SHIDZO wrote:
Thanks man
And in this case it was exactly the 80% I missed. So far I've only actively used envelopes for pitch modulation on kicks so I thought "WTF how does that work on the synths of the topic we are talking about??? These people are mental" - I feel a bit stupid now, I have used an LFO on a pitch envelope before as well. I was playing around with this looooong synth and I thought "Hey, why not putting a bit of an LFO on the pitch to get this bitch moving around little bit?!" I appreciate the input and the time you took. And thank you too for pointing me to Boards of Canada, this shit is great. Fucking hell I feel like a mouth-breather now... Like a funny mouth-breather though. Cheers
no problem. getting the theory down is really not that hard. Making it all click in your head afterwards is a lot harder.
Pay in mind that when you have a pitch envelope on a drum synth (and even on some other synths, Live's Analog has one like that as well),
it's usually simplified, like it can move only upwards or downwards to the setting of your original pitch (=the note you play or the note that your sequencer is playing).
Also, drum sounds are extremely short compared to most other synth sounds, so a pitch envelope like that is usually more than enough.
It's a bit as if you would be using an upwards or downwards saw LFO to modulate pitch.
More sofisticated synths usually have the same style ADSR envelope for their pitch like they have for their filter and volume.
Pay in mind that you can use your pitch and filter envelope negatively, but of course you can't do that with your volume.
I was once in a so called "sound design" class given by Rob Papen and he was saying there's no such thing as a negative envelope,
while fucking hell, yes there is, but of course only for filter and pitch.
For pitch it would mean you make the pitch go down first (attack) and then back up (decay) to the level set by your sustain, where it would stay as long as you hold your note (or the sequencer is still playing the same note), and then it would go up again to the original note's pitch when you release the note.
for filter it would mean you make the cutoff close first (attack), then it opens up again (decay), to the level set by your sustain, where it would stay as long as you hold your note (or the sequencer is still playing the same note), and then it would go up again to the original cutoff setting when you release the note.
Now the reason people usually use LFO's for their pitch modulation, is simply that envelopes are usually too drastic, and pitch modulation usually happens less extreme than for example filter modulation, or else you end up with a sound that's in the FX sounds kind of ballpark. Plus, very important, LFO's replay all the time. Envelopes only play once. There are enough synths out there with loopable envelopes (in part (for example the sustain phase) or completely), but that's more exception than rule.
Now, when you say above :
I have used an LFO on a pitch envelope before as well.
you probably mean you used an LFO to modulate the
pitch before,
because when you say
pitch envelope, you are technically saying that you were modulating a control signal (envelope) with another control signal (LFO).
This is of course possible, but definitely not on every synth, and it happens rarely that people use this.
A pitch envelope is a control signal routed to the pitch, but pitch is the parameter, the "thing you can change", to put it ultra-simple.
You can also route 2 LFO's or even more to the same parameter, or for example 2 envelopes to the same filter.
It can give you interesting results, if you have the option to try this on a synth, be sure to check it out.