Kick Drum Resynthesis with Bitwig

Tutorial | Sep 27, 2024

In this video, I explore ways to recreate kick drums using only native devices in Bitwig Studio by separating and synthesizing the low-end sine wave from a noisy kick sample. I demonstrate using filters, the Harmonic Split device, and the FX Grid to analyze pitch and volume, ultimately re-synthesizing the low end while discussing the challenges of persisting data within Bitwig. Despite some limitations, such as the inability to save pitch envelope data, I show that this method can effectively replicate kick drum sounds.

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Summary #

Maybe you don't watch the video, here are some important takeaways:

Hey folks, welcome back! In my last two videos, I discussed Kick Ninja and Kick 3, which are both kick synthesizers that allow you to drop in a kick sample. The software analyzes the pitch drop or pitch envelope of the sample and then re-synthesizes the kick drum accordingly. In this video, I'm going to explore how to achieve a similar effect using only native devices within Bitwig Studio.

To start, I chose a drum loop with kick drums embedded in it. The kick samples weren't ideal as they were short and noisy, making them harder to recreate. I decided to isolate one kick drum from the sample within the sampler, turning off key tracking and removing velocity information. The isolated kick drum still had some hi-hat noise, making it somewhat noisy.

To clean up the signal, I first thought of using filters, an FX2, or even an FX3 to separate the low and high ends. Using an FX2, I soloed the low end and visualized it using the O Scope oscilloscope. However, the results weren't perfect due to bandpass filter limitations.

Instead, I opted for a more refined approach using the Harmonic Split device, which is based on FFT (Fast Fourier Transform). This device allows separating the signal into multiple sine bins. I isolated the fundamental frequency in the low end and disabled the harmonics and noise, leaving me with a clean sine wave, although with some pre-ringing artifacts due to the FFT process.

Next, I transferred this signal into an FX grid to analyze the pitch drop. Using an oscilloscope within the FX Grid, I tracked the pitch information. I then employed a sine oscillator and used the pitch signal from the sample as its input. To replicate the volume shape of the original signal, I used a Follower device connected to a Multiply module, which changed the oscillator's volume over time.

After these steps, I successfully recreated the low end of the kick drum using the sine oscillator, driven by the original sample's pitch and volume shape data. I then tested this method with another drum loop and observed that I consistently got comparable results.

A notable downside I mentioned is that Bitwig Studio does not have a way to persistently save analyzed signal data. Once you reload the project, the pitch information is lost. This lack poses a limitation if you want to record the analyzed pitch data into, say, a scroll or segments module for later use.

Despite this, the approach worked fairly well for me, and I was able to blend back the top end or noise part of the kick drum with the reconstructed low end, achieving a more complete sound. I also tried smoothing out the signal using a low pass filter to prevent any harsh parameter jumps.

Other approaches attempted included using the Transient Split device, but it did not perform as well because the noise from the hi-hat interfered. An alternative I suggested was using phase modulation (FM synthesis) with the original signal and a sine oscillator for potentially interesting results.

Finally, I wrapped up the video, appreciating the multiple ways to achieve kick drum synthesis in Bitwig Studio, even if they yield slightly different results each time.

Thanks for watching, and I hope you enjoyed this exploration of native kick drum synthesis in Bitwig Studio. Don't forget to leave a like and subscribe for more content. See you in the next video! Bye.

