magazine - The FLipside Forum

Pilot Issue

magazine

FL Insight Magazine | November 2009 www.theflipsideforum.com | www.flstudio.comwww.theflipsideforum.com | www.flstudio.comwww.theflipsideforum.com | www.flstudio.com

Articles and Content

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Featured Extras:Not one but TWO DnB albums put together by our very own Rachel. Download them here:

All tracks were written by SpeaK over at the FLipside Forum. Check out their website for more information: http://speakmusic.net

Also included in this issue are links to various projects and assorted samples. All demo projects are to be used for educational purposes only.

magazine

http://www.theflipsideforum.com/FLMagazine/YourChoicebySpeaKmixedlivebyRachel.mp3http://www.theflipsideforum.com/FLMagazine/SpeaKAlbum2mixedlivebyRachel.mp3

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photo by Matt Brown

Startup GuidesSoundcards and Drivers

Hot TopicsLanes aren’t just for Bowling Anymore

Featured ColumnFL Studio on Ubuntu Linux

Guest ColumnDJ’ing, Past, Present, The Future is in Your Hands

TutorialsFLHowTo: Let’s Make Some Noise - Intro tutorial for the new FL Studio userFLHowTo: Removing ambient background noisesFLHowTo: Leveling With Fruity Peak Controller Loop SyncingFLHowTo: Tips & Tricks - Piano Roll

Hardware ReviewAlphaTrack from Frontier Design

Credits


Make FL Studio Work For YouEditor’s Note

FL Studio has been a mainstay for many aspiring and professional

musicians, not to mention the occasional dabbler in audio arts. With the ever-growing popularity of low-cost audio production software, FL Studio has fought its way to the top by providing some of the best and easiest methods for the creation process. It has an environment which provides multiple methods for achieving versatile results and has one of the most intuitive GUIs of any sequencer.

Ease-of-use has always been a factor in how FL was created. Even so, we always have questions about how to perform specific tasks, and aside from the Help file (F1 for those of you in the know) there are forums dedicated to the use of FL Studio and its counterparts. Most notably is the official forum over at

www.flstudio.comwhere you can interact with the actual developers of FL Studio and chum around with any number of users around the world. Other notable forums include:

www.theflipsideforum.comwww.warbeats.com

You can get loads of help from a

tightly-knit community of musicians, programmers and artists from around the globe. If you haven’t already taken the time to visit one of these forums, check them out. You may be surprised at what you find.

For the users that love to read up on the subjects of music and audio sequencing, there are a few magazines out there that cover a lot of ground. As a user of FL Studio, I was always disappointed with the lack of coverage on my favorite piece of software. There never seems to be a lot discussed about the program even though it is one of the most popular sequencers on the market. A member over at The FLipside posed the question asking about the existence of a magazine dedicated to FL Studio. Well what do you know…that spawned a lot of conversation about the possibility of producing one, and with JMC’s consent (the big guy over at Image-Line), this magazine was born!

The magazine came about as a way to provide a much more in-depth look at FL Studio and explore the many facets of audio production

using this software. This Pilot issue is meant to give you, the FL enthusiast a taste of the possible future of insight into using FL Studio. We have a great team of authors writing articles on various subjects and hope that your experience in reading this issue will either teach you a few things about FL, or simply spark your interest in reading more about FL Studio. After all, we’ll need your help to make this magazine successful. See, the magazine won’t just be about FL Studio, but also about YOU, the user. You’ll get the chance to have your voice heard and pitch in anything that you think will help!

Questions? Comments? Have ideas? Want to write for the magazine? Let us know! Email us at:

[email protected]

and tell us what you think. We would love to hear from you!

We hope that you enjoy this issue and look forward to any feedback! Here’s to the future of FL Insight!

Enjoy!

- DB

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Questions about soundcards are often asked on FL Studio

forums. With a never-ending flow of new computer musicians discovering FL Studio there will always be a need to explain what soundcards are all about. Here we’ll answer some of the most common questions asked.

THE BASICS

How important is a soundcard?

Aside from your PC and software of choice the next most important piece of hardware is a soundcard. For those who are not sure exactly what a soundcard is, this quote from the FL manual explains it in detail:

“The term ‘soundcard’ is used rather loosely. You may have a soundcard in your PC, a microchip on your motherboard or it may be an external device connected by USB/FireWire/Bluetooth, etc. The soundcard is the device that makes the sound you hear from your PC speakers.”

Soundcards are also referred to as audio interfaces and sound-devices. The average user will probably be starting out with onboard sound built into the PC or motherboard (most often built into pre-built computers that can be purchased at electronics stores). The more experienced user will most likely already have a professional or high-end soundcard installed.

What is a driver?

A driver provides communication between the soundcard and

the software. There are two types of sound drivers for Windows: Directsound (sometimes called the Wave driver), and ASIO.

Directsound is a component of Microsoft’s DirectX that allows a stereo (two channel) signal to pass in and out of a PC and the software that supports it.

ASIO stands for Audio Stream Input / Output. This allows multiple channels of audio to pass in and out of your PC and the software installed that supports it.

The onboard sound is basically a soundcard built into the motherboard of a PC and most of the time it is a Directsound only device. You can use a Directsound driver for playback in FL Studio but latency (delay introduced into the signal when routing through software) will be higher than with ASIO. *FL Studio cannot record with a Directsound driver.

If you want to get low latency performance or if you want to record in FL Studio you will need to use an ASIO driver. To help those with onboard sound devices get around this limitation there is the asio4all driver, which is an optional part of the FL Studio installer. The asio4all driver will allow FL Studio

to recognize the inputs and outputs of a Directsound device as an ASIO device so that you can record and route them as needed. Keep in mind it does

not work for every soundcard but

should work for most. Although it allows

recording and possibly lower

latency playback it may also use more

CPU so you may get the best results by switching back to the Directsound driver when you’re not recording. If you have a

professional soundcard with its own ASIO drivers then you do not need the asio4all driver.

What should I look for in a soundcard?

