Image Line Software FRUITY LOOPS-FL STUDIO 5 User Manual

IMPORTANT - Write your unique personal CD serial number here:

(locate your serial number on the CD case)

Information in this document is subject to change without notice and does not represent a commitment on the part of Image Line Software. The software described in this document is furnished under a license agreement or nondisclosure agreement. The software may be used or copied only in accordance of the terms of the agreement. It is illegal to copy this software on any medium except as specifically allowed in the agreement. No part of this document may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, for any purpose without the express written permission of Image Line Software.

FL Studio and Fruityloops are registered trademarks of Image Line Software. Other company and product names are trademarks of their respective owners.

Image Line Software is a division of Image Line BVBA. Visit Image Line Software at

http://www.image-line.com

Visit FL Studio on the web at

http://www.flstudio.com/.

TTAABBLLEE OOFF CCOONNTTEENNTTSS

TABLE OF CONTENTS .............................................................................................................................3

FOR FRUITYLOOPS 3.x and FL STUDIO v4.x USERS......................................................................... 5

INSTALL INSTRUCTIONS........................................................................................................................ 6

FIRST RUN................................................................................................................................................... 7

MAKE SOME NOISE.................................................................................................................................. 8

HELP! ............................................................................................................................................................ 9

GET THE "GETTING STARTED" LOOPS ............................................................................................9

THE STEP SEQUENCER ......................................................................................................................... 10

TWEAKING THE CHANNELS ............................................................................................................... 12

TWEAKING THE NOTES........................................................................................................................ 18

THE PLAYLIST (from Patterns to Songs) .............................................................................................. 22

GENERATORS (from Samples to Synths)............................................................................................... 25

INTRODUCING THE TS404 .................................................................................................................... 40

MIXING & EFFECTS ...............................................................................................................................44

RECORDING WITH LIVE TWEAKING............................................................................................... 52

THE EVENT EDITOR............................................................................................................................... 55

THE PIANO ROLL....................................................................................................................................60

AUDIO TRACKS .......................................................................................................................................65

INTEGRATED WAVE EDITOR.............................................................................................................. 67

THE BEATSLICER ...................................................................................................................................68

SHARING YOUR WORK ......................................................................................................................... 71

EXTERNAL CONTROLLERS................................................................................................................. 73

CREDITS..................................................................................................................................................... 80

INDEX .........................................................................................................................................................81

Lemon Boy is in the house: Yo, whassup! Having problems? Before you panic and start spamming the FL Studio Tech Support, look for me. I'll pop up here and there with answers to common problems that might save you (and the FL Studio staff) some trouble.

FFOORR FFRRUUIITTYYLLOOOOPPSS 33..xx aanndd FFLL SSTTUUDDIIOO vv44..xx UUSSEERRSS

This guide is current to Version 5 of FL Studio. If you were the proud owner of one of the FruityLoops 3 versions (good for you!) or FL Studio v4 (even better), then read on to see what's new in this version.

1. FL Studio Name. Since version 4, the name of the product changes to FL Studio. FL Studio contains all the stuff you know from FruityLoops 3.x and much more!

2. Mixer. The effects window from FruityLoops 3.x is now a full-blown mixer with 64 insert tracks, 4 send tracks, per-track equalizer, balance controls and disk recording. You can also create complex mixer setups by routing the insert tracks to each other!

3. Playlist. New Piano Roll style showing the correct pattern lengths, supporting live mode pattern mixing and brand new audio tracks are some of the improvements integrated in the new Playlist window.

4. Per-Pattern Grid Length. In previous releases, the Step Sequencer had one fixed length for the entire project. Now you can adjust the sequencing grid for each individual pattern!

5. New in this version …. Check out the new generators and effects in this release! Check out the WhatsNew.doc in the main FL Studio directory for a brief run down of what else is new

IINNSSTTAALLLL IINNSSTTRRUUCCTTIIOONNSS

There are two ways to purchase FL Studio: on line, or in a box with a CD and this printed manual. The installation differs slightly in each of those cases. Read here what to do:

A. If you bought your copy of FL Studio in a box, here's what you do.

1. Run the CD. Insert the install CD-ROM that comes with your box in your CD-ROM drive. If you have auto-run enabled, you will see the CD menu automatically appear. Otherwise, right-click your CD-ROM drive icon in Windows Explorer and select Autorun.

2. Start the Installation. Select the FL Studio installation link. The installation window appears. Follow the instructions on screen.

3. The Serial Number. During the installation you will be asked for you serial number. You can find it printed on your CD-ROM case. Write it down for further use and make a backup of this number.

4. Register On-line. After you complete the installation successfully you can register on-line to gain access to the extra FL Studio website features and community. Go back to the CD-ROM menu (reload as described in step 1 if needed), and click on the link called “Click here to register to the FL Studio community” or go to this link

5. In case of problems. Please consult our F.A.Q. section on our website www.flstudio.com. Useful information about known issues can be found there.

B. If you bought your copy of FL Studio on line, here's what you do.

6. Download and Install the Demo. Download and install the demo version of FL Studio. It is recommended NOT to install over previous releases of FL Studio/FruityLoops.

7. Apply for a Regcode. Go to received by e-mail after your purchase. Click the button below to your regcode to pop-up.

8. Wait for the E-Mail. The FL Studio team will send you an e-mail with a link. Make sure your email account can accept emails coming from us (domain: e-officedirect.com). Please follow all instructions carefully.

9. Run the Program. Restart FL Studio if it is running and you will be able to save your projects.

10. Bookmark the Web Site. The FL Studio web site is an awesome resource. Check back at

http://www.flstudio.com/ often to see what's up.

11. Read this Guide. As soon as you start FL Studio, you'll be confronted with strange dialog boxes and messages. Proceed to the next section of this guide to find out what to do next. Also check the extensive on-line help that comes with FL Studio.

http://www.flstudio.com/FLBoxRegistration.

www.flstudio.com/register and enter your username and password you

FFIIRRSSTT RRUUNN

OK, so you just finished the installation and started FL Studio. Read this section for an explanation of what you're seeing.

1. The System Settings Screen. When you first run FL Studio, you may be confronted with a dialog box like the one below (if not, use F10 to bring it up now). You just have to use the select boxes to choose your sound card and MIDI drivers. At first, you may be looking at the MIDI screen, but for now the most important one is the Audio screen, shown below.

Click Here

Then Here

2. Select an Output Driver from the list in the pull-down menu. If you don't know which one to pick, just leave it as it is. Later on if you have sound problems, you can come back to this screen (by pressing F10) and experiment with the other options.

