Intermediate FL Studio Guide Mastering Your Song

Compression

Most of you probably already know what compression is. Most of you, though, are also probably not using it correctly. The compression of the dynamic range of audio is a common thing and it is using on pretty much every modern audio track. What compression does, is making sure that the audio doesn’t clip: it makes sure that the audio doesn’t exceed the decibel limits so it makes sure that the audio simply won’t be too loud.

Now, this is how it works: when recorded audio is too loud and exceeds the decibel limits the compressor takes the peaks of the audio and compresses them so that they will stay within the limits and therefore won’t be to loud. However, it also takes the very soft part of a track and boosts the frequencies. Eventually, you’ve got a track with an average waveform and the soft parts are being boosted and the loud parts are being reduced in frequency and therefore in volume.

The problem with compression is that these days a lot of people really don’t know how to work with it. When one simply puts a compressor on a track then everything will stay within the volume decibel limits. However, it also really flattens the audio and takes away the soul and dynamics of the music.

When one plays a really emotional piece of the guitar, for example, and then on the end a louder part, then the compressor will make the first part louder to make everything have a common average decibel level. This takes away the emotion in the sound and therefore one should reduce the compression. In modern music, a lot of albums are very loud and undynamic: this is called the Loudness War. These days, it seems that most people are trying to put as much decibels within the dynamic range as they can. This will often result in an unemotional, undynamic track.

There are different kinds of compressors available, both physical and virtual compressors. Virtual compressors are getting more and more popular these days because they are more flexible and don’t require physical space in a studio. Also, they are more dynamic to work with because they are faster. Different compressors have different timbres, characteristic musical sounds. Examples of famous compressors are the VC 76 FET compressor that produces a punchy sound, and the VC 2A Electro-optical compressor that produces a very smooth and warm sound. Compressor choice is personal, and fortunately there are a lot of compressors available these days for different purposes.

Source: Wikipedia

Now that you know a little bit about compression, let’s take a look at some compression techniques. In fact, there is a session right here on beatmakers101 about compression techniques here. This is an incredible handy session as it provides a lot of different techniques on how to efficiently add compression to your track. Also, be sure to find as many resources as you can considering compression to get as much experience possible like (e-)books and other websites.

Equalization

Equalization is the boosting of specific frequencies of a sound. Two examples of EQ interfaces in Cubase are:

Intermediate FL Studio Guide Mixing Techniques

First of all, let’s start by explaining what exactly mixing and mastering is. The first term, mixing, refers to the process of putting multiple layers of audio together to make one final track, or to musically modify an existing track. The second term, mastering, refers to the process of optimizing the final track using all sorts of different mastering elements such as compression, equalization, stereo enhancement and more.
In this article, we’ll spend quite a bit more time on the mastering as we will discuss several mastering processes like compression and EQ. Now, let’s take as example me having recorded a track in my home studio. I’ve recorded the guitar, the piano and the drums using my digital condenser USB microphone onto different tracks in my sequencer software Cubase.
As I simply layer the tracks and play the song, the sound is quite undynamic and flat. What I can now do, is mixing. I can change the volume of an audio track at a certain point to make e.g. the guitar come out more clearly at a specific moment. This is the mixing of the track, the layering of the audio and the volume determination. Also, unwanted noise and clicks are removed in the mixing stage.
Now, the track will sound better but there’s still quite a lot of work to do. It’s time for mastering. By mastering the track one can really bring a track to life and spice up the sound. You can make the drum more dynamic, the guitar more or less sharp sounding, the piano more soft and you might want to boost the bass frequencies of the piano a little bit as there is no bass.
This is an example of mastering, which one does to spice up the track and make it sound way more dynamic. Below, you can here an example of a track that I’ve recorded. The first audio file is a raw recording, the only thing that I’ve done is layering the instruments. The second audio file is that same track, but now mastered. Compression, equalization, stereo enhancement and reverb effects are applied. You can certainly here the difference as the second track sounds quite different.

10 Quick Tips For Mixing Beats In FL Studio

1. Rbass from waves on your kicks is awesome. I normally use two kicks. Boost one at 100 and the other varies on original sound of it.

