The Castle series is a system of binary modules.
What is binary?
Binary is discrete ON/Off, 1/0, High/Low. There can only be two states in binary. In the Castle series the transition from low to high is at 0.5V. A single binary bit would only give on or off, but the Castle series was designed to utilize 3-Bit data streams. That means 3 single bits are processed in parallel, much like processing RGB.
3-Bit Data Streams
This combination of 3-Bits gives you 8 possible combinations or values. If the 3-bits were patched directly to RGB you would get Black, Red, Green, Yellow, Blue, Magenta, Cyan, and White. When using a 3-Bit data stream there is a proper order for the bits, from the Most Significant Bit (MSB) to the Least Significant Bit (LSB), this ensures that the signal is represented as an approximation of the original analog signal. If the bits are rearranged, however, interesting effects can be created similar to what happens in circuit bent digital hardware.
Arbitrary Pixels
To transform an analog signal to 3-Bit binary the Analog to Digital Converter module is used. Now that the signal is converted you can process it in any number of ways using the other modules, then to be recombined by the Digital to Analog Converter, or used as discrete RGB. All this talk of Digital might make one think of pixels, but that isn’t necessarily so with Castle. Since clock signals can be whatever you choose, there is no set pixel dimensions, and those pixels aren’t even necessarily square. If the clock is modulated like any other VCO the ‘data block’, what might be thought of as a pixel, is perhaps more rhombus than square, and it’s size can be varied. So while being 3-Bit digital, Castle is not restricted to being pixelated and jagged. Shapes can be rounded and undulate just like other signals in a video system. It is in between worlds. Analog, smooth, organic. Digital, rigid, artificial.