bass

How to make that sound...
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Any idea how to make this bass waveform, is this FM?
https://pasteboard.co/IfM6i2z.jpg

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Now we're guessing from a picture of a waveform? Bit of a guessing game without any audio. But I'm game. Does not look like FM. Looks like 4 detuned Lowpass filtered Saws at various amplitudes (low or no resonance). The higher amplitudes soon catch up with the others, so its pretty detuned (lower amplitude at lower frequencies). Anyway, you can determine their (relative) frequencies by just counting the distances between peaks/though zeros. The attack might just be a fast closing filter. Not sure why there's only distortion/irregularities on the positive peaks. I guess, since the positive peaks have a higher amplitude then negative peaks, it might just be filter non-linearities.

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wow what an explanation, thx, I'm not sure I got it all, but will try to play with 4 deatuned saws, btw it's a bass in this track https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7c3bNhKpgk

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SallyVate wrote: Tue May 21, 2019 10:27 pm wow what an explanation, thx, I'm not sure I got it all, but will try to play with 4 deatuned saws, btw it's a bass in this track https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7c3bNhKpgk
The sort of clean bass? Must be, since the wave from the picture is so clean. Sounds like it looks. :hihi:

Saws through a fast closing 24 dB/Oct Lowpass filter. The detuning is not really heard, since the notes are so short. Audible phase cancelling / comb filter effects (especially for the low frequencies) will not really happen yet. You might need to drive the filter a bit hard to get that "click" at the start and the distortion/non-linearities at higher amplitudes. Fast exponential/logarithmical "analog" style envelope curves will do for the "immediate" attack and fast decay.

Many synths can do this just fine. But not all have 4 oscillators per voice. You won't really need that 4th lowest amplitude oscillator, since it's amplitude is so low you won't really miss it. Maybe you can even leave the second lowest out, if you only have a 2 oscillator synth. Then you just have the highest amplitude pair, 1 a bit detuned and lower in amplitude/volume.

A synth like the amazing and free Surge will do this just fine (with "only" 3 oscillators or using 2 layers though).
https://www.kvraudio.com/product/surge-by-vember-audio

Good luck...

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thank you Kwurqx, I bow to you, you are truly the Master of Sounds :)
I know Surge, it's great synth, with using A and B you can have 6 oscillators :)

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I starting with two oscillators, it sounds much better if the second waveform is sine, btw maybe an automation on detune is used instead of 4 oscillators

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SallyVate wrote: Wed May 22, 2019 7:03 am thank you Kwurqx, I bow to you, you are truly the Master of Sounds :)
Haha, thanks, but that's a bit too much credit. I'm actually just an amateur trying to help people on their way in the wonderfull world of sounds and synths.

About the sine...

You'd think a Saw is a Saw. But actually there are many wave shapes that live under the name "Saw".

The "true and perfect" diagonal line contains all harmonics with amplitude 1/rank. But many variants are curved and/or not even a 50/50 mirror image in both horizontal and vertical plane. The zero crossing may not even be at half cycle and the curves may be above or below the diagonal.

All this makes Saws sound different. A common shape is "curve above diagonal". This generally means the first harmonic is amplified.

It can be revealing to send an untreated unfiltered raw Saw though an oscilloscope and see the shape(s).

And maybe see what happens if you add (or subtract with invert phase) a Sine. E.g. the with the free Melda Production MOscilloscope.
https://www.meldaproduction.com/MOscilloscope

And/or a frequency analyzer. E.g. the free Voxengo SPAN.
https://www.kvraudio.com/product/span-by-voxengo

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Thx, I'm using SPAN already and for oscilloscope I'm using Simple Scope https://github.com/x42/sisco.lv2 , it's lv2 plugin. I'm using Reaper on Linux, and to get lv2 work with it I'm using carla bridge lv2. I just recently started using Reaper cause I was annoyed with lack of curved automations on Ardour (it has only lines, no smooth curves) and Ardour wasn't working well with Surge.
Simple Scope is better than MOscilloscope to me because I can adjust length of waveform to show, I didn't find way to do it on MOscilloscope, and second I can have up to 4 wafeforms in same window, so I can easy compare with referential sounds.
Last edited by SallyVate on Wed May 22, 2019 2:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Simple Scope, lv2 only. Look good and versatile. Not "simple" at all. Maybe/hopefully someone will port it to other formats (VST2,3, AU, 32/64 bit)....

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yeah that would be nice, btw is there a way to adjust phase of an oscillator on Surge?

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ok I found that only way to play with phase is Width slider it gives Pulse-width for pulse shape or relative phase for dual saw

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SallyVate wrote: Wed May 22, 2019 2:40 pm yeah that would be nice, btw is there a way to adjust phase of an oscillator on Surge?
I actually recently entered Phase control as a feature request for Surge at GitHub (where it now lives a second life in the hands of the community).
https://github.com/surge-synthesizer/surge/issues/867

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awesome, I will add a vote there

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