Superbooth 2017: 4ms reveal Spherical Wavetable Navigator mothership
4ms Spherical Wavetable Navigator · Source: SonciState youtube
4ms Spherical Wavetable Navigator · Source: 4ms
4ms have revealed a stunning looking new Eurorack module. Although the layout seems identical to their already fabulous Spectral Multiband Resonator (SMR), this one is in black and that makes all the difference (just ask Arturia). They are calling it the Spherical Wavetable Navigator and it’s a features 6 wavetable oscillators.
Spherical Wavetable Navigator
It’s a very different beast to the SMR, it just happens to share some of the same hardware, and the front panel layout. But otherwise it’s not related. The sliders at the top are mix faders for each oscillator, underneath are 6 individual 1v/octave inputs. Then you have a row of 6 independent LFO outputs, again these are wavetable based oscillators, with a CV input to control the bank. Then at the bottom is your wavetable navigation.
The wavetables are arranged in a sphere, in 3D space. Your VCO’s can move within that space and depending on their position you get a different waveform. Sounds amazing! You have three controls to position your VCO, longitude, latitude and depth and they all morph from one to another.
There’s a transpose knob that takes the oscillators up and down in semitones either globally or individually. And you can also push octaves up and down. You can very easily create harmonics, chords and detuning.
Modulation in 3D space
The 6 LFO’s are out of phase by 60 degrees and you can use them to control the position in the wavetable. The colour of the circle of lights in the middle gives an indication of position. The speed of the LFO’s is mapped to the clock input and divisions of. Each VCO can have a differently clocked LFO. The LFO’s also have a trigger mode which can affect the internal VCAs to create patterns. Is this all crazy enough yet?
So, it’s a 6 oscillator wavetable oscillator, with 6 independent cycling trigger or gate LFOs, operating within a sphere of wavetables. The big knob in the circle of lights looks like it moves all sorts of parameters while the circle of lights gives an indication of stuff going on.
It’s going to be available by the end of the year at around the $500 mark although that’s not been set. More information should arrive on the 4ms website at some point. In the meantime enjoy this video from Superbooth by SonicState.
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