3. The DirectSound Streaming Buffer. Most of the stuff on this screen you don’t need to know about, but you should know what the Buffer Length does. Basically, if you make this buffer long, you are less likely to get choppy sound but changes you make to a playing loop will take longer to kick in. If you make it short, you are more likely to get choppy sound but changes will kick in faster. You want it short, but depending on your computer, you may need to come back to this screen later (F10) and make it longer. If you have a combination of a fast computer and a good sound card, you may be able to get the latency as low as 10ms. For a SoundBlaster Live, you can probably go as low as 30ms. The

Use Polling option can also improve latencies for some operating systems (keep it turned on if you use Windows 95 or 98, but try switching it off in Windows 2000 to see if it brings better performance).

4. The Main Screen. After you close the Environment Settings window, you'll be looking at a screen like the one below. FL Studio is all about windows within windows. So you're looking at the outer Main Window with its Tool Panels at the top. Then within that you're looking at the Browser (left) and the Step Sequencer (right). The panels might be arranged differently for you, but that doesn’t matter.

Step Sequencer

MMAAKKEE SSOOMMEE NNOOIISSEE

Press the Play Switch. This is the button on the Transport panel (next to the stop and record buttons). You'll hear the FL Studio 3 demo song. If this is not the first time you've run FL Studio, you'll have to reload this demo. Select Open from the File menu in the top left and double click the file NewStuff.flp in the Loops directory.

HHEELLPP!!

This booklet is just supposed to get you up and running quickly. It is not meant to be a reference manual for everything FL Studio can do (that would take a multi-volume encyclopedia!). Fortunately, there's a ton of info out there on what FL Studio does. Here's how to get it.

1. The Hint Bar. This is located on the Main Window just under the Menu Bar (see the previous page, in

2. On-line Help. FL Studio also comes with a massive on-line help reference. Just use the Help Menu

3. Tutorial Loops. Click File >Open and surf to the Tutorials directory. These loops contain notes on

4. The Web Site. FL Studio comes with a massive web site at http://www.flstudio.com/. The site has a

the top left). You can mouse over any of the controls anywhere in FL Studio and this panel will display a short description of what that control does. The Hint Bar also shows you the Shortcut Key that will activate the same function. This is displayed on the right. Pressing this shortcut key has the same effect as pressing the corresponding button.

and select Contents. This help also features context-sensitivity – select a window and press F1 on your keyboard. The reference automatically displays the help you are looking for.

how to do various things in FL Studio.

support section that includes a FAQ and a Discussion Forum, Online Tutorials, Video Tutorials (soon), Song Exchange section and the Samplefusion samples site. Check these to see if anyone has answered your questions already. If not, feel free to post your own question on the discussion forums.

GGEETT TTHHEE ""GGEETTTTIINNGG SSTTAARRTTEEDD"" LLOOOOPPSS

To use this guide effectively, you should find and load the "Getting Started" loops that were included in the FL Studio package. Go to the File menu (above the Hint Bar) and click on Open. Alternatively, click on the File Open Icon below the Hint Bar. Either method will get you a file dialog box open on the Loops

Directory. From here, double-click the Tutorials Subdirectory, and then the Getting Started Subdirectory and you will see the Getting Started Loops. Load up the first one (GettingStarted1.flp), press Play and move on to the next section!

HEY! Don't skip that step. This guide will work a lot better if you're looking at the example loops while you read…

TTHHEE SSTTEEPP SSEEQQUUEENNCCEERR

When you start FL Studio for the first time, you'll see the Step Sequencer window (see the “First Run” section). This is where you lay out your drum and melody patterns for your songs.

1. What is it For? This is where you find channels, and dots. The channels are laid out horizontally (see below) and each one contains a single sound. Each channel has 16 dots. If you're musically inclined, these dots represent 16 are the four beats of a basic drum loop. (The layout below is from GettingStarted1.flp. You should have this loop loaded now.)

A Channel

A Channel Name

2. What Dots are For? Clicking on a dot lights it up and tells FL Studio to trigger the channel (play the sound loaded into that channel) at that point in the loop. For instance, the 1 the DNC_Kick channel are lit up, telling FL Studio to play the kick drum sound four times during the loop (if you are thinking of groups of four dots as a single beat, FL Studio will play the sound at the start of each beat.) Try changing the pattern of dots in the DNC_Kick channel. (If you need to turn a dot off, right-click it.) Once you've got the dots to light up like the picture below, press the play switch to hear what you've created.

notes. If not, think of each group of four dots as one beat, so 16 dots

Some Dots

, 5th, 9th, and 13th dots in

Suggested Changes

Channel Controls

TThhee SStteepp SSeeqquueenncceerr

3. Play with the Channel Controls. After you've set up the pattern, try playing with the Channel Controls on the left. The two round knobs (wheels) control the volume and pan of a single channel,

and the green light switches the channel on and off (panning is like the balance control on your stereo; turning this knob moves the sound from left to right in the stereo field). If you want to reset a wheel to it's default position, right-click on it and select reset.

4. Make Your Own Beat. Don't like the beat above? Good, make your own! In the next sections, we'll teach you how to load in new samples, set up melodies, and change the sound of each channel (and even each dot) using Plugin Effects.

Don't Save! If you create a masterpiece and you want to keep it, at least save it under a new name. We need you to keep GettingStarted1.flp around so we can use it to explain some of the more advanced features later.

TTWWEEAAKKIINNGG TTHHEE CCHHAANNNNEELLSS

In this section, we'll show you how to modify the sound of the loops you create by tweaking the sound sample on each channel. FL Studio supports so much of this kind of tweaking that it's possible for two people to create loops that sound totally different using exactly the same samples (technically, each channel contains a Generator, which could be sample-based or could be a synthesizer plugin. More on that later, though).

Wait! What's a "sample"? A sample is a little piece of sound stored in a disk file. Each channel in FL Studio uses a single sample, usually containing a single note (like a snare drum hit or a single bass note), but they can also contain entire beats or tunes. Samples are usually ".wav" file types, but FL Studio supports ".xi" sound files

1. Open the Channel Settings Dialog. OK, let's get going and modify the kick drum sample. Load up the original version of GettingStarted1.flp again and click on the name "DNC_Kick" to bring up the Channel Settings window for that channel (shown in the picture below).

Click Here

Channel

Sam File Name

Selector

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee CChhaannnneellss

2. Load a New Sample. The first thing you can do is change the sample being used on the channel. The sample file name is shown on the picture above. Clicking on the file icon to the left will open a browser on the directory containing the file "DNC_Kick.wav" along with a number of other kick drum samples. As you click on them, FL Studio will automatically play the sounds for you. Try opening some of these other samples and listening to the effect a new kick drum has on the sound of the loop.

