Very Good Overview of Subtractive Synthesis
356209
Schmitz' book is a concise introduction to all of the bits and pieces that are necessary to understand subtractive (i.e., analog) electronic sound synthesis, particularly in consideration of synthesizers - both as hardware  and software - which employ this method.  With his tongue firmly in cheek,  Schmitz shows you a little history (e.g., the pandemonium of the  Telharmonium), covers all of the basics (VCOs, LFOs, filters [coffee and  otherwise], modulation, etc.), and whets the appetite for advanced concepts  and techniques.  He keeps the general tone of the book very simple, so it  truly merits the title of "newbie guide" - but someone like  myself (who has been tinkering around with such things for two years) will  find many nice refreshers and reminders to bring one back to center (after  one's been doing a little too much mind-bending modulating ;-).  Additionally, the companion CD provides excellent audio examples of all of  the significant analog-synthesis aspects that are mentioned in the book.
My only complaint is that, in this book being a "newbie"  guide, one is soon left wanting of a source that digs even deeper into the  same material.  Wizoo should do a more advanced guide along the same lines  - I, for one, would look forward to such a thing!
Also, if you have  Bitheadz' _Retro AS-1_ software synth, then this book would serve as a  better introduction to the program's components (and its functional  concepts) than does the program's own  actual manual.
1780129
If you are looking for a concise guide to help you learn how to write synthesizable Verilog to design and simulate real digital hardware in an FPGA, then this book is a very good place to look. I am a working FPGA application designer, published technical author, and part-time engineering professor, so my time is valuable to me -- the brevity and clarity of this book helps. If you understand the basics of digital logic at the schematic level and need to know how to design systems using Verilog HDL, then this should be a perfect fit for you. Anyone who's written this kind of material would also appreciate the difficulty of explaining concepts like this, and the need for challenging the concepts with incremental "quiz" problems and practical application examples. As it says on the first page, the book is aimed at engineering students and working engineers who need to learn Verilog. If you would rather have a verbose, PhD thesis style coverage of the topic, look elsewhere and you'll find lots of them. To paraphrase Mark Twain and Blaise Pascal "It's much harder to write a short book than a long one." And it's *much* easier to criticize a work like this than it is to create one, so take the negative review here on Amazon with that in mind. I suspect that reviewer may be like some students who find it easier to blame the teacher rather than take responsibility for their own failings.

If you are looking for a quick way to learn how to design digital systems using Verilog, then this book is a great place to start.  And unlike some reviewers, I've never met the author and have nothing to gain or lose by my reviews, which is why I use my real name. Search for me on LinkedIn under kenarnoldentrepreneur if you have any doubts that this is a genuine review and I'm who I say I am.

Cheers!
2240286
This is a fantastic book on optimal control especially for readers who do not have to learn the math as they go.  It covers a wide range of problems in a variety of disciplines and is an interesting book.  The approach is relatively modern although a differential geometric approach is not utilized.  For those wanting a pretty complete treatment of the basics of optimal control this will be a good supplement to the usual suspects or even a good stand alone text.  Although the mathematical requirements are not very great, the reader who has them firmly in hand will be the most successful.
1672164
I used this book for music synthesis in Android where libpd is indispensable due to the total lack of built midi support. This was a fantastic inroad to libpd.

This book assumes you know some programming, it's true. If you don't know how to instantiate an object, this is probably not the place to start in programming, nor does it pretend to be.

If you know some Java, or, better, you've spent some time around the Android API, you are plenty prepared. I came to this book with reasonable knowledge of (non-Android) Java and little more than an Android hello world under my belt. Within a few days I was able to put together an amusing musical app.

With a minimal programming background, you can use this book become better at Android and discover the world of digital audio synthesis programming.
4025030
It covers both continuous and discrete time systems each separately in depth. Large number of step by step worked examples gives you no chance but to learn the material. Description of the concepts and presentation of the techniques makes you understand and appreciate the usefulness of them, especially in control and communications. Illustrative MATLAB examples in each chapter are very helpful for me, simulating what I just read deepens my understanding, and it is really fun to apply what can oftentimes be a mathematically dry subject.

One more thing I personally appreciate about this book is the footnotes presenting historical comments. Historical information always gives me extra motivation and inspiration. I am highly recommend this student friendly book to the students like me, who are interested in signal processing.
4128597
I received a free item to review.

Those already familiar with traditional orchestration or jazz arranging  looking to move into the electronic realm can skim the early chapters on instrumentation and get right to the meat of technical setup, the specifics of sample libraries, scoring techniques and formulating a workflow for the task at hand.