What soundcard you need will depend on what you plan to do with your Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). Setting brand preferences aside, the first thing to consider is how many inputs and outputs you’ll need. Analog connections are for connecting hardware, instruments and microphones and are either XLR (3 pin for mics and direct signals), 1/4” mono (for instruments and line levels) or combo jacks which accept either cable type. There are also digital connections for connecting digital gear in the form of ADAT and SPDIF. ADAT, also called Lightpipe, uses a fiber-optic cable to transmit 8 channels of digital audio between devices. SPDIF may use the same fiber-optic cable, or a special 75ohm RCA cable, to transmit 2 channels of digital audio between devices.

Soundcards and DriversStartup Guides


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If you only plan to record one mic or instrument at a time and connect some monitors then you should be set with a simple 1 or 2 input model with line outs for monitors and headphones. If you want to record multiple tracks simultaneously, or keep some hardware connected without having to unplug and switch things, then a model with lots of inputs and 2 or more pairs of outputs will be needed. If you don’t need to connect hardware, instruments or microphones then you can simply use your onboard sound and the asio4all driver if needed.

The second consideration is the connection format. PCI and PCIe soundcards install directly onto the motherboard of a desktop PC; many have an external box with connections and controls. Firewire and USB soundcards connect to the respective ports on a PC and will be the choice for most laptop users. Between Firewire and USB I’ve seen more people having trouble with USB than Firewire. This is likely due to USB ports having to share the bandwidth of a hub in combination with most people having several USB devices connected sharing that bandwidth. Each Firewire port has full bandwidth to use without interfering with other ports on the PC. If you do have, or plan to get a USB soundcard then try to be sure it’s the only device on the hub by checking the hardware manager in Windows.

The third thing to consider is the physical format. There are internal cards, small desktop boxes, rack-mounts, and desktop mixer style soundcards to choose from. Before deciding, consider how often you’ll need to connect and disconnect gear. Many models, especially rack-mount, have

all the connections on the back where they are difficult to get to. Mixer style models have the benefit of hands on control of faders and many can also be used as a MIDI controller.

TROUBLESHOOTING

Why am I hearing clicks and pops?

There are several possible reasons that can cause audio glitching. If you have the latency set low on a CPU intensive project it can cause this to happen. Try raising the latency / buffer setting in the audio options dialog window of FL Studio (press F10 and click on the Audio button on the left). The amount of processing power being used by the project can also cause problems. Raising the latency may help this, as well as enabling the smart disable option for plugins in FL Studio and rendering any VST tracks to audio. One last thing to consider is disabling effects that do not receive any audio from the host. FL Studio has a feature called Smart Disable which turns off effects that are not processing any audio. This can be found under the Tools menu (Tools > Macros > Switch smart disable for all plugins).

Other hardware on your system can interfere with audio performance. If the latency

setting or CPU saving tips do not help, you may want to check for a problematic device. There is a great app, DPC Latency Checker just for this. Check out this web page for more information: http://www.thesycon.de/deu/latency_check.shtml

Why can’t I hear my mic or instrument?

First, you need to be sure you’re using an ASIO driver, either the one installed for your soundcard or asio4all. Next, select a mixer track and click on the window labeled IN, just above the effects slots. You’ll see a list of inputs available on your machine. Select the appropriate one and you should now hear the mic or instrument. If you have no inputs available in the list then either you do not have an ASIO driver selected in the audio options, or you may need to reinstall the driver and try again.

-brstma

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Lanes Aren’t Just For Bowling AnymoreA mini-review of the new Playlist in FL Studio 9

Hot Topics: Lanes

Lanes Aren’t Just For Bowling AnymoreA mini-review of the new Playlist in FL Studio 9

Hot Topics: Lanes

Lane-based tracking has been one of the many ‘buzzword’

phrases to hit FL Studio in recent years and much has been debated on the topic. This has led to an addition of many features in the Playlist, changing what was originally used as an environment in which basic patterns were built into a full length song. Where the term lane suggests a restriction in how content could be managed, FL Studio 9 breaks away from the mold and provides a much more flexible way of building tracks.

On first installation of FL Studio 9, the Upper Playlist window provides the user with the ability to lay out audio clips, pattern clips, and automation clips virtually anywhere that is desired. This is nothing new to FL Studio, but a couple of new features in FL 9 prove to add a great amount of flexibility, least of which is the option to mute an entire track with the click of a button. The Playlist also includes the new Mute tool where the user can

mute individual clips! This is sure to be a great hit with the FL Studio community!

As you compose and tracks are laid out, you may want to mute specific tracks for one reason or another. To the left of each track, where the track is named, there is a little green light that acts as a button for muting the track. Left-clicking this will mute the sound for that track while right-clicking causes the track to ‘solo’ while all other tracks become muted. Couple this with the ability to mute individual clips in the playlist window (mute icon in the menu bar) and you now have full control over what plays and what does not.

There are so many ways to manage the flow of your project and keep things organized. You can now title and color a track much the same way that you could in the lower (original) playlist window. Take for instance a track where you want all your clean vocals in one track and any processed vocals in another.

Label two tracks accordingly (hold down the ‘shift’ key while left-clicking the track name) and lay out the patterns as desired. You can even assign an icon to the track for ease of recognition (just like the Mixer). This proves to take a bit of the hassle out of the mundane task of keeping your tracks in line.

The Playlist has come of age in so many ways since FL Studio’s early days. Image-Line has done a great job of adding more and more options without sacrificing features that many users are accustomed to. I for one have grown to appreciate the Playlist in all its present glory and think that it offers great flexibility to the process of audio production.

-SC

Did You Know? - submitted by SingingCrane and Flat

If you want to quickly copy a pattern/individual channel with all its note properties (i.e. channel volume, note panning) simply choose that pattern in the Playlist and hit Shift+Ctrl+C (Clone). In the Playlist, select every pattern in multiple tracks by using the Select tool and left-click-and-drag across multiple track names. This will select all of the patterns in those tracks for the entire length of the song. This is very handy when needing to move patterns throughout an entire track.

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Featured Column

FL Studio 9 on Ubuntu Linux Featured Column

FL Studio 9 on Ubuntu Linux (yes, it can be done)

Ever wondered what it would be like to run FL Studio on a

Linux machine? With Linux gaining massive growth in popularity over the recent years, the increased need for porting programs and applications to this operating system is hardly surprising. So far open source advocates had to rely on alternative programs like LMMS (Linux MultiMedia Studio, an FL Studio lookalike) for desktop music production. This, however, has only been a stopgap measure for those wishing to work with the flagship Image Line product on their favourite Linux distribution. This article will guide you through setup and basic configuration of FL Studio 9 on the most popular Linux OS, Ubuntu 9.04. Without further ado, let’s get started!

