Copyright: ® Creative Technology Ltd.


Help Contents
Contents

Getting Started

Acknowledgment

Creative Experiment #1

Sampling and Sound Design

Hardware

Software

SoundFont™ Design Tool

Vienna SF Studio™

Toolbar

Instruments

Samples

Decks

MIDI Keyboard Deck

Introduction

Sample Deck

Introduction

One sound becomes many and varied

About Modulation

Envelope Deck

Introduction

One-shot deal

Modulator Deck

Introduction

Modulator 1

Modulator 2

Miscellaneous Deck

Introduction

Dynamic Filtering

Tuning Samples

Effects Processing

Loop Deck

Introduction

Loop points

Making good loops

Recording Your Own Samples

Sample sourcing hardware


Acknowledgment

This help file is an adaptation from the original document: "Elements of Sound Design with Creative Labs AWE32 Sound Board" written by Ed Rudnick of E-mu Systems™

Vienna SF Studio™ and Sound Blaster AWE32 are trademarks of Creative Technology, Ltd. SoundFont™ is a trademark of E-mu Systems, Inc., 1993. E-mu is a registered trademark of E-Mu Systems, Inc. All other trademarks are owned by their respective owners and recognised as such.


Creative Experiment #1

Hello and welcome to Vienna SF Studio™, a powerful sound design tool for Creative Labs AWE32 Sound Board.  To begin, here's Creative Experiment #1:

Step #1:	Watch your favorite blockbuster movie or multimedia software with the sound way up. Note your reaction and the quality of your experience.
Step #2:	Now turn the sound off and watch it as a silent movie. Again, note your reaction and the quality of your experience (if any).
Step #3:	Turn the sound back up and close your eyes. Hmmmm.
This is why you can buy soundtrack albums for all the best movies. Have you ever seen rows and rows of 'sighttracks' in your local store? No way! It's the sound that makes the experience whole and adds impact.

With your Creative Labs AWE32 sound board and Vienna SF Studio™, you become the music and sound effects editor/producer for any multimedia application that supports the AWE32. Our tutorial will guide you through this entertaining and exciting process.

We assume you've correctly installed the AWE32 hardware and Vienna SF Studio™ software according to the reference manual provided, and are familiar with IBM PC™ and Microsoft Windows™ operation. You may need to refer to the reference section of the Vienna SF Studio™ owner's manual for a more detailed and exact description of step-by-step operation.


Sampling and Sound Design

Sampling (wavetable synthesis) is the most straightforward and accurate means of capturing, manipulating and reproducing individual sounds. FM synthesis requires you either to use someone else's sound set or to understand and operate what is perhaps the most roundabout way of creating sound shapes there is (by bending sine waves with other sine waves). Sampling works more simply: grab it - pitch shift it - filter it - envelope it - save it or play it.

Sampling Sound Design is the process of creating an audio experience by identifying and capturing basic sounds via a set of real-world recorded samples grouped according to purpose, then changing their pitch (frequency), spectral content (timbre or tone color) and amplitude (volume) according to a simple but powerful synthesis formula to produce musical or sound effects  'instruments'. These instruments are then played live or computer sequenced via MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) control to produce the desired sonic result.


Hardware

Sound Blaster AWE32  We call it "AWE Inspiring", because we have a predilection towards stupid name jokes. The AWE32 is capable of many multimedia tasks; we will focus here on its EMU8000 sound engine, which provides 32 channels of 16 bit sampled sounds generated from either ROM (General MIDI) or RAM (downloadable SoundFonts™). The combined sounds are available either at the speaker output or, for very high quality sound output, the S/PDIF digital output which can be connected to an appropriate conversion or recording device such as a DAT having a S/PDIF input.

Make sure the AWE32 is plugged into the correct slot in your PC and shows all the usual signs of having been installed correctly by a qualified person such as yourself. If you're in doubt, turn to the installation instructions in your AWE32 owner's manual. When all is right, return here.


Software

SoundFonts™   For viewing and printing of text, you use screen and printer fonts. For listening, you'll use SountFonts. Like a specially shaped character set, they fit neatly into a file and suit a particular sonic purpose. Vienna SF Studio™ and the AWE32 support a specific subset of the SoundFont™ format that includes a variety of modulation characteristics for added expressivity. As you work with Vienna SF Studio™, you'll treat samples as characters and reshape them into an audio alphabet that complements and significantly enhances your particular multimedia application.

Vienna SF Studio™ Bank Hierarchical Structure:


Vienna SF Studio™

Vienna SF Studio™ is constructed to quickly and accurately build SoundFont™ banks. Everything is right there in a few select decks, each of which contains a set of sound design tools. With these decks, you load instruments and samples, assign them to MIDI or screen key ranges and modify them in creative ways to produce new sounds and alter familiar ones. In fact, you'll find that Vienna SF Studio™ and the AWE32 make up kind of an 'audio erector set' (for those of you who remember that incredible toy of yesteryear).

1)	From Windows, open the Vienna SF Studio™ SoundFont™ Bank Editor

2)	A previously saved deck configuration may appear; if a given deck is already visible when we suggest opening it, clicking the button will make it disappear

3)	This tutorial assumes that only the Keyboard Deck is visible upon opening Vienna SF Studio™

Vienna SF Studio™ Help  Once you've loaded Vienna SF Studio™, you'll notice that almost everything you point to has a yellow help note popup (Balloon Help) near the mouse pointer and a description at the bottom (Help Bar) of the current Vienna SF Studio™ window. This is in addition to a very complete help document found under the Help menu at the top of Vienna SF Studio™'s window. Use help regularly along with this tutorial as an aid to understanding Vienna SF Studio™ specifics.


