Just curious how other people work with this element of their music. Obviously preset surfing can be exhausting and counter productive to creativity, but reinventing the wheel from scratch with an INIT patch each time can be daunting, especially with complex pads and sound effects.
My personal approach is to have “patch days” and “production days”. I basically start by deleting every preset I dislike in a synth, then use what’s left as jumping off points for creating my own sounds. The eventual goal is for every patch to be at least somewhat unique, and when it’s time to jam I basically just scroll through them, changing easy things like the filters and envelopes to match whatever track I’m working on. This can feel preset surfy at times, but it’s the best I’ve come up with so far. What about y’all?
I always start from INIT. Or I ‘zero’ everything manually to a default patch (if it’s an analog machine with no memory to store an INIT patch). In fact, I also never save any of my own patches for re-use in my own music. Every time I record a track, it’s with a newly created patch made specifically for that track.
This might seem time and labour intensive, but I’d spend far more time trying find existing presets and then tweaking them to fit my arrangements. By building everything from scratch and designing each sound for a specific purpose and place, I can fit my mixes together without much in the way of equalization after the fact.
When I know exactly what I want, I start from Init.
Sometimes I have just a broad idea of a sound I need. Then I scroll through patches until I find something similar to the idea and design sound from this patch.
Sometimes I listen to patches and musical idea grows from one of this patches. Not all default patches sound bad. For example, Howard Scarr does magic with U-He synths and you can learn a lot about the synth and synthesis overall.
My non-existent sound design skills leave me no choice but to use presets, even though I agree that too many presets can be counter productive.
That being said, the majority of the songs I’ve written in the past few years have come from ideas I get from presets. I usually have days where I just play around with them randomly, until I stumble upon a sound that triggers an idea.
Less often I’ll be working on a song and I’ll have a specific sound in mind, so I’ll look for something close to that on a preset and then adjust it to my needs.
I used to always start with presets because I didn’t really have the skill to create the sounds in my head.
I’d say the synth which changed that for me is probably the Novation Peak, having all those controls hands on really made me want to explore synthesis in a way less knobby synths have not, and over a few months I became much more confident in synthesis.
Now usually start from Init unless there’s a specific kind of sound I’m not sure how to program, in which case I’ll usually find a preset and try to break down what elements are making it sound that way (e.g. by removing modulation to see what it’s doing, messing with the filter, etc), then I’ll try to create my own version using those tricks.
Having much more fun than I did starting with presets all the time TBH!
If it’s something hands on and analog I’ll utilize the scripts of yore and painstakingly recreate the exact settings (mental and room conditions included) that patches of the ancients were created.
Those interfaces are not to be played with for experimentation is the way to a death tone, and I will not be ruined by imperfect tones.
If it’s something more menu based like any of the Yamaha DX series, or Emu Proteusi I will start from init and then utilizing video conferencing tools I will consult with an array of sound designers to create patches based on what the elder gods have whispered into my ears.
From what I understand this is the only way to properly create, all other ways are impure.
Definitely using an analog synthesizer’s controls with out exact knowledge of the output will bring ruin, and using any presets on digital synths is exactly what they want.
On the older stuff with no patch memory, I just twiddle the knobs till I get what I want. I dont bother zeroing. (I know what I’m doing, so ‘twiddling knobs’ isnt random, there is method to my twiddling)
On the newer stuff with memories, I rarely save my patches anyway, so same as above.
Digitone is the exception. I either start from an initialised patch. Or… copy paste one of my written patches, then go from there.
It’s really wild how many of y’all start with INIT. I can easily dial in an acid lead or generic sounding pad, but some of the patches on my Virus? They either took me hours of work, starting with a preset, or blind luck. I couldn’t imagine doing that every time. I guess I have a lot of practice to do
preset surfing is like trying to decide what to watch on netflix. spend 3 hours browsing and decide on something sub optimal. now and then you find a gem though.
For something like a kick I’ll grab an unflashy preset and tweak it to taste. For a lead or chord sound, I’ll start from Init, there’s more room for show-pony modulation that will make me feel like a real synth pro.
It depends, mostly i create my own starting points i would like to modify later. I still eyperiment on the Prophet12 because its so deep. Fm, Feedback multiple destinations 4 envelope. I make my own Kickdrums with Kick2 Vst, then import it into the mpc, i make several versions, so i could choose which fits. Same with all other sounds. I try to build a libary of sounds to use. Stil i do struggle, because its really time consuming. When i start to browse samples (percussion) its really frustrating sometimes. I think its part of the learning curve, maybe to fit a sample instead of seeking the perfect one. Tempest is also a good challenge to synthesize, also very deep. Often quicker than flipping samples, at least for me
As others have said it completely depends on the synth. I didn’t realize how much I loved a basic sine wave until the Digitone. That said I used on so many tracks as a kind of preset before that.
I do enjoy taking something as a starting point that fits my mood at the time and making it what i think the song calls for. Not to be inflammatory but I will call a tiny bit of bs for all those who say they start with the init every time.
Same as @Scot_Solida here. Always start from INIT or set everything manually to a default patch on fully analog synths. Synthesis is just too enjoyable.
Before I go ham with innit, I pruse the factory patches to get an idea of possibilities and usually to see how the mod matrix is used. Then I go wild with the innit. I don’t mind tweaking factory patches to suit my tadte though. It’s a great way to learn programming. Ill try to recreate some of my favorite patches from other synths if I’m in a uninspired mood. Lots of trial and error and wondering how something might affect the overall sound.
I am not against presets. I use them as is, modifying them etc. But I can’t imagine making electronic music by just stabbing in the dark hoping to find a preset that inspires me. The basics of subtractive synthesis aren’t rocket surgery–if you have a basic analog monosynth with a knob-per-function more or less that is a good place to start and learn.
I do agree with not reinventing the wheel if you want something simple/classic. To me claiming their is a difference between making my own basic square bass patch and loading up a preset seems like unearned snobbery lol
