Wsm - May 2006 - Issue 001

Page 1

Sound Magazine www.Wusik.com

May 2006 #001

S o u n d s ElektroWusik Volume I Orchestral Lite Prodyon Dance Lead and Basses

A r t i c l e s How to use Manymapper to Create Sample Sets Using Wusik in Sonar 5 Effectively Getting to know you... Wusikstation V2 ...and more


Sound Magazine

Letter from the Editor

A total of 83 new MultiSampled SoundSets (70 meg) and a total of 165 presets

"... 2 thumbs up. They do exactly what WK says. They load quickly, add very little stress on the CPU and best of all they sound great. They sound great by themselves, but I've found that they also work well as a starting point. I play keyboard bass a lot and I can add any of several nice basses to the left hand. Or just stack a few of these guys up and make a REALLY nice layer that still has very little stress to the CPU. There are several presets that are the fast/slow attack of the same timbre, those can sound pretty cool when they're stacked..." by Bamim2 at KVR

I am a Wusik junkie. There, I admit it in front of all of you. I found Wusikstation a little under a year ago and my composing and bank account has never been the same since. Like all of you, I constantly am on the lookout for new virtual synths and sample collections. Wusik has filled that gap and then some. With over 40 gigabytes of sounds, tens of thousands of presets and a vast array of editing and sound modulation options, I never tire of anything Wusik. When William K., the founder and creator of the Wusik Engine (and to someone I am eternally grateful) approached me with the idea of a monthly electronic magazine that also contains samples and presets, my mouth dropped in awe and excitement. There is no other vsti synth, effect or company that I can recall that has done what William is proposing. Of course, there is also no other synth like Wusik either. I told William it would be a lot of work, but with the incredible Wusik community and 3rd party developers, we could really pull this off. Well, one month later, I welcome you with open arms to the first-ever Wusik Sound Magazine. We have a lot of great stuff in store for you - in this and future issues. For our inaugaral issue, we focus on Techno, Dance and Trance music creation and present to you ELEKTROWUSIK! A new sampleset and Wusik transformation that turns Wusik into a fantastic rythmic station. This issue contains the brand new powerful glowing neon blue ELEKTROWUSIK skin by designer extraordinaire: Synthpulse! We also have another treat for you, a metallic skin by Artvera (in three flavors) that has to be seen to be believed! We also have not one, but TWO feature articles, several tutorials, a few How-To’s, a complete cartoon page, a new satire series and tons of samples and presets to keep you busy with Wusik for weeks, or at least until the next issue is ready for download or arrives in your mailbox! I personally want to thank you for subscribing or purchasing this magazine. I know you will enjoy every page, video and preset! We hope to hear from you, our readers, both positive and constructive, so that we can tailor WSM specifically for YOU! Mike Felker

www.wusik.com Re-edited by MoniKe 2

Wusik Sound Magazine


In This Issue:

#001 - May 2006

04

14

Bitz-n-Bytz

- To: A Basic Arp

"Bitz, where are you,”

Users who have not yet attempted to master this feature of Wusik will be surprised...

07

Wave Sequencer How

How to use

Manymapper to Create Sample Sets Is a fantastic tool for creating sample sets...

08 Using Wusik in Sonar 5 Effectively Greats Digital Audio Workstations and Hosts that Wusik can operate inside of.

12

Getting to know you... Wusikstation V2 It’s a beginner’s look at this VSTi - first impressions and the like.

20

Amazing And

Getting Better Sound Designers Flock to Wusik

25

Wave Sequencer

How - To: A Basic Gate ...is typically a monotone version of an arpeggio pattern.

28

About the Contributors

31

What’s Included

In the DVD / Download - ElektroWusik Volume I - Orchestral Lite - Prodyon Dance Lead and Basses ...and many more Wusik Sound Magazine

3


Bitz-n-Bytz

by Mike Felker Illustrated by William Singleton

The

morning was bright and the sun was shining over a fire-splashed cloudy sky. In the yard, a cool breeze was causing the hanging laundry to flip and flop. Inside their recording studio, stacks of boxes were everywhere and patch cords lay about like strewn spaghetti in a tangled mess.

Bytz

was just waking up, his eyes slowly adjusting to the morning sun shining brightly through the window blinds. Someone had already opened them. Bytz looked over at his roomate’s bed and noticed it was empty, the covers thrown on the floor in a hurried mess. That someone could only be Bitz.

"Bitz, where are you,” screamed Bytz. There was no reply. Bytz sat upright and looked for his slippers. Jumping out of bed, no longer drowsy from the night’s slumber, he went looking for his fellow recording artist and life-long pal. Bitz had woken up an hour earlier and was now sitting in the middle of the hardwood floored recording facility, located in their basement, and was not far from the main mixing console. He could not move as he became trapped in a cocoon of audio cables, attempting to straighten the mess.

"Bitz,

where the heck are you?” Bytz had no idea why he was asking for him anyway. Bitz never answered any more than a simple “yes” or “no”. In fact, conversation between the two was usually quite boring and did not happen frequently. Most of the time, Bytz did all the talking.

"There you are,” said Bytz as he found his friend tangled like a fly in a spider’s proverbial web. “Did you make the coffee?” 4

Wusik Sound Magazine

"No.” "Did you get any donuts?” asked a perturbed Bytz. "Nope,” said Bitz. As Bitz continued to untangle the audio cables, Bytz shook his head. “Well Bitz, while you take care of that, I am going to go online and see what’s new. Let me know when you finish, okay?” "Yep,” came the whispered retort, Bitz really not paying attention, totally focused on the task at hand. Bytz mosied into the control booth and over to the computer. He pressed the power button on the 42 inch flat screen LCD display and it hummed to life in all it’s massive glory, like a small nuclear reactor. He typed in KVR’s URL; synapses began firing and pleasure centers began operating as the soft grey and blue earth tones told him he was now looking at his favorite website, the source of most of his current virtual instrument knowledge and the bane of his most persistent addiction.


Bitz-n-Bytz

Bytz realized a long time ago that he was a KVR junkie when Bitz came in one night and began laughing uncontrollably. Bytz, awakened from the maniacal giggling, found his forehead against the cold glass of their old CRT monitor as streamers of drool oozed down, puddling into the onion skin protected keyboard.

"Hmmm, I wonder what new things are available for download today?” he asked aloud, although no one was in the room to give him an answer. It was obviously a rhetorical question meant only for himself. He clicked on the ‘New Virtual Instruments’ menu choice and the broadband connection whirred to life. Impatient as ever, he muttered about how slow this was and that they needed a faster 20 gigabit connection as soon as possible.

Viagra and a microscopic color camera that no one could see. Bytz closed the windows as quickly as he could and clicked the download link. As Bytz was about to get up and make some coffee, the download bar told him another synth had successfully been collected, unzipped and organized. One more added to their ten’s of thousands of virtual instruments in the evergrowing collection. Meanwhile, in the other room, Bitz had finished with the cables and looked over toward the control room. He shook his head in dismay as he witnessed his addicted buddy downloading more stuff again - filling up their hard drive space with more useless crap and resulting in less and less room for their recording needs.

Suddenly Bitz heard Bytz wailing out loud “No, no, oh gawd noooooooooo” and turned his head as he saw the computer screen in the other room go RGB blue, recognizing the ‘Blue Screen of Death.’ He just shook his head back and forth.