Toolbar

The toolbar is right below the menu bar. Left to right in groups, the tools allow you to...

The toolbar is described more completely in the reference section of your AWE32 owner's manual. Our tutorial is geared towards familiarizing you with the decks themselves and the basics of sound design.


Instruments

Instruments are collections of samples arranged horizontally across the keyboard (multisamples) and/or layered vertically on top of each other. Instruments are imported, copied, pasted and generally arranged within the bank by the instrument manager tool (trumpets icon on the toolbar). Each represents a playable sound entity with a personality all its own.

1)	From the FILE menu, OPEN the file 'vienna.sbk'. It should be in the directory named 'samples\sbk'

2)	In the toolbar, select the Instrument Manager icon (trumpets)

3)	Select the 'Melodic' radio button. Note the scrolling list of instruments available in 'vienna.sbk'

4)	Now select 'Percussive' and note that there aren't any percussive instruments in 'vienna.sbk'

5)	The most often used percussive banks are in the internal GM ROM sound set, so what you'll usually hear is the MIDI channel 10 drum kit

6)	Click 'DONE'

Melodic vs. Percussive Instruments - Creative Experiment #2:

Step 1:	Hit a drum (or other convenient object). Now hit something different. Walk around the room and smack everything in sight. Notice the multitude of sounds available, each distinct in its own way. These are potentially samples for percussion instruments.
Step 2:	Go find a real musical instrument and play a bunch of different notes (but don't hit it). Ah. How melodic.
For flexibility's sake, Vienna SF Studio™ can edit one percussive and one melodic instrument per SoundFont™ (.sbk) file. Percussive instruments have one sample per key only, which of course hints that there might be lots of samples per instrument. Melodic instruments have fewer samples each spread across a range of keys, thus allowing melodic (or harmonic: chords) pitch shifting.

You might think because of this that sound effects would fit the percussion key mapping style better, and in fact it's very useful to be able to play loads of sound effects from the keyboard at once with one sound effect per key. However, by placing sound effects across a wider key range, the power of the AWE32's ingenious pitch shifting algorithm becomes eminently clear: a rubbed wine glass can become everything from a macroresonant ion drive at the low end to a micromolecular disruptor at the high end; a rain sample can be played simultaneously across several notes, evolving from a trickle to a downpour.


Samples

Ram sound samples: .sbk files  We have supplied for the purpose of this tutorial a file named 'vienna.sbk' containing many instruments and samples which you will download into your AWE32.  This demonstration bank includes parts of several other regular SoundFont™ banks. Of course, capturing your own samples can open up a universe of sound for endless exploration (make sure you get back in time for dinner).

1)	In the toolbar, select the sample manager icon (wavelines)

2)	Select the 'User Sample' radio button. Note the list of samples available in 'vienna.sbk'

Rom sound samples  Naturally, also available at the click of the mouse button are all the musical samples inside the AWE32 General MIDI compatible sound ROM bank.

1)	If not already selected, click the Sample Manager icon (wavelines)

2)	Select the 'Internal (ROM) Samples' radio button. Review the scrollable list of general MIDI (GM) samples available in the AWE32

3)	Click 'DONE'


Decks

Vienna SF Studio™ has six design decks which are logical groupings of controls suited to a particular portion of the sound design process. Each deck has sliders and buttons for direct control of parameters and graphic windows to see what you're doing with all those buttons and sliders.


MIDI Keyboard Deck - Introduction
Introduction

Always at the top of the Vienna SF Studio™ Window, this deck mimics a MIDI controller in case you don't have one, although with it you'd have difficulty playing a Mozart Minuet or a Chopin Nocturne. It has 97 little keyboard keys (8 octaves at once, 11 octaves total!) and one selectable modulation controller.

1)	Using the instrument selection pulldown menu in the toolbar, find Instrument '009 - Piano/Strings' and select it. The down arrow in the circle means 'loading - please wait a bit'

2)	Use the left mouse button to play some keys

3)	Use the right mouse button to play and hold a few keys

4)	Point to and drag the main volume slider up and down

5)	Use either mouse button to clear a held key; double-click the left mouse button to clear all held keys

6)	Click the red reset button to the lower left of the Keyboard Deck

7)	Click the Percussion Instrument  button (drum) on the toolbar; note the melodic button gets deselected

8)	Hold down the left mouse key and scan across the keyboard

Of course if you have a MIDI keyboard, plug it in and use it. Refer to the section of the owner's manual on installing and running a MIDI device if necessary.

A note on keys For all you non-keyboardists (27 at last count), don't be intimidated by the fact that we use a keyboard to trigger samples. It is no weirder than a computer keyboard in its arrangement and works equally well for musical and effect types of sounds. Besides, MIDI events are notes, so we gotta use 'em.

The upper left scrolling window of the keyboard deck selects which of 8 simulated MIDI parameters you may want to adjust (Main Volume, Modulation, Pan, Expression, Sustain, Reverb, Chorus or Velocity) using the slider below it, but for the most part you can design a sound without using this. Just click the red reset button in the lower left to default these values.

External MIDI keyboards and sequencers send these kinds of controller messages embedded in their datastreams. Vienna SF Studio™ does not alter the way SoundFont™ banks handle this data. Depending on the particular bank design, instruments may or may not be affected by such controller activity.

The three little triangles above the keyboard denote root key (red), lowest key in range (white or black) and highest key in range (white or black). They move around in response to changes made below in the sample deck.

The root key  of any sample defines the key at which the sample would be at its original sampled pitch. If the root key is on or between the other two triangles you can hear this.  But if the root key is outside this range, even though it still defines the original pitch, you'll hear either nothing or some other sample. So pay attention! We don't want you to get lost.

