Hi,
Listened with great interest to the GP backstage interview with Mike Lopez… a lot of the effects he mentioned are very new concepts for me.
Ie. I typically change piano types from things like Alicia keys to Pianoteq, add reverb…add a pad sound… and that is about it…
but this concept of ‘filters’ or compressors or shimmer etc is a new world for me.
Can anyone recommend some good starter filters to try all these things out?
Are there specific vsts?
I do have Komplete Ultimate and Omnisphere if that helps… but maybe some free vst effects are better for this particular use case.
Really interested in any specific effects that are recommended to tweak the sound of keyboard parts . to have them cut through the mix etc. add dynamics etc.
What are the best type of filter effects to experiment with?
Low pass filters and compressors?
Thanks for any tips at all… and thanks to the GP team and Mike for unpacking a whole new world of keyboard sound design options!
For the filter in the video I used the Kilohearts Filter which is free right now (they also have a few other free plugins). But any filters mentioned above will work. If you have any questions about the way I use those effects in the context of my rig feel free to ask.
Another really good free filter VST is TAL-Filter-2. It has a feature missing from many free filters…it can be tempo-sync’d to a host. Windows and Mac (including M1 support), 64-bit host.
Thanks for the reply Mike. Was super impressed with the way you’ve figured that all out. (Also to see gp being used instead of the seemingly dominant mainstage/Ableton in this ccm space)
I’ve been learning a bit of German and playing along with the German version of Reckless love and couldn’t figure out how the keys lead sound is a little unique and cuts though… I’m thinking they’re doing some of the secret sauce you’ve talked about…?
Anyway thank you so much. and to all here for the posts and great suggestions… will do some exploring…
It kind of hard to tell what the keys sound like here since a lot of that may be the guitar also using unique effects. That being said it doesn’t sound like a piano, it sounds more like a synth (at least that’s what it sounds like to me). Possibly a soft synth pluck sound with some detuning and reverb. I would go through whatever synth plugins you have and find the closest preset. Then tweak from there and try and get as close as possible.
Thanks Mike…that is awesome. Thank you!
Will be fascinated to see how you’ve approached that edit…can see I need to keep exploring Omnisphere…a bit of an untapped resource for me yet…
btw. what do you use for the common pads sound you referred to?
I have quite a few of the That Worship Sound preset libraries, they sound great. I use one of their pads as my main one. I try to use something very neutral sounding, that way I can add other effects to it like I showed in the video. So I avoid pads that maybe have a lot of motion, etc.
Hi Mike…so just had a play here tonight in Australia…had a couple questions…
Imitation is the greatest form of flattery…so am copying your global rackspace…but can’t figure out how you did a couple of things.
To turn the reverb off and on do you choose bypass? (I’ve got the same effect as you) Or something else? When I choose bypass it reverses the button behaviour…turning off the effect instead of on. I’ve tried other options like “mix” and it seems to flood reverb even though I have the same settings as you.
For the piano filter do you choose “Cutoff?”
I’m not sure if it would be possible to DM me a copy of your global for me to see how you’ve configured everything…no probs if you prefer not too…as I understand there is a tonne of work in there! Continuing to experiment…probably need to keep watching GP tutorials too. Thanks!
Yes I bypass via variations. You might have to “reverse” the widget value under the value tab in the widget properties. If you decide to use the mix option inside the plugin make sure you scale your widget so it doesn’t go past the max value you need. Otherwise your reverb may be too “wet”.
Yes I use the cutoff setting on the filter to change the character of my piano sound.
I’ll upload my global rackspace here, I have no problem sharing
At work right now so when I get home I’ll upload it.
Thanks again Mike! Will be really helpful to have a look at the back end wiring of what you’ve done…your rackspace is a tutorial in itself. I downloaded that filter set you mentioned… can see there are an absolute tonne of variation options…Could be forever tweaking sounds… And opened up a new world of sound design for other areas too like video production. Thanks so much!
