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Orca-Workshop
Orca is an esoteric programming language and live editor designed to quickly create procedural sequencers.
Orca is one of the inventions of Devine Lu Linvega of the small artist collective 'Hundred Rabbits'.
In this workshop we will:
- Look at a few orca demos to get an impression
- Get an orca setup running on your machine
- Get a very quick language overview
- Play through some tutorials together
- Get hooked and get lost in the rabbithole of orca
Please find a collection of orca resources at the end of this document.
Installation
Orca
There are many implementations of Orca.
The ones that work well for this workshop are:
- Easy setup: electron/js
- Advanced setup: ANSI-C implementation
Easy setup
The quickest way to get started on any platform is to just use the 'fancy' electron framework version. I recommend doing that for the workshop, to avoid the "install-party" effect. Download and run the binary release. The source link is just for your reference.
- Binary release: https://hundredrabbits.itch.io/orca
- Source/Docs: https://github.com/hundredrabbits/Orca
Advanced Setup
My favourite setup though, is running the ANSI-C version in Cool-Retro-Term.
Orca AND Cool-Retro-Term are available in many package managers, have a look in yours. Maybe you are lucky...
Of course you can run this version of orca in any terminal.
- Source/Docs: https://github.com/hundredrabbits/Orca-c
Pilot
Orca cant make any sounds on its own, it can only generate MIDI, OSC or UDP output.
Pilot is a 'companion' program (from hundredrabbits as well) that is a fun little synthesizer and is very easy to use with orca over UDP.
Download and run the binary release. The source link is just for your reference.
- Binary release: https://hundredrabbits.itch.io/pilot
- Source/Docs: https://github.com/hundredrabbits/Pilot
Language Quick Overview
- Esoteric Programming Language
- 'Frame-Oriented' language
- 26 operators
A-Z - Uppercase operators execute on every frame
- Lowercase operators execute on a 'Bang'
- Data is just Base36 numbers '0-9' and 'a-z'
- I/O: no I just O. MIDI/OSC/UDP
Tutorials
Tutorial 1: First Bleeps
In this tutorial we will only learn 2 of the 26 operators, and we will already be making noise.
Isn't that great?
Have a look into the directory tutorials/1_first_bleeps/.
There is an orca program for each chapter.
1. Bangs
The 'bang' is the trigger that activates lower-case operators.
There is technically only one operator that directly generates a bang. Its the operator D.
D- Delay, bang periodically ()
2. First Bleeps
Operators you learn in this chapter:
;- Send UDP packet (- / data)
for synthesizing the actual waves we are using 'Pilot', a soft-synth which we control with UDP packets. So, the commands we send using the UDP output operator are actually Pilot commands, not orca.
Pilot commands are 3-5 'bytes' long, where the first 3 are required.
The format is: CH OCT NOTE [VOL] [DECAY]
Where:
CH- Channels 1-f exist, they all sound different (and they are monophonic)OCT- Around 8 octaves should definitely existNOTE- Note names where Upper-case are white keys and Lower-case are Black-keysVOL- The Volume 0-z (even though the doc says 0-f, but hey we love clipping dont we?)DECAY- The 'length' of the note, 0-f (?)
Example:
;13C - Pilot plays note 'C' of octave 3 (default volume and length)
Putting It All Together
Tutorial 2: Scopehero
This is a very empowering tutorial with its 13 operators covered.
Have a look into the directory tutorials/2_scopehero/.
There is an orca program for each chapter.
1. Arithmetic
In this chapter you learn (almost) all the operators to generate and manipulate numbers:
C- Count (speed / modulo)I- Increment (increment / max)R- Random (min / max)A- Add (operand / operand)B- Subtract (operand / operand)M- Multiply (operand / operand)
2. Variables
In this chapter you learn all the operators related to variables:
V- Variable, r/w single (Write: name / val | Read: - / name)K- Kontakt, read multiple (Read: count / names)
3. Writer
There are a number of operators to write data into the grid. In this chapter we only look at one:
X- Write (x, y / data )
4. Flying Operators
In this chapter you learn about all the flying operators \o/ \o/ \o/:
E- EastW- WestN- NorthS- South
5. Scope
Putting it all together
Yay, by now we have already learned 15 operator, more than half of them all.
Now we can combine them to create a 'scope' to visualize and debug any variable values.
6. ScopeHero
Putting it even togetherererer
What is even more fun than 1 scope, is 3 scopes.
Let generate 2 'signals', add them together to create a third signal, and use our scope technique to visualize whats going on.
Resources
Orca
General
- Maybe the most official home of Orca: https://100r.co/site/orca.html
- Docs/Examples: https://wiki.xxiivv.com/site/orca.html
ANSI-C version
JS/Electron version
- Browser/online version: https://hundredrabbits.github.io/Orca/
- Binaries (js/electron): https://hundredrabbits.itch.io/orca
- Sources/Docs: https://github.com/hundredrabbits/Orca
Pilot
- Source/Docs: https://github.com/hundredrabbits/pilot