KVR Audio

cobalt1 · Post by **cobalt1** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 1:47 am

Does anyone have any tips or tricks for creating some interesting sounding pads or textures; preferably from samples? just starting to experiment with ambient music and could use some technical insight.

SARcazm · Post by **SARcazm** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 7:52 am

there's a few good youtube vids on sound design using Live and simpler/sampler. this guy is good: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnZe_OubmuI

also, using very gentle amounts of a noise LFO on pitch/cutoff/res works well for creating shifting sounds and textures.

tranel · Post by **tranel** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 8:18 am

cobalt1 wrote:Does anyone have any tips or tricks for creating some interesting sounding pads or textures; preferably from samples? just starting to experiment with ambient music and could use some technical insight.

Hmm.... my advice would be to use a synth / sampler with tons of modulation options. LFOs, loopable envelopes, aftertouch/velocity/key position (etc...) controlling pitch, cutoff, resonance and other things while just play makes for pads that sound very organic and alive. If you add all the modulation afterwards, it will sound more controlled / stiff.

As an example, my song Earth from Space is based on a constantly undulating pad sound with noise bleeps, filter sweeps, sine-wavy arpeggios weaving in and out of the music. This is one sound only, and it just kept modulating itself as I was playing, I didn't myself record any modulation afterwards. Make full use of LFO etc as said above, and remember that LFOs can control other LFOs, with the results particularly interesting if you use a Random LFO waveform.

Anyway hope it helps. You can listen to Earth in Space on the link below to get a clearer idea of what I mean.

tranel · Post by **tranel** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 9:30 am

Oh, and one more thing—don't be afraid to use unusual sound sources! If you have a handheld recorder, there is a universe of sound and inspiration around you. I discovered a while back that the ***weeeeeee*** from an electric toothbrush is an excellent—if somewhat buzzing and nasal-sounding—substitute for a bogstandard saw wave. Experiment!

mcnoone · Post by **mcnoone** » Wed Mar 18, 2009 9:41 am

You can also try listening to alot of music that uses pads and ambient sounds. I for one like to create the pads and textures of artists like Patrick O'Hearn or Suzanne Ciani. They design their own sounds too. Many movie soundtracks have good pad sounds too.
Good Luck

Mike

cobalt1 · Post by **cobalt1** » Thu Mar 19, 2009 7:57 am

SARcazm wrote:there's a few good youtube vids on sound design using Live and simpler/sampler. this guy is good: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnZe_OubmuI

also, using very gentle amounts of a noise LFO on pitch/cutoff/res works well for creating shifting sounds and textures.

Yes I think for the most part Its lack of LFO usage that has got me scratching my head; I need to get my hands on a good multi sampler though; cant say I like ableton's simpler too much; im sure the sampler in ableton is better though. Will post my results once I make a pad sequence I am happy with'

tranel · Post by **tranel** » Thu Mar 19, 2009 8:37 am

cobalt1 wrote:
SARcazm wrote:there's a few good youtube vids on sound design using Live and simpler/sampler. this guy is good: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnZe_OubmuI

also, using very gentle amounts of a noise LFO on pitch/cutoff/res works well for creating shifting sounds and textures.
Yes I think for the most part Its lack of LFO usage that has got me scratching my head; I need to get my hands on a good multi sampler though; cant say I like ableton's simpler too much; im sure the sampler in ableton is better though. Will post my results once I make a pad sequence I am happy with'

Sampler is really, really cool and if you use it within an Audio Rack (you can map "knobs" to multiple destinations at once) you're flying.

cobalt1 · Post by **cobalt1** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 7:02 am

tranel wrote:Oh, and one more thing—don't be afraid to use unusual sound sources! If you have a handheld recorder, there is a universe of sound and inspiration around you. I discovered a while back that the ***weeeeeee*** from an electric toothbrush is an excellent—if somewhat buzzing and nasal-sounding—substitute for a bogstandard saw wave. Experiment!

no Idea why I didnt respond to your earlier posts; I guess I thought I did.

