Field guide

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Start hereIntroduction

What PUNCHER is, how it plays, and which browsers can run it.

Start hereYour first sequence

Set up a sound, enter a chord, and let four voices play it their own way.

Start hereFind your way around

The sequencer sets the route. The grid holds the notes. The voices turn them into a performance.

Start hereConnect MIDI

Route the voices to an instrument, record a keyboard, or use PUNCHER's built-in sound.

Build a sequenceSteps & the grid

Enter notes, set the loop, and choose how the sequencer travels through the grid.

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Documentation
Support/Start here

Start here

Find your way around

The sequencer sets the route. The grid holds the notes. The voices turn them into a performance.

On this page

The window

The Sequencer panel is on the left, the grid and step editor are in the middle, and Voices are on the right. The top bar contains the file and edit menus, settings, transport, and tempo.

PUNCHER's three main areas: sequencer, steps, and voices. Open any screenshot for a closer look.
PUNCHER's three main areas: sequencer, steps, and voices. Open any screenshot for a closer look.

PUNCHER's three main areas: sequencer, steps, and voices. Open any screenshot for a closer look.

Voice tabs

The Voices panel has a tab for each of the four voices, marked with the voice's color. Select a tab to edit that voice: whether it plays, its pace, note length and rule, its transposition and scale fit, its velocity and MIDI channel, its instrument, and how many dots its pattern has. See Voices & patterns.

Each voice has its own tab. The selected voice's settings fill the panel below the tabs.
Each voice has its own tab. The selected voice's settings fill the panel below the tabs.

Each voice has its own tab. The selected voice's settings fill the panel below the tabs.

Pattern dots

Below the voice settings, each voice has a row of pattern dots: its rhythm. A colored dot plays a note and a grey dot is silent. Faded dots lie past the end of a shorter pattern. Click a dot to toggle it, and right-click it for options such as ratchet, probability, and condition. A band marks the dots the step reaches (pace bands), and chevrons mark voices playing the same note at once (collisions).

Under each row, Mute silences that voice and Solo plays it on its own. Click a row's number to select that voice. The arrows at the bottom export and import all four voices' patterns. See Edit the pattern.

Four pattern rows, one for each voice, with Mute and Solo under each.
Four pattern rows, one for each voice, with Mute and Solo under each.

Four pattern rows, one for each voice, with Mute and Solo under each.

Envelope editor

Under the step editor, Velocity & CCs shows the selected step as a piano roll of the notes the voices play. Its tabs hold a velocity lane for each voice, then the step's CC envelopes and modulated settings. Press + to add a CC.

Choose Edit, Draw, or Erase to work with points, and Steps or Ramps for how the value moves between them. Grid sets where new points snap. See Velocity & CC envelopes.

The envelope editor with a CC 74 envelope ramping over the step's notes.
The envelope editor with a CC 74 envelope ramping over the step's notes.

The envelope editor with a CC 74 envelope ramping over the step's notes.

Transport and tempo

Audition step stays off until the sequence is stopped. Record arms MIDI input recording. Set the tempo from 20 to 400 BPM by typing, dragging vertically, or using the minus and plus buttons.

If you cannot hear or record anything, read the note in the bottom-left corner. It reports missing routes, missing inputs, synth loading, and a browser without Web MIDI.

Editing values

Number controls support typing, minus and plus buttons, and vertical dragging. Slow dragging makes small changes; faster dragging covers more of the range. A drag creates one undo entry.

Edit → Undo and Redo also work for step edits, recording takes, and MIDI imports.

PUNCHER / Support & documentation