The page finally appeared a tenth of a second later and he gasped, “Ahhh, I see there are several new synths. This is GREAT. Oh, Here’s one. This one looks good,” he spoke in hushed tones, meant only for his own pleasure and no one else’s. In front of him, the screen pulsated at 85hz per second and his pupils dilated as he read the latest and greatest innovation from some unknown synth developer using, yet again, VSTi Creator. There were so many virtual instruments created with this package that they actually had logo buttons made, saying “Made with VSTi Creator.” You could even choose NOT to see synths made with this software. Bytz wanted to see it all. Bytz read the title “KillFrog,” nearly screaming, his hands actually shaking in anticipation as he prepared to digest the brief synopsis. “So what does it do damnit, what does it do,” he yelled at the screen as he clutched the mouse harder and harder. The description read: Killfrog:

a double-truncular morphing additive synth that makes any waveform sound like a belching toad.

"Sounds good. Hey, it’s a freebie. Gotta download this one.” ‘CLICK’ went the mouse and he was sent whizzing to the developer’s website, and more specifically to the download page for “Killfrog.” Two popups immediately opened up trying to sell him

Bytz was flailing all around trying to turn off the computer as the hard drive light signified that all their data was being chewed by a viral pac man. He banged on the desk, the chair and the walls. Bitz muttered something unintelligible and went back to the other side of the room as clean and tidy audio cables jumped off the pegs and were already beginning to tangle in a massive heap once more.

Wusik Sound Magazine

5


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6

Wusik Sound Magazine


How to use Manymapper to Create Sample Sets Manytone Manytone

Manymapper is a fantastic

tool for creating sample sets to either DashSND or WusikSND format. It is easy, straighforward and nearly effortless. Included on the DVD or download is a three-part video series on exactly how to use Manymapper to map the included Kazoo sample set, from start to finish, so that you load the samples into Manymapper, move them into a sorted position, map the keys and set their root notes, edit the project name, save the project and convert it to a WusikSND file. Then I show you how to copy that resulting WusikSND file that contains your brand new Kazoo over to the Wusik data folder so that you can begin designing presets.

by Mike Felker

has created an EXCLUSIVE

SPECIAL OFFER for subscribers to the Wusik Sound Magazine. “The deal,” as Mr. Manytone himself describes, “is they can get the Manymapper for $7.95” (list price is $14.95, so you are saving almost HALF what others will be paying for it.) “and it will come with a $10.00 coupon good towards any Manytone purchase. (Minimum $25.00 purchase before the coupon, Not valid on Sale Priced items.) The coupon will be delivered via email with instructions on how to use it.”

The following (long) link will get you to a Paypal screen where you can get this INCREDIBLE offer (or email paul@manytone.com and he will send you the link)! https://www.paypal.com

Wusik Sound Magazine

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by Mike Felker

Using Wusik in Sonar 5 Effectively There are many great Digital Audio Workstations and Hosts that Wusik can operate inside of. Digital Audio workstation software, which is used to record multitrack audio and midi productions, include Cubase, Sonar, Pro Tools, Nuendo, Samplitude, SAW and many others. Host software is more specialized in that it can host VST Instruments and effects without all of the overhead imposed by complex recording software. These include EnergyXT, VST Host, etc. Today

I am going to talk specifically about using Wusikstation effectively in Sonar 5 Producer Edition, since that is my DAW of choice.

So, first things first. Double-click on the Sonar icon to start it up. Your screen should look familiar to the graphic below (I am using Sonar 5 Producer Edition, as you can see to the right). Go ahead and left-click on the CLOSE button to bring up the next palette. Next you will see the QUICK START PALETTE. Left click on “Create a new project” and type in “wusik temp” or some other name you can remember.

This article is simply a quick overview and will only scratch the surface of the setting up and recording Wusik within Sonar. Future articles will get more in depth and specialize in specific topics to help you record your creative ideas easily and more effectively. It

should be noted that you can use this information in other DAW’s, but each software package does things it’s own way, so setting up Wusik in Sonar may be totally different than loading it into Logic, for example.

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Next, you are going to go to the INSERT -> SOFT SYNTHS


Using Wusik in Sonar 5 Effectively

Left click on “Wusikstation” and this box will pop up:

VST and scroll down to the “W’s” (for Wusik). There you will see two (or more versions if you installed V1 of Wusik, then upgraded to V2 and then possibly you also upgraded to V3 - then you may have many versions of “Wusikstation” or “Wusikstation Multi-Out” and never uninstalled or moved the other Wusikstation.dll files.

Under “Create These Tracks,” MIDI SOURCE should be checked because that creates a MIDI track that will be defined automatically to record Wusik data when recording your music tracks. FIRST SYNTH AUDIO OUTPUT should be checked if using “Wuikstation.dll” because that will create a new audio tracks and automatically define that to send the output from Wusik to your sound card or whatever sound source you have defined in the audio driver option box. Now, if, on the other hand, you want all of Wusik’s six sections (Oscillators 1-4 and the two Wave Sequencers) defined as separate tracks, you need to choose the “Wusikstation MultiOut” and remove the check from FIRST SYNTH AUDIO OUTPUT and instead check ALL SYNTH AUDIO OUPUTS. What this does is create 6 separate audio tracks and automatically number them for each track Wusik will output to. This way, if you want to do a surround sound mix, or use vst effects, eq or other tricks on a per track basis, you can. The other way, you can only effect (or affect) Wusik’s main output as a whole. SYNTH PROPERTY PAGE loads in Wusik and shows it on screen and SYNTH RACK VIEW opens up Sonar’s Synth Rack - a VERY important little window.

Compound that with the fact that William releases new Beta’s all the time). I have noticed that the top-most version is the most recent. Wusik Sound Magazine

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Using Wusik in Sonar 5 Effectively This next screen capture shows the Sonar MIDI and Audio track.

I also armed the MIDI track for recording, since we don’t record audio with Wusik, we record MIDI data. So, we have pretty much got Wusik set up Notice that TRACK 1 (not highlighted) shows “Wusikstation Primary Out.” This track is the Wusik audio track. Underneath that, you see “E-MU ASIO Ex Main.” This is the audio out (in my system, I use an EMU 1820M) If you wanted to send the Wusik audio data to a submix bus or some other sound device, this drop down box is where you would choose where to route the audio to. The next section (highlighted) is the MIDI Wusik track and you will see on the fourth line down it says “6Wusikstation 1.” This is the MIDI device that this track will receive it’s MIDI data from. Below that is the MIDI channel drop down box. Right now it is set to none, which is essentially OMNI (listen to all tracks), but if you drop that down (by left clicking on the little down arrow) you will see that Wusik, like most other MIDI devices, has 16 MIDI tracks to choose from. This is great for routing different Wusik parameters to specific MIDI tracks, much like the Multi-Out audio option. Now I have renamed both tracks to be a little more clear. The MIDI track is now called “Wusik MIDI” and the audio track “Wusik Audio.” I also chose MIDI channel 1 to listen to in the MIDI track and it now reads “1: Wusikstation.”

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and the Wusik graphic user interface (GUI) should already be staring you in the face. Let’s record something, shall we.

In this next screen capture, I opened Wusik’s preset browser and loaded in one of the very cool ELEKTROWUSIK presets (available on the DVD) or downloaded setup file. I am going to choose VARIOUS - SUPER GATE 01 and am going to record some chords and riffs for deomstration purposes.


Using Wusik in Sonar 5 Effectively Press the RECORD button in Sonar to start recording MIDI data and play some chords, riffs, the melody whatever moves you. Now that you have something recorded, you should see some MIDI data in Wusik’s MIDI track. You will see above that I played some chords and single notes and that got recorded in the MIDI track for Wusik, not the Audio track. Sonar has a neat little feature that allows you to see the resulting audio waveform in the audio track even though you recorded MIDI data. If you click on the little waveform button, it will turn orange and draw the audio waveform of the MIDI data as you PLAY BACK the track.

A nice little feature if you ask me (you can see the waveform as well as the MIDI data below).

