15 days only offered at dealer price = normal 449usd.

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Folktek has admittedly often been inaccessible for many people as the incredibly small production and one-of-a-kind pieces have been both costly and time consuming to create. The intention with this piece is to get some Folktek into the hands of anyone who's ever wanted some. 

Folktek has been around for years and made hundreds of unique instruments, and here's another! In the design vein of the Folktek Triad (shown below) and made to work with any or all of three. More photos and details here; http://folktek.com/instruments/symbiotic/aethermateriamentalis-triad-overview

If you've somehow never seen folktek works, have a gander at the broad array at folktek.com

The Conduit:

A symbiotic touch-based drone synthesizer based on a delay which then travels to a filter. Creating swells of oscillation that can delve into eternal noisy feedback territory as one desires. Connect to a sequencer to control the time/pitch and pull forth some powerful  synthesis.

Additionally the touch board is a control voltage generator/keyboard sending 0-5v in .5v increments. 

Note that the final will be slightly different than what's shown. The circuit's been redesigned to have the two outer knobs taken up on the panel to provide more space for the jacks with less interference.

• touch pads; 8 polyphonic notes + noise + pitch: all sensitive to touch. These are synchronous with the delay clock, meaning delay time = oscillator pitch. All notes are tuned with one another so the pitch is a master control.
• Oscillation and/or incoming audio sent through on-board filter: for further manipulation.
• CV controllable: over delay time/master pitch (+0-5v).
  
• Touch panels generate CV: signals from +0-5v in .5v increments to control your modular gear (it's a cv keyboard).
• Audio input: to get your sound into some delay and filter goodness. Expect the delay to be a noisy little bastard (this is a drone synthesizer). For a clean delay and filter signal, however, one can disconnect the touch plates and use it strictly as an effects unit for synthesizers, guitar, etc. Cv controls delay time.
• Delay: True vintage analog sound delay. The delay goes from extremely tight to some unspecified, very long, very noisy time. The range of the time knob has been allowed to extend to incredibly long times by allowing the degradation of quality beyond a second or so, allowing the sound to get into very lo-fi and grimy territory.
• Filter: Single knob style filter with fixed resonance allows for a nice, rich sweep.
• Adaptable with other Folktek works: Without sending the audio output anywhere, the oscillators will travel through the players' body and into Materia, Mentalis and/or Aether to be further manipulated (examples in videos).
• All 3.5mm jacks
  
• High quality parts, solid construction.
  
• Bamboo box with dark splines.
  
• 12v operation with included power supply
  

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For the experimenter/designer/installation artist:

This circuit has been designed to be easily removed  if one desires - to be rebuilt or recreated in any number of ways if a person should choose to get creative. Connectors (headers) on the board are present for the touch points, CV in and out, audio in and out, LED power, and regulated voltage outputs, etc.

This allows for anything to be wired out to anything else without ever soldering to the circuit. One could do some slight dis-assembly from the body, create a touch-based sound installation, for example, and put everything back the way it came without ever having damaged or altered the circuitry.

Additionally, for those into modifying circuits, the circuitry is easily accessible and there are plenty of ways one could reroute things. 

• Send touch connectors to anything metal to create new touch panels
  
• Send the point to circuit paint and create playable art works
• Add circuits and power them with this one circuit (12v and 9v power outputs)
  

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About Folktek and production:

Over the years, there has never been any folktek work created with an initial production run of greater than 25. In fact, many folktek works are historically entirely one of a kind. Some, like the gardens (illuminist, luminist and micro) have gone through several small production runs of 25 or less created at one time over the course of months, while some others have taken just as long or longer to create a run of just 10!

How this piece differs slightly from other Folktek works;

This Conduit is offered here to help with production. Your contribution will determine the number of instruments being made. Currently 50 instruments are in production and set to be complete and ready to ship just 2 weeks after this short 2 week campaign. If just ten were to sell, we'd buy the parts needs for all 50 and stop production there. If people want more, we can make more.

The cost of the Conduit is low compared to other folktek works because we've dedicated ourselves to extending production, while still not overextending ourselves into mass-production (something we've always strayed away from). Our goal is set low because the funds needed to finish these works is for small parts like quality knobs and house-made lamps.

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Spead the word:

Save 20 bucks by referring someone. If you buy a Conduit, tell someone else to buy a conduit and if he/she writes your name "message to campaign team" on the perk contribution page, we'll refund you $20 via paypal when all is said and done. One referral refund per person. But please, refer lots of people.

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Keeping it simple:

We're keeping this campaign simple - no stickers, no downloads, no extra doodads...Just the quality built instrument.

Pay for one Conduit at this initial discounted price, get one. Want more than one? double the price, do the math and add it to the total on the total on the contribution page. Please include a "message to campaign team".

If you missed this, the Conduit will be available in limited quantities after this campaign is finished at a price of $449 via folktek.com.

Funding goes into production. 50 are ready to ship once the parts we need to buy are placed on the panels.

If we happen to exceed 50, we're set to go into further production - from the pcb manufacturing and part mounting, to the panel drilling and the woodworking. Files, Jigs and materials are ready to go. Beyond 50 to the next 50, the wait will be 1 month from the end of this campaign to ship. If, by chance, we exceed that amount, we'll be prepared to handle the higher load and the wait will jump by 2 additional weeks.

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Risks & Challenges

The initial 50 are in production now. Should we exceed 50, we are prepared to go into a larger production and hire a couple folks for the weeks after the campaign ends. Any delays will only come from pcb manufacturing and assembly. However, if it becomes clear we'll need more circuitry as the campaign goes on, we'll begin producing them preemptively.

Video: