Creating Sound Effects

For creating sound effects you can really exploit every option that FabFilter One offers you. Especially the modulation features can help you create the coolest sounds. Because sound effects can be very diverse, ranging from a storm sound to a raindrop, there is not one ideal initial setting that will help you on the way. To be able to create a sound effect that you have in mind from scratch, you should be comfortable with the various options that FabFilter One provides. To give you an idea how different effect sounds are created, we will discuss two basic factory preset sounds.

In the explanations, the knob settings leading to the sound will be discussed. Knobs that are not mentioned are assumed to be set to their default value. You can quickly set all knobs to the default values by loading the Sawtooth preset from the Basic category.

Rain Drop

The first thing that comes to mind when you think of a rain drop, is that it sounds quite warm and 'round', somewhat like the sound of a sine wave. This indicates that a triangle is the best wave form to use. A rain drop sound is quite high, so a 4' scale setting would be good to start with.

• Set the oscillator wave form to triangle.
• Set the oscillator scale to 4'.

The second important thing that characterizes the sound is the fast rising frequency, starting low and ending very high. To obtain this effect, we need frequency modulation by the inverted envelope generator signal (the EG knob in the oscillator's frequency modulation section and the invert switch below it) in combination with a short envelope. A rain drop sound starts right away, so an attack value close to 0 should be used. To get the correct frequency modulation effect, short decay and release values are required.

• Set the EG knob in the frequency modulation section around value 9.
• Set the invert switch below the EG know to 'inverted' (at the right-hand position).
• Set the attack almost to 0, the decay to 2, the sustain to 6 and the release to 2.5.

We now have that characteristic fast rising sound. However, it still needs some tweaking. To give the sound a little bit more body, we use the cut-off filter and some cut-off frequency modulation by the envelope generator (the EG knob in the filter section).

• Set the cut-off frequency to 4.
• Set the EG knob in the filter section to 10.

Storm

Many effect sounds use the oscillator's noise wave form. A storm sound is of course one of the best examples of such a noise-based sound. The oscillator produces white noise. This type of noise is a quite high, hissing sound. FabFilter One also offers the possibility to add white or pink noise to its signal (using the noise knob and the noise type switch below it). Pink noise has a more dark and rumbling feel. White noise mixed with a bit of pink noise would be just fine for our storm sound.

• Set the oscillator's wave form to noise.
• Set the noise knob to 3 and the noise type to pink.

A storm sound is characterized by slowly swelling and fading winds. This swelling effect can easily be achieved using the modulation generator at a low frequency to modulate the filter's cut-off frequency (the MG knob in the filter modulation section).

• Set the cut-off frequency to 6.5 and the peak to 5.5.
• Set the modulation generator's wave form type to triangle and frequency to 0 and wave form to its center position (a perfect triangle).
• Set the MG knob in the filter section to 4.

To get proper fade in and fade out effects for the storm sound, we use high attack and release values.

• Set the attack to 5 and the release to 6.

Next: Loading presets

See Also
Creating sounds
Using FabFilter One