PrerequisitesIn order to execute FL Studio in Ubuntu you will need to download Wine application, wine-gecko (a Mozilla engine needed to display HTML pages correctly, i.e. the program’s About... page) and cabextract. (used for extracting Microsoft cabinet files) Copy the following Wine repositories one by one and install them via the command line (Applications/Accessories/Terminal):

wget -q http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/387EE263.gpg -O- | sudo apt-key add -

sudo wget http://wine.budgetdedicated.com/apt/sources.list.d/jaunty.list -O /etc/apt/sources.list.d/winehq.list

sudo apt-get update

sudo apt-get install wine wine-gecko cabextract

This will install the latest Wine on your system. (version 1.1.29 at the time of writing)

Audio and Wine configuration To configure audio settings in Wine go to: Applications/Wine/Configure Wine and select the ALSA audio driver under Audio tab. Make sure Hardware Acceleration drop down box is set to Full. If you’d rather use Jack sound server (good for low latency, but requires a separate Jack installation and a start of the server before each Wine session) you can also select it there.

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Featured Column


FL Studio 9 on Ubuntu Linux

The sound files that come with FL Studio are compressed with an OGG Vorbis codec, which needs to be enabled in Wine. You can either go to your /home/user/.wine/drive_c/windows directory and edit system.ini file manually by adding the line MSACM.vorbis=vorbis.acm under drivers 32 section or execute the following command in Terminal:

sed -i ‘s/\[drivers32\]/\[drivers32\]\nMSACM.vorbis=vorbis.acm/’ ~/.wine/drive_c/windows/system.ini

For some FL Studio plugins such as DrumSynth, Wasp or Wasp XT to work properly you will also need to copy the mfc42.dll file from your Windows installation (found

in Windows/System32) to /home/user/ .wine/dr ive_c/windows/system32.

A quick script that will download and install various redistributable runtime libraries for you (instead of the above) is available through winetricks. Open your Terminal and execute the following one by one:

cd /tmp

wget http://winezeug.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/winetricks

chmod +x ./winetricks

./winetricks mfc42 gdiplus vb6run riched20

To enable FPC downloads create a new text file, copy the text below and save the file with a .reg extension in your Desktop directory, i.e. FPC.reg:

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings]

@=””

“ProxyEnable”=dword:00000000

To import FPC.reg into the registry press: ALT + F2 and type: regedit

FL Studio 9 installation

Once you are done with the basic setup of the required components, it is time to install FL Studio. Right click the executable file (flstudio_9.0.exe, available for download from one of Image Line’s hosting services, i.e. tucows.com) and select Open With Wine Windows Program Loader. During the installation process an error will pop up: “Cannot read access control list. Error code: 1400”, simply ignore it by clicking OK a couple of times, it will not affect the installation.

Once installed, import your FL Studio registration code FLRegkey.Reg into the registry.

To import a reg file press: ALT + F2 and type: regedit

The FL Studio setup wizard will guide you through the installation process.

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Featured Column


FL Studio 9 on Ubuntu Linux

As the final step in your configuration you can enable font smoothing in Wine. Execute the following two commands in Terminal and choose “Subpixel smoothing RGB”:

wget http://files.polosatus.ru/winefontssmoothing_en.sh

bash winefontssmoothing_en.sh

Conclusion

While there are still minor issues with running FL Studio in Wine, on the whole, it is a satisfactory experience. Long gone are the days when you had to rely solely on your Windows box in order to quickly jot down your music ideas. True, nowadays there is a wider choice of open source

music applications than ever, but none of them are as versatile as FL Studio. The next article in this series will discuss optimizing FL Studio performance on Ubuntu. Until then, happy FLooping!

- Flat

Screenshots

GNOME 2.26.1

Fluxbox 1.1.1

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DJ’ing: Past, Present, The Future is in Your Hands

Guest Column


Guest ColumnDJ’ing: Past, Present, The Future is in Your Hands

Guest Column


Guest Column

Many years ago DJ’ing was considered an art form within

itself, people would practice for hours each day to perfect their beat matching abilities through pitch control, their ability to control the turntables to keep tracks in sync, scratching and various other techniques - such as using two copies of the same track and pitch shifting one up and down to create a phased effect; learning how to use and practicing the use of EQ’s and faders to further hone their mixing technique. Things have become a lot easier since those times with the introduction of software based DJ’ing.

Back in the early 1990’s you would have typically arrived at a venue carrying some rather heavy flight cases or record bags containing your vinyl’s for the night ahead. The problem back then with the weight of all the vinyl meant it was not really feasible to take your entire collection with you; that is unless you were a resident DJ and was allowed somewhere at the venue to store your equipment. This then itself brought in another aspect of DJ’ing, knowing your music, knowing your crowd and knowing what to take and what to leave behind. If you were only playing for a couple of hours, what set were you playing? Warm up set, Main set, Closing set? Again this could have an effect on your selection, a DJ playing a main set

would probably not have been too happy if the warm up DJ had played out a whole stream of the latest promo’s and big tunes so early in the night, although this did and does still happen.

A few years later CD mixers started to appear as a tool for DJ’s. Whilst still requiring similar technique to use, it did make a DJ’s life that much easier. With the introduction of assignable cue points a DJ could set a start point for a track, prepare the track and with the press of a button be taken back to their cue point. Another asset to using CD’s was that the risk of having a CD jump on you whilst playing was far less than that of an incorrectly weighted needle on vinyl. Also with the introduction of CD’s it meant that a DJ could take more music with them, what used to consist of a flight case of vinyl was now able to fit into their hand. The days of leaving tracks behind due to weight was coming to an end and a DJ’s selection for whichever set they may be playing was vastly increased.

Towards the end of the 1990’s MiniDisc players started to make an appearance, just like with the CD’s previously, you could again store more tracks in an even smaller space. Unfortunately, MiniDisc players were not a very common site in a DJ booth so CD’s and Vinyl’s still dominated

the DJ’s preferential form to transport their music.