In the upper right corner is a small squarish drumpad for playing percussive instruments. When you're on it you get a drumstick instead of a finger.


Sample Deck - Introduction
Introduction

You will always want to keep this deck in view. It lists all the samples in the current instrument in the scrolling window to the left and the key ranges for these samples on the right. Besides, if it's not selected you can't turn on the other decks below.

1)	Click the Sample Deck button (wiggly wave) on the toolbar

2)	Click the Melodic Instrument (2 notes) button

Important! All parameters visible on Vienna SF Studio™'s decks apply to the selected (highlighted) sample only. When you change a setting, you'll need to play a key within the defined key range for the selected sample in order to hear the change.

Since each instrument can have many multisamples and layers, you want to be sure what you're adjusting. Sample Solo is the means by which you know you're working with and understand changes made to a particular sample.

1)	Click the solo sample button (box with trumpet above it) in the far lower left of the Sample Deck

2)	Select any sample name; it and its key range become highlighted

3)	Play keys within and outside the sample's key range; note that you get silence when outside the key range

4)	Scroll through the list of samples and play with each one a bit

5)	Note the piano and strings are both multisampled horizontally and layered vertically with each other

Three buttons in the lower left allow you to Add, Remove or Replace a sample. When you add or replace a sample, the sample is loaded, along with previously saved root key and key range values which appear as triangles above the keyboard and as an H-beam in the sample deck.

If you delete or replace a sample prior to saving the bank, you've lost your carefully derived settings. As with any oops-I-didn't-save-my-file-changes situation, this can be frustrating.  Our recommendation is to check your instrumental work by playing across the entire key range, thereby checking all samples and their settings, prior to overwriting the file.

To make changes in key assignment,

1)	Make sure the sample is solo'd

2)	If desired, set the root key (original pitch) of a sample by clicking the middle pair of buttons (eighth note) at the bottom of the deck; listen how this affects the pitch of given notes within the sample's key range

3)	Stretch the sample across a key range by pointing to and dragging the endbars of its range H-beam in the highlighted area under the keyboard

4)	The finger will change to a double arrow to let you know you can do this

5)	Or, you can click the two sets of buttons in the lower right corner of this deck

6)	Watch the triangles in the keyboard deck move in response to this manipulation and observe the playable key range change


One sound becomes many and varied

Each sample is an individual sound recording playable by screen keys or other means.

1)	Using the Instrument selection pulldown menu, find '026 - Haunt Fonts' and select it

2)	The Sample Deck must be open and sample solo enabled

3)	Click the 'Thunder' sample; note that it's highlighted

4)	Using the key range H-beam, stretch the range of 'Thunder' from the top to the bottom of the keyboard

5)	Play keys across the entire keyboard range and listen closely

6)	Use right mouse button to latch several keys; click again to unlatch

You can go to extremes to make the original sound become something radically different than it was. The root key plays Thunder at its originally sampled pitch. Other keys within the defined range produce the same sound played back at a higher pitch (which also speeds it up) or lower pitch (which also slows it down). Multiple keys within the defined range create chords (if music) or cacophony (if sound effects) - both have their place in sound design. This is precisely how professional sound designers take thunder and make it into everything from a nuclear explosion to an alien pulse rifle. Or take other samples like swimming pool sounds and create everything from a fishbowl to an ocean. It's probably the most powerful aspect of sampled sound design: the stretching and multiplication of real world sound samples.

1)	Select 'Rain', stretch the key range and try the same thing

2)	Ditto with 'Frogs'


About Modulation

Because high quality samples eat memory like kids eat jellybeans, we have found ways to create interesting variations in sound by other means than throwing more samples at it.

Controlled modulation of synthesized sound originated in the early days of electronic music, when composers were experimenting with means of expressive control over inexpressive, flat and boring sounding oscillators. They discovered that by changing the amplitude (volume), frequency (pitch) and spectral content (filtering) of simple waveforms with a few simple modulation sources, that boring sounds became more interesting and that new dimensions of artistic possibilities opened up.

Related Topics:

Sources and destinations


Sources and destinations

Modulation of sound requires a source and a destination. In the AWE32, there are low frequency oscillators (LFOs) and envelopes (sometimes called ADSRs or DAHDSRs but never 'mailing envelopes') as modulation sources. Destinations are sample volume, sample playback pitch and filter cutoff frequency (mathnoid term: Fc) which is the coolest.


Envelope Deck - Introduction
Introduction

Everything acoustical, whether natural or manmade, has attack and decay characteristics. Hit something with a stick and you get a sharp, fast attack. Rub a wet finger on a wineglass rim and the attack builds very slowly. Bang an oven rack suspended from a string and hear a looooong release of sound. Clamp your hands on the oven rack while it's ringing and the release is damped short.

Electronic instruments have had to emulate these variable characteristics in a controllable and sensible fashion. When Robert Moog and Walter Carlos invented the voltage controlled synthesizer, they devised what are called 'envelope generators' (for enveloping the sound within a shape) or 'ADSRs' (for Attack Decay Sustain Release). These functions are so basic and useful that every synthesizer or sound board, no matter what its method of sound generation, has them. They only differ in detail.

1)	Click the 'Envelope Deck' button (mountain) on the toolbar

We at Creative Labs, not being satisfied with four ADSR parameters, have supplied you with not one but two full function DAHDSRs. Delay, Attack Hold, Decay, Sustain, Release. Each of these six variables has a particular purpose when creating the envelope that shapes the sound, and since there are two of them, you have the flexibility to push volume, pitch and/or filter cutoff frequency around in many different ways.


