futureretro …a zillion possibilities inside!
WELCOME Thank you for choosing the Zillion sequencer. This device will provide you with a lifetime of musical musings and inspiration. The Zillion is single track algorithmic sequencer based on the principles of the Triadex Muse. The Muse used counters and a shift register to generate more than a million musical melodies. The Zillion expands on these features to add more functionality and provide a zillion possibilities for you to discover.
PRECAUTIONS Never expose this device to rain, moisture, smoke, dusty, or extreme hot and cold environments. Clean the exterior with a soft dry cloth. Do not use abrasive cleaners that may harm the surface and finish of the unit. Never use hard or sharp objects on the touch pad, as this may damage the component. For normal operation, use only the pad of your finger. POWER A 9V DC universal power supply is provided, and can be used in any country by selecting the correct AC outlet pin type for your country.
MIDI IN The MIDI IN accepts MIDI clock and note information for syncing playback to external MIDI devices, programming music scales, and transposing melodies. Connect the MIDI OUT of your MIDI controller keyboard, sequencer, or DAW interface to this input. MIDI THRU The MIDI THRU will transmit all data that is received by the MIDI IN. Connect the MIDI THRU output to the MIDI IN of any device you wish to receive the same MIDI data the Zillion is receiving.
CONTROLS AND NAVIGATION The Zillion provides four soft keys under the display, increment (+) and decrement (-) keys, and circular touch pad. Soft Keys The four soft keys allow you to select functions and variables shown in the lower half of the display respectively above each key. Pressing one of these keys will select the function or variable displayed. Holding one of these keys allows you to make adjustments to the value, and changes will not take affect until you release the key.
Touch Pad When one of the four soft keys is held, you may also use the circular touch pad to increment and decrement the selected function’s value very quickly. To increment a value, drag your finger across the pad in a clockwise direction. To decrement a value, drag your finger in the counter clock-wise direction. Once the value is set, release the soft key for the value to take affect. For typical behavior, avoid dragging your finger past the 12 o’clock position of the pad.
MODES The Zillion provides 16 modes as listed below. 1. Playback 9. Melody 2. Tempo 10. Rhythm 3. Swing 11. Velocity 4. Direction 12. Theme 5. Loop 13. Shift Register 6. Transpose 14. MIDI Out 7. Scale 15. MIDI In 8. Program 16. Sync These modes are evenly spaced around the circular touch pad, starting with mode 1 located in the 1 o’clock position, and increasing as you move clockwise through the range of the pad.
PLAYBACK The top line of the display will show the current state of playback, and the note pitch being generated. Soft key 1 will stop playback. Pressing the Stop key when manually stepping through a sequence will cause the counters to reset. Soft key 2 will start playback. Pressing the Start key while a sequence is playing will cause playback to start again from the beginning. Soft key 3 will hold the transmission of MIDI note information being sent to the MIDI OUT while the sequencer plays.
TEMPO The Zillion has an internal tempo range of 25 – 250 BPM. Each of the four soft keys can be used to select a different value for the Tempo. This allows you to instantly jump to different tempo values. The active tempo value will be indicated with a triangle next to the value. The active tempo value can be adjusted at any time using the +/- keys. While holding any soft key you can then edit the tempo value using the +/- keys, or the touch pad.
SWING Swing adds a human feel by delaying the start of every other note by a set percentage. The Zillion can swing the timing of notes from 50% – 75%. With a 50% setting notes will play back strictly quantized for a rigid feel. While a 75% setting will provide the maximum amount of swing. Each of the four soft keys can be used to select a different value for the Swing. This allows you to instantly jump to different swing values. The active swing value will be indicated with a triangle next to the value.
DIRECTION Four directions can be entered to determine if the internal counters will increment or decrement, causing a pattern to play forwards or backwards. The four playback directions will be selected sequentially from left to right, with each new selection taking place when a loop point is reached. An arrow pointing right indicates forward playback, while an arrow pointing left indicates backwards playback. The arrow will become a solid triangle to indicate the currently playing direction.
LOOP A loop point will cause the internal counters to reset, limiting the number of steps a pattern will play before repeating. The loop point can range from 1-16 beats, 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, or 64 Bars. The loop point can be deactivated by selecting FRE (free running). Notice that values for beats are followed by a lower case “b”. Values for Bars are followed by an upper case “B”. Each of the four soft keys can be used to select a different value for the Loop.
