The finer points of Wave Slicing ( How Nerdy ??)

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Seeing as we all have to cut up teh beats, I thought it would be worth asking, do you lot cut off the very first part of a wave..(see the screan dump I have highlighted eth 'tail') its a Kick drum and I tend to be the most harsh to them, snares too.... but am I a very bad person for doing this ???
 

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cut it at the zero crossing
at the start of the first compression wave

sorry about the pic im at work

wave3pu.png
 
I'd probably cut it like this:

sdmcut4at.gif


I'm not sure what's right now? Ha!

Anyone care to shed some light?
 
I think that is how I cut it, where it really boosts, but then you have to make sure all other waves are same length if layering..just wondered if this was technically wrong, cos it sounds 'tighter' somehow...
 
logikz said:
i wouldnt worry about phasing issues, just make sure your samples hit at the same time.
Click to expand...

Phasing is not really a prob unless you either layer the same sound on top of each other or if you have a very similar sound in the same frequency range (i think that makes sense)

And the .wav cutting thing is really down to what you want the beat hit to sound like........
Basically if you want the transient on the beat or not i.e. the thump noise on the beginning of a kick or the snap at the beginning or a snare.
If you cut all the transients off the beginning of every beat hit, your beat will be very smooth and flat with little punch and ooomph........
BUT transients are problematic when it comes to headroom and volume so you don't want them to be toooo big either.
I personally chop it at the first part like SDM says and then you can always compress down the transient to give head room, it is not essential that the wav starts on an upwards slope just that it starts on the centre line
I hope that makes sense as i said above..........
if not :google: ? :teeth:
 
Dj_Fozzybear said:
Phasing is not really a prob unless you either layer the same sound on top of each other or if you have a very similar sound in the same frequency range (i think that makes sense)
Click to expand...

similar sounds? maybe like differnet kick drums or
snares that you layer. They all have similar timbre. And why? Because their harmonic overtones are very similiar to each other, thats why a snare with a fundamental of A 220 hz sounds similar to a snare with a fundamental of 150 hz and That same snare playing an A 220 hz sounds very differnt to a bass playing an A 220hz. Because of these clusters of hamonics or formants layering diferent snares or kicks etc....not accurately sliced will cause phasing issues.
 
sook said:
similar sounds? maybe like differnet kick drums or
snares that you layer. They all have similar timbre. And why? Because their harmonic overtones are very similiar to each other, thats why a snare with a fundamental of A 220 hz sounds similar to a snare with a fundamental of 150 hz and That same snare playing an A 220 hz sounds very differnt to a bass playing an A 220hz. Because of these clusters of hamonics or formants layering diferent snares or kicks etc....not accurately sliced will cause phasing issues.
Click to expand...

Fuck ME!!!
Now thats some tech info for ya'll!!!
All praise Sook an the mind of musical madness!!!:thumbsup:
 
sook said:
similar sounds? maybe like differnet kick drums or
snares that you layer. They all have similar timbre. And why? Because their harmonic overtones are very similiar to each other, thats why a snare with a fundamental of A 220 hz sounds similar to a snare with a fundamental of 150 hz and That same snare playing an A 220 hz sounds very differnt to a bass playing an A 220hz. Because of these clusters of hamonics or formants layering diferent snares or kicks etc....not accurately sliced will cause phasing issues.
Click to expand...

Right which is why you generally should cut at the zero-crossing where the wave is moving from zero to a positive number on the amplitude scale. I'm pretty sure this pushes the speaker cone outward which is why if you have two of the same signals with reversed phase you get phase cancellation because the speaker cone is trying to move both in and out at the same frequency and thus it doesn't move at all. At least this is how I remember it...correct me if I'm wrong.

The only situation which I can imagine you could keep the early bit of attack before the first major transient is if you're working entirely with audio clips on a grid since you could essentially line up the transient with the grid line. You'd keep the attack but it would come before the downbeat (or whatever beat you're aiming to place the hit on). I'm pretty sure Paradox works this way which is why his breaks tend to sound so natural.
 
Dru-Stylus said:
I'm pretty sure this pushes the speaker cone outward
Click to expand...

that is correct.....
called a compression wave
below zero being rarefaction waves


Dru-Stylus said:
You'd keep the attack but it would come before the downbeat (or whatever beat you're aiming to place the hit on). I'm pretty sure Paradox works this way which is why his breaks tend to sound so natural.
Click to expand...

he also layers in some of the air between hits
into his break. Helps enhance that natural played live
type sound
 
Dru-Stylus said:
Right which is why you generally should cut at the zero-crossing where the wave is moving from zero to a positive number on the amplitude scale.
Click to expand...

You can cut at *any* zero crossing, you might just need to invert the phase afterwards to make sure the sample is starting with a compression wave. (if that's what all your other samples are doing).
 
theres too much greek speak going on here
@affliction, i tried the phase inversion thing and it worked wonders for phasing issues, what is it?
@sook, what do you mean with air?


edit: @affliction right ok, got it. didnt see your last post there.
 
no greek speak....air=air ;)

in other words Paradox will actually sequence the ambient noise of a break in between hits so that while it's repatterned and at a faster tempo it still has that raw sound to it.
 
Last edited:
Affliction said:
You can cut at *any* zero crossing, you might just need to invert the phase afterwards to make sure the sample is starting with a compression wave. (if that's what all your other samples are doing).
Click to expand...

Cheers man, definitely makes sense.
 
sook said:
he also layers in some of the air between hits
into his break. Helps enhance that natural played live
type sound
Click to expand...
..that's why a lot of people will HP Filter an entire break and put in the background to give teh chopped break a natrual feel.
I think Paradox also plays the drums, so I am guessing he can play at the BPM he wants , so less slicing/stretching ??
 
i dont think so stan. i dont stretch anything less i want it to sound stretched. btw im treading lightly in all production related threads cos this fucking techboy talk kills my soul
 
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