One-shot deal

Envelopes, DAHDSRs or whatever you want to call them, sit around waiting for you to press a real or virtual MIDI key or hit a drum pad. The instant* you do, they begin their travels through the path you or we have set for them.  As they do so, the AWE32 samples follow along.

Remember!  If you let go of a key, the envelope immediately jumps to the release phase from wherever it is.

D	Delay  *We lied. If delay > 0, the envelope waits awhile before it begins its attack. This is useful for lots of esoteric things but normally you'd just leave it at 0. At a value of 127 it waits 22 seconds.
A	Attack  A value of 0 is most percussive and fast. Use this to begin drum sounds or gunshots. As you increase the value, the envelope takes more time to go from off to full on, up to a maximum of about 6 seconds.
H	Hold  Once the attack phase is finished the envelope holds at full value for this settable amount of time, up to 8 seconds. then it begins to...
D	Decay  which means to slide down again over a period of time set by this control, up to a maximum of 24 seconds, to the value programmed by...
S	Sustain  This isn't a time value, it's a steady state level for as long as you continue to hold the key down. For percussive sounds this is set to 0. For organ type sounds, try 127. Anywhere in between is OK, just listen to how it responds and leave it where you like it. When you eventually let go of the key, the envelope proceeds to...
R	Release  From wherever it is to 0, once again taking the amount of time you've set with this slider, up to a maximum of 24 seconds.
The button in the lower left corner of this deck with the red rectangle above it is the Envelope Deck parameter reset button, which returns all 16 envelope parameters (both envelopes even though you can only see one at a time) to their default values.

The envelope function is so readily understood in graphic form that we couldn't resist displaying envelope shapes with - you guessed it - box handles at the crucial points which you can grab (finger changes to double arrows) and adjust directly to quickly create the shape you want. Or, for more precise settings, use the sliders. Each reflects values programmed by the other.

1)	In the toolbar, load the instrument '019 - Piano'; select a sample and solo it

2)	Select the 'Volume Envelope' radio button on the Envelope Deck

3)	Click the red 'reset' button; all values on both envelopes return to default

4)	Set the 'Delay' slider to about 20; watch the envelope shape change; play the piano and listen to the change (hold the key until it sounds)

5)	Return the 'Delay' slider to 0

6)	Set the 'Attack' slider to midrange;  watch the envelope shape change; play the piano and listen to the change in attack time

7)	Set the 'Sustain' slider to 0 and the 'Hold' slider to about 30; play and hold a key within the sample's range and listen to the change

8)	Click the red 'reset' button and then set the 'Decay' slider to about 15; play the sample and verify a new shape (percussive envelope)

9)	Set the 'Sustain' slider to about 80; play and hold a key; note that the sustain value is a level and not a time

10)	Set the 'Release' slider to 127; play long release piano notes

11)	Now adjust all six sliders to their midpoints and use the box handles in the graphic display to create different envelope shapes; play keys

12)	Observe in each case how the volume of the sound is shaped directly by the envelope

Way deep inside the AWE32, these envelopes go from 0 to +100%, so we've provided several two way level controls which take the shapes and send them to their destinations in varying amounts and in either direction (-127 to 0 to +127), which means you can make rightside up or upside down envelopes. These sliders are labeled:

Filt Env Amount	controlling the amount of the Filter/Pitch envelope sent to control the filter frequency, which is often used and
Pitch Env Amount	controlling the amount of the Filter/Pitch envelope sent to control the pitch at which the sample is played back, which is rarely used (but don't be afraid to try it!)
The Volume envelope is always set to +127 internally because a slider for this would be a duplication of the 'Volume' slider in the Miscellaneous deck.

1)	In the toolbar, load the instrument '013 - Brass & Strings'; scroll down to and select the sample 'BrassSectC3' and solo it

2)	Click the red 'reset' button on the envelope deck

3)	Select the 'Filter/Pitch Envelope' radio button on the Envelope Deck

4)	Play middle C (black square key) and listen carefully to pitch

5)	Set the 'Pitch Env Amount' slider to +127

6)	Play the same key again - note the envelope with sustain at full value makes the pitch rise about an octave

7)	Using the box handles or sliders, create an interestingly shaped envelope for practice

8)	Now play a key or two; experiment with different envelope settings

9)	Try 'Pitch Env Amount' set to -127

10)	This is the most obvious way to finely detect an envelope's shape, even if its musical usefulness is limited to drum and trumpet falls

11)	Click the red 'reset' button; all values on both envelopes return to default


Modulator Deck - Introduction
Introduction

These modulators are more specifically low frequency oscillators or LFOs (not UFOs). They are periodic in nature, which means they're always going up and down regularly as long as you hold a key*, even though they always start at 0 when you press a key. The 'low' in 'low frequency oscillator' means subaudible, from about 20 Hz down to around .1 Hz or once every 10 seconds. As such, its effect can be subliminal. Interestingly at around 7 Hz with a sine waveshape, it's commonly used to simulate vibrato in melodic musical instrument when routed to pitch (and maybe filter). At around 20 Hz, it will produce flutter and at .1 Hz it's good for broad, sweeping changes in pitch, filtering and/or volume. Everywhere in between those points there are possibilities for your own sound. The idea is to experiment by choosing any old source and hooking it to a destination and see what it does. That's it! No rules.

Well, actually if you want rules, they might be:

•	Overmodulation of pitch in a melodic instrument usually sounds corny. Exceptions: trombone glissandos and bagpipes.

