Show HN: Veena Chromatic Tuner

[v15w]

We're happy to present Veena Chromatic Tuner, an app we've developed for musicians, instrument makers, and ethnomusicologists who need more than just a standard chromatic tuner. Our goal was to create a tool that not only supports pitch detection but also provides deep support for diverse musical intonation systems and offers intuitive visual feedback.

The Problem We're Solving: Many tuners are good for Equal Temperament, but has limited support when it comes to the Just Intonation, microtonal music, or the specific requirements of instruments like the Veena where fret positions are determined by precise ratios.

Oscilloscope-like Visual Feedback: Instead of just a needle, you get a dynamic, oscilloscope-like waveform display.

In Tune: The waveform appears stabilized, giving you an immediate, confirmation of perfect pitch. Sharp: The waveform rotates right. Flat: The waveform rotates left.

This dynamic visual feedback, akin to a digital oscilloscope's trigger synchronization, offers immediate, precise adjustment cues that go far beyond what a static needle can provide, allowing for incredibly fine-tuned adjustments.

Unmatched Intonation Flexibility: We understand that music isn't just 12-TET.

Just Intonation Support: Perfect for Indian classical music, early music, and any tradition that relies on pure harmonic relationships between notes. This is crucial for achieving the rich, resonant chords and melodic purity that Equal Temperament can't always deliver.

Custom Temperaments: Go beyond presets! Create, save, and manage your own unique temperaments with personalized ratio settings. This empowers composers, researchers, and performers to explore microtonal scales and historical tunings with ease.

Dedicated Veena Instrument Mode: It allows users to play and tune notes across 24 fret positions, specifically highlighting how note positions on the fretboard vary relative to each other when pure intonation is applied. This feature is invaluable for instrument makers and those studying the physics of string instruments.

Other Key Features:

Multicultural Note Naming: Display notes in Western, Indian classical (Carnatic/Hindustani), and Solfege, with support for multiple Indian language scripts (Tamil, Devanagari, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam).

Adjustable Reference Pitch: Customize A4 frequency from 440Hz to 432Hz or anything in between.

Transposition Support: Easily transpose notes for different instruments.

This app is would be useful for string players (veena, violin, guitar, sitar, etc.), wind instrument musicians, vocalists, music teachers, students, ethnomusicologists, and especially instrument makers and tuners who need to work with precise intonation and fret setting. Anyone exploring microtonal music will also find it incredibly useful.

We're actively developing the app, continuously adding features and improvements. While pitch detection is resource-intensive, we strive for broad device compatibility.

Check it out on Google Play: [https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=in.magima.digi...]

We welcome your feedback, questions, and thoughts!

[v15w]

To wrap up, Thanks, HN community. Your feedback, comments, suggestions, and technical discussions have been truly humbling. We're delighted to offer a complimentary premium version of the app to anyone who contributed to this thread, once it's released. Just email us when it's available.

[mitthrowaway2]

- Instruments list should have more instruments

- Would appreciate other temperaments: Pythagorean-C temperament, perfect 5th, etc. See the gstrings app for example.

- Base note selection only provides tone and sharp options (C, C#, D, D#...) but as you know, outside of equal temperament, C# and Db (and so on) are different pitches.

[v15w]

Thanks for your valuable feedback. Instrument list and temperament profiles would be expanded before adding other new features. The project started as a tuner app for South Indian Veena & as a fretting aid (based on ratios).

On base notes, have you tried using Just Intonation and other tuning profiles. They use perfect 5th. I will take a look at C# and Db difference in other temperaments. Maybe, our nomenclature needs a re-look.

[Ruarl]

This is an interesting project. It isn’t immediately obvious to me how the visualisations aid the tuning process. Please can you say a little more about how you expect a user to interpret those as they perform tuning work?

[v15w]

Pitch is an estimate based on sampled audio. Sometimes, it is not always accurately detected. Here, we have an additional visual cue that produces a stable/stationary waveform when the detected pitch is in tune with the selected reference note. A plucked tone has a slight variation in pitch from start to end; it rises and falls slightly. You can see this in the visual display. This would be very useful for fretting work, where each fret's tone is expected to have similar pitch variation.

[KaiserPro]

Perhaps it lets you get that last 1-1/4 of a hz that might otherwise get lost?

Its also probably really good for beginners trying on their own to train them selves so they can spot when they are over/under tune

[porterde]

The visual feedback sounds very much like the strobe feature on my guitar tuner. I think the first like this was the Stroboconn in the 1930s.

[dsego]

Peterson is the most known for their strobe tuners I believe. There are nowadays many other desktop and smartphone apps and pedals that have a strobe mode, but some are real strobes and some are only simulated. As far as I can tell, a real strobe will recreate the effect based on comparing the input signal frequency to a generated reference. A fake one will just use the estimated frequency (done by a pitch detection algorithm usually based on FFT) but instead of a needle offset or LED meter it will show a steady moving pattern, but it's not as responsive or as reliable as the real thing.

[v15w]

This visual feedback is very similar. It also shows octave changes i.e if the pitch detected is 0.5x, 1x or 2x the reference freq / note set.

[aanet]

Sounds interesting... Is there a youtube demo? Or a web-version of this for those who want to check it out? Maybe an iOS version?

Thanks

[v15w]

There is a short video here https://www.youtube.com/shorts/gZbP7svgBUM (not comprehensive. uses simulated sine wave and app generated tones). There is no web or iOS version.

[7bit]

A tuner with ads. There's plenty of ad-free tuners, thank you.

[v15w]

Thanks for the feedback! Ads help us keep the app free and support ongoing development.

[uundur]

https://www.facebook.com/calurtsdrums

[uundur]

Permanent block

[uundur]

Lupa password

[paride5745]

Any plan for an iOS version?

Most musicians use Apple platforms, so focusing only on Android could be limiting.

[v15w]

An iOS version is definitely in our plans. We intend to launch it once this app has gained sufficient traction.

[sabellito]

Maybe you're correct about windows vs macos, but I find it hard to believe that the current distribution of android vs iphone users in the world is much different for musicians.

[Intermernet]

This was true for decades but isn't really a thing now. Many studios and home daw set-ups are windows now.

Apple used to have the best audio subsystem but they've really dropped the ball.

Agreed that iOS is probably a good idea, but no longer crucial.

[leephillips]

So “Show HN” is now for straight-up advertisements of commercial products?

This ad copy is in the smarmy style of the worst corporate slop.