Reaktor's Mirror 1 effect in Max/ signal folding natural phenomenon?

n871's icon

I'm trying to translate a very basic effect/building block in Reaktor to Max. It concerns an audio modifier called 'mirror 1'.
The explanation according to the manual:

• Mirror 1: Rather than clipping the signal, this Module "reflects" any signal that passes
above the threshold level.

Does anyone have an idea how to make something like this in Max? Should I upload a video of how it sounds?
Not sure if the term 'reflecting an audio signal' is something common or not...

Evan's icon

I think you might be looking for the term 'folding'.
There's a [fold] operator in gen~ actually. I'd start there.

Exit Only's icon
n871's icon

Thank you Evan and Nick. This so-called folding distortion, is it something exclusively digital, or can it happen with analog oscillators? A simple sine wave for example can start to sound like an old tube theremin using this effect. Not sure if this by coincidence or not...

Evan's icon

Well folding an oscillation that goes above 1 can give the illusion of harmonics being present, so I don't think it's a coincidence. Although to get nicely musicl results you might have to massage the data bit. Could be wrong though as I have no experience creating a folding distortion.

n871's icon

Yes, it needs some filtering and then it can sound very warm. So, if anyone knows if folding distortion might be a 'natural phenomenon' please let me know!

n871's icon

If I'm not mistaken, all timbres on the early tube ondes martenots (1928-1960s) were derived from 2 heterodyning oscillators that produced simple sine waves. Maybe it's this folding distortion that allowed for timbres richer in harmonics...

Max Gardener's icon

pong~ > onepole~ comes to mind for simple cases