•	Slight modulation of filters by envelopes can help melodic instruments sound more punchy (if not more real)

•	Modulation of both volume and filter cutoff frequency by key velocity (via external MIDI control) definitely adds playability and expressiveness

•	Flying saucer sounds use LFO routed to pitch at +/- 127

Mild Warning!   Because modulation changes things around, sometimes you might notice your sound warps in unpredictable ways or seems to disappear completely. This is a sign you need to turn everything off and walk away.

WAIT!!! Just Kidding. All you need to do is balance the initial setting of the parameter you've just modulated off base. Envelopes, for instance, start at 0 and go mostly up, so a pitch that always seems sharp when a key is held is probably a victim of sustain > 0; or a sound that seems to disappear into the mud may be the result of a filter's initial cutoff frequency having been lowered too far after radical filter modulation experiments.

1)	Click the 'Modulator Deck' button (sinewave) on the toolbar


Modulator 1

As the little button on the upper left of this deck shows, the LFO shape is a sine wave. The controls for Modulator 1 are:

Delay	oops...we lied again. Like envelopes, the modulators have a delay control that allows you to adjust how long the LFO waits (up to 22 seconds) before it begins its wiggle. This is most useful when programming realistic vibrato in musical instruments. You'll probably find other uses for it.
Frequency	Adjustable from about .1Hz (ten seconds) to about 10 Hz. For actual vibrato, set this to about 64. For sci-fi sounds, try faster or much slower. If you set this to 0, it's 'off'; 1 is the slowest frequency
Vibrato	This means 'pleasant slight wavering of pitch and timbre'. Use this control to add a small  amount of modulation to the pitch of the sample and you'll hear what we mean. Slam this slider to the stops and you're underneath planet Xenon (low frequency) or high above Olympus Mons in a starcruiser (high frequency).
1)	If not already done, in the toolbar load the instrument '013 - Brass & Strings'; scroll down to and select the sample 'BrassSectC3' and solo it

2)	Set the 'Delay' slider to about 25

3)	Set the 'Frequency' slider to about 64

4)	Set the 'Vibrato' slider to 3

5)	Play and hold a key within range; observe that there's a slight delay, then a small about of LFO modulation is applied to pitch (vibrato)

Wah Wah	This term was coined in the days of sixties electric guitars and means 'control of bandpass filter with guitar player foot pedal'. The sound is so pervasive that it's a handy description of what happens when you add modulation via this control. It does to the spectral content of your sound what vibrato does to its pitch.
1)	Click the red 'reset' button on this deck

2)	Set the 'Frequency' slider to about 35

3)	Set the 'Wah Wah' slider to about 64

4)	Play and hold a key within range; observe that there's an immediate wah wah effect as if a trumpet mute were being waved in front of the bell of the trumpet

Tremolo	Another term from the guitar and organ folks, this does to a sound's volume what vibrato and wah wah do to pitch and spectrum. Try this entertaining example:
1)	Click the red 'reset' button again

2)	Set the 'Frequency' slider all the way up to 127

3)	Set the 'Tremolo' slider to about 64

4)	Play and hold a key down towards the bottom of the key range (around G2)

5)	Try latching several adjacent keys with the right mouse button...

Whoops ! Now the trumpet sounds a lot more like a helicopter, or a whole fleet of  helicopters! See why the AWE32 is so powerful ? Just try this stuff using FM synthesis...


Modulator 2

Modulator 2 is a separate LFO but only controls vibrato. This means you can make complex pitch modulation, separate simple pitch and filter/volume modulation, either or neither.

The button in the lower left corner of this deck with the red rectangle above it is the Modulator Deck parameter reset button, which returns all eight modulator parameters to their default values, essentially 'off'.

Here are a few modulation experiments to try using 'Instrument 026-Haunt Fonts'. Try these without the benefit of our outlined tutorial steps to see how you're doing. You might be surprised. We wouldn't be.

•	Sheets of Rain: very slow LFO frequency (but not 0) routed to rain amplitude (tremolo) and filter cutoff frequency (wah wah)

•	Weird Guns: percussive volume envelope added to thunder volume, and similar filter/pitch envelope added to pitch (vibrato) and filter cutoff

•	Rolling thunder: slow attack and long release volume envelope added to thunder, play keys in low range


Miscellaneous Deck - Introduction
Introduction

Here are the fundamental initial value settings. You will use them frequently in sound design. They control the filter, sample pitch, effects amounts and pan position.

1)	Click the 'Miscellaneous Deck' button (3 sliders) in the toolbar


Dynamic Filtering

Filters in sound can have many uses. The filters in the AWE32 were designed to accurately reproduce a very special type of filter found in analog synthesizers of the 60's, 70's and 80's called a voltage controlled lowpass filter (VCF or VCLPF). Instead of a voltage we use digital control to do the same thing. And there's a separate filter for each of our 32 channels.

As you dynamically move the filter frequency using the filter envelope and/or a modulator, strange and wonderful things start happening to even the most mundane of samples. What's happening is that the complex harmonic structure of the sample is being directly modified in real time by the filter to reduce or emphasize certain frequencies. This can happen quickly or very slowly. There can be a smooth response or 'peaky' sounding resonance or anywhere in between.

Filter terminology is no better or worse than some computer hacker terms:

Filter Cutoff:	the point on the audio spectrum, measured in hertz or kilohertz, where the filter starts perceptibly reducing  audio energy. In a lowpass filter,  everything below this point stays pretty much the same and everything above gets increasingly attenuated
dB/oct:	decibels per octave, which  in our case means that for every doubling of frequency  (octave up) past the Filter Cutoff,  sound energy drops by a factor of 4.
Filter Q:	a bump  of adjustable height in the filter's response that sits right at the Filter Cutoff frequency and can actually make the frequencies there much louder. Also called 'resonance' or 'emphasis'.  When Q = 0, there's no bump at all.
Once you've experimented with filtering, you'll probably see why analog synthesizers became so popular...

