The Snail 3 vs PLICATA

See the sound. Every sound has a hidden structure. The Snail reveals its beauty. Watch your music unfold in real time, in a luminous spiral of colour and movement. A voice, a plucked tanpura string, a single piano note: each reveals its own shapes, patterns and surprises. The Snail is a high-precision tuner, a window into sound, and a pleasure to watch. Explore the overtones that give an instrument its character, follow pitch and timbre through a musical phrase, or simply enjoy seeing what you hear. BEAUTY BUILT ON SCIENCE Developed at IRCAM, The Snail brings together years of advanced research in acoustics, physics and mathematics, alongside the study of temperament systems, musical cultures and musicians’ practices around the world. Its interface is unique, designed and built entirely in-house. Years of research into visual design and interaction make the complexity of sound visible, inviting and useful. Scientific depth meets the pleasure of discovery. Different traditions hear, name and organise pitch differently. The Snail gives you ways to explore those differences — and to work with the references that matter to your music. THREE WAYS TO SEE • Snail View reveals frequencies on an octave spiral, showing a note and its partials together. • Tuner View helps you make fine pitch adjustments with a rotating, colour-changing indicator. • Score View places frequency components on a musical staff, with optional quarter-tone notation. TUNE TO YOUR MUSICAL WORLD Go beyond equal temperament. Explore just intonation, Pythagorean tuning and scales from other musical traditions. Adjust the pitch reference and set the tonic to suit your instrument, ensemble or repertoire. LISTEN, LOOK, DISCOVER Sing, play, or open an audio file. See how a gentle touch differs from a strong attack, how a voice shapes a vowel, or why two instruments playing the same note sound so different. Choose Bubble or Classic presentation, adjust the display, and save your settings as presets. A left-handed layout keeps controls comfortable to reach. For musicians, singers, teachers, students, sound designers—and curious ears of every age. No specialist knowledge required. Just bring a sound. The Snail doesn’t judge your sound. It invites you to discover it.

PLICATA is a compact patchable monophonic instrument for hands-on sound design and performance. A morphing oscillator feeds wavefolding, a resonant filter and flexible VCA contour, while an independent SUB oscillator adds octave, interval and eight waveform modes. PATCH IT The 28-socket patch system opens audio, CV and event routing. Modulate FOLD without replacing the oscillator path, reset the LFO externally, replace the internal SUB source, control SUB level by CV, distribute modulation through MULT, or build feedback and audio-rate networks. Patch cables are recalled with your sounds. MICROTONAL XY PERFORMANCE The 13-key XY keyboard spans C4–C5. Tune every key independently by ±100 cents or start from 12-TET, Just Intonation, Pythagorean and quarter-tone templates. Horizontal movement adds pitch expression up to ±24 semitones; vertical movement can map each key to as many as eight sound parameters or performance macros. PERFORMANCE VIEW + 32-STEP ARPEGGIATOR Tap PERF for an expanded keyboard-focused surface. The arpeggiator follows INTERNAL, HOST or MIDI clock and offers UP, DOWN, UP/DOWN, AS PLAYED, RANDOM, WALK, CONVERGE, DIVERGE and CHORD styles across up to four octaves. Build patterns from 1 to 32 steps with independent pitch, octave, velocity, gate, probability and ratchet lanes. HOLD captures the note pool; FILL creates a momentary variation. Adjust swing, gate, velocity behavior, probability and ratchets live. Rotate patterns, create temporary MUTATE variations, FREEZE the result, and recall seven ARP scenes with optional MIDI keyswitch control. MACROS, MIDI AND SYNC Six bounded performance macros shape tone, motion, fold, envelope, drive and level. IGNITE is editable: choose multiple targets, ranges and response curves, then store the mapping independently from sound presets. Play compatible instruments from PLICATA’s built-in keyboard using MIDI or MPE OUT, with independent pitch expression for each note in MPE mode. PLICATA also supports MIDI/MPE input, host sync and externally reset or free-running LFO operation. COMPLETE SOUND STATES PLICATA ships with 20 factory sounds and a full user-preset system. User sounds recall synthesis, patch cables and performance configuration together. Search, organize, favorite, duplicate and tag sounds, or use GEN to create a complete new musical state without overwriting your library. USER presets share the same library between standalone and AUv3. Optional private iCloud sync keeps them available across devices using the same Apple Account. Local presets remain available offline; sync requires network access and available iCloud storage. STANDALONE + AUv3 Use PLICATA standalone or as an AUv3 instrument inside compatible Apple music hosts. FEATURES • Morphing oscillator, wavefolding and pulse-width shaping • Independent SUB oscillator with interval and eight waveform modes • Resonant filter, ADSR articulation and drive • 28-socket audio, CV and event patch system • 13-key microtonal XY keyboard with independent tuning • Dedicated PERFORMANCE view with expanded keyboard • 32-step arpeggiator with nine styles and three clock modes • Per-step pitch, octave, velocity, gate, probability and ratchet • HOLD, FILL, rotate, MUTATE/FREEZE and seven ARP scenes • Six performance macros plus editable IGNITE • MIDI/MPE input and built-in keyboard MIDI/MPE output • Factory and user presets with complete-state recall • Complete-state generation with GEN • Standalone and AUv3 operation Explore PLICATA: https://trambustissimo.com/#plicata Support: support@alessandroguardascione.com