How to Create a Tape Stop Device and Wave Tables in Bitwig
Tutorial | Jun 14, 2019
In this video, I show you how to create a tape stop effect using Bitwig's FXgrid device. I use delays, ADSR, and gain volume to create the effect. By adjusting the delay buffer size, you can achieve the slow down and speed up effect of a tape stop. I also demonstrate how to create flutter effects using tape emulation plugins. Additionally, I explain how to create wave tables in Bitwig by using wave files and the sampler instrument. By using the cycles mode and wave table position knob, you can scan through the wave tables and create unique sounds.
You can watch the Video on Youtube - support me on Patreon
Questions & Answers #
Maybe you dont watch the video, here are some important takeaways:
1. How does the tape stop device in Bitwig work? #
The tape stop device in Bitwig is created using a combination of delays, an ADSR module, a gain volume module, and a select module. When the button is pushed, the ADSR module fades down the signal, and when the value reaches zero, the select module selects a different path which cuts out the signal completely. When the button is pushed again, the select module selects the original path and brings back the signal.
2. Why is the delay used in the tape stop device? #
The delay in the tape stop device is used as a delay buffer to create the slow down and speed up effect similar to a turntable. By changing the size of the buffer, the playback speed of the signal can be manipulated, resulting in the tape stop effect.
3. How can the tape stop effect be enhanced using multiple delay buffers? #
Using multiple delay buffers in the tape stop device helps to increase the intensity and authenticity of the effect. By chaining multiple delays together, the slow down and speed up effect can be further exaggerated, creating a more pronounced tape stop effect.
4. How can wave tables be created and used in Bitwig? #
To create wave tables in Bitwig, wave files need to be created first. This can be done by recording sounds using a microphone or by using synthesizers to generate pure waveforms. The wave files are then added to the Bitwig sampler, using the cycles mode and the freeze button. Once added, the wave tables can be scanned through using the wave table position knob.
The wave tables can be used in the Bitwig sampler or inside the Bitwig Grid by browsing and selecting the desired wave table files. Additionally, the wave tables can be modulated using various phase modules, such as the shift module, to create frequency modulation effects and further enhance the sound.
Transcription #
This is what im talking about in this video. The text is transcribed by AI, so it might not be perfect. If you find any mistakes, please let me know.
You can also click on the timestamps to jump to the right part of the video, which should be helpful.
[00:00:00] Welcome to another video here on this channel and thanks for tuning in and
[00:00:05] today I want to show you how you can create actually a tape stop device and
[00:00:10] this was some question from the Bitwig discord. Someone stepped in and yeah asked
[00:00:16] how I can do a tape stop device inside the grid and I tried my best and came up
[00:00:22] with a solution within maybe five minutes so it's not perfect solution
[00:00:27] maybe but I want to show you nonetheless. I have here a drum loop track on a track
[00:00:34] on an audio track and I have an FXgrid device and I created this tape stop and
[00:00:41] this is how it sounds and then the battery is empty and to create this
[00:00:56] effect I used a lot of delays here and then ADSR and then gain volume and the
[00:01:03] select module to actually gate the signal out when the effect is over and I
[00:01:09] can play it again and can can watch the patch what's happening. So when I push the
[00:01:19] button the ADSR is basically fading down and then when the value is zero the
[00:01:27] select module selects a different path and this path is basically yeah there's
[00:01:37] nothing on it so there's no audio and you basically have cut out the complete
[00:01:43] signal and when you push the button again then you basically select again the
[00:01:54] bottom path and you have your signal back again. So why did I why did they use
[00:02:09] the delay here. The delay is actually a delay buffer and when you change the
[00:02:16] size of the buffer you have this slow down and speed up effect and you can
[00:02:21] basically just use this delay here. So we now have only delay audio in delay audio
[00:02:31] out and when you listen to the music and turn the knob back and forth you can
[00:02:36] you can hear this slow down and speed up effect. It's basically like a turntable
[00:02:54] when you have an vinyl running and then you touch your hand on the vinyl and
[00:02:59] stop and yeah speed it up or slow it down. It's kind of this effect and I make
[00:03:06] use of this effect with the ADSR and when we actually hit the button then you
[00:03:16] hear this slowing down effect.
[00:03:21] Oh it's actually the other way around I think.
[00:03:28] And I used multiple of these delay buffers to actually yeah increase the
[00:03:46] effect. I don't know it's actually useful but it sounded better to my ears.