2. Compress your instruments and drums. Compression is tough be careful. You should first turn the instrument down to a level where it isn't too loud and overbearing. Then turn the threshold down to the new level of volume for the instrument. For regular instruments the ratio should be 4:1 and for bass the ratio should be higher, between 6:1 and 8:1. Next use the gain to get the instrument back up to the desired level.

3. Drums loud and proud. If you are mixing a beat, your drums should be the loudest thing in the beat with out creatind distortion or overpowering the other instruments. This tip may seem like it could be taken lightly so I am gonna say this. When I realized this.... "Sales Increase".

4. Effects.... Effects....Effects. When you can't figure out what to do with something as far as mixing goes, try a phaser preset, a flanger preset, or any other effects you have laying around. This is a great way to change things up.

5. Mix With the volume as low as possible. If something sounds too loud when the volume is at a minimal you have to turn it down. By listening to the beat at a low level during mixing, you get to hear exactly what is overpowering if any and out of wack frequencies.

6. "Mastering" mixer presets on the master mixer track. Right click master tab, go to file, click open mixer track state. You will see a few presets there for mastering. Make sure you try all of them out to see which is best. One preset will not work on every song.

7. Pan your percussions, not your instruments. Sounds creazy but try it. I find this more desirable. Try putting the snare about 6% right. and then setting up the others to each side not too spread out.

8. Reverb on your snares is important. Use the regular drum room reverb and turn the effect down till it is perfect with the snare. Now this should set the tone on reverb for the rest of the beat.

9. Soft clipper. Just to be on the safe side I always add my soft clipper to the mix. It is a good tool to stop your beat from clipping.

10. Maximus plug in, this is good for adding the extra dynamic you are looking for. Add maximus on your master plug ins and use the preset Clean Master RMS, or just clean master. Anoth good one to use is the LinMB from waves. Use the Electro multi adaptive mastering and click the make up button to make that function automatic. Of course one with out the other, together maximus and LinMB would be too much. Those that don't have either may use blood overdrive and adjust the amount of the effect.


Quick tip: After mixing giver your ears about 3 hours to 8 hours and then listen to it on some different types of systems. Stereo, car stereo, laptop, etc. If it sounds good on everything its perfect.

Intermediate FL Studio Guide Mixing Your Beat

In live music recording less emphasis is put on the mixing of volume levels nd EQing. Those things are largely taken care of later, after everything is recorded.

In electronic and hiphop music a lot of mixing and EQing is done during the composition phase itself. Because in some essence, the "live instruments" have already been recorded (if you're using samples) and when you're putting together a track with samples or synths, your job includes mixing, balancing and EQ.

So you've already answered your own question. Yes, they do mixing at the composition stage. So for you to get good at it, you must also learn how to EQ, balance the volume levels of synths/instruments, pan and compress. But if I were you, I wouldn't mess with it too much in FL.

Make a "rough draft" as a painter would outlining general shapes in a painting. Focus on the actual composition, you'll concentrate on other details later. Besides, there are better tools for mixing actual wave tracks such as Audition, Audacity, etc. In FL, after a certain point, you'd be just wasting time.

FL is mainly a tool for composition, a sequencer.
Multi track recorders are mainly for mixing.


There are two places where the overall output level (volume) of FL Studio can be adjusted -
Main volume fader.
Master Mixer track fader (14 bottom of page), see the 'Mixer reference diagram' below.
The Main volume fader should be left at the default position (Right-click and select 'Reset') and the Master mixer track fader used for overall level adjustments. The following discussion assumes the Main volume fader is in the default position.
How to adjust levels of the final mix