Maybe it’s time we free up some of that VALUABLE RAM. Sonar has a FANTASTIC and life saving feature called FREEZE that unloads Wusik (or any vsti) from memory and converts the recorded MIDI data to a more permanent form of audio data YET THE MIDI DATA IS STILL EDITABLE. Just

amazing! The little snowflake in the icon bar of the SYNTH RACK is the freeze option button. If you press on it, a drop down box will let you pick some choices. We want “Freeze Synth,” so left click on that; however, make sure that the Wusik MIDI track is selected in the main Sonar interface and the Wusik vsti is highlighted in the synth rack as well.

Once you click on “Freeze Synth,” Sonar will chug away at rendering that track in realtime (rendering = converting the midi numeric data to a audio / visual waveform) so that now you have audio data, not MIDI data. At this point, you now have your MIDI track

Okay, so we have MIDI data recorded and we have several other tracks recorded as well (pretend for a moment), my, we are running low on CPU space, as the CPU meter in the lower right of the Sonar interface shows us.

unloaded and greyed out and your audio track with a brand spanking new waveform, ready for editing or applying vst effects to (make sure to right click in the FX box and deselect “By-pass” so that the vst effects will actually take effect.)

Now you can go to the FILE -> SAVE AS menu choice and save your file for later work. Congratulations! You have successfully loaded, recorded and froze Wusik EFFECTIVELY in Sonar 5.

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by Adrian Frost

Getting to know you...

Wusikstation V2 First of all a confession: I’m a beginner, a noob or a newbie. Until now, synths, LFOs and waveforms have been something of mystery to me. I’ve been a musician for going on 20 years if playing the trumpet when you were 12 counts. Until June, 2005 my music was all decidedly analog - bass, electric and acoustic guitars in various bands and situations. The trumpet never did last - I used to go bright red when I played and that is so not cool. In 2005. I got bitten by the bug for computer music.

Noteworthy Composer provided my starting point. But MIDI through the Microsoft GS Wavetable Software Synthesizer was less than satisfactory. Even the Yamaha S-YXG50 soft synth didn’t give me what I was looking for. That’s when VSTs became an issue and an

interest.

C ubasis 5.0, followed by energyXT, became my playground. So, like all addictions it started simply enough - a bit of MIDI here, a host there, a VST when no one was looking… the usual path. Now my hard drive is littered with almost finished tracks, half finished tracks and musical sketches. But I’m happy. After a while you tend to seek out others with the same addiction - not for help to kick the habit… more for help in doing things the best way, finding the next hit. KvR is an addict’s paradise and that’s where I learned of Wusikstation, amongst others. So where’s this all going? WilliamK asked me if I would be interested in contributing to the new Wusik Sound Magazine. Nice opportunity… but I know nothing, or at least not much. So I offered this article: Getting to know you… Wusikstation V2. It’s a beginner’s look at this VSTi - first impressions and the like. One of the first things that you notice when running a new VST for the first time is how it looks. Not that it’s 12

Wusik Sound Magazine

about looks… but it does make a difference. Wusikstation in its grey and red skin is business-like, nothing too flashy but certainly not boring. If and when you get bored with the default skin there are others to choose from - right click just about anywhere in the VST’s window or click the “Wusikstation” logo text to get the configuration dialog. Down at the bottom is a “skins” option - go wild. There’s some nice additional skins available from the Wusik website too: http://www.wusik.com

Being new to Wusikstation the first temptation was to simply click around and see what happened.

Running the skins .exe (setup) file will put things in the right places. So everything is looking nice… how about some sound. Being new to Wusikstation the first temptation was to simply click around and see what happened. Fun but ultimately not greatly productive. What you do learn is that you can get


Getting to know you... Wusikstation V2

a good sound out of Wusikstation very quickly just by choosing one of the available presets. As you swap presets you notice things change - sliders move, knobs turn - fine. More importantly, the lights above the labels O1 through O4, W1 and W2 will change. W1 and W2 we will keep for another time - they’re souped-up Oscillators that can also act as normal Oscillators. The last button to take note of is M - which stands for Master and contains controls for all the Oscillators and Wavesequences.

O1 to O4 represent, simply, a place to put a sound from one of Wusikstation’s soundsets. They are the heart of Wusikstation. Just below is a red bar, divided into three sections, that shows the current contents of each O (or Osc, or Oscillator if you decide to go read the manual - helpful but not essential at this stage). To the left is the name of the soundset being used. Then there is a graphical representation of the sound and finally, on the right, the name of the preset. Each oscillator is independent and can have its own soundset.

A

good place to start editing sounds is to load up “Aerate” from Presets -> Wusikstation -> Famous Keys -> Synth in the presets file browser. This loads the VFX1 soundset into O1 with everything else set to reasonable and useful defaults. The contents of O1 can be copied into O2 by right-clicking and selecting “Copy Layer” then clicking the O2 button followed by another right-click and “Paste Layer.”

Even without editing O2 further the “Aerate” sound is immediately somewhat chunkier and more forceful. Using Tune from the “Pitch” section, the pitch of O2’s sound can be raised or lowered. The amount (in semi-tones) isshown in the top-right corner. Hovering the mouse over a control will also show its current setting. You can go further by copying O1 to O3 and then raising O3’s pitch to create chords from one note. With 6 possible sound slots and the ease with which layers can be copied, it is possible to quickly build up powerful sounds in Wusikstation. All that without even getting into Filters, LFOs and EQs.

Having played around with the presets for a while your attention is drawn to all the other buttons and controls.

The “aerate” preset is also a useful starting point for demoing soundsets as you get a good idea of the set’s raw sound.

One thing I discovered reasonably early is that clicking either the soundset name or the preset name brings up a nice file browser - and the possibilities open up before your eyes. Depending on what you have installed in the way of soundsets and presets they all become available to you via the browser. It is also may be useful to note that changing a preset will change the soundset being used, you can change the soundset without changing preset. This means that if you find a preset you you can swap in different sounds into any of active oscillators for an instant new sound.

buttons and controls. The geek in me counted 8 sliders, 19 rotary knobs, 37 buttons and a number of red clickable bits - that’s excluding O1 to O4, W1, W2 and M.

but the like the

Having played around with the presets for a while your attention is drawn to all the other

Setting both FX1 and FX2 from the “Layers” section to zero flattens out the sound. Wusikstation provides two effects slots for each oscillator layer. Clicking “Edit” opens the FX control’s window within the main VST window. Above the rotary knobs is the effect name. Clicking the name opens the now familiar file browser window from which a variety of effects can be selected. Some effects also offer sub-settings accessible by clicking the text to the right of the effect name. Everything I’ve written so far has simply come from experimenting with Wusikstation. There is a manual available from the Wusik site, but it is easy to get up and running and making useful and decent sounds quite quickly without it. There is much more to explore and all the buttons and controls hint at enormous sound shaping possibilities. But, for now, I’m kind of happy with “Aerate.” Wusik Sound Magazine

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Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Arp The

purpose of this set of tutorials is to familiarize new or inexperienced Wusik owners with the creating of some very basic arpeggios and rhythmic presets using the wave sequencer layers. Users who have not yet attempted to master this feature of Wusik will be surprised with the range of possibilities, and the ease with which advanced presets can be constructed.

