collection, and one big bundle module containing about 175 sub-modules. The <a href=\"\/?page_id=444\">GUI modules<\/a> went in a different direction: algorithmic brushed metal surfaces, a whole shelf of image effects, a filter frequency-response plotter, a sonogram, even an OpenGL viewer that loads 3DS\/OBJ\/STL scenes into a synth GUI.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Tools around the format<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Understanding the SEM file format led to tooling: the <strong>SEM Explorer<\/strong> displays general information and pin properties of any module file, the <strong>SEM Merger<\/strong> chains as many modules as you want into one, and the <strong>VST to SEM wrapper<\/strong> made any VST plugin usable natively inside SynthEdit. A convolution module could even get impulse responses embedded straight into the module file.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Everything came out of my Delphi ASIO &amp; VST open source project, and the sources are still available. The modules are no longer maintained \u2014 but as an exercise in learning a foreign architecture from the outside, this chapter taught me more than most.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Here is a confession right away: I have never actually used SynthEdit to make music. But I was fascinated by how it worked \u2014 a modular environment where third-party modules (SEMs) plug into a visual synthesis graph. So I did what I always do with fascinating architectures: I took it apart and built for it. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1972","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dsp","category-retrospective"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>SynthEdit modules and tools - Christian&#039;s private site<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.pcjv.de\/?p=1972\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Christian\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Christian\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/79b654f8c2fb5bf9405ccc4cb1c11880\"},\"headline\":\"SynthEdit modules and tools\",\"datePublished\":\"2026-06-09T08:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-07-24T15:28:27+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972\"},\"wordCount\":264,\"articleSection\":[\"DSP\",\"Retrospective\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972\",\"name\":\"SynthEdit modules and tools - Christian&#039;s private site\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2026-06-09T08:00:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-07-24T15:28:27+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/79b654f8c2fb5bf9405ccc4cb1c11880\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/?p=1972#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"SynthEdit modules and tools\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/www.pcjv.de\\\/\",\"name\":\"Christian&#039;s private site\",\"description\":\"Private site of Christian-W. 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