FL studio has a Main volume, in the menu bar AND a Master Track Volume (14). To ensure the Master mixer track level is an accurate reflection of the final output:
Make sure the Main volume is at the default level (Right-click and select 'Reset'). It's probably a good idea to get out of the habit of even touching this volume slider, its main purpose is to make sure a master volume control is always available (when the mixer is hidden) and some audio emergency crops up.
Adjust Mixer Track Faders and/or Channel volume knobs to obtain the relative instrument levels you desire in the mix.
Use the Master Track fader (left most track in the Mixer, 14) to adjust the final level. Consider also, placing Fruity Limiter in the last FX bank of the master track. Limiting is a form of automatic peak volume control.
Following the above steps will ensure the Master track peak meter (5 & 11) and the Main volume meter, in the menu bar, display the same peak levels. Red/Orange peaks (over 0 dB) will indicate clipping in the final output or rendered mix, as depicted below.
Sampler Channels vs Audio Clips

If you are paying particularly close (and possibly unhealthy) attention to the output levels of Sampler Channels, you may notice they are a few dB down on their recorded level. There are three reasons for this:
Sampler Channels load at a default 55% volume, about -5.2 dB. This 'feature' is to prevent clipping when several Channel Samplers are used together and also to allow some extra headroom for note/step velocity modulation. The assumption is that Channel Samplers will be used as 'instruments' and so you will be playing (see the next point) and mixing them to sound right 'in the mix'. If a Channel Sampler is too quiet, turn it up.
Sampler Channels respond to note velocity. The default note velocity in FL Studio is 100 (MIDI = 0 to 127). If a sample is too quiet you can also play it louder.
Sampler Channels respond to the default Circular Panning Law. This reduces the sample gain by -3 dB at center pan, tapering to 0 dB at the extreme L/R pan positions.
So together the default load state for a Channel Sampler can be about 8.2 dB lower than the samples recorded level. If you absolutely need a sample to render at its recorded level, load it as an Audio Clip by dropping your samples on the Playlist (these default to 100% volume, 0 dB). Finally, make sure the Master and Main volumes (described above) are set to 0 dB and don't forget the effect of note velocity on playback level.
Using FL Studio Peak Meters
Often when mixing, your goal is to get the peaks of the loudest sections of the mix close to the maximum possible level, 0 dB, without clipping, going over 0 dB. Clipping happens when a sound wave carried inside audio equipment (analog or digital) becomes louder than the maximum volume that can be reproduced. When audio is clipped its waveform looks like the tips of the peaks have been 'clipped' off, as shown in the picture of the Main peak meter below (left). While occasional transient clipping incidents are not usually a problem, if clipping is pushed too far your audio will distort and crackle. Once a saved (rendered) audio file is badly clipped, there is no way to fix the problem (although the Edison Noise Removal Tool does have a Declipper Function that can rectify mild clipping issues).

This can easily become very frustrating while mixing and very often leaving your mixes sounding “worse” than the original beat!

I’ve wrecked a lot of beats while trying to mix.  Mixing doesn’t come easy; it really does come from hands-on practice.  If you aren’t practicing, you can guarantee you’re not going to get better!

Instead of making a beat, take time out to learn mixing.  The more things you can know as a beatmaker/producer, the more valuable you will be.

By that I mean, if you know how to make a beat, mix, and master.. well, that’s 3 jobs you have!  In the music industry, these are 3 individual jobs that take place.  So the more you can learn and conquer, the more ahead of the game you are, the more you understand, and the more money you can save in the end!

Have you ever attempted mixing vocals? This starts to make your beat now “a song”. I feel when vocals come in to play, there’s a lot more room for error, as now you have to try to get that vocal to sit nice in the mix! (But practice makes you better right!)

Take advantage of that LOW CUT / HIGH PASS FILTER, this is very handy to clean up mixes, as there is unnecessary bass in a lot of sounds and instruments! — Again, the rule of thumb is to go until you hear the filter effecting the sound, then gently back off until it’s sounding how it was.

Many times even if the sound isn’t sounding normal, and is sounding a bit thin and weak because you’ve gone too far with your high pass filter, it can make the sound cut through your mix even more, so sometimes doing the cut while your beat is playing is a good technique as well! (As this is how the sound is going to be played; with the beat, not solo’d right? ;) ).

Intermediate FL Studio Guide Transition Effect

The way Flash (and I'm assuming 9th) does it, is he'll export a loop of highhats hitting on eighth notes from FL Studio to a wav file.