As time progressed further, computer based software started to appear with each version becoming more DJ friendly than the previous version. During this time though CD’s were still dominating and still continued to do so for a long time to come. The more sophisticated a DJ’ing application started to become, the less former techniques became. This then gave rise to the use of MP3, having your music collection stored on a hard drive or flash disks, thousands upon thousands of tracks all within one small unit.

Image Line is just one of many companies which offers one of these DJ’ing software tools in the form of Deckadance. After downloading and installing the program I was quite taken aback by the amount of functions this program has. A very nicely laid out and designed interface which is pretty common among their products. Automatic BPM detection to aid in syncing your tracks for you although minor pitch adjustments may still be necessary. There are various types of filters for you to play around with - LP, HP, BP, BR. If used to good effect, you can increase the emotion of a break and build up.

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Guest Column


Guest Column

Did You Know?

Image-Line offers a wide variety of audio tools for your

production.

Image-Line’s products not only cover audio production, but

website design as well.

Built in Phaser, Echo and LoFi controllers which, via manipulation of the X,Y grids, gives you even more tools to add that extra bit of sparkle to your work (if you remember back at the start when I mentioned about achieving phasing with pitch manipulation, Deckadance makes it easy).

Another interesting feature is its ability to load in VST’s and MIDI files and have them sync to your tracks; a nice example would be if you are playing a vocal track over another track, you could load in the Vocodex VST, or any other vocoder, and use it to apply effects to the vocal track. For those of you who still like using vinyl, Deckadance accepts input from time coded vinyl and allows for pass-through of regular vinyl so you are not going to miss out on all that this program has to offer you.

The amount of possibilities that this program has to offer can only really be seen by trying it out for yourself. The things which I have mentioned are only a small fraction of this program’s capabilities. You can download a demo version from the Image Line website and see all that this program really has to offer.

Deckadance gives you so much power at your fingertips that the future really is in your hands.

- Rachel

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FL How To: Tutorials

Let’s Make Some Noise! Intro Tutorial For The New FL Studio User



Whether you are a musician, an audio designer or an

enthusiast, learning new software can be a daunting task. This tutorial is dedicated to the new user of FL Studio. Those who have either barely used the software or who just got it and can’t quite make heads or tails of how to go about starting a project. We will cover the basics of starting a new project to try and

get you up and running with little hassle.

For this tutorial we’ll first assume that you have already installed FL Studio and are ready to get started. We’ll be using FL Studio 9 for this tutorial, but the steps we take should work for versions going back to FL 7 for those who have not yet upgraded (though it is highly recommended).

**If you are using an older version of FL Studio with this tutorial and cannot find the samples referenced, feel free to use any samples that you want. This will not affect the outcome of your project.

Open FL Studio and let’s get started!

Image-Line provides online help here:http://flstudio.image-line.com/help/

Step 1New Project Template - Since we want to get you moving in the right direction, let’s start with an ‘Empty’ project. Under the File menu (in the top left area of FL Studio) choose ‘New from template > Minimal > Empty. This will open up a completely empty project. *Note – the last template that was used is the template that FL Studio will open with the next time you start up the program.

Step 2Add some samples - With our empty project, we want to start by adding some sounds. For this we head on over to the built-in Browser and rummage through FL Studio’s goodies for some quality samples. The FL Studio browser shows on the left side of the work area upon first install. If you can’t see it, simply click the ‘View Browser’ button up in the transport bar along the top area of the program:Alternatively you can press F8 on your keyboard. The Browser works much like a standard file browser but with a different look. *Quick Tip – look at the menu bar and move your mouse around the interface. FL Studio gives you a readout, or hint, of what your mouse is hovering over. This can really help out a lot when performing different tasks in FL Studio!

Let’s start with percussion as it tends to be the quickest and easiest to throw together. Grab a few samples under the ‘Packs’ directory: FLS Crash 01a, FLS Hatcl 01, FLS Kick 01, and FLS Snare 01a. Click and drag each of the samples up onto the Step Sequencer area to load the sample. *You can easily replace the empty Sampler channel already there by hovering your mouse cursor over the Sampler button when dragging a file. So far this is what we should have:

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Step 3Program A Beat -Now that we have some samples to play around with, let’s make a basic rhythm. All that is needed is to click the buttons in the Step Sequencer for the moments at which we want to hear the samples. The buttons will light up when clicked. Try making a pattern and hit the Play button up in the transport bar *Note - make sure that FL Studio is in Pattern Mode up in the Transport Bar. That’s what we call quick percussion!

Step 4FPC For Ease Of Use - So far we have learned how to add samples for building percussion, but it seems that the more complex your rhythms get, the more extensive your project becomes. FL Studio comes with some very handy tools to help organize and eliminate a lot of clutter. For percussion, let’s use FPC instead. FPC can be found under ‘Channels > Add One > FPC’. FPC is a drum machine with multiple ‘pads’ that you can assign samples to. It has multi-layer support, which means that you can either pile on multiple samples to all play at once, or have a lot of samples assigned to a pad where only certain ones are triggered depending on velocity (i.e. how hard you press a key on a keyboard, etc). For now we will use the default kit that FPC loads with. Click around on the pads on the left side of the interface to hear the different samples. *In FL 9 clicking at the top of a pad results in a quiet sound whereas clicking on the bottom area of a pad results in a much louder sound. For more information on how FPC works, refer to the Help file (press F1 on your keyboard). Let’s close FPC and move on to the next step where we program another drum beat!

Step 5Open up Piano Roll for FPC - You should now see a new button in the Step Sequencer titled ‘FPC’. Right-click the button and choose ‘Piano Roll’. This will open up FL Studio’s Piano Roll where we can program notes that will trigger the sounds we want to hear.

*Note – these notes are only trigger events and do not contain sound themselves…think of it as a visual set of instructions to tell FL Studio what note or sample we want to hear played back. With this tool we have a lot more flexibility to get more out of our sounds.