3. Check out the Browser. Another way to load samples is to use the Browser (that's the other window you see when you first opened FL Studio in the "First Run" section above.) This is a special browser for selecting and loading samples, loops and presets files. To find the DNC_Kick sound, click on Packs, and then Dance. Left-clicking on a sample will play it, right clicking will open it into the selected channel, and you can also drag and drop into the step sequencer. (You select a channel by clicking on the green Channel Selector light to the right of the channel name as shown above.)

Click Here

Lost the Browser? No problem. The five big buttons on the tool bar shown below will open and close various windows for you, including the Browser and the Step Sequencer. (Don't worry about those other windows for now, all will become clear in the fullness of time…)

Then Here Then Here

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee CChhaannnneellss

4. Play with the Sample Effects. Ok, at this point the best advice is to start the loop, then play with the controls in the sample (SMP) panel of the Channel Settings Dialog and listen to the difference in sound. Here's a short description of what some of them do. For more info see the on-line help.

ol, Pan: These are the volume and panning wheels that also appear on the main screen for each channel. Turning these will make the wheels on the main screen turn as well.

Remove DC Offset: Use this option to fix “vertical” offset in the samples (see Wave View below). Reverse Polarity: "Flips" the waveform vertically. Normalize: Maximizes the sample volume without distortion. Fade Stereo: Creates a stereo fade from the left to the right channel of the sample. Reverse: Reverses the sample. Swap Stereo: Switches left and right channel of the sample.

Wave View Window: Shows the shape of the sound sample. Click here to hear the sample with all the effects . Also a drag and drop window for loading samples.

Pitch: The wheel changes the pitch of the sample (speeds it up or slows it down). The number indicates how far the pitch wheel can stretch. Move it by clicking and dragging.

Fade In (IN): Applies a quick fade in to the sample (turn maximum to left to disable). Fade Out (OUT): Applies a quick fade out to the sample (turn maximum to left to disable). Pitch bend (POGO): Applies pitch bend to the sample. Useful with drum samples. Crossfade Loop (CRF): Allows you to crossfade the sample for the creation of smooth loop sections (turn maximum to left to disable). Trim Threshold (TRIM): FL Studio trims the silence at the end of the samples, as this frees up RAM and does not alter the resulting sound. This control allows you to raise the volume threshold below which FL Studio detects "silence".

Can't hear the difference? If you press a button or turn a wheel

and you can't hear any difference in the sound, try making the same change on another channel. For example, sometimes a change that doesn't affect a kick drum much will make a huge difference to the sound of a snare. If you still can't hear the difference, stop the loop from playing and listen the sounds separately by clicking on the wave view window. You might be able to hear the effect better without the other instruments.

eadphones)

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee CChhaannnneellss

5. Add Some Echo. Go back to GettingStarted1.flp, open the DNC_Kick channel settings and click the FUNC tab to get the view shown below. The controls in the top section (Echo delay / fat mode) can be

used to set up a cool echo effect for a single instrument. Start by turning up the FEED about a quarter of the way, and listen to what happens to the kick drum sound… Try playing with the other controls to change the sound of the echo… You can also toggle between various echo and “fat” modes by clicking the title bar of the Echo Delay section (the default is Classic Echo). More on these different effects can be found in the on-line manual…

Feed: Echo volume (sets how quickly the echo dies out).

Ping Pong: Makes the echo flip back and forth from left to right (sounds cool

n h

Arpeggiator: This gets explained in the Generators section of this

uide.

Pan, Cut, and Res do the same job as on the sample panel, but the effects build up as the echo dies out.

Pitch controls the pitch of the echo. If you turn this wheel right, the echo will get higher as it dies out.

Ech: Number of times the instrument will echo before it

sto

Time: Controls the amount of time (in dots) between each echo. Maximum delay time is 16 dots.

Getting Echo Time Just Right: The "Time" control is fine-grained to get you just the exact echo you want. But if you want to echo on the beat, you will have to look at the Hint Bar while you turn the dial. If you want the echo every three dots, just turn the dial until the hint bar shows "3:00".

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee CChhaannnneellss

6. Play With the Instrument Settings. Ok, let's take a quick look at the INS panel before we move on. (There's also stuff you should read about in the MISC panel too, but you can get that info from the

On-line Help.) Click on the INS tab and you'll get to the Instrument Settings. Here you can add Envelopes and LFO to your sample for the Volume, Pan, Cutoff, Resonance, and Pitch settings.

Indicator Light

Set Middle Note

LFO

Effect Selector

Envelope

7. What's an Envelope? An envelope causes a particular parameter to rise, and then fall over the life of the sound. The most classic thing to do is to have a Volume Envelope that makes the sound rise then fall in volume. But you can also put an envelope on Pitch, Cutoff, and Resonance. You can get more info on what all the parameters mean in the On-line Help, but Delay (DEL) sets how much time passes before you hear the sound, Attack (ATT) sets the fade-in at the beginning, Hold (HOLD) sets how long the sound lasts at full volume, and Decay (DEC), Sustain (SUS), and Release (REL) control how the sound fades away. Play with the wheels and watch the graph change.

8. What's LFO? LFO stands for Low Frequency Oscillation. It makes a particular effect oscillate up and down during the life of the sound. Again, more info is available in the On-Line Help, but Amount (AMT) sets how much the effect oscillates, Speed (SPD) sets how quickly it oscillates, Delay (DEL) sets how much time passes before the oscillation starts, and Attack (ATT) sets how quickly the oscillation ramps up to it's full amount. Play with the knobs and watch the graph change.

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9. How do I Use Them? Use the Effect Selector (see diagram above) to choose the effect, and then turn the knobs on either the Envelope or the LFO. To turn the Envelope on and off for each effect, click on the Indicator Light. To turn off the LFO, reset the Amount (AMT) to the middle (knob pointing straight up.)

10. Why Can't I Hear the Effect? Well, if you're still on the Kick Drum from GettingStarted1.flp, it's going to be pretty hard to hear any LFO effect, although the Envelope might make a difference. These effects are more audible on longer samples. To hear the effects better, go to the Instrument Settings for the Ins_Round sample and play with the settings now.

Now we're cookin' with gas!

TTWWEEAAKKIINNGG TTHHEE NNOOTTEESS

By now you're familiar with many of the ways FL Studio lets you tweak and shape your sounds. In this section, we'll show you how some of those effects can be applied to each dot separately. We'll also show you how to program melodies.

1. Check out the Graph Editor. The easiest thing to wrap your mind around is probably the Graph Editor utility. First, select a channel to edit by clicking on the channel name, or by clicking on the green Channel Selector light to the right of the channel name. Then press the button that makes the graph editor pop up as shown below. (Make sure you've loaded up the original version of GettingStarted1.flp first.)