[00:03:54] So it's yeah it sounds more authentic and yeah you also can see that I use the
[00:04:12] button here signal gate in and I used not the audio out of the ADSR instead I
[00:04:20] use the signal out so we just using the signal path or the signal values of the
[00:04:28] ADSR and not the audio in and audio outs and I used this gain knob here to
[00:04:35] actually increase the signal or the value of the signal so when you remove
[00:04:42] this you can hear that the gate responds much much earlier and it's not what I
[00:04:49] wanted. So it switches off before the effect or the fade out is over so I'm
[00:04:59] instead of adding a number I'm using this gain knob here to actually offset the
[00:05:07] value of this signal path so pretty easy to delay the cutout of the of the signal
[00:05:19] and it's a pretty easy you know pretty simple setup and this is called tape
[00:05:27] stop and this is also on my github repository so you can download it there
[00:05:33] play around with it or even just try to recreate this from this video and yeah
[00:05:40] play around with the knobs and maybe with the effect of the delay here you
[00:05:46] can also create some kind of flutter effects when you have some maybe some
[00:05:52] tape tape emulations as a VST flutter effects are basically a part of it so I
[00:06:03] have here this tape machine that's also gonna be inside the bitwig release I
[00:06:11] think and I have this flutter value here and the flutter rate so you can emulate
[00:06:30] maybe some kind of tape deck where the playback speed is not so constant like
[00:06:38] on an mp3 right and when you open this device you can see I feel this delay and
[00:06:45] modulated this delay just to have this kind of flutter effect I also used here
[00:06:52] wave shaping I think where I actually used noise as an input and this noise is
[00:07:01] going to filter device here and I have a
[00:07:09] notch filter here and I'm shaping the filter with an audio
[00:07:17] input so when the audio goes in
[00:07:21] you can hear that the noise is basically reacting to the audio input and it
[00:07:38] sounds a bit like when you record audio on tape and that's what I intended with
[00:07:45] this plugin so at a base noise floor noise and then a little bit of shaping
[00:07:54] the noise filter with the audio just can see the audio goes into the follower
[00:08:02] follower then goes here to this attenuate I think yeah and then to the
[00:08:08] modulator out and then I'm changing the input of the filter and I'm
[00:08:18] using the audio to actually shape the cut-off frequency
[00:08:25] so you can combine these two and then you have basically nearly perfect
[00:08:55] tape deck yeah imagination tape deck emulation simulation I don't know but
[00:09:05] it's it's fun to create these effects and use it so yeah this also device
[00:09:14] which is inside a bitwig release I created this this preset and yeah it's
[00:09:22] not for download at the moment but when you buy the new 3.0 version it will be
[00:09:27] inside of this inside of the preset library yeah and then there was a
[00:09:34] question I wanted to answer on on my youtube channel and let's look at that
[00:09:43] 666666 death asked cool can you explain what do you mean by I added
[00:09:50] wave tables what is the process to do that and he talks about my monster
[00:09:58] preset here where I have wave tables used as an oscillator and what I've done
[00:10:09] is basically I've created wave files so wave tables are just pure wave files and
[00:10:16] I used them inside the sampler and use the cycles mode and yeah that's
[00:10:23] basically it I created wave samples use them as wave tables and yeah that's all
[00:10:31] there is to it and I can show you how you how are how you can create so it's
[00:10:37] wave tables for bitwig and it's also pretty easy you just need a clip and some
[00:10:43] kind of
[00:10:46] synthesizer or instrument you can also use your vocals you can record stuff with
[00:10:53] the microphone and then I'm using here pretty low node I'm going with f0
[00:11:01] because most of the wave tables are at f0 then 24 cents offset but I am just
[00:11:10] using f0 here and some kind of pure waveform
[00:11:17] something like this and I'm adding an sweep and let's start with that
[00:11:29] so the wave table is changing because afterwards we want to scan with the
[00:11:34] wave table position knob through the wave table so there needs to be it there
[00:11:42] needs to be at least one kind of change
[00:11:47] so we have our sweep in there and then I'm using a name wave table f0 so the
[00:11:57] sampler recognizes the right pitch and then we don't need to bounce it because
[00:12:05] bitwig is doing that for us so just use the sampler here and just drag the clip
[00:12:11] into this
[00:12:14] so and then we have basically bitwig is bouncing the clip to wave file in the
[00:12:20] background and add it to the sampler here then we're gonna switch to the cycles
[00:12:30] mode and we turn on this freeze button here and then you can use it as a wave
[00:12:38] table
[00:12:40] so pretty simple and this is basically it's one wave table sound but in my
[00:12:57] case I created a moody sample patch so multiple samples and I saved it here as
[00:13:04] a moody sample preset mega wavetable - that's it and when you open the patch
[00:13:12] you can see I have a lot of different way files here created from different
[00:13:17] synthesizers I like and I also use the select mode or pane so I have I can use
[00:13:29] this select knob here to select different way files and use this button to scan
[00:13:37] through the wave tables
[00:13:55] so pretty simple stuff and you can use this patch inside the grid of course
[00:14:02] when you have your poly grid here and you go to the oscillators pane and you
[00:14:09] select the sampler you can actually
[00:14:14] use the moody sample patch inside here so I'm browsing with the sample make our
[00:14:22] wavetable and then I have my
[00:14:29] speed freeze on
[00:14:35] so you have your wave tables inside the grid and for the wavetables synthesizer
[00:14:47] I also use some of the phase modules here when you use this rep for instance
[00:14:55] this rep module you can see the signal in as an audio signal and the and the
[00:15:01] output of this rep module is a unipolar signal and we need to actually convert
[00:15:11] it back to an audio signal because now it sounds pretty bad or not so bad but
[00:15:17] we need to use the sign module here so we create you can see the there's a phase
[00:15:25] signal going in and a signal going out so it's basically converted back to the
[00:15:31] signal the audio signal range
[00:15:35] but now in between you can use all these phase modules here and for instance this
[00:15:44] shift module
[00:15:47] and what you can do now is you can use in different oscillator maybe the sign
[00:15:59] oscillator here and we need again a modulator out like this and we can
[00:16:09] modulate this shift
[00:16:12] and what we now have this that we basically frequent modulate the wave
[00:16:30] table with the sign oscillator so you can apply wave or a frequent modulation
[00:16:37] to the sampler with this more or less trick in the grid or that's how I used
[00:16:43] it maybe it's not so clean frequency modulation but you can get a lot of cool
[00:16:48] sounds out of it and yeah that's basically another trick I want to share
[00:16:53] it with you and yes that's how you create wave tables in bitwig and that's
[00:17:01] how I created it and how I use it in my monster preset patch and yeah that's it
[00:17:09] for this version for this video and I see you guys in the next one tomorrow
[00:17:14] maybe so see you there bye
[00:17:20] [Music]