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Step 6Programming Piano Roll – On the left side of the Piano Roll window, you should see text that names off the different samples assigned in FPC. Click on each one to hear how they sound. Again, you can get louder or softer sounds either by clicking on the left area of a pad’s name (quieter) or the right-most area of the name (louder). Click on the Pencil tool at the top of the window and draw some ‘blocks’ on the grid. Hit play to hear the results. *Quick Tip – right click on a block to delete it.

Let’s pause for a moment and take a look at what we see. There are a number of things that have occurred when we drew in the notes. First you should notice that the Step Sequencer shows what looks like a smaller version of the Piano Roll. This is a graphic representing what we have programmed into the Piano Roll for FPC. Second, when we drew in the notes, the lower window of the Piano Roll shows what looks like upside down ‘L’s (older versions of FL will only see a vertical line with a dot at the top). These represent velocity, or rather how loud the notes will sound; and in the case of FPC, this dictates which sample is triggered for a specific pad that has multiple samples assigned; try raising and lowering each line by dragging the little dot up or down. Hit play to hear the difference.

*Hint - Highlight only the note you want to affect by using the ‘Select’ tool (icon that looks like a dashed square). Any note you click on should be a different color; change back to the Pencil tool and drag the highlighted line in the lower window up or down to affect only that note.

One last thing to mention is the Play Position Marker. This is the little orange triangle that rides along the top of the grid when you hit Play. This tells you where the playback occurs in the sequence of events. The blocks represent an amount of time in which a sound will occur. So

when the marker reaches the left side of a block, a sound is ‘turned on’. When it reaches the right side of the block, the sound is ‘turned off’. There are other things going on, but that gives a basic idea of what we are seeing versus what we are hearing. Keep this all in mind when we get to programming a synthesizer. It will make much more sense. Close out the Piano Roll and let’s move on…

Step 7Cleaning up – Since we now have the FPC for our beat, let’s get rid of the original samples we added to our project. Right click each button in the Step Sequencer that you want to remove and select ‘Delete…’. FL Studio will tell you that the selected channel is about

to be deleted (no undo). Click OK. Just be sure that you don’t delete the FPC channel as we are going to use the drum beat we just made for our project.

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shortcut) if it is not already. Hit play again and you will now see that Mixer Insert 1 will light up from the audio passing through it. Click on that Insert to select it. You can load effects into any of the numbered slots (1-8) provided for each Insert. Click on the arrow for slot 1 and choose ‘Select > Fruity Delay 2’.

The effect will load and present you with a set of controls that you can use to adjust different parameters of the effect. Hit Play. To hear the difference, you can click the little green light next to the effect name in slot 1.

Step 11Compose the track – at this point the only thing left is to compose the track. Open the Playlist (F5) and start drawing your Patterns into the grid. We currently have two different patterns on the same ‘Pattern name’, which should be Pattern 1. We can split up what we have done into separate patterns by going to the Playlist Options menu and selecting ‘Patterns > Split by channel’. This will break our pattern out by channel across multiple Patterns in the Playlist so that we can control which pattern plays.From here you can rename the patterns as needed (click a Pattern name and hit F2) though FL Studio 9 automatically names them based upon the name of the channels themselves. Additionally you can color the Pattern names to better suit any organization you choose to work with in your projects.

Step 8

Adding a Synthesizer – As much as making beats can be fun, they tend to sound a lot better with some music! Let’s add a synthesizer and program in some notes. Go to Channels > Add One > 3xOsc. This is a three voice ‘subtractive synthesizer’ that although looks simple, really is quite flexible and versatile (for more info press F1 for the Help file). We’re not going to cover actually programming the 3xOsc synthesizer here, so we’ll just stick with the default sound for now.

Step 9Make Some Music – here we want to go back into the Piano Roll to program our notes and bypass the Step Sequencer buttons. Again, right-click on the 3xOsc button in the Step Sequencer and choose ‘Piano Roll’. You will notice that the Piano Roll now has keys on the left side representing notes on a keyboard. The same applies as before with velocity when you click on the keys (left side is quiet – right side is loud). Make sure that the Pencil Tool is selected and draw in some notes. Hit play and see how it sounds.

*Quick Tip – hover your mouse over the right edge of a block (a double arrow should appear – make sure that Caps Lock is off) to resize the block.

*Hint – enable Ghost Channels under Helpers in the Piano Roll menu (first icon on the left in the row of icons at the top of the window).

Step 10Add Basic Effects – currently the project sounds pretty lackluster, so what you can do to spruce it up is add effects. Close out the Piano Roll and open the Channel settings of the 3xOsc (click on its button in the Step Sequencer). In the upper right corner you will see a graphic with two dashes and ‘FX’ underneath. Place your mouse over the two dashes and click-drag your mouse up to assign it to an effects slot in the Mixer. Now open the Mixer (F9 keyboard

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At this point you can either draw blocks into the lower playist window (similar to the Piano Roll), or for even more flexibility, draw the patterns in the upper Playlist window. To draw a pattern, click the Pattern name in the lower window that you want to draw, and use the Pencil Tool to draw the pattern in the upper Playlist window. Again, you can right click what you have drawn to quickly delete it.

*Note - For playback, make sure that FL Studio is set to Song Mode to test out what you have composed.

The upper Playlist window allows you to perform many advanced tasks, such as Slip Editing and Automation. We’ll cover these and more techniques in future issues. For now, take the time to get comfortable with some of the basic features of the Playlist.

This concludes the basics for starting a project in FL Studio! Play around with some of the different settings of each of the items discussed in this tutorial to get a feel for what it does. If you run into trouble, there is always someone willing to help on the FL Studio forums! Good luck and happy programming!

-SC

Get the most out of FL Studio...It is always recommended to reference FL Studio’s Manual (press F1 with FL Studio open), though sometimes you may get stuck and need to ask for

help. There is a ton of resources on the web if you know where to look. After looking through the manual first, check out the official FL Studio forum at www.flstudio.com. Alternatively you can swing by www.theflipsideforum.com for help and troubleshooting. Both

of these websites should give you a great place to start when looking for answers to commonly asked questions.

13



Removing Ambient Background NoisesRemoving Ambient Background NoisesTutorial Series by MarcDTutorial Series by MarcD

Noise Reduction

Hiding background noise from sounds and samples is an

important step towards a clean, crisp sounding mix. Even if you do not notice the little bit of noise in your sounds (or hardly notice), it is simply good practice to remove it as the problem is quickly magnified when dealing with multiple tracks. The accumulated noise can go well beyond the audible and turn your mix into a muddy, blurred blend.