Channel Selector

h Editor

Gra Button

Graph Editor

Effect Selector

2. Check out the Effects. Try clicking-and-dragging the Effect Selector to see which of the various effects are available. You should find Pan, Velocity (another name for Volume), Filter Cut, Filter Res, Pitch, and Shift. Most of these effects were discussed previously, in the "Tweaking the Channels" section. The difference here is that you can also tweak the value of these effects for each separate dot. Each bar on the graph sets the effect value for the single note above (or below) it. GettingStarted1.flp already has some tweaking in it. Check out the Volume tweaks in the CHH channel and the Cutoff tweaks in the Ins_Square and Ins_Round channels.

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee NNootteess

3. Panning the Kick Drum. Try setting the pan effect as shown below for GettingStarted1.flp. The pan graph centers in the middle. You can set pan values by clicking inside the bar for each note at the desired level. After you have set up the view shown below, you should hear the kick drum flipping back and forth from one speaker to the other. This sounds really cool if you combine it with the 3-dot echo you added in the previous section…

4. Try the Velocity. You can get instruments to fade in and out over a pattern using the velocity graph. Try this effect on a channel as shown below. This graph does not center in the middle like pan, but goes from zero to maximum, with zero at the bottom. Volume slides like this can sound extra cool when combined with Cutoff and Resonance slides. (Hint: to make a smooth line in the graph editor, right-click on the first bar, then drag the mouse to the right to set the values of all the bars at once.)

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee NNootteess

5. Play with the Other Effects. Try to get a feel for the other effects on the graph editor. Filter Cut and Filter Res can be used to add or subtract values to the main cutoff and resonance wheels in the INS

panel of the channel settings dialog box. (See the "Tweaking the Channels" section.) Pitch makes the sample higher or lower, like the pitch wheel in the channel settings dialog box. Shift can be used to push a dot closer to the dot beside it (you more musical types can use this to groove a beat).

6. Check out the Melody. When you play GettingStarted1.flp, that synth melody you hear is being played on the Ins_Round channel. To see the notes of the melody, click the Keyboard Editor button with the Ins_Round channel selected as shown below. What you see now is a vertical piano keyboard for each dot on the screen. Hopefully, you have some keyboard skills. (If not, it's time for some lessons!) You can change each note by left-clicking one of the buttons on the keyboard. Right-click turns the note off. When the loop is not playing, clicking a note will also play that note.

board

Editor Button

Channel Selector

Keyboard Editor

7. Change the Melody. Now go ahead and change the melody! You can make it sound how you want, but below is a suggestion for those who like a note of tension in their music (you can find this melody in GettingStarted2.flp). You can use the keyboard editor on any sample - synth, bass, guitar, even drums. Have fun!

TTwweeaakkiinngg tthhee NNootteess

8. Super Important Tip. When you want to make a melody out of long samples, you often need to set it up so that each note cuts off the previous one. You can do this most easily by right-clicking the Channel Name in the Step Sequencer and selecting Cut Itself from the pop up menu. Notice that the Ins_Round channel has this option selected. Try deselecting it, but be warned - the results can be nasty!

Big News! You can now undo the last tweak! Do it from the Edit Menu or with ctrl-z.

ars

TTHHEE PPLLAAYYLLIISSTT ((ffrroomm PPaatttteerrnnss ttoo SSoonnggss))

Now you've seen the basics of what can be done with sampled sounds in a single pattern. In this section we'll show you how to program more than one pattern and link them together into a longer loop. Load up GettingStarted2.flp and read on…

1. Check out the Pattern Selector. FL Studio lets you create hundreds of different patterns. In the previous sections, we've just been working with pattern 1, but we can access the other patterns either by changing the number in the Pattern Number box. Use your mouse to drag in the Pattern Selector or use numeric ‘1’ till ‘9’ or ‘+’ and ‘-‘). You’ll find these controls somewhere on the tool bar at the top of the main FL Studio window.

QuickPad

(sometimes disabled)

2. Check out the Playlist. This screen can be opened using the button under the hint bar, or by hitting F5, or by right-clicking the song/pat button on the main screen (see above). Try it and you should get

a new window that looks something like below. This window is somewhat similar to the pattern view, except that the dots operate on whole patterns rather than single channels, and the bar lengths here vary to reflect the pattern length. Notice that GettingStarted2.flp consists of pattern 1 repeated 11 times and pattern 2 once at the beginning. Make sure Song is selected and press Play. You should see the Play Indicator on the playlist start to move, and hear the patterns it is playing. When it comes to the end of the dots, it jumps back to the Loop Point and continues playing. Try moving the loop point (right-click where you want it to go) and see what happens. (If you press the Pat button, FL Studio will just repeatedly play the current pattern in the Step Sequencer.)

Loo

Play Indicator

Point

Pattern Selector

Song/Pat Button

Pla Indicator

Patterns

(right-click to rename)

TThhee PPllaayylliisstt

3. What's the Point? Now you can assemble a number of patterns together to make a song. This lets you alter melodies, change beats, insert fills, and reuse some of the early parts of the song later. Many composers use a separate block of patterns for drums, bass, lead, etc. so they can work on them separately at first, and then piece the song together in the Playlist.

4. Add Fill Patterns to GettingStarted2.flp. Here's a simple example. Select pattern 3 using the Pattern Selector and then lay it out as shown in the first picture below using the DNC_Snare found in Packs > Dance. Press the Pat button to hear this pattern play. Then repeat and lay out pattern 4 using the VT_Crash sample found in Packs > Basic >Vintage or DNC_Crash sample found in Packs > Dance (You will have to add two new channels for this by clicking and dragging from the sample browser or by using the channel menu.)

Pattern 3

Pattern 4

Big deal…

TThhee PPllaayylliisstt

5. Using the Fill in the Song. Yeah, big deal. But now lay out the Playlist as shown below, and hopefully you'll begin to get the idea. Note that you need one extra dot for Pattern 1 and you need to move the Loop Point to the second bar (Right-Click to do that.) You can find the finished product in GettingStarted3.flp.

Groovy.

6. What is in Pattern 2? By now you probably checked out pattern 2 and discovered that it seems to be empty and still appears to be long in the playlist. All will be revealed eventually (but you could experiment with removing the pattern from the playlist to see what difference it makes…). We’ll talk about what pattern 2 does in the section on Live Recording. For now, just enjoy the ride!

7. What is the Empty Area Below? This feature in FL Studio (Producer edition only) – is for audio tracks and automation envelopes. Audio tracks give you the freedom to see and edit your samples right in the Playlist. A good example of using audio tracks is the startup project itself. Open NewStuff.flp and check the audio tracks area:

Each track can hold unlimited number of waves (unlike patterns, where each line is a specific pattern). Each wave is actually held in an Audio Clip channel (double click a wave to see its properties). To add a new instance of a wave, just click in an empty place inside the tracks. Try moving the waves or cutting them with the slice tool. You can find more tutorial projects explaining how to use them and also plenty of information in the on-line help (focus FL Studio and press F1). See more info in the chapter Audio Tracks. You can apply automation envelopes (eg. to fade in/out an audio clip) on top of these audio clips.

