The Dazatronyx Optical Tremolo is a tremolo pedal from the maker Dazatronyx, built around all-analog photocoupling. Instead of an electronic switch chopping the signal, the pedal restricts and modulates the output volume by shining a fluctuating light against a photo-sensitive field, which is the defining approach of an optical tremolo1.
The circuit is analog, and it is a design the maker clearly has a stake in. On the product page he states1:
"My tremolos are easily my favourite circuits, and have occupied more of my design time than anything else."
Where it came from
This is a long-developed circuit. Development took over a decade before the maker was happy with the way it sounded and functioned, and he describes it as his first unique effect circuit design from scratch, one he started in high school1.
How optical tremolos work
The photocoupling approach is what separates this pedal from tremolos that use electronic switching. Because the audio path is opened and closed by light falling on a photo-sensitive element rather than by a transistor or chip in the signal path, the circuit is all-analog from input to output1.
Optical designs have become a small family of their own within the wider tremolo pedal field. Other makers take the same basic idea in different directions:
Dazatronyx built its own take on the optical approach: the Dazatronyx Optical Tremolo is an analog tremolo pedal, and the maker describes it as a design from scratch rather than a copy of an existing circuit. "This was my first unique effect circuit design from scratch, which I started in high school," RockBoard's PedalPedia says of it1.
Against that field, the Dazatronyx pedal stands as the maker's own take on the optical approach: a straightforward analog photocoupling design rather than a feature-packed one, refined over a long development period1.
Videos
Mike Hermans
Brett Kingman
Brett Kingman
Sources (1)
- Optical Tremolo by Dazatronyx, RockBoard PedalPedia, 2026
