Creating Your Own Sounds

[SimonT]

Do people here, who make electronic music, have an idea of a sound they go for before creating it, in your mind I mean, or do you just listen to a song you like, and say, I'm going for a sound similar to that? How long does it take to become good at this? I only seem 15% better than what I was since I been trying to improve 8 months ago. That’s with help at college as well. If that’s the rate, then I’m not gonna be a 100% great at it till May 2018. I would’ve thought in 8 months of almost daily study, I’d be getting towards maybe half way there by now. Does it just click one day?

Does anybody know any good sites that might help me along. I was trying Syntorial, but then you have to pay after a couple of lessons, and money is tight. Does anybody recommend it or anything similar that may be free? or any other tips or tricks for getting better a understanding what makes up a sound? I am gonna give this site a whirl today:-

http://adsrsounds.com/

Thanks!

 

[Ddream]

I'm producing for a year and a half now, and I'm getting into synthesizing my own sounds just now. I use mainly massive for this, watched tons of tutorials on "how to achieve [insert producer name here] basses". Nowadays I can make my own atmospheric pads (it's a huge part of my music), but I still struggle to make decent basses (specially because it's a huge part of drum and bass production).

Normally I watch SeamlessR "how to bass" series to get some new techniques (on youtube), but mostly I spent countless hours trying different things until I come up with something good enough.

 

[syris]

I didnt want to believe that it's mostly just fiddling around, but it really is, at the end of the day. Like Ddream said, emulating people is a good place to start, but learning how to make your own sounds mostly does come from just messing around and experimenting.

 

[The Funk Junkie]

I normally have something in mind before I start to make it but then I'll get sidetracked halfway through the process and end up with something totally different that works just as well, haha. One thing to do is to start with a preset that has a similar sound and then mess with the oscillators, filters, voicing etc until it becomes what you are picturing for the song, that's my typical process.

 

[rayzer]

i learned synthesis by reverse engineering presets i liked to see what effects switches had on the overall sound, made a note of each functions effect then after a while i could start to hear the properties of a sound rather than the sound as a whole. practiced with all types of sounds and when i got stuck i analyzed sounds visually in an audio editor and tried to pick out things like waveshapes. with a bit of reading up on terms it made more sense.

regarding making sounds i usually have an idea of what i wanted and if its not available ill use a stand-in preset and make it when i have time to spare.

 

[DJTeddy]

Now i am no expert in producing or sound design but what I've learned from about a year of experience is it really does take time to come up with good synths. I've taken advise from people on forums and watched a ton of videos and i am now starting to get better at sound design. Just give it time and try to do what some people say like reverse engineer some presets or watch some tutorials. You should check out SeamlessR on YouTube like Ddream said. He is really skilled at what he does and he has a link for his videos so you can download the patch. I personally download them not to necessarily use them but to try to reverse engineer them and lean how they are made.

 

[Exploding Soul]

Sometimes I have an idea of what kind of sound I want to make, but I never really have a detailed idea if you know what I mean? either I just think something like "I want to make a heavy bass" or "I want to make a very wet bass", or I just mess around in Massive.
I always start with the sound in massive , but I also add like 7 effects and 3-5 eqs, so in terms of sound design I add a lot of effects to it outside of Massive.
And sometimes when I want to try some new stuff I download massive presets on basses that my favorite artists use, and then I look at what kind of filters, oscillators etc they use in and try to apply it the next time I mess around in Massive.