Introducing the Recursion Studio, a novel video synthesizer, and the first commercial product by Entropy & Sons.  The Recursion Studio is an HD visual instrument platform packaged in a stand-alone case, with a touch screen and a wide variety of other hardware inputs.  The device outputs a stream of real-time, interactive, HD (1080p) visuals over HDMI.  There are few, if any, other commercial video synthesizer devices on the market with HD resolution, and none as powerful and configurable as our synth. 

The device is a multi-instrument visual synthesizer 'platform.'  It currently houses 5 distinct visual 'instruments,'  with additional instruments in development.  The device has WIFI and was designed with continuous future software development in mind.  The synth is currently shipping, but full time development is still ongoing and is slated to continue at least through 2025 and into 2026. 

The device is developed around an internal semi-modular architecture.  The 'instruments' are predefined module networks that expose vast spaces of modular and parametric variation.  As of Q3 2024, there are around 270 modules on the synthesizer.  Onboard the synth are the following instruments:

• FRAXTAL - a novel fractaline feedback simulation, and the namesake of the synthesizer.  This instrument consists of 40 modules, 31 of which can be swapped out with other modules of similar type. There are around 100 total numerical parameters that can be controlled in the instrument.
• INTERFERENCE - a wavefront interference simulator
• WAVIBOI - a 1 channel 3D wave renderer/oscilloscope
• WAVIGRL - a 2 channel classic CRT-simulation oscilloscope
• CATPARTY - the tutorial instrument.  In Q3 2024, this instrument will be upgraded in generality to be a blank canvas, where visual content can be generated entirely from scratch.

Each instrument comes with a special 'modulation' module, which allows you to generate simple auxiliary patterns which can be wired into numerical parameters on the synth to provide spatial variance to them.   Temporal variance to parameters can be added via the onboard LFO system. 

The synthesizer exposes 3 onboard UI's on the LCD, of increasing complexity.

• PLAY - for experimentation, and playing with patches, with a full understanding of the internals of the synth unnecessary.
• PERFORM - Designed for recalling and editing patches in a live performance
• CREATE - Fully exposes the semi-modular architecture of the synth and all parameters/modules.

There is also an onboard patch library management system, which allows for saving/editing/tagging/etc of patches.  Patches can be snapshots of all or even part of the live module network.  For instance, the 'COLOR' module sub-network of one patch can be stored and directly applied to another patch at a future point. 

The hardware has a wide array of I/O channels.   There are knobs & buttons on the top of the synth as well as a touchscreen, for direct control of the device.  The back of the device has 8 0-10V CV input jacks, and DIN MIDI input & output ports.

There are also 1/8" jacks for input & output of audio rate signals, which the device uses for audio analysis. The device can extract BPM info from these signals, which can then be used for LFO frequencies and event durations. The synth can also trigger events when it detects a beat.  And advanced frequency analysis algorithms also run on the live audio stream and can be integrated into patches. 

On the left side of the device are 4 USB ports.  The USB ports support USB MIDI devices and video input.  Web cameras can be attached to the system & fed in as textures.  The device come with an HDMI -> USB converter, allowing you to feed the outputs of other HDMI devices into the system, allowing the device to be a part of modular HD video systems.  Images can also be uploaded to the synth via USB drives.  Video clip support is in development (Q3 2024), as is NDI support.

There is a powerful onboard mapping editor, which allows you to map input 'signals', such as CV values, MIDI events, button presses, etc, to various 'actions', such as setting parameter values, loading patches, swapping modules, etc. 

Images and video's created by the device are available on our

• Media Page
• Instagram
• YouTube Channel

The Recursion Studio is currently shipping and is available starting at $1200 USD for domestic US sales.   In other countries, the price may vary due
 to import taxes and fees. 

Please contact us to learn more. 

For Distribution in Europe & the UK contact:
Liquid Sky Artist Collective

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Entropy and Sons is the work of a single developer based in Brooklyn, NY, who studied mathematics, computer science, and electrical engineering at MIT.  The software running on the Recursion Studio was developed in a dorm room there in 2005, and has been in continuous development ever since.