Related Topics:

Filter Cutoff

Filter Q

Filters and spectral content


Filter Cutoff

Unlike fixed filters such as treble and bass controls where you can change the amount but not the frequency, each AWE32 sound channel has a fancy 2 pole 12dB/octave lowpass filter with adjustable frequency. This slider controls where the filter cutoff frequency sits before you start adding or subtracting envelope and modulator (LFO) signals, including externally generated MIDI control signals that may eventually be applied.

1)	Click the 'Add Sample' button in the Sample Deck

2)	Scroll down to and select 'BSawtoothWaveA3'; click 'OK'

3)	Solo the sample

4)	Set the 'Filter Cutoff' slider at various points and play keys all along the range. Pay close attention to the change in sound energy and the tone color or 'timbre' of the basic sawtooth wave

5)	Leave the slider at about 64

Unfiltered sawtooth wave

Filtered sawtooth wave

Incidentally there is a good deal of interaction - at least it will seem that way - between this control, the filter env amount control and certain envelope parameter settings (particularly sustain) and to a lesser degree the Wah Wah control and LFO settings. Technically, that's because the filter frequency tries to be the instantaneous sum of all these control inputs and can therefore wind up in seemingly unexpected places. For instance, if you program a filter envelope and turn it up with the Filt Env Amount slider, then play a key, it may seem like the filter is not sweeping. Why? Because the filter cutoff default setting is 127 and you can't go any higher than that. Moving the filter cutoff slider way down allows the positive going envelope to move the filter from a low cutoff to a higher one and that's when you hear it very clearly.


Filter Q

 Resonance. Emphasis. Peak. The sound you get when you're almost but not quite whistling. Leave this control at 0 and you get no peak, just a smooth dropoff at the Filter Cutoff frequency. Move it up and the peak gets taller. At the top, you get a sort of variable length pipe through which to push samples, and the length of the pipe can change really quickly with filter cutoff. Ahhh, sound design! It's so wacky. Make sure you let the kids play with this one.

1)	Set the 'Filter Q' slider to about 64

2)	Set the 'Filter Cutoff' slider at various points and play keys all along the range. Pay close attention to the peak in sound energy and the tone color or 'timbre' of the basic sawtooth wave

3)	Set the 'Filter Q' slider to 127; try more notes and 'Filter Cutoff' settings

4)	Leave both sliders at about 64

5)	Select the Modulator Deck

6)	Set 'Wah Wah' to around 64 and play some notes

7)	Set 'Frequency' to about 10 and play some more

8)	Click the red 'reset' button in the Modulator Deck

9)	Select the Envelope Deck and the 'Filter/Pitch' envelope

10)	Create an interestingly shaped envelope for practice

11)	Set 'Filt Env Amount' to about 64 and play some notes

12)	Set 'Filt Env Amount' to about -64 and play some notes

13)	Mess around

Sawtooth wave with low Q

Sawtooth wave with mid Q

Sawtooth wave with high Q


Filters and spectral content

These filters are great for removing what's there, but if there's not much harmonic or spectral energy there, and consequently not much to remove, the filter may seem like more of a volume control than anything else.


Tuning Samples

As is similarly the case with Filter Cutoff frequency and Volume, the final actual perceived pitch of a sample is the sum of several settings and control inputs: where the sample was originally placed (see Root Key), MIDI keyboard note number, MIDI modulation control inputs (if any), and the following three parameters.

Related Topics:

Coarse Tune

Fine Tune

Scale Tune


Coarse Tune

Adjusts the pitch (frequency) of the sample being played in one semitone increments up or down.

What's a semitone? Why, it's half a tone. Seriously, though, it's the smallest standard musical interval. It's the difference you hear when you play any two adjacent keys on the keyboard when using both white and black keys. Otherwise known as a 'minor second' in musical parlance, there are twelve such intervals per octave; that is, if you pick any key and then play twelve adjacent black and white keys up or down, you'll wind up hearing the same note when you finish as when you started, except that the frequency will be doubled (octave up) or halved (octave down).

1)	Click the red 'reset' button in the Envelope Deck

2)	Click the red 'reset' button in the Modulator Deck

3)	Select the Miscellaneous Deck

4)	Click the red 'reset' button in the  Miscellaneous Deck

5)	Play middle C (black square key); listen to pitch

6)	Click once to the right or left of 'Coarse Tune' slider knob within the slider outline; value should change plus or minus one for each click

7)	Play middle C again; hear semitone change in pitch up or down for each click

8)	Using the middle C key for each, try the following 'Coarse Tune' settings: +12, +24, +36, +48, +64; -12, -24, -36, -48, -64, -72

9)	Leave slider at 0

10)	Note that +48 and above suffer from 'aliasing' which produces weird sounds and incorrect pitch - this is normal and usually not a problem

Original waveform of a baritone sax

The original baritone sax waveform pitch shifted up by 24 semitones

The original baritone sax waveform pitch shifted down by 24 semitones


Fine Tune

If you thought a semitone was a small pitch change, wait 'til you try this one. Most people cannot even detect a one unit change in this control unless it's compared to another pitch of initially the same frequency. The unit of measure is the 'cent', meaning one hundredth of a semitone. A value of +99 gives almost a semitone up - if you need it to go all the way, you must set this one to 0 and move the coarse tune slider up a notch. The same is true for the lower limit of -99. Fine tune is exceedingly wonderful correctly applied. Use it to adjust out-of-tune musical samples or to create a honky tonk piano (or worse) from a regular piano by layering an in-tune sample with its out-of-tune companion. Curiously, layering and detuning does the same thing as chorus, except that it takes twice as many AWE32 channels to do it.

