Thursday, October 3, 2013

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.

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