Syntorial notes

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Chapter 1.1 Saw+Pulse
-Saw and pulse waves= most common.
-Saw wave = bright, edgy and used for a lot of different sounds.
-Pulse wave= more videogame-like, artifical sound.
-Pulse wave= heavy in low pitches.
-When designing heavy bass sounds, use pulse since it has heavy sound in low pit
ches.

Chapter 1.2 Pulse width

-Pulse waves are special because the pulse width can be changed
-In default state the pulse width makes it a square wave
-Gets more saw like when you make pulse width very small/thin
-pulse width doesn't affect saw waves' sound
-square(default PWidth) sounds hollow and more "thick"
-medium Pwidth sounds inbetween
-thin Pwidth sounds childlike, silly, duck-like, voice like, sitar like
-medium and square pulses sound more voicelike and thick than saw wave
Chapter 1.3 on your own
-Initialize vst(primer in syntorial) and listen to its waveforms(pulse and saw)
Try changing the pulse width
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Chapter 2.1 Low pass filter
-Low pass filter determine brightness of synth.
-Control brightness with cutoff
-more cutoff= rounder and darker until fundamental pitch is eliminated,
making the sound disappear completely
-Less cutoff=sound gets brighter and edgier
-Reducing cutoff by a little bit doesn't change the sound much, but it
reduces the amount of sizzle(zzzzzzzzzzzzz) sound making it cleaner.
-Think of this sizzle as a noise osc seperate from the osc
Chapter 2.2 Cutoff+ main volume
-If cutoff is too low, volume of sound gets low
-to make up for this volume loss, we turn up the volume
-This is great for making bass patches and other round,dark sounds.

Chapter 2.3 on your own

-Check out your synths' low pass filter and cutoff knob
-Play notes in different ranges in different cutoffs and try different waveforms
-Try making some bass patches
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Chapter 3.1 Amp envelope attack
-Determine synth's volume over time.
-Attack:begins when u press a key. How long it takes for sound to go from silenc
e to full volume.
Long attack good for pads. Short attack good for short plucks

Chapter 3.2 Amp envelope release

-Begins when you release a key
-Determine how long it takes for volume to go from current volume to 0 volume
-Good for attacks, ambients, and often in bass and leads too.
-0 release gives abrupt unnatural ending cutoff to a note which is undesireable
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Chapter 4.1 Doubling and Transposing
-By using 2 oscs at same time, you could mix them together and generate new soun
ds
-First, set mix knob which determines balance between osc1 and osc2
-If mix is set to 50, you hear half osc1, half osc2
-By playing osc1 at normal pitch with osc2's pitch altered, you can generate new
sounds
-Can't use any number for osc2 pitch be cause it can be dissonant
-several common ways: any#of octaves(12semitones), 1 fifth(7semitones), any#of o
ctaves+1 fifth
-When doubling and transposing oscillators waveforms should be the same.
-When reproducting a 2 osc sound, first set mix knob to 50, then make pitch the
same, look at
waveform, then figure out mix knob of oscs
-when reproducing 2 osc sound with wavetype, pulsewidth, mix, semitone control,
filter cutoff,
attack, release, volume, this is what to do:
look at amp envelope first,
then cutoff
then transposing of oscillators and mix knob
the volume etc
Just trust ears
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Chapter 5.1 Filter envelope
-Filter envelope is similar to the amp envelope which modulate synth's volue ove
r time
-Unlike amp envelope, Filter ENV modulates a synth's cutoff overtime
-An amp envelope ATK makes sound louder overtime
-A filter envelope ATK makes sound brighter overtime
-Know that the sound will never get darker than the cutoff knob setting
-Filter envelope amount knob determines the brightest your sound will ever get
-Therefore: Filter Cutoff=Minimum brightness
Filter Envelope Amount=Max brightness
-First set cutoff to match the beginning darkness of sample sound(how dark the s
ample sound begin with
-Then set filter Env amt knob to match the max amount the attack will raise the
cutoff(brightness) of sample
-By the way, if you bring the cutoff down, the brightness of filter envelope amo
unt will also go down which can be confusing
-this is because the filter env amt actually determines the distance between the
darkest and brightest part of your synth. Therefore,
if cutoff is lowered, the brightest part of the synth will darken along with it
even if you did not change the amount of filter env amt
-So, if you need to change cutoff, you probably need to change filter env amt al
ong with it so sound doesn't get too bright or dark
-Finally find out attack
Chapter 5.2 Filter envelope Attack
-You can make the filter envelope attack faster or slower
-You can create a very fat attack when you turn it to a very small value under 7
5 millisec
-A fat attack is a "horn attack" since it has the fat and roundness of a trumpet
-first set cutoff to match sample's starting/darkest point
-Then set envelope amount to match sample's brightest point
-Then set attack to match sample attack speed
-Lower cutoffs usually makes fatter horn attack
Chapter 5.3 Filter envelope release
-Starts when you release the key
-Determine how fast your sound will drop from current brightness(max brightness
which is filter env amt)
to cutoff knob's brightness(lowest darkness which is filter cutoff)
-Starts bright and darken overtime
-To replicate sample, first set cutoff to darkest/ending point
-then set env amt to the held/brightest point
-then set the release
Chapter 5.4 Filter envelope attack and release
-Set filter cutoff, filter env amount, filter atk, filter release all at same ti
me
-cutoff=set to minimum brightness at beginning and end(after release) of note
-envelope=how bright sound is allowed to be
-first set cutoff to match minimum bright part at beginning of sound
-Then set envelope amount to max brightest part which the attack will bring us t
o
-Finally set the attack and release
Chapter 5.5 Filter and amp envelopes
-filter envelope and amp envelope can be used together to create new sounds
-first listen to amp envelope and copy, then do that to filter envelope
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Chapter 6.1 Delay
-delay creates echos
-delay mix knob=determine balance between wet and dry signals
when turned to 0 it is 100%dry, 0%wet
when turned to 50 it's 50%dry, 0%wet
do not turn above 50 in most cases since that would make delay m
ore prominent than original dry signal
When mix is turned to 50, get reduction in volume which can be f
ixed by increasing main volume to make up for difference
create space(feel like in a big arena) around your sound acting
like a reverb, make sound bigger,go along with other sounds better. Can also use
to create rhythmic patterns
dry=unaltered signal(original notes played on keyboard)
wet=altered signal(delay)
Chapter 6.2 Delay time
-delay creates echos
-delay mix knob=determine balance between wet and dry signals
when turned to 0 it is 100%dry, 0%wet
when turned to 50 it's 50%dry, 0%wet
do not turn above 50 in most cases since that would make delay m
ore prominent than original dry signal
When mix is turned to 50, get reduction in volume which can be f
ixed by increasing main volume to make up for difference
create space(feel like in a big arena) around your sound acting
like a reverb, make sound bigger,go along with other sounds better. Can also use
to create rhythmic patterns
dry=unaltered signal(original notes played on keyboard)
wet=altered signal(delay)
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