By utilizing so called noise gates, we can manage the noise on a track. The purpose is not to remove the noise from the sound (once noise is part of a sound it is hard to remove it), but rather to hide it during quiet sections where the track would otherwise only contribute with unnecessary noise.

Simply put, a noise gate allows a

sound to pass when it is above a certain threshold (the noise gate is open). If the sound is below the threshold, the sound is not let through (the noise gate is closed).

In the illustration above, the red line represents the input signal. As long as it is below the threshold value (the gray line), the noise gate is closed (see the green line for the output signal). When the input signal exceeds the threshold, the

noise gate opens. How fast it opens depends on the attack setting. Similarly, when the input signal falls below the threshold value, the gate closes. How fast it closes, depends on the release setting.

In FL Studio you have a few options when it comes to noise gates, most notably the Fruity Limiter. But also the fruity Love Philter can be used for this purpose.

Fruity Limiter

To illustrate the Fruity Limiter noise gating capabilities, first add an

Audio clip to the Step Sequencer and load the FLS_OhYeah.wav sample, which you can find in your FL Studio folder under Data\Patches\Packs\Vocals.

Next, place a few clips of this sample in the Playlist and play the song.

You will clearly hear a noise at the end of the sample (where you hear the word ‘yeah’). Make sure to listen to it a couple of times so you know what is being referred to.

Now, this is the unwanted noise that we will attempt to suppress using the Fruity Limiter. Go to the Mixer and add the Fruity Limiter to the first FX slot of the master track.

Note: It is better practice not to use the master track unless you want an effect to be applied to all sounds in your project (all sounds are routed to the master track). For simplicity’s sake, the master track is used here.

(cont’d)

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The Fruity Limiter is a compressor, limiter and noise gate in one. What we will focus on is the basic noise gate functionality that it offers via the controls shown.

If the Thresh (threshold) control is turned entirely to the left (no threshold), the noise gate function is effectively switched off. If you play the song, the Fruity Limiter will show something like the image to the right.

QuickTip: Make sure the Loudness Gain and Ceil (Ceiling) controls are set to similar levels as in the screenshot to avoid the limiter function to kick in.

In this state, you will still hear the noise at the end of the ‘yeah’. But let’s increase the threshold a bit and play our song again. See below.

Hint: Make sure to turn the Noise gate Gain control entirely to the left (as shown above).

If you use a similar threshold as in the screenshot below you should really be able to notice the reduction in noise at the end of the vocal clip!

The Rel (release) control will also have an effect. As discussed, the release controls how fast the gate closes when the input signal falls below the threshold. If you set this too high, you will still hear the noise in the output signal as the gate simply does not close fast enough. If it is low the gate will close abruptly giving a less smooth transition.

Finally, with the Gain control you can adjust the signal passing through the gate when it is closed, but for our noise reduction exercise we are not really interested in boosting the signal. We want to suppress it completely.

(cont’d)

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Fruity Love Philter

The Fruity Love Philter is a feature-rich filter plugin that allows for creating really complex filtering and

gating effects (it has 8 filter units, where each unit can feed its output into the next). What we will discuss here, however, is how to use the plugin as a basic noise gate.

Add the Fruity Love Philter in the second FX slot of the master track in the Mixer. Also, make sure to disable FX slot that contains the Fruity Limiter. See below:

Next, select the ‘Basic noise gate’ preset from the FX slot options menu.

The Fruity Love Philter will show the image to the right.

It would go (far) beyond the scope of this tutorial to discuss every feature and control of the plugin. Nevertheless, let us have a look at some of the relevant aspects.

First of all, let’s talk a bit about the IEF (input envelope follower). IEF is a feature where the input signal is converted into a controller signal. Simply put, the louder the input signal, the bigger the IEF signal. While not giving any visual feedback (unfortunately), the IEF controller signal moves up and down the horizontal scale you see at the bottom of the filter.

Now, the interesting thing is that this IEF can function as a modulator source of a modulator target. In other words, we can let the level of the IEF control a target, such as the volume. See below:

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As you can see the IEF has been selected as the source, and Vol (Volume) as the target.

But how exactly does the IEF affect the volume? Well, that depends on the graph above the IEF scale. As you can see, the line starts at 0% (volume of the output signal is reduced to 0) and quickly rises to 100% (volume of the output signal is unaffected). The way to interpret this is that at low input (IEF) signal level the output signal is muted. When the input (IEF) signal exceeds a certain level (threshold), the output signal is unaffected. Sounds familiar, doesn’t it? This is a noise gate effect.

Listen to the song and determine whether the noise gate has the desired effect. Most likely, you want to tweak things a bit and for this we have threshold, attack and release at our disposal.

With respect to the threshold, you can change this in two ways. By changing the graph or by changing the Envelope Follower Level slider.

Let’s first have a look at the graph. The way that you can manipulate it is very similar to the way you manipulate automation clips. You can move control points, add and delete control points, etc. In the screenshot to the right, you can see that I have moved the threshold up a bit (I also added one control point to make sure the change in volume is abrupt).

With respect to the Envelope Follower Level slider (the rightmost slider on the plugin labelled IEF), what this one does is transpose the IEF scale to higher or lower dB ranges. Now, with a fixed graph, transposing the scale up or down will effectively be the same as changing the threshold (the threshold in the graph will be at a different dB level if you change the position of the Envelope Follower Level slider. Try this out while you play the song.

From the introduction you know that attack and release determine

how fast the gate opens and closes. The controls for this can be found on the right side of the plugin.

The best way to learn how the various settings influence the noise gate is by trying. Unlike the Fruity Limiter, there is no visual feedback so you have to do it by listening carefully to the output sound (which is actually the preferred way to work on your sounds).

Conclusion

We have seen that removing noise from your sounds is important in order to achieve a clean mix. Noise gates can help us to do this.

Both the Fruity Limiter and Fruity Love Philter offer a noise gate. Which one you want to use is first of all a matter of taste, but either way, make it a habit to reduce the noise in your compositions!