TRANSPOSE The sequencer pitches can be transposed by up to 36 semitones within this mode. Each of the four soft keys can be used to select a different transpose value. This allows you to instantly jump to different transpose values. The active transpose value will be indicated with a triangle next to the value. The active transpose value can be adjusted at any time using the +/keys. While holding any soft key you can then edit the transpose value using the +/- keys, or the touch pad.
SCALE There are 99 musical scales that limit what notes can play as generated by the Melody algorithm. Scales 1 – 16 are presets, while scales 17 – 99 are user definable. The top line of the display will show the name or user number of the currently selected scale. Each of the four soft keys can be used to select a different scale. This allows you to instantly jump to different scale selections. The active scale value will be indicated with a triangle next to the value.
PROGRAM The Program mode is used to edit user scales 17 – 99. Select The value above soft key 1 is the currently selected user scale to edit. When soft key 1 is selected use the +/- keys, or the touch pad to enter a new value for the selection. Note The value above soft key 2 indicates one of eight notes for the scale. Notice when the asterisk is displayed next to this value, it indicates this note of the scale is currently playing.
PROGRAM Pitch The value above soft key 3 is the pitch for the currently selected note of the scale. When soft key 3 is selected use the +/- keys, or the touch pad to enter the pitch for the currently selected note of the scale. When Pitch is the active selection, MIDI notes received on the current MIDI IN channel can be used to quickly enter a pitch value for this note of the scale. X (Global Transpose) The value above soft key 4 is the global MIDI transpose value indicated as “X”.
ALGORITHMS The Zillion uses algorithms to generate the Melody, Rhythm, Velocity, and Theme aspects of a sequence. These algorithms are generated with variable counters, and a 32-bit shift register. Counters Counters produce off (0) / on (1) logic output signals. Counter values are expressed as a “C” followed by a two-digit value. This two-digit value indicates the number of 1/16th note clock counts before the output of the counter will change states off/on.
ALGORITHMS 32 bit Shift Register The shift register accepts a logic signal at its input and shifts that value sequentially through the 32 outputs, starting at output 1 and ending in output 32. You can think of this as a of 32-tap logic delay. th Logic data is shifted to the next output every time a 1/16 note clock occurs. Shift register outputs are expressed as an “S” followed by a two-digit value indicating the output number.
MELODY In the Melody mode, you set counters, or select outputs of the shift register as sources to generate a binary number that then selects one of the 8 possible notes of a scale to play. Soft key 1 – 3 sources generate a 3-bit binary number to select 1 of 8 notes of the scale to play. Soft key 4 source determines if the note programmed in the scale will play transposed up an octave or not.
MELODY The active source value can be adjusted at any time using the +/- keys. While holding any soft key you can then edit the source value using the +/- keys, or the touch pad. The new source will take affect when the soft key is released. In addition to the counter and shift register sources, you can also simply set this source to OFF or ON. Change the source values for the counter, or shift register settings and notice how the selected order of notes of the scale change as the sequencer plays.
RHYTHM In the Rhythm mode, you set counters, or select outputs of the shift register as sources to generate a binary number that then selects one of four possible rhythmic states. Soft key 1 and 2 sources generate a 2-bit binary number to select one of four rhythmic states. Possible states include note-off (rest), note-on with 50% duration, note-on with 100% duration, sustain, and 32nd notes depending on the Gate Type selected. Soft key 3 value ranges from 0 – 255.
RHYTHM Soft key 4 value sets the Gate Type, determining the possible states. GT1 allows note-off (rests), note-on with 50% and 100% durations. GT2 is similar to GT1 but also adds the possibility for 32nd notes to occur. S/H allows note-off (rests), note-on with 50% duration, or sustained notes to occur. The Zillion defaults with sources 1 and 2 set to ON, the density set to 288, and GT1. This produces notes of 100% duration to play for every step of the sequence.
VELOCITY In the Velocity mode, you set counters, or select outputs of the shift register as sources to generate a 4-bit binary number that then selects one of sixteen evenly spaced velocity values ranging from 0 – 255. Soft keys 1 – 4 select sources 1 – 4 respectively. Source 1 is the least significant bit, source 2 is the next significant bit, source 3 is the next significant bit, and source 4 the most significant bit. By default, all sources are set to ON.