Musicians coming from an electronic music background looking to broaden their instrumental pallet to include digital orchestration will find Galreaths book to be one of a small handful of worthwhile texts on the subject. As useful as it is however, Id strongly recommend (and I think Galreath would agree) first or concurrently studying a traditional orchestration text (i.e. Adler, Kennan, Forsyth, Piston) as well as some of the better-known jazz and commercial arranging texts (i.e. Sebesky, Mancini, Israels, Corzine, Pease and Pulig (Berklee), Grove ).

The challenge of many orchestration books is twofold: To separate instrumentation  the largely static body of technical information about instrument ranges and common practice playing techniques from orchestration in the whole: Ensemble scoring techniques, musical arrangement and transcription considerations, instrumental combinations, color and timbre blending, as well as practical  performance considerations.

Galreaths book attempts to cover both bases and I have to say I wish hed spent less time on instrumentation  if only to allow for even more depth in the scoring techniques, libraries, workflow  and other areas that really set this book apart.

His examples lean toward traditional orchestral techniques: clear demarcation of theme and accompaniment, divisi parts, arched dynamics. Thats musically where Im coming from as well and I found his craft solid and well-evident  worth devoting time to study.

I have to say I still feel the one indispensable book on MIDI orchestration has yet to be written but Galreaths can certainly vie for top honors.
I also own the previous edition; the changes I can detect are mostly refinements and technical updating rather than any fundamental reorganization.
3720919
Ever wonder how to compose a funky digital montage? Perhaps like those you see so often in magazines. Well, Photoshop has many ways for you to accomplish this, as demonstrated here. Other simpler books invariably show how you can include various image files into a Photoshop document and then do some elementary special effects. Trouble is, such efforts often yield crude results.

By contrast, artists in this book explain far more graceful techniques. Such that, collectively, a final image may reasonably be regarded as artwork in its own right.

The nine example chapters let you see different methods and together they demonstrate not a single correct way, but a spectrum of approaches. Which may encourage you to experiment. In this sense, the book is open ended, if you adopt this attitude.
83837
<a data-hook="product-link-linked" class="a-link-normal" href="/Convex-Optimization-Euclidean-Distance-Geometry/dp/0615193684/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_rvw_txt?ie=UTF8">Convex Optimization & Euclidean Distance Geometry</a>

I thought I'd use this book as a reference since the unusually large Index is a good place to locate the definitions.  Dattorro starts from the basic premises and works through the algebra with many examples and many good illustrations.

I've found that Dattorro's perspective on each subject (optimization and distance geometry) is both algebraic and geometric.  He bridges those unexpectedly well.  His approach to rank minimization, for example, is how I would have thought of doing it, in terms of eigenvalues.  It feels right to me.

Dattorro's notation is "progressive."  A vector is represented by a single letter, say x, with no embellishment to distingush it from a real variable.  That makes the presentation simple, but takes some getting used to as does his style of "missing articles" (e.g. the) and replacement everywhere of "i.e." with latin "id est."

The book is organized by convex optimzation first then distance geometry second,
three chapters devoted to each.  The appendices support seven chapters total and take half the book!  It's a big book.

Dattorro's treatment of distance geometry is the book's main strength.  The main result is a new expression for the relationship between the semidefinite positive and Euclidean distance cones, and takes a long time to get there.  Along the way, he goes back to 1935 and integrates the results of Schoenberg (before modern linear algebra), Cayley and Menger, Critchley, Gower, then augments that with some later results like Hayden, Wells, Liu, & Tarazaga, and then more contemporary results like Deza & Laurent, Wolkowicz, Saul and Weinberger to name only a few.  Then, of course he shows how that all relates to optimization.  I particularly liked the geographical map reconstruction examples where only distance ordering was known.

I recommend this book to anyone who wants both a good introduction to convex optimization and a reference to some latest techniques, a few of which Dattorro may have invented.  There is a good review of semidefinite programming, and what he writes about distance geometry refreshes old math with new.
4693868
This book is unique.  I purchased this book to learn how to choose optimal window functions for a very specific signal processing task I use in my research. I'm not an engineer and only knew a little about windows, such as the effect of main lobe, side lobes, and spectral leakage, but after reading this book, cover to cover, I feel much more comfortable making decisions about which windows to use for specific applications and signals. Rarely do I read a signal processing book cover to cover, but this was really enjoyable.

Window functions are critical to many applications in signal processing and this monograph gives solid examples of how the same window may perform differently across applications. For example the properties of a given window to design an FIR filter may not hold for spectral estimation, and he presents clear methods/formulae to predict performance in each application.  The author also presents clear ways to use windows to design filters with specific performance requirements. Overall, the book is extremely well written and clear.