He'll open that wav file loop onto a track in the multitrack view of Cool Edit Pro and loop it out for a few bars.

Next he'll take his sample (already timestretched to the tempo of the highhats) and paste that onto a track in the multitrack view of FL Studio under the highhats.

Next he'll chop out (cut and paste) different sections of the sample and put them on their own tracks rearranging them following one another until he's got a melody he likes from the arrangement of the chops.

When he's got that (and any variations on that theme) in the way he wants it, he'll export that arrangement (minus the high hats) to a wav file.

Then he'll bring that new wav file up in FL Studio and trigger it along with drums.

I'm sure there are a million and one ways to chop and arrange samples both in and out of FL Studio, but if DJ Flash does it this way there's a good chance he learned to do it that way from 9th Wonder.

So let’s fast forward (>>) through your relentless digging through all those dusty records. 

Finally you’ve found it! That simply amazing record with that amazing voice/loop/breakdown/part and you want to sample it and make the hottest possible record known to man, but you don’t know how to sample in FL.

So lets get down to it. Is your sample dirty? Excess clicks, pops, noise, record hum, scratches etc? If you want it that way skip through this part, but I would suggest, and this is a personal opinion, that you work with the sample as clean as possible initially and dirty it up to your specifications after the fact. 

In order to clean up that sample (not too much though) I would suggest the Waves plug-ins X-Noise, X-Hum and X-click. Use Sony Soundforge 8 or any other audio editing application to clean up the whole song, cause who knows what other parts may work when you start.

Now that you have your soon to be sampled song ready to be chopped and re-assembled just dump the whole .mp3 or .wav file into the bottom of the playlist editor. You can load up as many different files as your computer can handle. Depending on the size of the file you may just see a blank block with the name of the file appear saying that it is being streamed from your hard disc.

In order to see the file go to the step sequencer click on the sample and click the option that lets the file be displayed.

So now you can see your file. Let the chopping looping and screwing begin.

In the play list editor to the left hand corner you will see a few tools that you may or may not have used. Let’s try the knife tool

In order to cut out the part you want just set your snap to ‘none’, zoom as close as possible and start cutting. 

Now that you have cut your loop or part play it on loop to make sure that you have cut it just right.

Hmmm. . . 

So how do I find the tempo of this?

Well you have options. You can either count how many bars you have sampled and adjust your tempo till the number of bars the file takes up syncs (once you haven’t stretched or compressed the sample before it would remain the same). Or you can stretch or compress the sample out to the required length or the number of bars the sample contains and adjust your tempo till it sounds like normal or how you want it (think chipmunks)

Ok, now you have your loop but you want to play another part of the song under it. Just cut out the part you want to use from the same file and make use of the ‘make unique’ function. Now you can have your different parts chopped up differently and don’t have to worry about parts dropping out because they start after one another. Try it. It’ll make sense once you do.

Once you click a part that you have chopped click again in an empty part of the audio section of the playlist to copy it.

Another problem you may encounter: Hit points don’t match up.

So your snare and kick sound a bit off sometimes during the sample. What you can do and get away with without any drops in the sample is cut the sample where the hit point is off and drag the hit point in the sample back onto the line where your kick or snare hits. 

Another tip: Eq

Eq out all kicks and bass, they are your enemy. Not really, but if you want to change the kick pattern and come up with something totally new I suggest you do it and replay the bassline. This way you can now have more to switch up in the song. Also to you can eq out most of the backing instruments under a vocal and put it in under your music. 

Don’t forget to use your panning and volume automation in here also.

So forget about that Fruity Slicer and going back and forth from program to program.

Once you get the hang of it I guarantee that it would help you out a great deal.

Just click my sig for examples of this procedure.

the 3 chord combo. Wich is really all that the name suggests. 

verse: 

la la lalala 

la la lalala 

la la lalala 

la la lalala 

DUN DUN DUNNN 

*chorus cue* 

Also removing instruments rather then adding them right before the chorus is cool. just for a bar or two. like have all your kicks drop out or something. makes the chorus seem much more impressive.