GGEENNEERRAATTOORRSS ((ffrroomm SSaammpplleess ttoo SSyynntthhss))

Up until now we've only been playing with Sample Channels. But FL Studio also supports channels that contain sounds made in real time by software synthesizers like Wasp, SimSynth Live, and the TS404. To use the proper terminology, every Channel contains a Generator, which could either be a sample, a synthesizer plugin, or some other type of sound generator in combination with the effects in the Channel Settings dialog. The combination of these Generators with the sample channels gives FL Studio a major power boost!

1. Adding a Synthesizer Channel. To add a channel containing a synthesizer Generator, click on

Channels > Add One as shown below and select one of the many available like TS404, 3xOsc, BeepMap, BooBass, Buzz Generator Adapter Fruity DrumSynth Live, Fruity DX10, Fruity SoundFont Player, Plucked!, SimSynth, Wasp and

many others (the list of generators is growing with each release!).

(not included in boxed editions), FPC, Fruit Kick,

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2. What to Expect. The new channel will appear in the Step Sequencer and the Generator's Configuration Screen will appear (except for the TS404). If the Configuration Screen is small, it will

appear inside a Channel Settings window (3xOsc, BeepMap, Fruit Kick, Fruity SoundFont Player, Plucked!,…). Otherwise, it will appear as a standalone window (BooBass, Buzz Generator, FPC, Fruity DrumSynth Live, Fruity DX10, SimSynth Live, Wasp, …).

3. How Do I Use 'Em? We will review the TS404 in detail in the next section, and much of what you learn there will be applicable to the other synths. But it's important for you to know that most of these Generators have their own help available. If the Configuration Screen for the Generator is embedded in a Channel Settings window, click on the channel name. If it's in a standalone window, click on the corner of the dialog.

Preset Sounds

Help

4. Preset Sounds. Many of the synthesizer generators (BeepMap, Buzz Generator, Fruit Kick, Fruity DrumSynth Live, Fruity DX10, SimSynth Live, Wasp,…) have preset sounds available. In most cases, you can get to them from the Presets section of the menu shown above, or by clicking on the little arrows in the top right (see picture above).

5. The Channel Settings. All these generators have a Channel Settings window that you get by clicking on the Channel Name, just like for Sample Generator Channels. But since each generator is different, they may not all have the same panels as the Sample Generators do. For instance, the TS404 has the SMP, MISC, and FUNC panels, while the BeepMap has INS, MISC, and FUNC.

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6. What do these Generators Do? OK, here's the skinny on some of the Generator. For more info on the TS404, see the next chapter. For more info on everything else, see the On-Line Help. Please note that some of these Generators need to be purchased additionally. If you haven’t bought them, you’ll only have the demo version of the Generator that will allow you to listen to its sounds, but these channels will not be saved in your FL Studio project.

a. TS404. We get into this in more detail later, but it's a techno machine for creating synth lines and

bass lines, which sound similar to the classic TB-303 machine.

b. 3xOsc. This is a very plain generator that allows you to mix three Oscillators, each of which

generates a tone. The sounds on their own are not exciting, but they are good raw material to be combined with INS panel effects and other plugin effects (explained in a later chapter).

c. BeepMap. This is a weird one. Takes a bitmap image file and turns it into a sound, with strange

and wonderful results. This is the same kind of synth that Aphex Twin used to embed an image of himself in a track that shows up when the track is put through a spectrum analyzer.

d. BooBass. A handy little bass generator from the guy who brought you SimSynth.

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e. Buzz Generator Adapter. Buzz has a bunch of cool, buzzing synth sounds that you can pick

from (Rectal Anarchy is shown below). A few “Buzz Machines” come free with FL Studio, but you can find lots more on line at

For licensing purposes, this generator is not included in the boxed versions of our software.

f. Dashboard. Allows you to create your own MIDI and Internal Controller interfaces (check the

on-line help to see what internal controllers are about).

g. Fruit Kick. A kick drum generator.

www.BuzzMachines.com.

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h. Fruity DrumSynth Live. A Drum Synthesizer plugin that lets you define drum hits and control

them via a keyboard.

i. Fruity DX10. An 8-voice polyphonic (that means 8 notes at once) FM Synthesizer. This one’s

designed to give high quality sounds without eating up too much CPU.

j. Fruity Granulizer. This one helps you get cool, choppy sounds out of your samples, like when

the “Funk Soul Bruvva” sample slows down in Fatboy Slim’s “Rockefeller Skank”.

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k. Fruity Slicer. This one lets you slice up a beat and then play back individual drum hits using the

keyboard. You can make cool breaks really quickly with this tool. (More on how this works in the BeatSlicer section below.)

l. Fruity SoundFont Player. An advanced sample generator that works with the SoundFont2

collection.

m. Fruity Vibrator. You can add vibes to your songs using any Force Feedback (.ffe) file. These

files can be created using Microsoft Force Editor tool in the DirectX Developer SDK.

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n. Plucked! A synthesizer that specializes in stringed instrument sounds like guitars, harps,

mandolins, etc.

o. SimSynth Live. A fully functional digital synthesizer. Use this baby to create phat-sounding

analog sounds for your dance and trance tracks.

p. Wasp. Another full digital synthesizer. This one is better for creating fast, buzzing, techno-

oriented sounds (hence the name).

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q. WaveTraveller. Create realistic scratches with a full control over the smallest details!

r. Layer. This isn’t really a Generator, but it’s cool. It lets you create a master channel to control a

bunch of other channels at once.

s. MIDI Out. This one isn’t a Generator either. It lets you send a MIDI controller signal to an

external (or internal) MIDI device.

t. FL Keys. FL Keys is a realistic piano simulator with optimized CPU and memory usage.

With the help of several additional modules included in FL Studio, FL Keys can also operate as Rhodes & Roto Organ (note: additional modules might be available from

www.flstudio.com).

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u. FL Slayer. FL Slayer is a realistic electric guitar simulation originally developed by reFX. It uses

a hybrid synthesis similar to physical modeling. The simulator is equipped with a high quality amp section and effects rack enabling you to recreate the complete electric guitar sound without additional plugins.

v. Sytrus. Sytrus is a versatile synthesizer combining Frequency Modulation (FM), Ring Modulation

(RM), plucked string modeling and subtracting synthesis, and featuring a powerful envelope editor. The synth includes a powerful editable unison mode and a comprehensive effects section.

