So i have a question about sound design. What does it specifically mean when you say sound design, like is it just the process of which you make your sound with a synth?
Sound design is a vast field: it can include creating sound effects for theater or film/tv/radio/games, it can be creating unique musical sounds, it can be the combination of existing sounds to make new interesting timbres (complex harmonic amalgamations)
I have worked with sound fx libraries to create the sound of a bus trundling along and then coming to a stop including opening the doors for use in a stage production, I have made the sound of a body falling down multiple flights of stairs for comic effect for another stage production
I have used a synth to simulate a heartbeat and a helicopter moving in and then away (both of those were tough ones but done in afternoon both times on an Roland MKS80) for use on stage and in a soundtrack
I have created new lead and bass sounds for some productions simply by using automation clips or just going in and adjusting adsr's on filters and vca's
Sound design is a wide field and a long term study and application of ideas
I mean i know all the basic controls and things like that and i know an FM synth basically has to do with LFO's (i thinks) but that is about it. I do not really know how to get the sounds i want or things like that.
This comes with time knowing what sources to use, how to apply things like adsr's (envelopes) to filters and vca's
FM synthesis is about the complex relationships between one oscillator driving the pitch of another oscillator; in most cases you are looking at whole multiples of the fundamental pitch of the final oscillator (fractional ratios are possible and can produce interesting sounds. the nett effect of using one oscillator to drive another is that you shift where the final oscillator is in its phase cycle because all of the driving oscillators are affecting specifically the current phase position of the master oscillator.
the only way to know what you will get from a particular combination of oscillators in an FM patch is to try varying individual parameters and listen to the results: it can become more complicated because you could choose to use an envelop on each individual oscillator as well as apply a filter to each oscillator: you would need a custom fm synth to do that but it is possible to do with any of teh current synth creators such as max, pure data, synthedit, reaktor, etc
I feel like all of my sounds are just saw waves that are barley modified. I mean i listen to mainly electronic music and i hear some of the synths they have and i really do not know how they come up with some of those synths.
Change your sources, listen to the results, make lots of notes
you have to treat sound design like you are a scientist changing variables to see the effect on the end product/chemical/physical action reaction/compound
I guess what i am really trying to ask here is how do you guys make your synths sounds a certain way, unique in a good way, and how do you know what they are going to sound like. And where did you guys learn your knowledge of sound design? Also i know some of this stuff comes with experience and time i just want to know where to get started and how to better my skills.
Side Note: I have only been producing for about a year if that is of any use.
Experiment and keep lots of notes - see above