- MarcD

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Leveling With Fruity Peak ControllerFL How To: Tutorials

Leveling With Fruity Peak Controller

Loop SyncingLoop Syncing

Did You Know?submitted by Rachel, Flat and MarcD

• Right clicking on an individual mixer channel will now bring up the options that were once in the top corner drop down box of previous versions of FL Studio.

• Trying to figure out the tempo of a sample? Right click the tempo box > Tap... Click the tap icon repeatedly to see the tempo adjust to new levels.

• Save often and use ‘Save new version’ (or Ctrl+N). FL Studio will automatically save your project under a new name (suffixes the project filename with a revision number).

• Right clicking on Pattern/Song mode in the transport bar will open or close the playlist.

One common way to level out volume peaks in a vocal track is to manually create points on an automation clip. This can be tedious

and time consuming, not to mention any potential lack of fun. The Fruity Peak Controller can be used to accomplish the same task with just a few minutes of setup. The project included here http://www.theflipsideforum.com/FLMagazine/peakcontroller.zip uses the vocal track from Mr. Special’s Aren’t You Clever demo project found in the Cool Stuff folder.

Load the peak controller in an effects slot, deselect mute, right-click the fader and select ‘link to controller’. Under internal controllers select “Peak ctrl (track name) Peak”. On the peak controller turn the vol knob left of center and the base knob up to around 50+%. You’ll have to play with these along with the tension and decay settings until it responds as desired.

-brstma

Have you ever wondered how to get a loop to sync to the tempo in FL without using time-stretching? Here’s how:

Load the drum loop found here http://www.theflipsideforum.com/FLMagazine/drum_loop_150bpm.wav into a Sampler Channel in the Step Sequencer. If you know the tempo of the loop set the tempo in FL to match (the sample loop is labeled). If you don’t know the tempo of a sample, right click on the sample’s waveform display in the channel window and select “Detect Tempo”. Follow the instructions presented and set the tempo in FL to match. (Run a search in the help file by hitting F1 for more details if needed)

Now click on the first step in the step sequencer to enable it (be sure that you are in pattern mode) then render the file. In the render settings select ‘WAV’ for Output Format, ‘Cut remainder’ for Looping Mode, and ‘Save Acidized’ under Options. Render the loop then load it into a Sampler channel or drag it into the playlist. Now when you change tempo, the loop will change with it and you will get a popup window asking “Restretch all channels now?” Selecting ‘yes’ will re-pitch the acidized loop you’ve made to the original pitch. Selecting ‘no’ leaves the pitch intact as it changes when you change tempo.

- brstma

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FL How To: Tips & Tricks

Piano RollFL How To: Tips & Tricks

Piano Roll

The Piano Roll in FL Studio is one of the most comprehensive sequencing tools. It opens the door for creative expression and precision of which could never be done without software. Below are some tips on how better

to use this amazing tool.

Group notes in the Piano Roll by selecting the note events you want to group, pick a color from the Color group menu and then press ALT+C. All selected note events will now have the new color. To select all notes belonging to a specific color, select the color in the Color group menu and press SHIFT+C.

-MarcD

Suffering from writer’s block? Stuck in a rut? Been there, done that? Go to Tools/Riff machine... Don’t forget the randomizer tool as well. Click play first, then open the randomizer tool and start tweaking. Once you find something you like, shift the notes around and alter them as needed.

- Flat

Have trouble remembering your scales? Open up an empty sampler channel, right-click and choose Piano Roll. Activate the ‘Helpers > Ghost channels’ option in the drop down menu and map out your scales. Now everytime you open the piano roll view of another channel in that pattern you can easily see your scales.

- Rachel

Right click on the icons in the Piano Roll to bring down menus. For example, the Pencil Tool, when right clicked, will bring up the Chords and Scales Chart. The Selection box will bring up various selection options.

- Rachel

19


Hardware Review

from Frontier Designfrom Frontier Design

As the proud new owner of the Frontier Design AlphaTrack

I feel the need to spread the word about this impressive DAW controller. I have a couple of MIDI controllers with faders, encoders and buttons but none have been quite as useful as the AlphaTrack when it comes to controlling the fundamentals of FL. Transport controls, channel selection, Playlist and piano roll scrubbing, and mixer track controls can all be managed with AlphaTrack.

AlphaTrack is available worldwide and the MSRP is $249 (USD). However, it sells through many retailers for $200 and can be found used on ebay as well.

The features of the AlphaTrack are best quoted from the “FL Studio and AlphaTrack” PDF:

“The AlphaTrack features a high-resolution, 100mm, touch-sensitive, motorized fader, 3 touch-sensitive encoders, 5 mode select buttons, 8 general function buttons, channel dependent backlit Rec, Solo, and Mute buttons, 5-button transport controls, SHIFT key, touch-sensitive touch strip, and a 32 character LCD display. There are also 17 LED indicators. Silk-screened labels clearly indicate the basic functions of most of the buttons. On the back next to the USB connection is a ¼” jack for a standard momentary foot-switch.”

The controls are permanently linked to functions in FL Studio making it unnecessary to bring windows into focus first to control them.

Installation of AlphaTrack is a snap, just be sure to follow the directions carefully. Once installed there is an applet icon on the Start menu where you can select the control mode for different applications.

FL Studio works with the native mode of the AlphaTrack and the only setup for use in FL is the MIDI options. The AlphaTrack uses two-way MIDI communication with FL Studio to send and receive data.

The usefulness for basic control is immediately apparent. The transport controls work as expected with the most useful control being the Record button. This is a nice addition to my gear as it adds an ‘all-in-one’ solution for any transport needs I may have, plus it avoids more mouse clicks when dealing with my other gear. Transport control functions behave like this: the Play button works as both playback and pause; Fast-Forward and Rewind allow high speed cursor movement; Stop stops playback.

The Touch Strip controls playback speed of the Playlist when in Song Mode and the Piano Roll when in Pattern Mode. When playback is enabled moving one finger to the right of the center point advances playback speed, and moving to the left decreases s p e e d . T o u c h i n g two fingers to the strip f u r t h e r increases the speed, however, it is still slower than the Fast Forward or Rewind buttons. When p l a y b a c k is stopped, touching two fingers to the strip will move the cursor position accordingly. When using the touch

strip the display shows the cursor position in measures and beats.

