The prime benefit of FL Studio Mobile lies in the pure ease and simplicity of creating music with little thought and a smooth work flow. In many cases, Image Line has found ways to load FL Studio Mobile with a powerful tool set while maintaining the flexible and friendly interface. Unfortunately, one thing that remains limited and hidden from plain view is the ability to shape sounds to your liking. That’s not to say that personalizing sounds is impossible in FL Studio Mobile – Image Line has included some options and you can push things a little further with some creative tinkering. With that in mind, we’re going to focus on the sound manipulation options in FL Studio Mobile throughout this series.
Making The Most Out Of What You’ve Got
At it’s very core, sound design is about pulling the most appropriate sound for your music out of the tools at your disposal. When you’re constructing sonic properties within an app with limited capabilities like FL Studio Mobile HD, it’s important to take that message to heart. It’s not impossible to shape fantastic sounds within FL Studio Mobile HD, but it requires a familiarity with all the app’s effects and a working knowledge of their capabilities. It’s important to spend time with all of the effects, regardless of how they look from the outside – you’ll develop a stronger final product as a result.
First Impressions Can Be Deceiving
At first glance, the Amp effect seems ultra useful on a visual level, but sonically, it really doesn’t garner much instant respect. It certainly looks pretty cool – the wire mesh and internal tubes bring the physical world of amplifiers right into your iPad. The input and output plugs smell of expandability and brings visions of Propellerheads Reason into our mind’s eye. Once you start moving knobs and faders though, it just doesn’t seem to make that big of a difference. It’s pretty easy to give it a quick once over and then move onto effects with more instant gratification.
Going Deep With The Overdrive
The name of the effect in itself is deceptive – this screen really isn’t about amplification, it’s about overdrive. The fader on the left hand side of the screen labeled “Overdrive” does most of the heavy lifting in this respect – move it from 0% up through 100% to add overdrive onto your track. When you do this, get away from the idea of amplification though – you’re not turning the sound up, you’re adding some edge to your sound. The overdrive will effect the sound itself, not your overall level; even when you place your fader on a soft volume, you can still get distortion on the sound. You will get a slight volume boost from adding overdrive – you’re dealing with a thicker texture at that point – but this screen is really about changing your tone.
Understanding The Possibilities
In order to get the idea of this effect, isolate a track on put some overdrive on it, listening for sonic changes as you move the fader. Make sure that you compare the difference in sound between 0% and 100% – listening closely to these extremes makes the potential for finding subtle texture shades apparent. Once you’ve heard those two sounds, slowly move the fader through the middle range – this is all about small changes. You’ll find very minute changes, but don’t disregard the importance of this fader area – it’s this attention to detail that will guarantee unique and interesting sounds in your music.
Finding Your Overdrive Style
In the middle of the screen, you’ll find a knob marked “Amplifier Style” with two settings, “Type 1″ and “Type 2.” These two settings provide a slightly different type of overdrive that you can apply to your music. “Type 1″ overdrive is a beefier sound, with more emphasis upon the lower register. “Type 2″ overdrive is a bit thinner and tends to prioritize the high end of the sonic spectrum. These differences are more apparent when you push the “Overdrive” fader closer to the top, from about 60% to 100%. This is an important point to consider when you’re using the Amp effect to shape your sound though – “Type 1″ and “Type 2″ overdrive are very different sounds.
Useless Plugs
There are three plugs that sit on the right side of the screen, labeled “Line In,” “Line Out,” ad “Aux.” Before you start considering the potential of running a signal out to another app or using an auxiliary input, you should know one thing – these plugs are strictly for show. There is absolutely no functionality associated with these plugs, and no matter how much you tap on them (and believe me, I tried), you won’t get any results. This was a major error on the part of Image-Line; apps shouldn’t include confusing and non-functional buttons, knobs, faders, or plugs – it just muddles the app’s usefulness.
Going Large With Your Whole Mix
The lower left hand corner of the screen contains the standard on/off switch and “Limit To FX Tracks,” which, in this case, is something to consider. The use of the Amp effect to add overdrive to a specific sound can be very potent, guaranteeing that you pull a completely new quality out of the track. It might be worth overlooking the “Limit To FX Tracks” option and applying the Amp effect to your whole mix though. A small amount of overdrive can add some warmth and depth to the overall sound of a song; “Type 1″ overdrive works especially well in this respect. You don’t want to crank the overdrive so much that your song sounds fuzzy, but a little edge can go a long way.
Stretching Your Limitations
In reality, the Amp effect may not be the sound shaping device that captures the majority of your attention, but it’s worth spending some time exploring. You’ll find that overdrive can make a drastic difference in your sound and will sometimes change the state of your overall mix. Like most effects in FL Studio Mobile HD, it’s a bit limited, but in this case, your limitations will go a long way.
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