Our Noodlebox Indiegogo Campaign has now finished. However the product will be on general sale in a few months. If you would be interested in updates please join our mailing list at https://six4pix.us19.list-manage.com/subscribe?u=acda445162dbb15a6bae5f008&id=2a16e0b401   Thanks/Jason

Introducing Noodlebox

Noodlebox is a four part sequencer for making electronic music. It has analog CV/Gate outputs for each part and supports MIDI.

Noodlebox has been designed to be 

• Fun and intuitive – Edit your synth lines in the bright clear graphical LED matrix - just like using an Etch-a-Sketch - and tweak them live while they play.
• Great for jamming – Quickly loop and reverse sections of a sequence, jam with pitch transposition, crank crazy pitch randomness up and down then snap back to the original notes, incrementally add Euclidean gates... editing features common to many sequencers take on new creative and expressive meaning!
• Quick for live arranging – Capture variations of a pattern into four different 'pages' and arrange them to cycle automatically in any order, all while still jamming live and without missing a beat. Quickly save compositions to memory and recall them later.
• Powerful and flexible – Noodlebox is like having four step sequencers in one box, each with CV/Gate and MIDI output, and you can use it exactly like that. Or you can dive into the new possibilities opened up by the internal routing, cross-modulation and scaling of the four parts.
• Solid construction – Comes as standard with lovely, solid oak end cheeks (from Synths And Wood) and powder-coated, extruded aluminium side rails. Reassuringly weighty!
• No HP in the rack! – Why isn't Noodlebox a Eurorack module? Well, by staying on the desktop, it saves valuable space in your Eurorack setup, and you can move it around to where it's needed. Not to mention that a horizontal control surface is just so much more comfortable to use!

The Story...

My name is Jason and I have been making electronic music accessories for almost 8 years. Over that time I've been able to leave the day job behind and focus on making open-sourced kits and products for musicians. These include the Arpie arpeggiator, Le Strum MIDI controller, Banana Split MIDI splitter, Orange Squeeze MIDI merge and the CV.OCD MIDI to CV converter. These products are all designed by me, assembled here in Brighton, UK with the occasional help of a couple of friends, and released under the Sixty Four Pixels brand name.

As a passionate musician myself, I have always wanted to make the type of products that I would use. The idea of Noodlebox came about from experience playing with simple knob-based step sequencers such as the Korg SQ-1, and in particular some experiments I did with linking multiple SQ-1s together in interesting ways (setting different sequence lengths/clock divisions, adding pitch CVs, multiplexing between CV outputs, swapping gates between sequencers and so on). What got me most excited were the quirky grooves and melodies that emerged; unplanned but inspiring to build upon, tweak and refine.

Noodlebox is intended to bring that kind of fun experimentation and serendipitous workflow into a single compact device. With over a year of jamming with the prototype I have expanded the functionality into what I hope is a very immediate and hands-on live sequencer, perfectly paired with Eurorack and desktop analog synths in improvisational setups. 

Features In Detail

Noodlebox has four independent sequencer layers, each with a CV/Gate output. Each layer runs separately to the others (although staying in sync) and has its own step count, clock division etc. 

Each layer has four pages of up to 32 steps each. Pages can be used for A/B/C/D type pattern variations, for verse/chorus type song sections or chained to make a single pattern of up to 128 steps. You can cue up lists of pages for automatic cycling (up to 32 pages). Arranging pages is designed to be quick and easy to do creatively in a live setting.

Each step has a value range of 0-127 corresponding to row position of the data point in the scrolling window. This value corresponds to a chromatic or scale-forced note pitch CV (V/Oct or Hz/V output) or to a general purpose modulation CV (0 to 8V range). Freely mess with scaling modes during playback for microtonal weirdness!

User-entered CV points can be padded or interpolated into empty steps for fast creation of melodies and modulation slopes without the need to enter a value at every step. Voltage slew can be introduced between data points.

Gate points can easily be edited separately from CV points, so you can experiment with the rhythm of a fixed melody and vice-versa. The gate length (duty) is adjustable at layer level and any step can be “tied” to the next for legato play or rhythmic variation.

Gates can be set manually or by Euclidean algorithm. Each gate point can be assigned probability, retrigger/ratchet and accent (for MIDI velocity). Gate timing can be micro-offset for swing and slide effects, with or without randomness.

All layers can output MIDI notes or controller change (CC) messages, on shared or different MIDI channels. MIDI notes from an external keyboard can also be recorded and quantized into the grid while the sequence plays. Use Noodlebox as a MIDI looper just as intuitively as a guitar looper pedal.

Layers 2, 3, 4 can internally modulate the CV output of the previous layer by summing with it or overlaying it. This requires no special cable patching and can be used for automated transposition or adding simple variations to a sequence, right up to meandering microtonal craziness.

Editing features such as cloning and erasing data points, shifting patterns in pitch and timing, setting loop point and play direction, adding randomness (and taking it away again) are designed to be hands-on and creatively useful in a live setting.

Eight memory slots store the whole of the Noodlebox session (all four layers). An auto save memory slot is used when shutting down using the OFF button, so that you can pick up where you left off when you turn it on again. A special memory slot can also be prepared as a “template” for new sessions to save commonly used settings.

