Making a sample sound stereo

Started by DJ Omnimaga, November 03, 2007, 12:42:24 AM

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DJ_Omnimaga

First of all to open the following video you need a Windows computer with Windows Media Player or any other video software that play .AVI files on it. You probably noticed that all sound samples in Music 2000 are mono recordings. In some cases it can make a big difference in the song quality. You can add stereo by adding reverb effect to the note, but sometimes you don't always want the reverb effect. The following video will show an alternative:



Basically you create two copy of the same riff, clone one of them, select all notes, go in notes parameters to change the sample offset in it (not too high though), edit the note pan so you only hear the sound from one side of speakers/headphones. Afterward you edit the other riff so the sound is heard from the other side. DON'T CHANGE the sample offset though.

Once it's done it gives the results heard near the end of the video. See the difference, eh? You can use a different sample offset obviously. Just mess around with it and find out which settings suits your need more. Keep in mind this trick may not work with all sound samples though.

Pros:
-No need for reverb effects to have stereo, good for when they aren't wanted at all.
-Useful for hardsynths like in trance/techno songs.
-Not glitchy like note effects (on top of that the two stereo effects in the note effects menu doesn't even sound stereo at all

Cons:
-Takes two sound channel instead of one, so if you use this effects in many riffs you will run out of sound channels very quickly.
-You may need to do minor adjustments depending of the sample used.


Not a Number

#2
(Apologies for the bump)
I've found a more practical solution, and plus it circumnavigates the hassle of creating each riff twice.

1. Create and record the song as you would.
2. In Audacity, open the file and click on the stereo track itself.
3. Go to Edit > Duplicate (Or hit CTRL+D)
4. Pan one track 100% to the Left and the other 100% to the Right.
5. Click on the top track to deselect the bottom.
6. Zoom in as far as you can, so you can see each indivdual sound-variation...thing (*doesn'tknow the term for it*)
7. Because for some reason, it zooms to the middle of the song. Click on the Skip to Start button (looks like a purple "|<<")
8. Now select from 0.000000 to 0.001000 (it'll go to 0.001010, but don't worry about that)*
9. Delete the selection and your sound will now be in stereo!

(I'd provide video footage proving this theory, but my screen recorder doesn't record sound. :P)

-edit-
*I've been experimenting with how much you can delete without it being noticable; I think you can go as far as 0.001010, but I can notice the slight delete, even at 0.00005 seconds being deleted (and that's as little as you can delete)

DJ_Omnimaga

#3
Yeah thats another good method which I used for half of the songs included in Timgul Rave Mix Volume 1, since those were mono. An example is Busted Up Remix, the first song

However it removes the alerady existing Stereo effects in your songs (like an acid lead going from left channel to right back and forth), so it is more practical if the entire song is mono. Also in some rare cases it increase bass like crazy so you may need to reduce it slightly

147 crew

#4
WOW, my melody actually sounds good!!! New tune I'm making sidewinder..but one problem my screen is very full, gonna have to try it out on my bass line, hopefully upload tomorrow..cheers for the advice..

So what about if my sample offset is progressive? As the Bass I'm using, (Drama,) starts at 4606 and ends at 735, one side is good the other same and boring? Anything you can do or as you say it will only work with certain samples? Try it in audacity, but I didn't understand that very well..!?

DJ_Omnimaga

you can do lot of stuff based on this method. If you use it make sure to not start at 0 on some samples tho, cuz on one side it will fade in and not the other, which will sound weird

I would only recommend this method with long samples

147 crew

so is it worth doing the cloning riff trick as now I can get the track into stereo using audacity? As the mp3 files sound very different now, especially on facebook

DJ_Omnimaga

yeah now it's worth it. Of course reverb effects can also give stereo though, but for synth it sounds better with the stereo technique


pillagemyvillage

#9
after reading this i applied stereo to all my bass and melodies.
they sound so much better now so i would highly recommend using this technique!

ImL

#10
I stumbled on that while making Perfect Day. I just offset one riff by a fraction of time in the left channel, and left the cloned one alone, but switched it to the right channel. Has amazing result.
Cloned an entired song once and tried it, but needs some major tweeking to get the same result. cloning individual riffs makes for a more interesting song

DJ_Omnimaga

true, you really need to make sure to just do this with long samples and not percussion so it sounds good

Not a Number

I've just noticed one minor and annoying problem with this; if you're using a sample that has a loop effect added and you're ensuring the sample keeps looping, when the delayed sample plays, it doesn't loop.

So far, the only way around this I've found is to create a clone of the sample and move the first few "bits" (I think it's from 000000 to 000800) to the very end, then have the sample start at 0. Unforunately, owing to sample size (and quality) this will severely eat up your SRAM.

Not a Number

#13
Bump/doublepost for new reason:

Now, I don't know if this applies to the PC version, but I've found this works with the PSX version (on an emulator).

In the Note Parameters of the Riff editor, go to the icon that usually has this icon:

[][][][][][][][]

And change it so it looks like this:

[][][][][][][][]

I don't know the term for it, but I've simply called it "Yellow Stereo".
You might want to turn the note volume down a little as it may clip. But exit and voila, instant stereo. No need to use two channels for stereo effect (which I've now called "Red Stereo".) :)

Example: Attached file: "Infinity part one" sample; riff using Red Mono (no stereo effect added), followed by same riff with Yellow Stereo. (omg leaked track lolz)

Pros:
- no need for having 2 channels for each sound file
-- thus more samples allowed to be played simultaneously
- should you have needed a sample that loops in stereo, you can now have just the one sample in your pallete (see above post)
-- thus more SRAM available
- now you're able to properly pan the note left and right and still keep the stereo effect

Cons:
- Only con I can think of is that the volume might be too loud, which can be easily fixed

147 crew

Isn't that yellow red thingy the echo effect, and you can also make it disappear?

Not a Number

I know you can change it to
[][][][][][][][]
but I can't remember what that does.

I think that if you set it to, say:
[][][][][][][][]
It'll treat it as two 1/32 notes, allthough with no change in pitch. Maybe if you use the pitch bend function you could, but then you're still limited to changing the pitch by a maximum of 2 semitones.

147 crew

I tend not to play around too much 'cos the samples start to go very strange  ???


pillagemyvillage

hmmm from what i can remember...
what youre talking about refers to the note reverb and note repeat.
if you click on the red square once and turn it yellow you apply what ever reverb you have chosen to the note.
if you activate 2 squares say 4 squares apart the note repeats twice. this is particually handy when using a snare towards the end of a snare build up. the more squares you activate the more the snare note will sound like a machine gun! the further each square activated is apart, the less tight the repeat will be. 
if you make all squares dissapear there will be no note sound at all.
i know this because it took me a while to work out how to apply reverb to notes.
im not sure turning the square yellow gives a stereo effect, but then ive not used music 2000 for 2 years!

147 crew

yeah thats the bar/note effect section I mean, all I know is that I don't mess with that part. Leave it to the pro's  ;)

Not a Number

I'm anything but a pro (I just know the basics and I'm able to construct a tune without making it dischordant - only exception being h.a.r.d. Remix 2003) but I'm using Yellow Stereo just so I can make my music sound better. Pan-Delay Stereo is OK to a point, but with some songs I've made in Pan-Delay, you can sometimes notice the delay. (Pentanol 1.250 being a prime example)