1)	Using middle C again, try various values of 'Fine Tune' starting at '1' and go up until you think you hear a pitch change; compare with a 0 setting


Scale Tune

Western music is based on twelve evenly spaced or 'equal tempered' semitone intervals per octave. Music from other parts of the world often follows different conventions with more or fewer intervals per octave. Scale tune lets you set either semitone or quarter tone (24 intervals per octave) keyboard response.

1)	Set 'Scale Tune' to 50

2)	Drag across the keyboard; note 'microtonal' tuning

3)	Reset 'Scale Tune' to 100

Non-keyboard instrument from all over the world often play intervals that are not evenly spaced, for reasons of acoustical physics. As a matter of fact, you can achieve these results with your AWE32 by judicious alignment of Coarse Tune, Fine Tune and Scale Tune across a number of multisamples.


Effects Processing

Reverb

Chorus

Pan

Volume


Reverb

Short for 'reverberation', meaning 'speak again' as if you didn't know that already. 'Wet' and 'dry' are such apt names for the extreme settings of this slider it's a wonder we didn't put them on the screen. Dry (no effect) is 0 and dripping wet is 127. Somewhere in between is what you'll usually use...we'd recommend something in the teens to single digit values to avoid reverbitis. It just sounds so good that it's hard to resist.

1)	Using any sound, try various values of reverb from 0 (dry) to 127 (wet); the default value of 7 is about right for most work


Chorus

The name comes, we suppose, from a chorus of voices; the effect is to harmonically richen a sound by creating a very  slightly out-of-tune version of the original sample and mixing the two together. The chorus slider has the effect of adding in more of the detuned version. Chorus works very well with harmonically rich samples such as the sawtooth.

1)	Set Reverb to 0

2)	Using 'BSawtoothWaveA3', try various values of the 'Chorus' slider

3)	Leave 'Chorus' slider at 0


Pan

Another ancient audio term, short for 'Panoramic' as in a wide screen landscape. This control, which defaults to center at 64, allows you to position each sample independently from 0 (full left) to 127 (full right). It's made to order for creating a mix of music and/or sound effects in which each sound has its own identity not just by virtue of its pitch and tone color but also by its apparent position between the left and right speakers.

1)	Make sure 'Reverb' and 'Chorus' are at 0

2)	Using any sound, try different settings of the 'Pan' slider

Reverb, Chorus and Pan sliders share a certain interaction which is noticeable when pan position is very far from center. This is because reverb and chorus take the dry mono signal and process it into a richer stereo version. Therefore, if you've set pan to either side, the dry signal will surely be present as you've indicated. But adding quantities of reverb or chorus will fill out the space between left and right which makes it seem like you've moved the pan control back towards center. Especially with reverb, this is virtually correct audio behavior.

1)	Set 'Pan' slider to 0 (full left)

2)	Set 'Reverb' or 'Chorus' slider to about 20

3)	Play keys

4)	Note apparent change in pan position


Volume

This may seem like it needs no explanation, but wait! Remember that a lot of what you do while adjusting other parameters, especially the filter, affects the final signal level. And there are usually differences between samples to be balanced while creating an instrument. This handy control is the solution to those problems. We won't attempt a lengthy treatise on balancing layered multisamples, but we will point out why the default setting is 110 and not 127: it's because you'll want to be able to both raise and lower sample volumes to achieve the desired result.  Avoid the temptation to bring all your volumes up! Start with the main volume (and Creative Mixer volume) set 'loud enough' and work your way both down and up with individual sample volumes. Also, if you do a lot of filter work, don't be surprised if you find yourself going back and forth between this and filter cutoff. That's why they're both on the same deck.

1)	Using any multisampled or layered sound (solo must be 'off'), experiment with balancing individual sample volumes

2)	Notice how the character of the sound changes simply by remixing sample volumes


Loop Deck - Introduction
Introduction

Way back in the early eighties when some friends of ours perfected digital sampling, the need for loops in sound samples became obvious. The first clue came when they tried to play a long note using a short sample. Adding a feature that allowed a section of the sampled wave to be played over and over again seamlessly turned out to be the solution to this problem. Later, loops were used to cleverly reduce the amount of memory required for sampling.

The AWE32 provides not only controls you will need to create loops, but also something our friends didn't have back then: graphic screen depiction of the actual sample for ease of loop editing. Lucky you!

When you select a sample and open the loop deck, you'll see the waveform displayed in all its wobbly grandeur.

1)	Click the 'Loop Deck' button in the toolbar

2)	Click the 'Add Sample' button in the Sample Deck

3)	Scroll down to and select the 'FretlessA2' sample; click 'OK'

4)	Solo the sample

5)	Point to an area of the waveform; the mouse pointer turns to a magnifier

6)	Use the left mouse button to zoom all the way in on the waveform in steps

7)	Use the right mouse button to zoom all the way out

When you zoom in far enough - 10 or 12 clicks - you'll see the individual sample points as blue dots and short lines. Zoom back out of this amazing microcosm of sound and you'll see the sound designer's most often encountered challenge: to find the best (or even one good) loop point within a sample. The challenge is multiplied times the number of good loops required to create a coherent multisampled instrument. If you're doing sound effects or Rap it's often somewhat easier, however.