Hardware Specifications

• Input sockets: MIDI In (3.5mm TRS jack. MMA standard “type A”), Sync In (3.5mm mono jack. 5-15V pulses, selectable function), Aux In (3.5mm mono jack. 5-15V pulses, selectable function)
• Output sockets: MIDI Out: (3.5mm TRS jack. MMA standard “type A”), Sync Out (3.5mm mono jack. 10V pulses, selectable function), Aux Out (3.5mm mono jack. 10V pulses, selectable function), 4 x Gate Out (3.5mm mono jack. 10V pulses), 4 x CV Out (3.5mm mono jack. 0-8V range, 12-bit resolution, V/Oct, Hz/V and selectable linear voltage scaling)
• Display: custom LED assembly, 32 x 16 pixels (128 x 64mm), 3 brightness levels
• Indicators: LEDs for tempo, MIDI activity, gate activity, power
• Controls: 11  buttons, rotary encoder, power on and off switches
• Processor: 32-bit ARM Cortex M0+ running at 48MHz, with 128k FLASH/16k SRAM. Firmware user-updateable by MIDI system exclusive (SYSEX) message
• Power: 9-12V DC centre negative barrel, 2.1mm pin (guitar pedal type).
• Enclosure: aluminium extrusion top/bottom, solid oak sides, 1.6mm composite PCB material front/back
• Size: approx 185 x 155 x 24mm (40mm height including encoder knob)
• Weight: approx 515g 
• Included accessories: 1 x wall-wart type power supply with mains pins for your region (UK, EU and US type supplies available), 2 x 3.5mm TRS to 5-pin MIDI breakout adaptors

What We Need 

We have been developing and refining Noodlebox for almost two years. When you support this campaign you are helping us to get over the last bump, which is the production run. 

Noodlebox is our first crowdfunding campaign. We have decided to take this approach since the parts outlay for the production run is significantly higher than that of any previous product and we have found that we require additional funding for the PCB and surface mount fabrication.

At this time we have functional prototype units that are close to the final product. All product development to this point has been self-funded. While there are some final decisions to make around manufacturing, and some work to test the first release of the firmware, we're ready to begin production and present this campaign as a pre-order of a final product rather than the funding of product development.

What You Will Get

All perk levels for this campaign include a full Noodlebox product set from the first batch of units. This includes a quality myVolts branded "wall-wart" power supply for your region (UK type, EU type or USA type) and a pair of MIDI breakout cables.

These will be shipped to you by an express courier service with tracking and a signature required (DHL or similar).

Depending on your perk level you may also receive a black, cotton Sixty Four Pixels logo T-shirt in your requested size and/or a set of Befaco Banananuts (coloured custom nuts for 3.5mm sockets, original knurled socket nuts will also be included).  

All perk levels have the same price, which is lower than our anticipated retail price. Banananuts and T-shirts are limited quantity free gifts - so get in there early, folks :) 

Risks & Challenges

The Noodlebox hardware design is complete and we have ordered or received almost all of the components for the first production run; custom aluminium extrusions and wooden end cheeks have already been sourced from small companies in the UK. Other electronic and electrical components have been sourced from well-known suppliers including Mouser, Farnell, RS and Rapid. So this will happen!! 

However, the challenge right now is to predict exactly how long it will take, given the current coronavirus situation. The main tasks left to complete, and things that may impact them, are

• PCB manufacturing (making the blank circuit board panels). This will be done by a Chinese factory which is currently operating normally. However there remains a risk of unexpected delays impacting the manufacturing or shipping of the boards back to the UK.
• PCB assembly (automated soldering of surface mount components to the circuit boards). Our Estonian contract manufacturer is currently open for orders although at a slightly reduced capacity. However there remains a risk of unexpected delays impacting the manufacturing or shipping of the boards back to the UK.
• Product assembly (soldering additional components to the circuit boards, testing the finished boards, assembling boards into the enclosures, programming firmware, final testing, calibration and packing for dispatch). These steps are taken in our workshop in the UK. A long extension of current social distancing measures due to coronavirus may extend this process as I may not be able to employ the friends who would usually assist me with this work.
• Finalise product firmware (testing, bug fixing, documentation). This work is being carried out in parallel with the above steps. I am doing this work myself, limiting possibility of unexpected delays (excepting illness etc).

The risks noted above are largely out of our control. However their impact will be to the timeline rather than whether production happens at all. 

Our current anticipated timeline is that we'll have the assembled PCBs during May 2020 and be able to complete final product assembly during June. This timeline has us shipping units out during June or July 2020.

However we do ask you to be sure you accept that these timescales could be subject to change when you decide to support this campaign

Thank you very much for your interest and I hope you enjoy your Noodlebox!

Jason Hotchkiss
Sixty Four Pixels Ltd

Product video filmed and edited by Darren Stockford. 

Please note that photos and video are of the final prototype. The production version is expected to be identical, although we might make some small changes (for example to the switch caps and the knob). Any display flickering visible on the video is an artifact of the camera and not visible during use.