Granular synthesis approaches

As far as the idea of sound grains is concerned, any synthesiser producing rapid sequences of short sounds may be considered as a granular synthesiser. However, there are important issues to consider when designing a granular synthesis instrument. Three general approaches to the technique are presented as follows. 

The sequential approach to granular synthesis works by synthesising sequential grain streams. The length of the grains and the intervals between them are controllable, but the grains must not overlap (Figure 5.3). 

Finally, time-based techniques approach synthesis from a time domain perspective. The parameters of time-based synthesis tend to describe sound evolution and transformation of time-related features e.g. in terms of time lapses. Examples of time modelling techniques include granular synthesis and sequential waveform composition time modelling techniques are discussed in Chapter 5. 

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