The tutorials use a progression of steps to guide the user from a blank preset to the final product. For each step in each tutorial, there is an image of the Wusik GUI with a red arrow on it, indicating the control or group of controls to be manipulated during that step. Text accompanies each image with an explanation of what to do, and why (where applicable). Also for each step of a tutorial, there is an appropriate preset that has been provided with all the changes for that step already completed. This series of example presets may be used to help guide the user along the path toward completing the tutorial. If each step is followed carefully, the user should be able to reproduce an exact or close approximation of the tutorial preset at the end of the series of steps. The presets within the tutorials are designed at 120BPM and for the middle C octave (C5) for best results, and require Wusik version 2.0 or higher. Additionally, the Famous Keys soundset (the original Famous Keys 1-4, not FK Plus) is required for these presets to work. The majority of users should meet both of the listed requirements. Upon the first loading of any of the presets, Wusik may have to search for files, especially in cases where the user has moved soundsets from their default location. If the sounds are unable to load, please post on the Wusik forum, and someone may be able to assist in reconciling the issue. Please designed 14

keep in mind that the presets were with instructional value, not music

Wusik Sound Magazine

by Tranceglobal

making, as their primary purpose. Due to this constraint, they may or may not be useful as actual presets in the composing of music. Note: Users who are not yet familiar with the basic functionality of Wusik should first review the online manual at www.Wusik.com. The tutorials are fairly easy to follow, but are not a stand in for reading the manual and practicing completing basic operations, such as preset selection, loading of an effect, or using the mod matrix in a basic manner. There will be more advanced tutorial presets, along with other content from myself in future Wsm issues. Now gomake some presets! Tutorials for this issue include: 1. Basic gate preset. 2. Basic arpeggio preset.

Before

beginning any tutorial, it is suggested the user load the included ‘Init’ preset to be sure that starting conditions are the same as the tutorial starting condition. It is also a good idea to demo the final preset of a tutorial to get an idea of the goal. During the tutorial, playing on a MIDI keyboard frequently is suggested, so the user can get an idea of the sonic changes happening at each step. There WILL be steps where the sound has become muffled or silent (such as when a volume sequence is first placed and all values are zero), but these are interim construction steps and this is part of the preset design process. In these cases, move on to the next step without fear that something is wrong.

Basic Arp Preset An arpeggio is a pattern of split notes. An arpeggio may be monotone, or have a melodic pattern. The following tutorial illustrates the creation of a basic arpeggio using the wave sequencer function on Wusik.


Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Arp 1. Turn on wave sequencer Layer 1 (W1).

4. Set the sequencer speed of the wave sequencer layer to 1/16.

2. Load the “Saw” waveform from the soundset

5. Set the wave sequencer to Sync on. This setting

folder called “Waveforms” into this layer.

will restart the wave sequence when each new note is pressed.

3. Open the sequence editor for the layer by

6. Set the wave sequencer loop start and end

selecting wave sequencer, or right clicking on the W1 layer button.

points to range from steps 1-8. This will cause the sequence to step one by one through the first eight steps, and then repeat.

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Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Arp 7. In sequence slot 1, select a ‘tune’ sequence.

8. Initialize the sequence to zero by right clicking on the sequence pane. This ensures no tuning changes have been made yet.

10. In sequence slot 2, select a ‘Volume’ sequence.

11. Program the volume sequence in the sequence pane on steps 1-8. Sequence (in order) the values: 76, 49, 63, 41,19 , 63, 36, 55 into steps 1-8 respectively. This has added a sequence of volume changes to make the arpeggio more interesting.

9. Program the tune sequence in the sequence pane on steps 1-8. Sequence (in order) the values: 7, 0, 3, 0, 5, 0, 3, 7 into steps 1-8 respectively. This sequence is the basic arpeggio note pattern. After the sequence is entered, play a note or two to hear what is happening.

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12. On the mod matrix, set up a modulation in slot 1 that uses ‘W1 Mod 1’ as a source, and ‘W1 filter Res’ as a destination. Set the Min, Max, and Amt to values of 0,127,and about 70 respectively.


Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Arp 13. Now, in sequence slot 3, select a sequence of type ‘Mod 1’. This sequence will serve as the modulation source for the modulation established in the mod matrix during the previous step.

16. Turn on filter 1.

14. Program the modulation sequence in the sequence pane on steps 1-8. Sequence (in order) the values: 125, 41, 90, 38, 127, 46, 90, 55 into steps 1-8 respectively. This sequence will not be audible until the filter on the layer is turned on, which will be done in a few steps.

17. Set the resonance and frequency controls for filter 1 to values of about 25 each. Now that the filter is on and settings for it have been made, the filter resonance will be controlled by the Mod sequence created back in step 14.

15. Now close the wave sequence editor by left clicking once on the W1 layer button. Do not double click as this will turn off the layer.

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Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Arp 18. On the mod matrix in slot 2, set up a modulation with ‘Mod LFO 1’ as the source, and ‘W1 Filter Freq’ as the destination. Set the Min, Max, and Amt to values of 0,127,and about 127 respectively. This modulation will allow LFO 1 to control the filter 1 frequency. Double check that the LFO speed is set to 8/4, and a sine wave (these should be default if the included Init preset was used).

21. Select the Master layer.

19. Open the FX1 edit page.

22. Adjust the FX1 send level of layer W1 in the mixer section to a value of about 25. The effect should now be influencing the sound. This preset is finished, play a few notes.

20. Load the ‘Stereo Echo’ (delay) effect, and choose the ‘short echo’ preset. (This effect is already loaded if the included ‘Init’ preset was used). This preset will add some delay ambience behind the sound.

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TT ii pp ss

&TT rr ii cc kk ss

How to make an envelope 'Delay' before affecting something?

Is there an easier way to go from one layer to another?

Since V3 you now have the Envelope-Type option. By selecting the last type: Inverted Exponential x 4, you will introduce a large delay before the envelope works. You can lower it by selecting x 2 instead. Its not a real Delay, but it will work for most cases.

Yes, just the TAB key from your Keyboard. Notice that not all hosts will support this. On some you have to enable/disable something before VSTs can "read" key-strokes.

Most presets have way too many effect, can I turn it off globally for good? Yes, just open the Configuration window (right-click on the W logo, or anywhere that has a blank-space on the GUI) and Set "Enable FX" to No/Off, now click on "Set Defaults." This will force all new instances to not use the internal FXs. Notice that this will not affect saved songs. So if you had old songs that used the effects, they will still do once you open those.

How can I have a FIXED value on the Mod-Matrix? Just pick CC 0 as Source (or anything to be true) and set MIN and MAX to 127, now the AMT will define the value. Why my Volume-Pedal won't affect the Master-Volume? You need to do the following: Right click the Master-Volume, select Midi-Learn, now move the Pedal. Right click again and define MAX to 64 (or whatever you like best).

Can I have Free-Running LFOs instead of Synced to the BPM tempo?

Why my Host Volume Fader won't affect the Master-Volume?

No, but you can fix the tempo on the Configuration Page.

You need to do the following: Right click the Master-Volume, select Midi-Learn, now move the Volume Fader. Right click again and define MAX to 64 (or whatever you like best).

How can I add a global filter to my presets?

How can I use an effect as Insert? Easy, click on Master and set a Filter from there. This will affect all layers, will use less CPU usage, and will also be easier to setup. You can also add a Mod-Matrix option such as ModWheel (CC1) to Master Filter Frequency. Use the Smooth (M) option to remove the "Zipper-Noise" while doing Frequency changes. Notice that you can't use any Mod-Envelopes to the Master-Filter. As Envelopes are Polyphonic, and the Master-Filter is Monophonic. We will introduce a new code for V3 that will allow you to do that, by selecting the Mono mode (voices = 1).

V1/V2 doesn't have such feature. But, you can disable the original signal of all layers. Select FX1, the option DryOut does that. Set it to Zero. (0) Now you will only hear the Effects output, not the original signal. Notice that this option only shows up for FX1, but affects all layers and also FX2.

by WilliamK

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Amazing And Getting Better

by Funky Chicken Dance

SOUND DESIGNERS FLOCK TO WUSIK AMAZING,

AND GETTING BETTER… what else could you say about the Wusikstation family of products? Sure, many VSTi synths have qualities that motivate professional sound designers and enthusiastic music fans to design their own presets. But the Wusik engine is a rarity: it has spawned a collaborative network – you could even call it a family if you want – of enthusiasts turning out soundsets and presets for the brand. As a result, users have access, at reasonable prices, to the kind of range of sound options that one associates with ‘big name’ companies with their vast multi-gigabyte sample libraries and proprietary players.