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w. Fruity Keyboard Controller. Fruity Keyboard Controller is a very useful internal controller

plugin, which allows you to map notes and their velocity to any property that can be automated within FL Studio & the loaded plugins. This plugin allows you to quickly implement Pattern Controlled Filtering (PCF), or accurate semitone-to-semitone slides for plugins, which do not support natively such features (VSTi and DXi plugins).

x. Speech Synthesizer . This is a wizard to add synthesized speech lines to your song (see p.39). y. Fruity Pad Controller. Hook up any midi controller or use the pianoroll or step-sequencer to

trigger our multi velocity layered drum machine to create realistic and convincing drums.

z. VideoPlayer. Syncs video to the song position for perfect video scoring.

7. Even More Generators! With the Fruity Wrapper you can now add any VSTi or DXi plugin synthesizer you download or buy. From the Channels menu select Add One > More. This will produce a list of the available plugins as shown below. You can select any of the plugins under the Fruity Generator Plugins heading by double-clicking them. The “F” in the box beside the plugin name marks it as a “Favorite” and will make it appear directly in the Add One menu.

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8. VST and DXi Plugins. You’ll notice the Fruity Wrapper in the above list. This generator is only to be used for VST and DXi synth plugins, which are listed under the obvious headings in the above picture. But you don’t need to open it on its own – if you double-click on one of the VST Plugins, it will automatically open a Fruity Wrapper for you. A VST plugin synth, confusingly called the mda DX10, is also available as freeware. Some of the additional Fruity Generators come in Fruity / VSTi / DXi version. This way these generators can also be used natively in other music host programs. Please check our website at

http://www.flstudio.com/ for more information about this issue.

DX10

9. The Other VST Plugins. I know what you’re thinking – what about all the other VST Plugins in the list? VST plugins are either synthesizers or effects (FX), and most of the ones you have to start with are FX (we explain how to use the FX in the Mixing & Effects section below). Unfortunately, there is just no reliable way for FL Studio to tell the difference between FX and synth plugins, so you’ll just have to remember which is which. If you try to open a VST Plugin and all you get is an error message and the empty wrapper shown below, then it was probably an FX plugin.

DreamStation is an example of a DXi plugin

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10. Do I have to register? Some of these products are made by FL Studio partners, so yes in some cases you do have to register them to unlock their full capabilities. Go to information on where to send your hard-earned cash.

11. Where Can I Get More? There are literally hundreds of synth plugins out there to download. Some of them are free, and some you have to pay for. Search the web and deals. A place you should definitely bookmark is plugin you could possibly want (new VST Plugins should go in the FLStudio4 > Plugins > VST directory on your hard drive).

Don't deny yourself, dude! You need all these generators. Save up your squeegee money and buy them ASAP.

http://www.flstudio.com/ for more

http://www.flstudio.com/ for good

www.kvr-vst.com - a huge sites with every VST

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12. The Arpeggiator. Now that we've introduced the Synth generators, we can finally tell you what the Arpeggiator section in the Channel Settings window is for. Open one of the synth channels (SimSynth Live, for instance) and go to the FUNC panel of the channel settings box. Now click the up arrow and select a chord. Now go to a new pattern and place a single SimSynth note and press

play. Instead of a single note, you get a repeating arpeggio. Cool, huh? Read more about this in the on-line help.

Direction of Arpeggio

Speed, Duration, etc.

Octave Range and Repeat

Chord Selection

me… me… me… ∗

∗ me… me… me… +

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13. Static Synthesizer Sounds. FL Studio also contains static support for the standalone version of SimSynth and a drum sound synthesizer named DrumSynth. If you own either of these pieces of

software, FL Studio can read their output files into a normal Sample Channel. It is not as flexible as a real synthesizer in FL Studio, but this way you can get the phat sounds of SimSynth without the huge processing load of a real-time synth. DrumSynth is free from SimSynth at www.flstudio.com. You should find some presets for both synths in the Browser.

www.mda-vst.com and you can get

SimSynth

DrumSynth

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14. Speech! Yep, you read that right. You can have a conversation with FL Studio using the built in support for speech synthesis. The easiest way to access this feature is to look under “speech” in the sample browser, and drag one of the files there onto the step sequencer. You’ll get a dialog that looks like the one below. All you have to do is replace the text, choose a personality, style, rate (speed), and pitch. Click the “listen” button to hear what it will sound like. When you’re done, press the check mark and a sampler channel will be added. You can also drag a speech file into a Granulizer, Fruity Scratcher, or Fruity Slicer channel. Have fun.

You might have to spell some words funny to make it sound ok… Also, you can make it sing by putting the number of semitones you want the pitch to rise on each word in brackets after it. Try typing “all your(2) base(3) are(2) beelong to us” in the dialog above (use a monotone style.)

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The TS404 was originally a standalone synthesizer designed to perform like the classic TB303 bass-line sequencer that gives modern techno it's unique sound. The 404 is not intended to be an exact replica of that classic machine, but it will still lend a unique techno flavor to your compositions.

1. Add a TS404 Channel. First of all, load up GettingStarted1.flp. Then add a TS404 channel as shown in the previous section.

2. Copy the Notes from Ins_Round. That's right, we're going to replace the Ins_Round sample with the TS404. First, use the keyboard editor to program the TS404 notes as shown, then click on the Channel Mute light to turn off the Ins_Round channel and play the result. You may want to turn up the TS404 Channel a little bit too.

Mute This Channel

Turn Up the TS404

Umm… I liked it better before…

Add the Notes

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3. Not Too Impressive Yet! OK, so that doesn't sound too good. That's because you're using the TS404 default settings. Click on the channel name to bring up the TS404 Channel Settings Dialog as shown below, click the TS404 tab and tweak the controls however you want (one possibility is shown below, with some of the changes pointed out). Our own version can be found in GettingStarted4.flp (actually, you may have to tweak your own version a bit more than what we’ve shown here to make it sound exactly like GettingStarted4.flp).

Click the TS404 Tab

Change the

That's a little better…

FX Track

explain this later)

(We'll

Change the Oscillator Shapes

Make the Notes Decay Slower

Make the Sound Trashier

Last Thing to Do:

Turn these wheels slowly while the song plays…

You're a Techno god.

(

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4. Understanding the Controls. Like with the other channel settings, this stuff is explained further in the on-line manual. But for now, here's a brief overview of what the main controls do. There are also lots of other interesting controls you can get to by clicking the MISC, FUNC, and SMP tabs. Have fun, and try to get a feel for it…

The oscillators: You can have two slightly different sounds playing at once. Click on the little pictures for different waveforms. Set the octave by turning the CRS wheel.

The Envelope: Attack, decay, release, sustain, etc. (Check out the little

icture!)

The Filters: Cutoff and Resonance. Try the buttons too

Distortion: Turn up both wheels for a nastier sound.

Lo1

etc).

Oscillator mixing: Turn the MIX wheel to hear more or less of oscillator 1 and 2.