Intermediate FL Studio Guide Perfect Snare Roll

In this tutorial you will learn how to make snare rolls in FL studio. Creating snare rolls is very important to add variation to your beats. They can be used to create transitions between parts of the beat and create a buildup effect to the next section of the beat. Snare rolls typically occur near the end of a bar but can be used in other sections of your beat if you choose.

In order to make snare rolls interesting, there are a couple things that you should do. One important thing you can do is chop up the hits so that each hit is not the same length. This will give your snare rolls a speeding up or slowing down effect.

Another important element of the snare roll is breaking up the pattern and leaving some spaces between pants to create dynamic combinations of snare rolls. A lot of producers just create snare hits that hit on every beat and it doesn’t really add much to the snare roll. Creating slightly more complex patterns by using gaps between them will make them much more unique and sound more like a real drummer.

The next thing you should consider is creating pitched snare rolls. This type of snare roll typically descends in pitch as the fill plays. This can create a very nice effect on the snare and I really like to use this technique when transitioning between sections of beat.
In the tutorial above you will see exactly how this process is completed. Snare rolls are not overly complicated and can really add a lot to your beats. Follow this tutorial and you will be on your way to making great sounding fills starting now.

6 Step Example : 

1

Launch Ableton Live or FL Studio and start a new project by selecting, "New Project" from the file menu. Sift through your sample library to find a good one-hit snare drum sample. If you don't have one, a quick search online will reveal a multitude of free drum samples for download.

2

Load your drum sample into the built-in sampler. If you're using Ableton Live, create a new MIDI track by dragging the "Simpler" instrument into the "Tracks" window, then drag the desired snare sample into the "Simpler" instrument window at the bottom-left of the screen. In FL Studio, drag the snare sample into the sequencer window beneath the default track names.

3

Open the piano roll, which is a virtual piano that you use to change the pitch of your sample. In Ableton Live, double-click in the first empty clip space under your snare sample "Simpler" track. The piano roll appears at the bottom-right of the screen. In FL Studio, right-click on the snare sample you dragged into the sequencer window and select, "Open Piano Roll" to display the piano roll.

4

Begin sequencing a basic snare roll to create a down-south roll. Left-click in the piano roll next to the key marked "C3" to create MIDI events, which will play your snare sound. Listen to a few of your favorite hip-hop tracks for inspiration. Arrange your snare hits according to the beat grid shown in the piano roll window. Press, "Play" to listen to your basic snare roll.

5

Turn your snare roll into a down-south roll by moving the MIDI events you created on the key "C3" to other, lower keys on the virtual piano. Drag the events up and down the piano using your mouse. The program automatically changes the pitch of the sound. Arrange the snare hits in descending order so that each event is on a lower key than the one previous.

6

Press, "Play" to listen to your down-south roll. It will have the same rhythm and structure as the basic snare roll you created, but the sound will get lower and lower as it plays. Build your beat around this roll, or use this method to inject the down-south roll into any previously created beat.

Read more: http://www.ehow.com/how_7586301_do-down-south-snare-roll.html#ixzz2ghH8gKdN

Intermediate FL Studio Guide Perfect Sampling Technique

The way Flash (and I'm assuming 9th) does it, is he'll export a loop of highhats hitting on eighth notes from FL Studio to a wav file.

He'll open that wav file loop onto a track in the multitrack view of Cool Edit Pro and loop it out for a few bars.

Next he'll take his sample (already timestretched to the tempo of the highhats) and paste that onto a track in the multitrack view of FL Studio under the highhats.

Next he'll chop out (cut and paste) different sections of the sample and put them on their own tracks rearranging them following one another until he's got a melody he likes from the arrangement of the chops.

When he's got that (and any variations on that theme) in the way he wants it, he'll export that arrangement (minus the high hats) to a wav file.

Then he'll bring that new wav file up in FL Studio and trigger it along with drums.

I'm sure there are a million and one ways to chop and arrange samples both in and out of FL Studio, but if DJ Flash does it this way there's a good chance he learned to do it that way from 9th Wonder.

So let’s fast forward (>>) through your relentless digging through all those dusty records.
Finally you’ve found it! That simply amazing record with that amazing voice/loop/breakdown/part and you want to sample it and make the hottest possible record known to man, but you don’t know how to sample in FL.