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] Hey folks, welcome back.
[00:00:02] In the last two videos we talked about kick ninja and kick three, two kick synthesizers
[00:00:08] or re-synthesizers where you can just drop in a sample or kick sample and then it analyzes
[00:00:15] these kick samples for the pitch drop or for the pitch envelope and recreates or re-synthesizes
[00:00:21] these kick drums.
[00:00:23] In this video I try to figure out some ways how to do that inside of Bitwig Studio just
[00:00:28] with native devices.
[00:00:30] So here I'm gonna just take one drum loop.
[00:00:37] So I feel like this.
[00:00:39] And here are kick drums in there, right?
[00:00:41] But these kick drums are pretty hard in my opinion to recreate because they are short
[00:00:47] and noisy.
[00:00:49] So let's single out here one kick drum inside of the sampler, disable key tracking and also
[00:00:56] remove here the velocity.
[00:01:00] So this sounds like this.
[00:01:03] You can also hear there's some kind of hi-hat on top.
[00:01:08] So it's pretty noisy.
[00:01:10] So the first thing we can do in Bitwig to clean the signal or to separate the top and
[00:01:18] the lower end is of course we can just use a filter or an FX2 here, an FX3 for instance.
[00:01:26] Let's use FX2 first.
[00:01:29] Just solo here the lower end.
[00:01:37] Let's use the Scope.
[00:01:39] What's the name?
[00:01:40] O Scope.
[00:01:43] Yeah.
[00:01:51] So this is how it looks like here.
[00:01:53] But obviously we use here some bandpass filters to separate the signal.
[00:02:00] So we can also try and use instead of the FX2 we can use a harmonic split device which
[00:02:06] is spectral based or FFT based.
[00:02:09] And it tries to split the signals into multiple sine bins.
[00:02:15] So here we can say we want to track a signal here in the low end.
[00:02:20] Let me see how this looks like.
[00:02:26] And then we pull this down here.
[00:02:29] Now we have the fundamental in this box here.
[00:02:32] We can disable the harmonics and also the noise on top.
[00:02:40] We are left with the pure sine signal in the low end.
[00:02:47] Probably have to...
[00:02:53] No.
[00:02:57] I'm completely lost.
[00:02:59] Oh yeah, there it is.
[00:03:02] Yeah you can see it's basically just a sine wave but with a lot of free ringing.
[00:03:10] It's because of the FFT process or the separation and you can't prevent that.
[00:03:17] Maybe with the bigger window size but you can't change this here in bitwig.
[00:03:24] But with this we can more or less easily track the pitch.
[00:03:29] So we can just use this harmonic split device here.
[00:03:34] And let's say we go into an FX grid.
[00:03:43] We single out here just the low end.
[00:03:45] Then we go into an FX grid.
[00:03:49] And in here we can just take this and analyze it for the pitch drop.
[00:03:55] Let's use a oscilloscope tool.
[00:04:00] Let's see how this sounds.
[00:04:13] You can see we get here some informations.
[00:04:18] Which is the pitch information.
[00:04:21] And then we use the sine oscillator probably here.
[00:04:26] We use the signal as a pitch input here.
[00:04:31] And we want to change the volume of course of this.
[00:04:36] But instead of using an envelope use a multiply and a follower.
[00:04:44] So we follow here the volume shape of the input signal.
[00:04:50] And use this for the multiply to change the volume over time.
[00:05:12] Let's put this in here.
[00:05:22] Now we are fully recreated the low end here with the sine oscillator using the pitch information
[00:05:30] from the sample.
[00:05:33] But only the low end.
[00:05:35] And the follower for the volume shape.
[00:05:37] This kind of works fairly well in my opinion.
[00:05:43] Let's use another drum loop here.
[00:05:45] Let's use this one.
[00:06:00] And an oscilloscope looks like this.
[00:06:07] Let's just assign with the pitch envelope on it.
[00:06:12] So this is how you can recreate it.
[00:06:14] And again here a big problem that I always have with the grid or bitwig studio in general
[00:06:21] if you analyze a signal like we did here with the zero crossing there is no way of persisting
[00:06:28] this data in any shape or form.
[00:06:31] You can't save it into a recorder or you can't save it into the sampler.
[00:06:35] You can't save it in the array.
[00:06:37] Every time you reload the project this pitch stop is gone.
[00:06:42] Because maybe you want to just save this here or record this into a kind of module like
[00:06:49] here the segments.
[00:06:54] So you want to replicate what you see in here.
[00:06:57] You want to replicate in here.
[00:06:58] But there is no way of doing this.
[00:07:01] I did feature a grass for this like years ago but I don't know it's probably not that
[00:07:08] important for most people.
[00:07:11] But I wish we had some kind of way of persisting data that is created inside of the grid that
[00:07:18] you can persist with the patch or with the project.
[00:07:21] It would be really nice.
[00:07:25] So this is one way of doing this.
[00:07:27] You can then here like I said mix in here the top end or the noise part which is the
[00:07:33] whole kick drum.
[00:07:36] Or we can put this kick generator here in the fundamental.
[00:07:40] Oh that's completely wrong.
[00:07:43] Put this here in the fundamental box right.
[00:07:47] Then we can bring back the harmonics or the noise.
[00:07:56] I think that's better.
[00:08:04] And then we could maybe.
[00:08:06] It's no more better.
[00:08:09] Yeah maybe smooth out here the signal with the low pass.
[00:08:15] Something like this.
[00:08:19] So you don't have not too much parameter jumps in here.
[00:08:31] But you can hear it works fairly well.
[00:08:38] Oh is there pitch in there?
[00:08:39] Oh yeah there's pitch in here.
[00:08:43] Let's use a different sample here.
[00:08:45] Let's do something like this.
[00:08:55] Pitch key tracking off.
[00:09:05] So the low end is completely replicated or re-synthesized here with this FX grid just
[00:09:11] by using the zero crossings module.
[00:09:14] And it would be so great if you could just persist this in some kind of module.
[00:09:22] Something like your scroll.
[00:09:24] You can only draw stuff in right.
[00:09:26] It would be nice if you could just record this into a scroll and then save it with the preset
[00:09:31] would be so nice but it's not possible.
[00:09:49] I really like to do this kind of stuff here.
[00:09:52] It's probably not something you want to do live because we have here a lot of latency.
[00:09:58] 85 bpm because of the harmonic split device here.
[00:10:04] You can also try and use here the transient split device and put this device here on the
[00:10:15] tones.
[00:10:16] Right.
[00:10:17] That should kind of work too.
[00:10:22] Not really.
[00:10:23] Yeah, because there's also the hi-hat in there, the noise on top.
[00:10:36] So it's probably better on the harmonic split device.
[00:10:45] So yeah, so this is how I would do it inside of the grid here with some FFT splitting.
[00:10:51] There are probably a lot of more ideas.
[00:10:53] You could try something like using the sample here and feed it into the phase modulation
[00:11:01] input.
[00:11:03] Yeah, just to do FM basically with the original signal and the sine oscillator.
[00:11:11] This works too sometimes.
[00:11:13] So there are so many ways of doing this and it's always two different results and it's
[00:11:18] always fun and it also always gives you something.
[00:11:23] Okay, that's it for this video I think.
[00:11:27] Leave a like, leave a subscription.
[00:11:28] Thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next video.
[00:11:30] Bye.