S

o, what makes Wusik such a magnet for designers? First, of course, it’s ‘not just another synth,’ using familiar circuit emulations to create sounds. It’s more akin to the groundbreaking Wavestation of the late 1990s, because it adds the manipulation of sound samples to its inventory of tricks. But, unlike samplers or the fancier playback engines that we’ve come to call ROMplers, it’s still a relatively full-featured synth under the hood. The guts of the product is the Wusikengine, reckoned to be among the fastest around. The sampler works in 32-bit mode internally, and feeds two filters, wave sequencers and LFOs synched to the project tempo.

Samples

are stored in the proprietary .wusikSND format, but the Wusik engine eats .WAV files quite happily, giving it access to a vast potential library. There’s a WAV converter included in the bundle. Many high quality loop, sample and oneshot collections in WAV format are available, and it’s 20

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the common option for digital recorders, for those who sample their own sounds. And if that’s not enough, recently Wusikstation owners have been taking advantage of a discount deal on W. Grabowski’s modestly priced Extreme Sample Converter (ESC v.3) to flip samples from other formats to Wusik use.

O

kay, technicalities aside, how does it sound? In a word, incredible. As Wusik.com and third party developers have shown over and over, there’s precious little the synth can’t do. Grinding industrial sounds? Smooth chillout grooves? Amazing ambient washes of sound? Biting techno synth leads? If you can describe it, the Wusikstation can and has done it.

It’s that versatility, plus those ‘samples plus synth tools’ that explain the Wusik format’s popularity. I asked some designers to tick off what they liked.

J

ohn Gibson runs Dangerous Bear Underground out of Washington DC, and has several Wusik-compatible collections. “From a sound design perspective, the attraction to Wusik is threefold. One, Wavesequencing. I am a former Wavestation owner, and I loved it. It was one of the most unique and under-appreciated synths of its time. The WusikEngine’s implementation of that feature is the best that has been done in my opinion. Two, basic ‘romploid’ synthesis. This is actually my favorite type of synthesis, because you can always play samples of the basic analog


Amazing And Getting Better waveforms, but an analog synth can’t sound like a piano. It’s just a more flexible system because the input can be anything. Doing the basic layering, filtering and effecting is dead easy in WusikEngine, and the mod matrix is fairly comprehensive; it kind of reminds me of the Oberheim Matrix series in that you can get to every parameter from every other parameter, and modulate modulators as well. Also, the UI is very easy to grasp and still allows great depth of programming if you want it, or quick tweaking if you don’t. It is an ergonomic design marvel. Three, it just sounds good. And if it sounds good, it is good.”

J

eremy Janzen of Nucleus Sound Labs (in Alberta, Canada) is also a big Wusik fan. Why? “Two things: Ease of use, and Wavesequencing. First, it’s really easy for myself, my affiliated designers, or customers to load some samples into Wusikstation and come up with a pretty good sounding preset. But at the same time, there are the two Wavesequencing OSCs, which are harder to master but can create amazing results! Very few other samplers/ synths have this same combination of ease of use and advanced features.”

D

ennis Lenz of Prodyon.de tells me he goes for: “Its flexibility! The fact that you can easily browse through various sounds, WAVs and preset and combine them easily. I also like the Wavesequencer very much since it’s capable of doing very interesting rhythmic sequences! Designing presets for Wusikstation was a breeze. Also the EQ is very handy sometimes.”

The

eponymous Zvon of that Montrealbased design shop says he likes Wusik because of “the ability to easily layer and mix up to four waveforms and the wavesequencers.” In designing presets, the key is to “use the layers and the wavesequencers! A preset has to sound good on its own first. The FXs and modulations are an added bonus, not a way to cover an otherwise uninteresting sound.”

A

s you’d expect, Wusikstation v.1 was launched with a handy-sized collection of sounds by WilliamK and other developers. There were 450+ soundsets, and over 500 presets. Gradually, this collection has evolved into what is now called the ‘Big Package’: 2300+ soundsets and 1650+ presets, covering a huge spectrum of categories.

Designers represented include Tim Conrady, ToTC, Drinelli and others.

The v.1 engine has not vanished – it can be found inside BITR’s VOX'd and TSW Pro,along with Manytone Music’s Manystation. But it was superseded in the summer of 2005 by a more sophisticated v.2. For users, one significant change between versions came with the introduction of individual wusikPRST format presets, replacing the familiar bundled .bnk collections of presets. A converter tool makes it easy to update the v.1 banks to v.2 use. Another significant plus was the way in which Wusikstation now seeks out sounds and presets in its format over the drive in question, and the seamless installation kits provided with Wusik products.

While

v.2 remains the principal product, Wusik.com is now actively developing v.3, which is in an ongoing beta mode. Like most small creative shops, Wusik’s plans are fluid, and it’s proved advantageous to Wusik fans to be part of the process, help with testing, and make suggestions, rather than merely stand back and wait. Assorted Extras: Drumillenium: A weighty collection of 102 drum samples and 62 kit presets, additional to the 1450 samples included in the drums section of the ‘Big Package.’ HQ: This ‘high quality’ set of samples and presets emerged later in 2005, and contained some very pleasant surprises. It samples three rare German pianos – Essenfelder, Fritz Dobbert and M. Schwartzmann – an Aria classical guitar, and two drumkits. The Essenfelder piano is particularly beautiful. Famous Keys +2 and +3: A complete surprise to those of us who kid ourselves we know what’s going on! These March 2006 releases feature samples from two Yamaha synths, the SY22 and the SY85. The ‘+2’ is designed to be undemanding on CPU. Teksonik, a frequent Wusik contributor, added a set of 21 free presets for FK+3 a little later.

L

ike v.2’s Big Package, v.3 has its v.3 ‘Gold’ version, which promises to be a large, constantly evolving family of sounds in its own right. The selection of sounds produced under the HQ name Wusik Sound Magazine

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Amazing And Getting Better during late 2005 is part of that Gold version, which is to be extended with various other HQ samples (William has mentioned a choir set, strings, acoustic bass among other possibilities).

convincing collection of basses, and more. A stellar cast of characters are credited for the presets, which I find first-rate. Manytone’s subsequent product, Manyguitar, uses a DASH Signature engine, but its samples are compatible with Wusik.

And of course, right now you’re reading an ezine that’s also a vehicle for delivering yet more sounds and presets. In the fall of 2005, Wusik.com had contemplated producing an ElektroWusik edition – with a distinctive, bright ‘techno’ GUI and brash danceable sounds – to cater to musicians with those specific tastes and broaden the appeal of Wusik. The GUI skin exists, and part one (of three) of the ElektroWusik sounds is here, a generous 1GB or so of samples (including Virus) plus presets from several designers.