So lets get down to it. Is your sample dirty? Excess clicks, pops, noise, record hum, scratches etc? If you want it that way skip through this part, but I would suggest, and this is a personal opinion, that you work with the sample as clean as possible initially and dirty it up to your specifications after the fact.

In order to clean up that sample (not too much though) I would suggest the Waves plug-ins X-Noise, X-Hum and X-click. Use Sony Soundforge 8 or any other audio editing application to clean up the whole song, cause who knows what other parts may work when you start.

Now that you have your soon to be sampled song ready to be chopped and re-assembled just dump the whole .mp3 or .wav file into the bottom of the playlist editor. You can load up as many different files as your computer can handle. Depending on the size of the file you may just see a blank block with the name of the file appear saying that it is being streamed from your hard disc.
In order to see the file go to the step sequencer click on the sample and click the option that lets the file be displayed.

So now you can see your file. Let the chopping looping and screwing begin.
In the play list editor to the left hand corner you will see a few tools that you may or may not have used. Let’s try the knife tool
In order to cut out the part you want just set your snap to ‘none’, zoom as close as possible and start cutting.
Now that you have cut your loop or part play it on loop to make sure that you have cut it just right.

Hmmm. . .
So how do I find the tempo of this?
Well you have options. You can either count how many bars you have sampled and adjust your tempo till the number of bars the file takes up syncs (once you haven’t stretched or compressed the sample before it would remain the same). Or you can stretch or compress the sample out to the required length or the number of bars the sample contains and adjust your tempo till it sounds like normal or how you want it (think chipmunks)

Ok, now you have your loop but you want to play another part of the song under it. Just cut out the part you want to use from the same file and make use of the ‘make unique’ function. Now you can have your different parts chopped up differently and don’t have to worry about parts dropping out because they start after one another. Try it. It’ll make sense once you do.

Once you click a part that you have chopped click again in an empty part of the audio section of the playlist to copy it.

Another problem you may encounter: Hit points don’t match up.
So your snare and kick sound a bit off sometimes during the sample. What you can do and get away with without any drops in the sample is cut the sample where the hit point is off and drag the hit point in the sample back onto the line where your kick or snare hits.

Another tip: Eq
Eq out all kicks and bass, they are your enemy. Not really, but if you want to change the kick pattern and come up with something totally new I suggest you do it and replay the bassline. This way you can now have more to switch up in the song. Also to you can eq out most of the backing instruments under a vocal and put it in under your music.

Don’t forget to use your panning and volume automation in here also.

So forget about that Fruity Slicer and going back and forth from program to program.
Once you get the hang of it I guarantee that it would help you out a great deal.
Just click my sig for examples of this procedure.

Intermediate FL Studio Guide Automation Effects

Above a certain feedback level, delays begin to regenerate. In other words, the echoes begin to get louder rather than quieter. This is fine up to a point, but soon makes a train wreck of your mix if left to its own devices. To control this, we've set up the delay on an auxiliary, sent our signal to it at the critical moment and automated the feedback level – nudging it up and down to keep the delays alive, but dropping them back when unruly. Panning or tremolo after the delay makes the whole lot bounce from side to side. We've also automated the tremolo speed, so that the movement isn't predictable.

Occasionally wanted to delay the snare to get some characteristic heavy echoes. To do this, we set up our delay of choice on an auxiliary channel and automated the send level from the snare to it. Most of the time, the delay remains straight, but every once in a while, the send rises to produce a greater amount of echo.

Left to their own devices, pads can often become dull and simply take up space. Here, we've livened one up considerably by varying its tone, vibrato, distortion amount and effects settings. We've routed it to two auxiliary buses, then adjusted the reverb and delay/phaser combinations on them.

Big, fat basses that evolve and grow throughout the duration of a note are all the rage, whether in dubstep, DnB or even house. You can get this effect using filter envelopes alone, but if you want variable growl each time, automation is the key. Here, we've written a basic part and automated the filter cutoff by varying amounts. We've also used Logic's curve tool on some sweeps so that they take you by surprise.