The 8 Function buttons are linked as follows:• F1: Redo• F2: Undo• F3: Previous Pattern• F4: Next Pattern• < Track >: Mixer Track select• LOOP: Song / Pattern Mode select• FLIP: brings the rear window into view and continues to cycle them each time it is pressed.

When F1 or F2 is pressed the display shows a readout of the FL Hint Bar; pressing F3 or F4 displays the pattern selected; using the Mixer Track Select buttons displays the selected track name. The LOOP button has an LED to show when the project is in Loop or Pattern Mode; the FLIP button has no indicators when pressed. Some of the Function buttons also control other parameters when the AlphaTrack is in SHIFT mode. See the

“FL Studio and AlphaTrack” PDF for more details.

The 3

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Hardware Review

from Frontier Designfrom Frontier Design

continuous encoder knobs are sensitive to the slightest touch and touching one displays the current parameter and value it is assigned to. Each encoder also functions as a button and resets the value to default when depressed. There are 5 modes selectable using the labeled buttons below the encoders, each of which has an LED to indicate when it’s selected.

• PAN assigns the selected Mixer Track’s pan to encoder 1 and stereo separation to encoder 2.• SEND assigns the encoders to control the Send 1,2 and 3 levels for the selected Mixer Track. In SHIFT mode they control send 2, 3, and 4 levels respectively.• EQ mode assigns them to control the EQ of the selected Mixer Track, controlling gain of bands 1,2 and 3, and frequency of bands 1,2,and 3 when in SHIFT mode.• PLUG-IN mode allows the three encoder knobs to be assigned to parameters in FL and work in SHIFT mode for a total of 6 controls. They can be linked permanently to a control or to follow a control, such as controlling the currently selected Channel volume in the Step Sequencer. The touch message can also be used to send a CC message.• AUTO mode assigns encoder 1 to scroll Patterns, encoder 2 to scroll Mixer Tracks, and encoder 3 to scroll Channels in the Step Sequencer. Again, the Pattern name, Track name or Channel name are shown on the display.

While the AlphaTrack does receive updated MIDI data when you move a linked parameter using the mouse, it does not show the updated value on the display until you touch an encoder. I’ve also noticed the resolution of the encoders is not very fine so parameter values jump 3-5% at a time instead of 1%.

Finally we reach the fader section, where there are REC, SOLO, MUTE, and SHIFT buttons and, of course, the wonderful motorized fader. These also control the selected Mixer Track (except SHIFT) and the buttons are back-lit rather than just having an LED indicator. The Record button behaves as if the record icon in the Mixer Track is right-clicked with a mouse, saving any recorded audio to the default FL Studio recording folder. It would be nice to be able to set it up to work as a left click action, bringing up the ‘browse’ window to choose where to save and name the recorded audio, but it is still a nice touch. The motorized fader moves instantly when scrolling through Mixer Tracks and is not at all loud. When touching or moving the fader the display shows the level value in %, the dB value and the selected Track being controlled. As with the encoders, the display is not updated until the fader is touched, and depressing the fader resets the volume to default. The fader does have high resolution control and changes the value in 1% increments.

I only have a few complaints about the AlphaTrack:

• The buttons are hard plastic and need to be pressed rather firmly until a loud click is heard.• The encoders would be much better if they had finer control like the fader.• Back-lit play and record buttons would be a nice touch.• If you put your PC in sleep mode and leave the AlphaTrack plugged in the applet will become unresponsive upon waking. Even worse, on my PC I get a “Program not responding” message at shutdown causes my system to take 5 - 10 minutes to shut down. There’s a topic on their forum about it but no

mention of it in the manual. I found a workaround by disabling the applet from starting up at boot, but this will not allow you to switch the AlphaTrack’s control mode to use other apps, and it still has to be unplugged / re-plugged after waking from sleep, but there’s no more hanging at shutdown and it works just fine otherwise.

These are somewhat minor things that do not negate the functionality and ease of use of the AlphaTrack, yet keep it just a point away from being a perfect product in my opinion.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars!

Resources:http://www.frontierdesign.com/d o w n l o a d / p d f / A l p h a T r a c k /FLStudio_8_%20and_AT.pdf

http://www.frontierdesign.com/Products/AlphaTrack

-brstma

21


CREDITS

FL Studio is produced and distributed by Image-Line. For further information please check out the Credits in Fl Studio (Help > About...)

FL Insight could not have been possible without the following contributors. To all of you who have had either an influence on this magazine or have contributed, I personally want to send a huge thank you!

Special thanks goes to JMC and everyone at Image-Line for not only supporting this magazine but for also programming some kick-ass software! You guys rock!

- DB

This publication is in a web-based format. For a hi-res, printable version, please contact us at [email protected]

Writers

FLipside member: brstmaFL Experience: 7+ yearsMusical Experience: Bass, drums, guitar, DJ

FLipside member: FlatFL experience: 9 yearsMusical Experience: Piano Music Genres: instrumental, jazz, nujazz, new age

FLipSide Member: MarcDFL Experience: 4 yearsMusical Experience: FluteMusic Genres: Progressive trance, classical and celtic music; experiments a bit with all of the above.MarcD is also the owner of the popular FL Studio tutorial site:

http://forbidden-fruity.blogspot.com

FLipside Member: Singing CraneFL Experience: 9 yearsMusical Experience: Guitar, Drums, Mandolin, Keyboard, TromboneMusic Genres: Rock, Jazz, Classical, dabbles in Electronica (multiple sub-genres)

Guest ColumnistFLipSide Member: RachelFL Experience: 9 yearsMusical Experience: DJ, Keyboard, Learning Guitar - Acoustic and ElectricMusic Genre: All; tries not to style herself into one genre but most people seem to like her Ambient pieces most.

Graphic Design

FLipSide member: defect9FL Experience: 7 yearsMusical Experience: Trombone, Keyboards, sequencingMusic Genres: Experimental, Techno, Classical elementsMusical Ability: Awful; should stick to graphics and art ;)

Layout: Singing Crane in association with 3Berry MediaEditor: Don Bradbury

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Documents

Transcript of magazine - The FLipside Forum