It’s

fair to say that if you only had the Wusikstation v.2 and ‘big package’ you’d still have one hell of a synth, at a modest price. But the same tropism that brought well-known developers into the act has also encouraged third-party businesses to cluster around Wusikstation. It should be recognized that all of them have other lines of business and other sample format platforms that they serve, but they see Wusikstation as a major emerging format to rival those typically much more expensive players. Bear in mind that some of these developers are also the focus of loose conglomerates of designers, and you’ll see that Wusik has the makings of a true popular movement. BITR

One

of the first to jump into the Wusikengine addons business was Back In Time Records (BITR), based in Wiesbaden, Germany. The company has been around since 1995, developing samples and working with big names like Akai and Image Line. It hadn’t tried a VST product before, but collaborated with Wusik on a very successful line called The Second Wave (TSW). Initially a fairly modest collection, this grew into TSW Pro, with 950 presets and 1800 samples. Although Wusikstation owners can run the product inside Wusik, the line is also sold as a VST with the Wusikengine bundled, like other big-name romplers. A second product, VOX'd, brings 1500 vocal and choral samples to the platform, along with 128 well-designed presets. Manytone Music

M

anytone’s Manystation is a Wusikenginebased VST that is definitely worth a good look. It features a carefully chosen collection of guitar samples, some excellent cellos, keyboards, a very 22

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Zvon

A

much-underrated Canadian developer, Zvon offers some truly unique products. It’s not ‘the same old sampled stuff’ here! One line is based on an ‘altered’ Rhodes piano – meaning one that has been given a ‘John Cage’ treatment with tacks, paper clips under the hammers, and other sonic violations – to produce some quite idiosyncratic samples. Zvon then goes on to layer and mangle these into even more nutty sounds. A must! Similarly, his ‘marching horn’ collection is based on sounds from a funky junkshop horn of unknown provenance that is sampled and mutated into an amazing family of voices, from smooth brass sections to bizarre wailing. It has to be heard to be believed. The third, based on vocal samples by a Montreal jazz singer Julie Hamelin, is charming, strange, and challenging, and well worth a try. A final oddity is his aptly-named IYTTIW – ‘if you thing this is weird’ – collection of percussive items. As you can tell, I’m a fan. Zvon’s stuff is bizarre, but useful. Nucleus Sound Lab (NSL)

A

big surprise in 2005 was the appearance of a series of evergrowing samples and presets under the SoundCell name. Now operating his company as NSL, developer Jeremy Janzen explains: “I started sampling about 3 years ago, just for fun. And I released these sounds for free on my old website www.finalfloyd.com. At the time there really wasn’t anything like Wusikstation mostly just ‘serious’ samplers like Kontakt and Halion, etc. When Wusikstation was released, (fun trivia fact - I did the initial 32 factory presets for Wusikstation v1) I noticed 3rd-party add-on sets getting released and doing fairly well. I got to thinking ‘My free samples are just as good as these. I can compete in this market!’ So I did just that. I sampled a few more sounds, bundled them with the old finalfloyd.com sounds and released SoundCell ONE. I was really shocked by its popularity.” “Since then it’s just been a continuation for SC2, SC3 and SoundCell Trilogy. Basically my plan behind each one was to make it exponentially more impressive than the last. The overall goal is to


Amazing And Getting Better create sounds that are useful to me in my own music, and to sell them at a price anyone can afford.”

W

hen SC1 started the series, it was a 170MB collection, and very cheap. By the time the series wound up, with the combined ‘Trilogy’ offering, it came to 2.4GB of samples, and over 1000 presets.

textured backdrops that fall outside the usual range of ‘pads’ found in synthesizers.

O

ne striking set was produced commercially by Intelligent Machinery, and turned over to the public domain in the fall of 2005. Two slightly different versions of this huge collection have emerged in Wusik format, one from NSL, the other from autodafe.

Dangerous Bear Underground What Next?

d

BU has two excellent offerings in the format: its first, Fuel, bundles four earlier libraries and has 600 presets and over 1.5GB of samples, developed by John Gibson in conjunction with such well-known names as Chris ‘Ugo’ Sciurba, Paul Walsh and Teksonik. A newer library, Ignition adds another 800MB of samples and presets by Gibson and Ugo. In his own words: “Fuel 2.0" is the culmination of a process of consolidating four libraries I had done for WE. It is best seen as a good, diverse sampleset that will get you one step beyond the bread and butter of something like Manystation or the workstationy nature of TSW. It’s got the vintage stuff, like classic samplers and beatboxes, and weird stuff like SliceKits and SynWav that will get you a lot of flavor for your composition and/or sound design needs” With Ignition “our idea was to build a sample set around the kind of programming we wanted to do. That was to put a lot of emphasis on the wavesequencer and particularly plucked and percussive sounds. We were not able to do some of the original sampling we set out to do, but the soundset we ended up with was more than worth it. Ugo’s work on that was brilliant, and worth the price of the library by itself.”

How far can Wusikstation go? My personal guess is that designers are only beginning to scratch the surface, believe it or not. For example, the synth has amazing microtuning potential (it features the mindboggling Scala collection of 2400 tuning options). Coupled with ethnic instruments – or not, if you have a mind like Conlon Nancarrow – there’s a lot of potential. Clever though most presets are, few have dug deep into the layering possibilities of four OSCs and two wavesequencers. Then there’s the mod matrix, which has an incredible number of possibilities….and is going to be yet more complex in v.3!

I

bounced this question off dBU’s John Gibson, who without any prompting replied: “creating WE products and involvement in the Wusik community are at the center of my life and career in a way I could never have imagined when I bought the synth in the fall of ’04. Who knew it could get this big? I see a lot of potential for more growth ahead.”

On Their Way

A

utodafe is best known as the guy behind Megabass collection. But he also has a fine Steinway grand piano sampleset in WE format.

Mallory freebies. You don’t always have to pay. In the fall of 2005, KVR user Mallory popped up with sets of presets for Wusikstation, which he’d designed using a proprietary algorithm to pull sound samples together. Christened with flamboyant Latinate and medical-sounding names, they can be found at the Wusik.com site. They run to twelve folders in number, and largely – but not entirely – focus on mutated keys and pads. A very useful set!

"The

drones." Musicians working on industrial sounds, or scoring for films, often seek

In late-April, as this issue of WSM is put together, three new major collections of Wusikcompatible soundsets and presets are hitting the market. More are scheduled to follow through the year.

1 NSL is surely going to cheer up a lot of synth fans with its new collection Oberheim Resurrection As developer Jeremy Janzen puts it: “it seems every day you see someone decrying the lack of a good Oberheim VSTi emulation. So it seemed a really good sample product to bring to market.

My plan with the sounds themselves was to bring a variety of really raw, useful analog Wusik Sound Magazine

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Amazing And Getting Better sounds to Wusikstation. Of course, some of my preset designers got a little bit more creative with the samples and thus there is a variety of more processed, wavesequenced, and effected Oberheim sounds to be had here as well.” In keeping with previous offerings from this design shop, it’s a monster: 450 MB of samples, 600+ presets, by, well, ‘the usual suspects’! Jeremy’s right: apart from the very nice collection of presets for Rhino 2 by Daniel Maurer, good ‘Ob’ sounds are hard-to-find at sensible prices. (release date: April 22, 2006). On the NSL site, it’s leaked that this is the first in a series of ‘classic synth’ products.

1

Dangerous Bear Underground is launching a new series called Sonic Scapes with Volume 1 due to release on April 26, 2006. This set, John Gibson explains, “is about sound design at the sample level. It is the WE iteration of my sampling projects for ’06. Different versions and combinations of the same recording and processing sessions will be released for Sampletank, Kontakt and STS-24 and maybe some more formats. But it is basically a reflection of my approach to sampleplayback synthesis: which is that you basically have a signal chain coming from the sample, through the synth engine with its modulators, filters and effects, and that chain is the object. Recombining as many sounds as you can in the chain. Then that is a new sound that can be taken even further. Some of SonicScapes is actually samples I have done, resampled after having been processed in one synth engine or another, now reprocessed in WE for SonicScapes. Those Wusik presets might get resampled and used in Kontakt, like a wavesequence made into a loop then mangled in Time Machine, or in Sampletank with STRETCH. You never know, because dBu libraries are all actually living works in progress.”