LFO: Low frequency oscillation. This function slowly turns a parameter such as the CUToff up and down. Try turning up the amount (AMT) and the speed (SPD). Then try playing with the buttons to make the RESonance, tuning (OSC) and pitch width (PW) oscillate.

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5. Pitch-bending the 404. One last thing. You can bend the notes on the TS404 to make some really cool synth lines. The TS404 also has a Pitch Bend Line at the top of its keyboard as most of the other synths (but not all of them support it!). If you click on the Pitch Bend Line, the current note will slide into the next one. Go back to GettingStarted4.flp and try setting up the keyboard as shown below. The finished result is in GettingStarted5.flp. Actually, as of version 3.5, this sort of melody is better done using the Piano Roll. More on that in a future chapter…

New Notes

Pitch Bend Line

Can't click off the pitch-bend line? Try right and left clicking. One of em's gotta work!

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IMPORTANT REMARK: This guide is a general Getting Started guide for all existing FL Studio Editions. Some features however, are not available in some editions. The FL Studio Fruityloops Edition doesn’t have the Track Adjustments & Mixer sliders capabilities. Please check our site

www.flstudio.com for upgrade conditions.

One great addition to FL Studio Producer Edition is the new Mixer window (previously called Effects Tracks window). You can mix up more than 69 tracks and even make links between them to create complex mixing chains… But wait, let’s start from the very beginning. The Mixer window’s best feature is that you can add cool effects to your channels. The effects you can add range from simple things like a volume control to more advanced effects such as chorus, reverb, phaser, delay, flange, and EQ among others (you can also add generators, notebooks, controllers, monitors and all kinds of other goodies here too). Remember when we told you to change the FX Track in the TS404 Channel Settings? Well now we're gonna explain what that was all about.

1. Open the Mixer Window. Guess what? The GettingStarted Loops were using Mixer Effects all along! Load up one of them and bring up the Mixer screen by pressing F9 or by going to View > Mixer. You'll get a window like the one below…

FX Tracks

FX Plugins

Track Adjustments

2. What You're Lookin' At. Along the top are the FX Tracks. You have one Master Track, 64 Regular Tracks, and 4 Send Tracks. The wheel with the slider below each track is their volume and

stereo balance control (just like on a real mixer pult!). The insert tracks are displayed 16 at once, but you can switch which 16 tracks you see (click and A/B/C/D switches at the top of the window). The Master Track is selected by default. Each track has room for eight FX Plugins. The Getting Started Loops use the Fruity 7 Band EQ plugin in the Master Track, and the Fruity Delay and Fruity Reverb plugins in Track 2. Try changing the track to find the other plugins.

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The Track Adjustments panels show some properties each track has. The volume and stereo balance settings are the same like the one below each track (the other ones are added for convenience, as you see them all, no matter the selected track). The other things on the track adjustments panel are equalizer, stereo “width” knob and a decibel meter (shows the output volume of the track).

3. Turn Plugins On and Off / Mixing Wet and Dry. Click on the green LED next to each plugin slot to turn it on and off. Try this with the loop running to hear the difference. You can also tweak the knob next to the LED to mix a “dry” (without effect) and “wet” (with the effect) sound.

4. Select Plugins. If you want to add new plugins, click on the arrow where you want to add the plugin and then choose from the Favorites List or choose Select to choose from the entire list and configure your favorites.

Click Here

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5. Tweak the Plugins. Right-click the plugin to open and close its Plugin Settings screen. Some plugins have a plain interface like the Fruity Fast Dist shown below. Others have fancier looking controls. Most plugins come with their own help as shown below, so we won't go into how to use the controls here. But for now, why not play with them to see what they do?

Left OR Ri Click This Bar

6. Sending Sound to the Plugins. Now we can finally explain what the box in the top right of the Channel Settings does. Any effects placed in the Master FX Track will be applied to all the sounds in the song. But effects in the numbered Regular FX Tracks will only be applied to the Samples and Synths, which have selected that FX Track in their Channel Settings Dialog. So, in GettingStarted5.flp, the Ins_Round and TS404 Channels are sending their sound to FX Track 2, where Fruity Reverb and Delay will be applied. The other channels are sending to FX Track 1 (default), which contains no effects.

Sending to FX Track 2

Effects have presets too…

Click Here for Help

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7. What are the Send Tracks For? There are 4 special Send Tracks that take their input from other FX Tracks, rather than from Generator Channels. Suppose you want to put the same Fruity Reverb on Guitar and Drums, but you want to add Fruity Delay to the guitar and EQ to the drums. Easy. Send the drums to Regular FX Track 2 where you put the EQ. Send the guitar to Regular FX Track 3 where you put the Fruity Delay. Then put the Reverb in Send Track 1 and turn the Send 1 wheel on Regular FX Tracks 2 and 3 to send the output of these tracks to Send Track 1. Now you have the same reverb applied to both guitar and drums, but you only had to use a single reverb plugin. The send wheels are placed in the Tracks Adjustments panel for each track.

This FX Track Sends its Output to Send Track 2

8. Changing Plugins Order. The order in which you add effects plugins has a huge impact on the way the final output sounds. Plugins are like guitar stomp boxes. On each FX track, the first plugin in the list is applied first, and then the output of that plugin is fed to the second, and so on. To make it easier to experiment with effects order, FL Studio has a simple function to move an effect up or down in the effects chain. It's on the effects menu shown below (Move Up and Move Down.)

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9. What do the Plugins Do? Like we mentioned, you can get on-line help for all of the FL Studio Plugins, but here's a quick rundown on what they all do…

Buzz Effect Adapter. This adapter lets you load in any Buzz Machine effect. FL Studio comes with a bunch installed already, but you can get more at

www.BuzzMachines.com.

Fruity 7 Band EQ. Equalizes your sound (just like on your Dad's stereo at home.)

Fruity Balance. Lets you change the pan and volume while live recording.

Fruity Bass Boost. Boost that bass for a super-phat sound.

Fruity Big Clock. Pops up a huge timer to tell you how long the song’s been playing.

Fruity Blood Overdrive. Use this to distort channels.

Fruity Center. Use for real time DC offset removal.

Fruity Chorus. Adds a smooth chorus effect.

Fruity Compressor. Use this to flatten out the dynamics of the sound. Apparently Fatboy Slim uses

massive compression to get his drums to sound the way they do…

Fruity DB Meter. Pops up a big levels meter.

Fruity Delay. Use for a true echo (not just repeated samples like the channel echo).

Fruity Delay 2. The next generation Fruity Delay. Adds panning and other effects.

Fruity Fast LP. Use for low pass filtering that's CPU friendly (cutoff and resonance).

Fruity Fast Dist. A great little distortion effect that uses almost no CPU.

Fruity Filter. More cutoff and resonance filtering that’s not so CPU friendly.