Loop points

Fortuitously we have already (at no small cost of time and money) spent many thousands of design hours researching and creating Really Great Loops in every loopworthy GM bank instrument and in all the downloadable SoundFonts™. Those loops are called global loops. As always, we want you to be able to get creative, so we've put in a tool which allows you to add or subtract an offset from these global loops that result in local loops which only apply to the sample when it's played across its defined key range (highlighted under the screen keys in the sample deck) within a particular instrument.

When a sample is loaded, the local loop start and end points (green lines) are set to the global loop start and end points (red lines but you can't see them yet because they're hidden under the green ones). If you want, you can change the globals or the locals. Or both. And since the locals are offset from the globals, if you then move either of the globals their respective locals follow them around like lost puppies.

However if you change the global loop points, you are changing them for every place in the entire bank the sample is used (see Hierarchy).

1)	Play and hold middle C; listen to the sustained sound produced by the existing loop (this is a 'single cycle' loop)

2)	Use the mouse to zoom in between the two green lines near the end of the sample

3)	Position the mouse directly over the left green line (local loop start point) until the magnifier becomes a double arrow; click and drag the line to the left; notice the red line (global loop start point) appears

4)	Play and hold middle C; listen to the change in the sustained sound produced by the new local start loop point

5)	Repeat this process for the right green line (local loop end point)

Expect really weird sounds when you first try this.

You can use the buttons below the waveform display for super accurate loop editing. You may have to zoom in to see what you're doing and to allow the loop buttons full resolution.

1)	Drag the green local loop points back onto the red global loop points

2)	Use the two sets of local loop point buttons in the lower right to match the values for the global loop points at the lower left. The red lines disappear under the green ones (offset = 0,0)

3)	Play middle C to confirm everything is returned to normal

4)	Now offset one of the local loop points by one in either direction; notice the harsh buzz introduced by the now imperfect loop; hear also that a wider loop makes the pitch flatter and a narrower loop sharper

5)	Turn the 'Loop Enable' button (checkmark) near the lower right corner off

6)	Play middle C; note the very short sample that demands looping

7)	Turn 'Loop Enable' back on

Looping, if enabled by the checkbox in the lower right hand corner, and assuming that a key is pressed long enough for sample playback to reach that far, starts at one and only one of these samples, proceeds along until it encounters the one and only end loop point, then without stopping for a breath or a cup of coffee jumps back to the start loop point. Looping repeats this process as long as the key is held down. When the key is released, playback ignores the end loop point and blasts all the way through the tail end of the sample. That is, unless there are so few samples at the tail end that it would make a 'click' - 10 or so - in which case the looped portion is repeated during the release phase.

1)	Experiment with different samples and loop settings

2)	Note how tricky it is to get clean musical loops

3)	Note how easy it is to get interesting and odd loops


Making good loops

Percussion instruments in general don't use loops, so we'll focus on loops in melodic and effects instruments.

Melodic instruments like trumpet, flute and other wind instruments and to some degree piano, guitar and other stringed instruments use relatively short loops that begin sometime after the natural sampled attack and the natural initial decay that are part of the sample have elapsed and a steadier portion of the waveform is encountered. In other words, you are more likely to find a seamless set of loop points after all the excitement of the attack has died down. In many cases, we use a single cycle of the waveform as the loop. That's a tiny loop but sometimes necessary because even two cycles, unless they happen to be absolutely identical, can produce weird harmonics. Sounds with more complexity, such as piano, often present an even greater challenge because they contain two or three separate vibrating sound sources (like 2 or 3 strings per piano key) which must be looped absolutely perfectly.

But it's still worlds easier than programming for FM synthesis.

Hint:   Take advantage of the hard work we've done on musical instruments and focus your initial sound design effort on sound effects, many of which don't need to be looped at all since they are percussive in nature (BANG - BOOM - POW - ZAP - CRUNCH - DRIP - SPLAT). Although some SFX benefit greatly from looping: rain is a great example of a loop that is the same size as the sample; it just repeats over and over. Talk about wet...

Take a look at, listen to and adjust for your own loopification a few of the loop points we've set in 'vienna.sbk':

Instrument	Samples	Notes
012 Brass & Strings	BrassSect...	single cycle loop at end
012 Brass & Strings	Strings...	long loop after attack
014 Train	train	loop entire sample
026 Haunt Fonts	Bird Screech	loop disabled
016 Crazy Piano	KPiano...	medium loop after initial decay
One of the great moments in a sound designer's career is right near the beginning when she or he discovers the power of good looping. Take a few minutes now to scramble the local loop points on some of these sounds and discover for yourself how much fun this can be.


Sample sourcing hardware

Almost anything will do for experimental  purposes, but why short change yourself even at the start ? Use a CD player or, if you're really cool, a DAT (Digital Audio Tape) recorder to grab chunks of the best sounding source material. The sound chain is only as good as its weakest link. Speaking of which, resist the temptation to use cheap audio cables and connectors for your setup. Believe us when we say "you'll be sorry later if you do".

If you are using your own recorded source material and especially if you use a DAT or other precision method of capturing live acoustic samples, you will soon discover that your microphones may actually the weakest link in that whole chain; speakers/headphones are the other. Visit your local music store and check out both dynamic and condenser microphones.

Condenser mics are generally better for musical ensemble recording because of their flat audio response; dynamic mics are frequently used for solo work. About $100 will get you a decent stereo condenser mic; that's the minimum we'd recommend.

If you're really shooting for the moon, expect to spend $500 or more on 1 stereo or 2 mono professional quality condenser mics. And don't forget that pro condenser mics need a +48 volt 'phantom' power supply.

For field recording of sound effects, less expensive dynamic microphones often can handle the job because they're rugged, need no power supply and can generally take more sound pressure levels without distorting than condenser mics.