A production technique... fx as audio

[theBadger]

Take a track... Vocals, guitar, whatever...


Add some effects... something you like the sound of...


Set it to 100% wet and record it to an audio track. (just how you do this depends on which DAW you are using.)


Now you have an audio track with just the effect on it. It's prolly too much so you might want to turn it down a whole lot in your mixer.


Now you can use all the techniques that you would usually use for audio tracks: chopping, splicing, reversing, pitch shifting, beat mapping, envelope filtering, time-slipping, autotuning, vocoding, beat crushing, compressing, amp simulating and who knows what else... on just the effect.


I know there are other ways to achieve the same results, but having the fx as an audio track just opens up creative ideas for manipulating it.


A delay that has been hard-tuned. A heavily compressed version of your kick drum that has been acidized, transient shaped, chopped and subtly mixed back in. A huge verb that has been time-slipped away from the vocal and softened by an event envelope.

You could even feed the effect into melodyne and have it turn it into midi (in theory).

Iif you are collaborating with a mate who doesn't own that particular effect unit, you can still use it in a shared project. Even better, if you have a mate with a rare and expensive fx, he can record it as audio for you and email the fx track back to you from the other side of the world.

And when you come back to your project after you've accidentally uninstalled that plug in suite... it'll still be there as audio so your track will sound right.


There are so many reasons to 'burn' effects channels as audio it's a wonder why I've never, ever, done it. :evil and yet embarrassed grin:


tB.

[Audi01]

Great tutorial tB

I also found this technique to be of use. It can extend to a whole song; record either some parts or the whole of the song. Insert this into the song and the creative possibilities open up! I've only done this once out of necessity but ever since then I've wanted to do it more.