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Already available (released mid-April) from Prodyon.de is a collection called Dance Leads Vol.1, which has 300 presets. What’s a dance lead? Samples on the site feature some smooth European sounds, the kind of thing you’d expect from a Berlin developer. Dennis Lenz says Dance Leads is: “a collection that covers many kinds of electronic lead sounds, useable for house, dance, trance, whatever. Many of the sounds have some nice modulation stuff going on and I also made heavy use of the “sample start” manipulation feature which works just fantastically! It gives somehow a really organic feel. A library of ‘dance basses’ has also been launched. He comments: “my dream is to have a very large collection of thousands of presets someday ranging from electronic pads, rhythmic sequences to drumkits and sliced loops and stuff.” 24

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Long-delayed – but, surely, due to appear before mid-summer? – is a collection from BITR called Ethnotronic Above 1GB in size, with 500+ presets and a wealth of ethnic instruments both familiar and unfamiliar, it’s been pending since October 2005. My personal hope is that this will be a product well worth the wait, since reasonably priced ethnic collections are scarce. It’ll also be released in Halion format.

4

And let’s give a namecheck to Mike Felker, who’s editing WSM. He’s well known under the name Karmacomposer on KVR, and has a collection under development for release this summer.

Sho

knows who else will pop up with collections this year? I certainly don’t. It could be you, the reader. As NSL’s Jeremy Janzen comments: “I think something very useful for each Wusikstation user is to learn to create their own presets. Due to the wide variety and quality of presets included with Wusikstation and its 3rd-party products, it’s probably easy to think ‘Why bother learning to tweak/ program Wusik?’ In fact it’s quite easy to get started - and it can be a very creative and rewarding process. And who knows - if you get really good maybe you can help me with a future Nucleus SoundLab product!”

I sometimes flatter myself as a ‘power user’ of Wusikstation, but I’ve personally done very little but tweak effects. Mea culpa! But there’s a reason: my ‘data’ folder for the product and associated files clocks in at (gulp!) 15 GB, consisting of 22,000 files in about 500 folders. And, it’s sure to get bigger as the months roll by.

...a

nd that’s not to mention the compatibility of Wusik’s engine with the many collections of samples offered via DASH Signature. (Developer WilliamK’s handiwork can be found on many MP3 samples at that site; he was a developer there before launching his own brand.) Those .DASHsnd files are quite easily converted for use withWusik v.2, and include the many samples of vintage synthesizers, FM synths, Moogs and Mellotrons that run on the EVE platform, plus the sounds behind the EMM Knagalis ethnic sound synth.


Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Gate

by Tranceglobal

Basic Gate Preset

A

gate effect, sometimes called a trance gate, is typically a monotone version of an arpeggio pattern. The rhythmic pattern is created by altering the volume in a series of steps. This tutorial is a very basic gate effect, with some pan and filter modulation to add some movement.

3. Open the sequence editor for the layer by clicking the ‘wave sequencer’ button, or right clicking on the W1 layer button.

1. Turn on wave sequencer Layer 1 (W1).

4. Set the sequencer speed of the wave sequencer layer to 1/16.

2. Load the “Analog14” waveform from the soundset folder called “WS_Famous Keys 2” into this layer.

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Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Gate 5. Set the wave sequencer to Sync on. This setting will restart the wave sequence when each new note is pressed.

8. Program the volume sequence in the sequence pane on steps 1-16. Sequence the values: 11, 30, 60, 01, 68, 01, 79, 84, 41, 1, 87, 49, 36, 01, 36, 65 into steps 1-16 respectively. This sequence establishes the basic gate effect.

6. Set the wave sequencer loop start and end points to range from steps 1-16. This will cause the sequence to step one by one through the first 16 steps, and then repeat.

9. On the mod matrix, set up a modulation in slot 1 that uses ‘Mod LFO 1’ as a source, and ‘W1 Pan’ as a destination. Set the Min, Max, and Amt to values about 35,127,and 127 respectively. This modulation setting will cause the sound to pan about the stereo field in time to the LFO 1 waveform. Double check that the LFO speed is set to 8/4, and a sine wave (these should be default if the included Init preset was used). Play a few notes to hear this effect.

7. In sequence slot 1, select a ‘Volume’ sequence.

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Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Gate 10. Now close the wave sequence editor by left clicking once on the W1 layer button. Do not double click as this will turn off the layer.

13. Open the FX2 edit page.

11. Open the FX1 edit page.

14. Load the ‘Digital Distortion’ effect and choose the ‘soft’ preset. This effect will give the sound some edge.

12. Load the ‘Stereo Echo’ (delay) effect, and choose the ‘short echo’ preset. (This effect is already loaded if the included ‘Init’ preset was used). This preset will add some delay ambience behind the sound.

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Wave Sequencer How - To: A Basic Gate 15. Adjust the Filter, Rezo, Drive, and Satr values to 127, 62, 80, and 127, respectively.

Broaden your sonic palette. Try our soundsets for the Wusikstation.

16. Select the Master layer.

The Prepared Rhodes, unique electro-acoustic percussive sounds from a real Rhodes Mk 1. The Marching Band Horn (3 volumes), add a brassy flavor to your songs. The IYTTIW modified trumpet sample set, 41 waveforms of processed staccato trumpet.

Electronic Drums/Percussions kits, 161 original percussion samples. 17. Adjust the FX1 and FX2 send levels for layer W1 in the mixer section to a value of 127 and about 75 respectively. The effects should now be influencing the sound. This preset is finished, try it out.

From Jazz singer Julie Hamelin Julie Vocal FX vol.1, a collection of one-shot female vocal FX and scats. Julie Scats Collection, female jazz scat singing one-shot samples.

Visit our Products Page for details, dowloadable demo soundsets and MP3s. http://www.lesproductionszvon.com

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Frank Genus (aka ‘ToTc’) . . . is a preset designer/sample provider – About Frank: Frank Genus is a professional sound designer from New Jersey in the United States. He started offering freelance sound design in 2000, and has worked with the likes of ConcreteFX, Dash Signature, Cutter Music, Progress Audio, Kjaerhus Audio, Linplug, Cakewalk, and a long list of other developers. In October of 2003, Frank collaborated with friends Alex and Jake to form Pro-Sounds, a commercial sound design company. He has also collaborated with Tim Conrardy and Marc Houpe to form the group T3, which has released 2 banks for the TSW wusikstation soundset, and continues provide a range of free and commercial services via ToTc Productions and Pro-Sounds. Contact information: ToTc Productions: www.totcproductions.com Pro-Sounds: www.pro-sounds.net

Funky Chicken Dance . . . is a relative neophyte in the VSTi world, but has made up for the delay. Contributing to the KVR forums under the half-baked name funkychickendance , he aspires to be polite and patient, or at least funny. He’s a ‘Sixties generation’ guitarist who has worked as an editor or writer for most of his life. Often too lazy to create his own presets, he’s grateful for the thousands already made by inspired designers. He runs on a Dell 3.2GHz, 1GB RAM, 270GB hard drive rig, and has artvera’s new gold skin on his Wusikstation GUI. Unfashionably, he thinks ACID 6 Pro and FL Studio 6 Producer Edition are perfectly adequate hosts. Based in rural Maine, he’s working on an album, just like everyone else…oh, and he’d like to give a ‘shout out’ to all his bros on the forums who have contributed so much to his ongoing musical education.

Zvon For the first issue of the WS mag, I will prepare a multi-set bundle of waveforms from my soundsets that will include some that are not in the current demos. The package should be between 30

and 60 MB. It will also include new presets that will work with this special bundle. I will also include a coupon for a certain amount of rebate on the featured soundsets. It will be named "Special multi-set 01" from Zvon.