Im all about recording various sound sources using my shotgun mic; my H2 and even a piezo mic. The issue im having is not so much not having the right tools are not being aware of the concepts or methodology. I have a somewhat strange fascination with pads and want to be able to try different approaches to producing them.

Few things Ive noted are:

1. There seems to be a threshold where a pad somehow stops behaving as an ambient/background sound and takes on the role of a lead; the more gradual the progression between the two points (background --> lead) the greater the effect.

2. Subtle nuances in the pads texture add a more natural analog feel to the sound while upholding the pads timbrel qualities.

3. Combining pads seldom leads to a good overall sound; and great attention must then be given to eq'ing

JediMind · Post by **JediMind** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 7:24 am

Slow envelopes, a lot of filtering (HP, LP, BP, your choice, experiment), reverb, and, very important, layers. You can layer 3 different pads covering 3 different frequency ranges and then top it off with a small arpeggiating icy bell.

MadGonzo · Post by **MadGonzo** » Sat Mar 21, 2009 9:32 pm

cobalt1 wrote:Does anyone have any tips or tricks for creating some interesting sounding pads or textures; preferably from samples? just starting to experiment with ambient music and could use some technical insight.

samples, i dont know, i wouldnt

um ambient eh
thats the easiest kind to make

waveform -> optional slight unison detune -> sustain, long decay ADSR + poly (at least 2) ->
chorus i suppose ->
phaser can make the low end fade, but its also going to help with stereo sep ->

now, pick the most spacey or lushy verb you have (because most modular synths wont have the best reverb anyways) and max the decay
or just find a good preset and THEN max the decay

make sure either to lower dry and increase wet or have high dry and extra low wet
mixing both is never a good idea

pads usually arent straightforward if you want to make it stand out in a song
the most common or simple thing you can do is to modulate PWM to the waveform
simply putting a LFO or some kind of envelope on it, while experimenting carefully on the top and bottom min/max values
so that ie. the effect youre creating goes along with the attack on the amp volume

also polyphony = 2 is good for 2 chorded situations, so you shouldnt disregard that value entirely, it does change the sound alot!

portamento is very cool sometimes
heres an example of why:
http://commandante.fwsnet.net/padelicious.mp3

btw my pad has distortion/drive also,
to achieve that use lowpass filter and set it to around 0.5-2khz
increase resonance, experiment with keyboardtracking
and the strength of the distortion

dark_virus · Post by **dark_virus** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 3:11 pm

MadGonzo wrote: thats the easiest kind to make...

Nice tips!

loachm · Post by **loachm** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 3:33 pm

...you can create pads and drones very easy using samples with the Grainstates ensemble in Reaktor, or in Absynth and probably with Absynth's new rival Alchemy...

...you can also do very interesting things using samples with these tools...

http://www.timefreezer.net/index.html

http://photosounder.com/

mojogigolo · Post by **mojogigolo** » Mon Mar 23, 2009 3:38 pm

the guy above is right - get reaktor, or some sort (any sort) of granular sampler/ synth if you want ambient sounds from samples. comb filters can be good too.

himalaya · Post by **himalaya** » Tue Mar 24, 2009 1:29 am

cobalt1 wrote:Does anyone have any tips or tricks for creating some interesting sounding pads or textures; preferably from samples

In the past, I used to get some very interesting pads and ambient textures by sampling any synth pad chord/chord sequence and transposing the sample.

If it's done with the right combination of chorus/phase/flange + delay + reverb, the resulting sound takes on a completely new and otherworldly character. The key here is how well the particular sampler handles transposition. In my case I used to use an Emu sampler and the sound was always top notch. (Emu were known for very good sample transposition).

You don't have to even sample a pad chord or chord sequences. I remember I got a beautiful ambient texture by sampling and transposing a piano melody with lots of delay and reverb. It became a bouncing, cascading glass-like texture.

I remember really liking the character of the transposed reverb. There was this one particular sound, where the reverb took on a very granular-like effect. Who needs modular synths like Reactor.

Nowdays, the same could be easily achieved in any DAW. Just render a standard synth pad chord progression with lots of effects then transpose it down an octave or two, or use a specialist pitch-shifting process/plugin.

Creating ambient textures and pads