When editing an automation envelope in the playlist, you can use snap on the horizontal attributes of a point using the snap drop down menu. But how can i use snap on the vertical attributes of a point? This is very annoying, especially when you are trying to add lots of points to something like the master volume. is there a way to use snap on this so i don't spend all this extra time making sure all my points are at the exact default volume level???




You need to know how to send Channels (samples or instruments) to Mixer tracks, and set up basic stock FX.

1. The need for Automation

Scenarios frequently come up in music production where you need to automate some parameter - volume, cutoff frequency, channel panning, etc. A very common need is in dance/trance production, where the cutoff point of a low pass filter must slowly increase (i.e. coming out of a breakdown), sweeping some fat, detuned multi-sawtooth synth from warm and deep to bright and harsh. Another example would be the fade-in of deep, powerful strings underneath a piano-driven soundtrack piece.

The ability to do this, naturally, is called Automation - where actual control movements are recorded into the song, and those controls automatically repeat your recorded movements on subsequent plays.

FL Studio has significant support for automation. Just about every control available can be automated - the primary exception being the pre-computed FX (those found in the first tab of the channel settings window).

2. Automation - How to do it

Now, time for a simple walk-through of the process! For this tutorial, I've made a simple beat, then automated the cutoff of a "Fruity Fast LP" effect on the master FX channel. I love sweeping beats - they make you feel like something powerful is welling up... you can listen to the end result clip here.

1. Start a new FL project.
2. Make a groovy little beat on Pattern 1. Or use mine. Note - I am not including the samples with mine because they are all stock. If you don't have the samples for some reason, it should be pretty obvious what you need to substitute in (basic hat, kick, snares).
3. Place 4 bars of your beat sequence (Pattern 1) in the Playlist.
4. Press F9 to bring up the Mixer.
5. Put a Fruity Fast LP on the Master FX channel.

OK, so we've got our four bars playing our groovy little beat. Time for some automation! Bring up the window for your LP filter, set Cut-off control low - I set mine to 2 "ticks."


Automation Clips

There are several ways to create automation clips. The easiest way is to right-click on the control you wish to automate and then choose ‘Create automation clip’. See the below screenshot where I create an automation clip for the channel volume control (Trance lead channel):



Note that this method can only be used for native FL Studio controls. For controls on VST plugins you can first manually tweak the control you want to automate and then select Last tweaked parameter | Create automation clip from the Fruity Wrapper menu. See below for an example with the Nexus plugin:




Regardless whether you automate a native control or one on a VST plugin, the result is the same: An automation clip is created for the control in question (it is already linked to the control) in the upper part of the playlist view (where all clip tracks are placed). See below:




An automation clip created in this way spans the entire length of your playlist. In the example above, I have not yet begun to place any pattern blocks and the automation clip therefore assumes the default length. However, I can now start to manipulate the clip. See the screenshot below:




Initially, the automation clip only has one (last) control point. To increase the length of the clip, simply left-click it and drag to the right. Release the mouse button when done. Make sure that you have selected the middle focus button and checked Slide and unchecked Step (see picture above).

To give the clip a shape, add control points. To add a control point hold down the Ctrl-key and move your mouse pointer to the position where you want to add a control point. The mouse pointer changes and shows a plus (+). Then, left-click and voila, you have an new control point. You can ‘pick up’ control points by moving over them (the mouse pointer changes into a hand), holding down the left mouse button and dragging the point to another position. Release the mouse button when you are done.

To change the shape of the spline between to control points, use the tension handle. Simpy left click a tension handle and move your mouse up or down (holding the mouse button down). Release the mouse button when you are done.

To remove a control point, right-click it and choose Delete in the menu. Also, experiment a bit with the menu options Single Curve, Double Curve, Hold, Stairs and Smooth Stairs. You will see you can manipulate the shape of the spline ending in the selected control point by using these options.

Make sure to play around a bit and create various shapes. Being able to create clips precisely the way you want it will defintely benefit you further down the road.

Now, listen to the way the automation clip influences the Trance lead sound.