Autodafe . . . started playing classical guitar at 12. When he was 16 he joined its first band, in which he played guitar, singed and also played some keyboards. They got close to a record contact with a big italian "alternative" label, but then the band broke up. He then devoted to keyboards and synths, and from 1997 (his first "serious" DAW) to date he played electronic instruments, softsynths and began collecting analog synths. His collection of old analog synths reached more than 50 units, and today still counts about 40. His latest project as a musician is www.wavewizards.com. He recently started creating patches and sample sets for various soft synths, as well as creating his own VST instruments and FXs, see www.autodafe.net. He currently works as a free-lance Technical Trainer for IT Companies.

Adrian (aka Anzoid) . . . lives and works in southern Belgium. I'm English but have lived in the Belgian Ardennes with my family since 2001. We have three children between the ages of 5 and 2. Only our eldest was born in the UK; the other two were born in Belgium. Computer music is a relatively new hobby but I've been playing music since I was in secondary school - I'm now 33. I started out playing the trumpet but it never really was my thing. At the age of 17 I learnt to play bass guitar followed by "ordinary" guitar - electric and acoustic. I've played bass in a number of bands in different parts of the UK - the defining moment being the opportunity to play through a 400 watt amp which made my trouser legs flap... that and buying a Hohner headless bass 11 years ago which is still my pride and joy. The purchase of a Casio keyboard one Christmas (there are some samples available with this issue of WSM) started me on the not so long road to full blown VST

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addiction. My website at www.anzoid.com is home to all of the music I've produced so far.

Dave C. (aka. TranceGlobal) Dave C: Manual Updates. Dave has been into synthesis and recording for a relatively short time- just over five years. Music and technology, however, have both been a long time passion. Two years ago Dave returned to college, after a few years working in an unrelated field, to obtain a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering. The degree is approximately half completed, and a masters degree may likely be pursued directly following.

SynthPulse Brian Cypher (aka: synthpulse): Graphic Designer: 1977-1988: Signage, custom paint, lettering, graphics, pinstriping, airbrush murals, flames etc. for custom vehicles. In the mid-80's I worked for a company doing graphics for "Large Inflatable Product Replicas", for example, 50 foot high beer bottles! 1989-1992 I worked for a U.S. Dept. of Defense contractor, creating graphics for Computer-Based Training (CBT) for the U.S. Navy's VAQ-129 squadron. Interactive aircrew training for the EA-6B Electronic Counter-Measures aircraft (the "Prowler" jammer). Yes, I recreated real electronics gadgets, knobs and buttons and LCD screens, on old-school PC's. That's all I'm allowed to tell you! Since then, I have been doing logo design, business graphics and signage. I bought my first synthesizer in 1983. A new grey Roland SH-101, that I still use. I also own a Juno 60, Juno 106, Arp Axxe, some Casio synths, Yamaha DX-TX's, EMU's, and rack effects. My home studio is called Jetnoise Studio, because I live near an airbase, and I'm in the flightpath. Musical influences: Beatles, 60's psychedelic, Pink Floyd, Tangerine Dream, Eno, Bowie, Ultravox, Bill Nelson, Depeche Mode, Xymox, Peter Murphy, Garbage, Trance.... that stuff! I'm currently 48 years old. http://synthpulse.wusik.com

Vera Kinter (aka. Art Vera) My interests are computer music and graphic art. Some time ago I began to cooperate with H.G. Fortune, one of the best developers of VSTi plugins. I create sound patches and graphics for many of his VST instruments. http://www.artvera-music.com

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Wusik Sound Magazine

Vip Zone "was going to send us free virus samples in return for promoting theyre site. We would need to include on the presets name the site URL. Must include (vipzone- samples.com) on the preset name that uses the samples." vipzone@time4base.com

Mike Felker (aka. Karmacomposer) Professional Composer / Production / Printing - Currently involved with the Wusik Sound Magazine, sampleset creation and preset design. About me: Classically trained in piano starting at the age of 6, I continued my training throughout elementary, middle and high school. During my middle and high school years, I also played Trumpet in orchestra. At the age of 16, I helped my father in his Sir Speedy printing center where I learned to run printing presses and typography. It was during college that I really began composing on my own. Starting with a Korg poly- 800 and then a Kawai K-1, I created music on my apple II+ and then purchased an atari TT computer using SPMTE Track sequencer. During college two of my instrumentals received air-play on a nationally syndicated radio show. After I graduated from the University of South Florida with a Bachelors in Sociology and a double-minor in English and Psychology, I worked with Eckerd Corporation, Price Waterhouse and many other firms all involving computers, multimedia, printing and newspaper and magazine layout. During this time, I was elected to the board of the Florida Motion Picture and Television Association (FMPTA) and the Southeastern Music Conference (SMC) and won a Crystal Reel Award for my 3D Animation Work in a television commercial. I have been a member of ASCAP for the last 10 years. I have owned three companies before now, specializing in computers and printing and have instructed three other companies to successfully design and publish magazines of their own. Now, at 38 years of age, I own a recording studio and production company where I duplicate, print and package CDs and DVDs, among other things. My hardware of choice currently is a Korg Karma and a Technics KN7000. I have embraced the world of sampling and virtual instruments. Sonar 5 Producer is now my DAW of choice and I use literally hundreds of virtual instruments, of which Wusik is definitely my favorite GO-TO synth - I use it for everything. My most current achievement is a 4 year contract to create the music for a PC Game title that will have worldwide distribution. You can visit me on the web at http://www.mfelkerco.com


What’s Included In the DVD / Download This month’s theme is ELEKTROWUSIK and we have plenty of sounds and presets to make your Techno, Dance and Trance tunes vibrate with these tasty samples. There is nearly one gigabyte of samples and presets on the DVD and in the downloadable WSM file:

You will also find the self-running three-part Manymapper video tutorial companion to the short article in .exe format (132 Meg) and the video codec that you need to install to watch all of our video tutorials here at the Wusik Sound Magazine. Also make sure to look out for Manytone’s awesome offers inside.

The Last Word

ElektroWusik Volume I - 68 new SoundSets - 720 Meg - 182 presets. Synth List: Alpha Juno, Moog Prodigy, Paia Fatman, Virus, Digital Filters and other special sounds.

Orchestral Lite A simple set of Orchestral sounds: Violins, Strings, Glockenspiel, French Horns, Pizzicatos, Timpans, Bells, and other. 15 new SoundSets, 15 presets, 22 Meg.

Prodyon Dance Lead and Basses A Demonstration of theyre full SoundSets, 22 Meg, 40 presets.

product.

64

ToTc Sounds 13 presets. 5 extra Sounds: 540 Kit, (L/ R) 540 Strings (L/R) and Alesis-HR16. 52 Meg.

I hope everybody enjoyed our first Wsm issue. With the help of the whole Wusik community, we can make every new magazine bolder, bigger and more superb... I think you get the picture. I want to give a personal Thank You to Mike / Karmacomposer for his incredible help on editing the magazine. Also to Autodafe for the extra Sounds for ElektroWusik, SynthPulse and ArtVera for the new ElektroWusik Skins, VipZone for the Virus samples license, Dave for the incredible work on the manuals and tutorials, Peter for his superb Article and everybody else that helped us out. If it weren't for all the help we got so far, Wusik would never lasted so long. So a big THANK YOU for all who supports our work. WilliamK

Zvon Sounds Several. 26 extra Sounds, 54 Meg. 35 presets. Gate/Arp Tutorial presets: 43.

Karmacomposer Kazoo samples 1 Soundset, 25 mono samples in .wav format, 9.16 Meg, 1 Preset.

We have other goodies for you as well. Following the ELEKTROWUSIK theme, there are several new skins for yoiur Wusikstation by Synthpulse and Artvera - and both in several color variations as well.

Considering each issue is packed with gigs of content, now you can get the Wusik Sound Magazine DVD delivered right to your mailbox every single month so you can spend more time playing and less time downloading!

$15

www.mfelkerco.com Wusik Sound Magazine

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