THEME In the Theme mode, you set counters, or select outputs of the shift register as sources to feed the input of the shift register. The output of source 1 and 2 are fed to one logic gate, while source 3 and 4 are fed to another logic gate. The output of these two logic gates will be feed a third logic gate, and the output of this third logic gate is the parity bit that feeds the input of the shift register.
SHIFT REGISTER The 32-bit shift register can be used as a source of logic for the Melody, Rhythm, Velocity, and Theme. While in the Shift Register mode, the top line of the display will show the current state of logic data as it moves through the shift register. However this portion of the display will be blank when the sequencer playback is stopped as no data is moving through the shift register. Shift register outputs 1 – 32 are shown from respectively from left to right in the display.
MIDI CHANNEL OUT Each of the four soft keys can be used to select a different MIDI output channel. This allows you to quickly switch between playing sounds on one of four different MIDI channels. The active MIDI OUT channel value will be indicated with a triangle next to the value. The active MIDI OUT value can be adjusted at any time using the +/keys. While holding any soft key you can then edit the MIDI OUT value using the +/- keys, or the touch pad.
SYNC In the Sync mode you can set the Zillion to play by its internal clock, or sync to an external MIDI clock. The top line of the display will indicate if sync is set to internal or external. The bottom line of the display will indicate if just MIDI notes, or MIDI notes and MIDI clock will be transmitted from the Zillion’s MIDI output. Use the +/- keys to choose one of the four possibilities.
SAVING YOUR WORK Any edits you make to the internal settings or user scales should be saved before turning the power off, otherwise you will lose any changes. To save all changes to memory: • Select the Playback mode, then press the + key. • The display will show “Save Everything?” • Press the + key to save the scales to non-volatile memory. • Press the – key to cancel the save operation. All saved data will automatically be recalled the next time the unit is powered on.
SOFT RESET At times you may want a fresh place to start a new session. The Soft Reset procedure will default all internal settings and parameters to factory condition. However, this will not clear out User Scales saved in memory. • Select the Playback mode, then press the – key. • The display will show “Initialize Setup” • Press the + key to load the default settings. • Press the – key to cancel the save operation.
HARD RESET A hard reset will load all the default settings just as the Soft Reset procedure, and will also reset notes in all User Scales to a pitch value of C2. • Start with the unit off, hold the – key and turn the unit on. • Hold the – key until the display shows the units serial number. To store the default internal settings or user scales to non-volatile memory, be sure to save the scales as described above. Otherwise the last saved user scales can be reloaded the next time the power is turned on.
TIPS • The most important tip we can give is to experiment! • Setting the loop point to FRE (free running), and then using counter sources with numbers that do not easily divide into one another, can create long evolving patterns for the Melody, Rhythm, Velocity, and Theme. • Programming and transposing scales with a MIDI keyboard can produce some fantastic results.
TIPS • Using counters as sources provides more repetitive results. For more complex patterns use shift register sources. • Some rather interesting patterns can occur when using multiple shift register outputs for sources. • By assigning shift register sources to Melody, Rhythm, Velocity simultaneously, as you make changes to the Theme or Shift Register’s Parity selection, all aspects of the sequence can change. • Scales can also be thought of as 8-step sequences of pitches.
TIPS • When the preset Chromatic scale is selected, source 4 of the Melody will select the next 8 notes higher to play instead of the octave as it does for other scales. This allows you to play 16 ascending notes, which can be very useful for triggering a sliced beat of 16th notes in an external sampler. The Melody sources can then be adjusted to “remix” these sliced beats.
TROUBLESHOOTING PLAYBACK If you are experiencing problems playing an external sound module check the following: • Is the BPM LED blinking? If not, the Zillion is not playing. • Is the Zillion set to external sync and waiting for the master clock to begin playback? • Check to make sure the MIDI OUT of the Zillion is connected to the MIDI IN of the sound module you want to play. • Try using a different MIDI cable. Occasionally MIDI cables do fail.
SPECIFICATIONS Construction: Steel Dimensions: (L) 6.25” x (W) 3.50” x (H) 1.25” Unit Weight: 0.8 lbs Universal Power Supply: 100-240V AC input, 9V DC Power In: 9V DC (center positive) Current Draw: 45mA Inputs/Outputs: MIDI IN, MIDI THRU, MIDI OUT Possibilities: Endless! Each product is hand made in the USA. Manual written by: Jered Flickinger Future Retro copyright © 2014 www.future-retro.
