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BT techniques

I was wondering if anyone knows the ins and outs of some of BT and other electronic artists' trademark techniques? I know it's not just BT, but I say him because he just does it A LOT. Things like stutter-stepping...how do you achieve that? I'm not a novice audio user, but novice with these techniques.

Examples I'm thinking of are like BT - Revolution...things like transitions between sections, it sounds like a super super stuttered snare with some kind of filter? I would post examples but this site doesn't allow mp3's to be posted. I have cut out a few short mp3's from songs as examples of what I'm referring to but I can't post them here!

-Arudius

Hey. You can post samples of songs at YouSendIt. If you come up with specific questions about BTs techniques, I'm pretty sure I can tell you how to do it .

Cheers,
Zac

Oh awesome! Well here is a seemingly simple example but it still eludes me. I'm familiar with synthesis, but it just escapes me how to create this:

http://s40.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=...IQ3NOU0W52ESPH6

My first opinion would be...use a snare sample, of course fade the volume, but is that a phase filter or something that gives it that weird "woooaaaahhh" quality? Builds a lot of energy!

Thanks for your help! I can post more examples too if you'd be open to helping me out.

-Arudius

I want to say that has a flanger/phaser...with a vocoder? I'm not too familiar with crazy effects, but I definitely know that's a phaser/flanger.

That's several things. Obviously it's a stuttered snare drum sample, but there's also some flanger/phaser automation and some peak filter automation. Maybe some distortion and compression. The phaser gives it the sparkly sound that it has, but what really makes it sound like someone going weeeeuu is a peak/formant filter. The latter is best if you want to get such trippy filter sounds.

quote:

Originally posted by djlogik I want to say that has a flanger/phaser...with a vocoder? I'm not too familiar with crazy effects, but I definitely know that's a phaser/flanger.

I just fail to see what the vocoder has to do with it But in fact that is an awsome effect, trying now

Wow! I'm really impressed with how many people responded to this! I'm trying the flanger/phase trick, and one of my friends (Kyven, actually...check them out www.kyven.com) :-D ...he told me that you could do it a number of ways, but perhaps a "comb" filter?

-Arudius

To me that sounds like a flanger and a vocoder. I tried recreating it but without the original sound (which is undoubtedly recorded by BT himself), it would be very difficult to reproduce an identical or even mostly similar effect. Put the flanger in before vocoder and then do some pitch bending and youll get something similar. Btw, a vocoder is a special type of comb filter, and if the comb filter you were using is advanced enough, then that could be substituted.

Cheers,
Zac

Ok then i guess i dont really know how the vocoder works then

Ill shut up now

Justin

quote:

I tried recreating it but without the original sound (which is undoubtedly recorded by BT himself)

Can you imagine BT sitting there with a mic going, "weeeoooo"?

I have read many interviews and watched him work in Logic. Time correcting is so important to his music. He will do 40 processes on an edit, including everything mentioned above. he is religous about sound design using Kyma, Supercollider, and Csound. and also, he does all of his stutter edits by hand.
BT rocks.. he is a musical genious and has the most creativity i have seen from any producer, engineer, vocalist, composer etc.

BT - Somnabulist = 6,148 edits on the lead vocal ---- world record

quote:

Originally posted by WirelessEyes BT - Somnabulist = 6,148 edits on the lead vocal ---- world record

Hey. Yeah, thats quite impressive, especially when it takes me a few days to do a hundred vocal edits in a song. Stunning...

Cheers,
Zac

i think its called learn how to program in kyma give alot of possibilities. he knows that thing inside out.

quote:

Originally posted by IDarkISwordI Btw, a vocoder is a special type of comb filter, and if the comb filter you were using is advanced enough, then that could be substituted.

Que?

A comb filter puts mixes the signal with a slightly delayed version, so that phase cancellation occurs. It's the same technique as a flanger, but the flanger adds the factor of the comb filter opening up and closing down with an LFO.

A vocoder is something entirely different. It analyses a "modulator" signal in the following way: the signal is divided up into a defined number of bands (i.e. 16 or 32 or w/e), and for each band the volume envelope is passed on to a "carrier" signal, divided into an equal amount of bands. The modulator is typically a vocal, and the carrier a synth, though this is not necessary. The signal you ultimately hear is the carrier, but with some of the frequency responses of the modulator applied to it as described.

quote:

Originally posted by mzvirbulis i think its called learn how to program in kyma give alot of possibilities. he knows that thing inside out.

he was the first user of Kyma. he beta tested the first release.. haha. Kyma can do anything.. and I mean anything and it will just get better

quote:

Originally posted by Pjotr G Que? A comb filter puts mixes the signal with a slightly delayed version, so that phase cancellation occurs. It's the same technique as a flanger, but the flanger adds the factor of the comb filter opening up and closing down with an LFO.

Wrong. A comb filter, aka formant filter (just more flexible), is a huge bank of bandpass filters. The reason it is called a comb filter is because setting these bandpass regions, on a spectral display, it will look like you ran a comb through it. What you were describing sounds more like a phaser.

Cheers,
Zac

[EDIT:] Wikipedia gives almost the exact same thing as you however, the difference being is they dont go into further depth of how one really interfaces in the music world. I suppose at the very basic level, that is what happens though.

quote:

Originally posted by IDarkISwordI Wrong. A comb filter, aka formant filter (just more flexible), is a huge bank of bandpass filters. The reason it is called a comb filter is because setting these bandpass regions, on a spectral display, it will look like you ran a comb through it. What you were describing sounds more like a phaser.

A comb filter is not a bank of bandpass filters, it is a bank of bandreject/notch filters. This same effect is acheived by a flanger, which is why they are synonyms.

It is also not a formant filter, which is really just an EQ that is set to emulate the resonance curves of formants, or the vowel sounds of the human mouth. (Fun Fact: Your mouth is one big, sometimes stinky, EQ. Have some Altoids.)

A phaser is in fact also a comb filter. The difference between a phaser and a flanger being that you can control each "tine" separately, and can create irregularly spaced "tines" as a result.

OMGWTFBBQ?!

Thoughtlessjex, please could you break that down a bit more?

I've always known what the effects SOUND like, but never known what they are ACTUALLY doing?

If you could explain it a bit more, then maybe we could place it in the stickies too, I feel if people know what they are actually doing to their sound, they may be able to control them better also?

Cheers,

And good advice coming from everyone! Even if all is not 100% correct, its all part of learning!

Lunar

Technically, all this stuff is in the stickies. It just takes some digging to find.

The Tutorial Master List thread has a link [http://www.theprojectstudiohandbook.com/directory.htm]here[/URL], which eventually led me to this article on phasers. It also touches on the relationship between phasers and flangers. That thread and the directory that it links to are treasure troves of information. It just takes some time reading through them to figure out what all your kit does.

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