Modulation 'Masterclass'

First of all, I put 'masterclass' between quotes because I am not a master. I can call myself an 'expert' after +10.000 hours of patching but that's no guarantee for good information. However, you wouldn't be interested in watching modulation basics either. So my 'masterclasses' are more like sitting around the campfire, telling ghost stories, and we're all equal. It's just me telling the stories and it's OK if none of them are true.

I've been inspired by a subscriber, who pointed to his beloved Rossum Trident/Triton as his/her/their favorite VCO. I looked it up, decided there's too much overlap with my THREE-BODY VCO, but noticed something interesting called 'Zing modulation'. It's a recipe based on ring modulation, with the simple trick of syncing the carrier and modulator. Dave wrote he may have been the first person who ever used the term 'hard-sync', but credited the technology to Serge Tcherepnin. Suddenly I was lost and inspired in a new world of modulation I did not know about. Since it's a recipe instead of a circuit, we can all use it as long as your VCO has a Sync input, and you have a ringmod in your case. If you don't, get one. It's an essential piece and it costs nothing.

I can't explain Zing modulation (ZM) without Ring modulation (RM) without thru-zero amplitude modulation (AM) and when the bloody TZ comes along I am aways reminded that I am still clueless about thru-zero FM. I've seen good, bad and no explanations about TZFM. I know it preserves pitch, it's been restricted to digital - but now it's also possible with analog - and it needs to be supported by the VCO. The biggest enigma (for me) is, if it preserves frequency and pitch quality to the highest degree, how can it be frequency modulation?

You can't seem to patch it up, the VCO should do it. I have a problem with things that can't be done. It's not that I am stubborn, an important aspect of creativitiy is to never give up. And to be confident you'll figure it out eventually. Thanks to Dave Rossum's recipe, I wondered if I could ringmod my modulator VCO before it goes to my principal VCO's LIN-FM. It can't possibly be amplitude modulation anymore.
I experimented with ring-modulating the modulator with an inverted version of itself (inversion is not important, a copy also works), so it would go thru-zero-by-itself. I don't know if this qualifies as true thru-zero so I call it WTFM.

Anyway, this video can keep you busy for weeks. Happy Patching!
Robert.

00:00 Intro
00:52 Amplitude Modulation
01:44 Frequency Modulation
02:47 Ring Modulation
04:12 Zing modulation by Dave Rossum
04:52 Thru-Zero Linear Frequency Modulation
05:59 Thru-Zero Linear WTF Modulation by Cinematic Laboratory
08:17 A few Ring Mod alternatives
09:32 Zing along with Serge and Dave