About the format: The first two chapters cover the basics of signals and systems, and should be easy to follow for somebody with basic signal processing background.  He leads the reader through clear arguments of why windows are necessary.  Then, he describes the key parameters of common and lesser used windows.  The tables and figures are really helpful and intuitive. Everything you need to implement the windows presented is present.

I especially found the chapters on FIR filter design and Spectral Estimation helpful.  Rather than presenting a bunch of different methods, he sequentially explains the benefits of one method over another and how they lead into each other. There is a clear story to each method and why it was created.

I would have liked to see a bit more clarity on how a window does/doesn't affect the phase of your signal. This is important when working with phase sensitive signals and was largely left out. Perhaps in a future revision or at least a blurb on why it's not important?

Overall, this is really an essential book for anybody who uses windows regularly.  I hope it helps others as it did myself.
3672264
I picked up this book because I am interested in localization systems. This engineering book deals with ultra-wideband localization, which is expected to be a killer application with centimeter-range precision. The book covers a lot of ground, including basics of UWB, ranging algorithms, and localization algorithms, as well a number of more advanced issues. Although mathematically pretty rigorous, I found the book generally easy to read, especially because of the clear examples. Definitely worthwhile for anyone interested in UWB localization.
4418410
This book is a wonderful read about image processing.  Having read most of the 1st edition (yes I'm reading all of the 3rd), I can say that this 3rd edition is larger (yet not insurmountable) with more examples, explanations, mathematical development and new material.  I'm currently in the chapter about frequency domain processing and must say that the previous chapter about spatial domain processing is more robust, even now including a good introduction to fuzzy logic.  Anyhow, with a good background in applied math and Matlab programming, this material is easy reading for me, but should also be accessible enough for anyone with a general technical background.
2190770
This book works best if you think of it as a substitute for class lectures, while working through exercises and material from a more traditional text. In that role, it's truly excellent, and a fast, pleasant read, despite its bulk.

The bits on approximation in function spaces are particularly well motivated, and include a juicy excursion into convolutions.

Highly recommended for undergrad analysis students with time for some extra reading.

Just make sure you have an actual textbook on hand for exercises and reference. Browder is good for the latter, Pugh for the former, and Rudin does both.
1998430
"PCB Design for Real-World EMI Control" is a great book on techniques to reduce EMI problems in your designs.  The book has a good layout with each chapter building on the last.  Techniques are discussed in detail with very little math.  Overall, the book is easy to follow for the beginning designer and a good reference for the experienced designer.  I recommend this book to anyone involved in PCB design.
69642
This new edition of Prof. Saber's book is a valuable contribution to the literature on difference equations. Its clarity in language  and style in addition to the large number of  applications makes suitable for senior  students  in science and engineering.
3337233
I just received this book in the mail and was hoping for a good addition to my DSP library. This book is really good, I have flipped through the pages and note how clear the examples are. The M-Files actually explain which equation is being referenced in the MATLAB examples. I recommend this book after you study DSP basics such as DFT and FFT etc. This book jumps right into Fourier Analysis and might be a challenge for a beginner. At the same time the beginners book will cover the basics well and leave you hanging after the elementary phase is over; now where do you go. This book will be the next phase as it's complete with MATLAB-Simulink flows which you will need to learn MATLAB alone and you get a bonus of advanced DSP understanding; so you get a double leaning curve. The M-Files can be obtained from the publisher which I received in one day after my book arrived. I'm very happy - Thanks
3857270
As an engineer with digital design experience but little DSP application experience, I found this book to be very helpful in understanding and applying everyday DSP algorithms. The book is basically a digest containing many C coded examples of realtime DSP designs including filters, tone generators, FFTs and other common DSP routines. They are easy to implement (all scipts are included on the accompanied CD) and are also fun to play with.
  Assuming you have the TMS320C6711 DSK with code composer studio(I got mine on ebay for $100), you will be realizing the designs within minutes after first opening the text.
  This book is not a first course in DSP.  It helps to know a little about the theory (signals and systems and/or a dsp course) before diving into this text.
  In conclusion, if you know a little about DSP but have no experience in applying it, I highly recommend this text.
156878
I found this book very helpful when working on my dissertation.  It provides a great overview of the algorithms and approaches used in VLSI CAD, many of which can be extended to the FPGA CAD work I was doing.  Other reviewers have commented that they sometimes referred to the original papers cited.  I too did that when I wanted more information, but still found this book to be great as a reference and starting point.