Fruity Flanger. If you have to ask, you haven't heard it yet. Real popular among guitar players, this

LFO-type effect can add a cool feel to any song.

Fruity Flangus. A very useful effect, which allows you to enrich the stereo panorama of your instruments, add high quality chorus and simulate unison synthesis.

Fruity Formula Controller. This is a fancy internal controller that you can link to other wheels and sliders inside FL Studio. Wait until the Live Recording section for more info...

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Fruity Free Filter. Yet another filter - a classical 12db instead of a state variable filter like the Fruity Filter (whatever the hell that means.)

Fruity HTML Notebook. Add some notes to your loop in html format, or add your own web page!

Fruity LSD. Enables FL Studio to access the DirectMusic Software Synthesizer bundled with DirectX

8. Note that you must have DirectX 8.0 or later installed on your machine. The LSD acts like an external MIDI device, which can be controlled from a MIDI Out Generator Channel (see section on Generators above).

Fruity Mute 2. Use this to mute (silence) channels while live recording.

Fruity Notebook. Keep your song notes here! This is the plugin used in the Tutorial Loops that came

with your package.

Fruity PanOMatic. Useful for panning the sound back and forth smoothly.

Fruity Parametric EQ. A parametric equalizer built for FL Studio. Regular equalizers only let you set

the levels for preset frequency bands, but with a parametric equalizer you choose the frequency bands to equalize.

Fruity Peak Controller. This is another internal controller. More on controllers in the Live Recording section below.

Fruity Phase Inverter. Use to reverse the stereo phase (left and right).

Fruity Phaser. Like the Flanger, but even cooler.

Fruity Reeverb. Use for a much nicer reverb than you can get on the Channel Settings dialog.

Fruity Scratcher. Load up a sample and scratch the hell out of it. This plugin is actually more like a

generator, since it produces sound on its own rather than modifying a channel.

Fruity Send. Place this plugin between two other plugins to split the signal and send it to one of the four Send FX channels.

Fruity Soft Clipper. This is a CPU friendly soft limiter filter. It allows you to avoid clipping and distortion by applying soft compression to the input signal.

Fruity Spectroman. Pops up a spectrum analyzer so you can view the spectral distribution of the sounds in your track.

Fruity Stereo Enhancer. Adds some really nice stereo separation and other effects.

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Fruity Vocoder. An advanced vocoder with a wide range of adjustable parameters and zero latency (i.e. the vocoded sounds are not “late”). This effect uses quite a lot of CPU with slower machines but has unique precision and features.

Fruity WaveShaper. Is a wave distortion effect which maps input to output values using flexible spline-based graph.

Fruity X-Y Controller. Yet another internal controller you’ll learn more about in the Live Recording section below.

10. Preset Effects. If a plugin has built in presets you can access them through the presets section of the effects menu as seen above, or by using the little arrows like with the synthesizer plugins. You can create your own presets by clicking save preset. When you do this, FL Studio saves the positions of all the plugin controls so that you can get that exact sound back again later. If you save your presets in the directory FL Studio suggests, then it will appear on the menu under presets.

11. Getting New Plugins. We gave you a great selection of FX Plugins with your FL Studio Package. But people are always creating new ones, and you can find many of them on the web. Some are free and some cost money. Surf the web to see what you can find! The on-line reference (press F1 in FL Studio) contains in-depth step-by-step guides on how to install and use such third party plugins.

12. CPU Considerations. "WOW!! I can use as many plugins as I want?!?" Actually, no you can’t. Each plugin you use takes up a certain amount of your computers power. Some take more power than others. The number of plugins you can use before your computer starts grinding and running out of breath depends directly on your CPU speed (you know, that Megahertz thing) and also somewhat on the amount of memory you have. There is no formula for how many plugins you can use, but if the sound starts breaking up after you add a plugin, it’s a good sign that you’ve gone a few plugins too far. Don't forget about the Send Channels, though. They can help you cut down on the total number of plugins. Also don’t forget that adjusting the Buffer Length can often solve your CPU problems (see the “What are You Lookin’ At?” section).

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Load up GettingStarted1.flp, open the Channel Settings for Ins_Round, and click on the INS tab. Now start the loop and watch the cutoff wheel. Hey! It moves while the song is playing! What's up with that? That, my friend, is what we call Live Recording and it's the key to making your songs come alive…

Click the INS Tab

Watch this Wheel Move!

1. Choose an Automation Pattern. OK, this is important. Finally, we can tell you what Pattern 2 does in GettingStarted1.flp. It's where the Live Recording data is stored that moves the Ins_Round and Ins_Square cutoff wheels. The only way to not tie yourself completely in knots over where you stored your Live Recording data is to always have one pattern where you do your entire Live Recording. For this song, it happens to be pattern 2. Then you need to place that pattern in the Playlist at the beginning of the song to play back the live tweaking. As you learn more about what you are doing, you can break out of this mold, but you need to start simple.

Remember to Select the Right Pattern During Live Recording!

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2. Record Some Live Tweaking. The easiest thing to do is load up GettingStarted5.flp - the one with the TS404 in it. Open the Channel Settings Dialog, start the song, and practice playing with the CUT and RES wheels of the TS404. When you think you've got something groovy, make sure you've selected pattern 2 (the Main Automation pattern), then press the Record Switch shown below. You may hear a three-tick countdown first, depending on whether the 321-countdown light is on (see below). Then start the song and work your magic. The song will play once and then stop. Turn recording off and press Play. You've just done your first Live Recording session!

Song Mode Count in

Record Switch

3. Set the Buffer Length low. You may have noticed that there is a short delay between your tweaking and FL Studio's response. That's controlled by the buffer length (hit F10 and select the Audio tab). The lower you set this slider, the faster FL Studio will respond. But don't set it too low, or the sound will be choppy (see the "What are You Lookin' At?" section).

4. Important Note. When you've got the Recording Switch on and the loop is playing, moving a wheel will erase over all the previously recorded tweaks from that point in the song until the end. This can be frustrating, so often it's best to get the recording approximately the way you want it and then make further changes in the Event Editor described in the next section.

5. What can be Recorded? Most wheels and sliders are recordable, including those that control Plugins. But some controls aren't recordable. The quickest way to tell what's recordable is to mouse over a control and look for the red dots in the Hint Bar. If these dots appear, then you can record that control.

Description

Plugins. You can do live tweaking recording on most Plugins, but not all of them. Experiment to find out.

Red Dots

LemonBoy's Live Tweaking Recording Advice…

* Always, always, always check the pattern selector before you start recording!!!

* Try to get your song laid out the way you want it before you start live recording. Once you have events recorded, it is difficult to change the layout of the playlist in a way that will still sound good.

* Always save a backup copy of your loop before you start any live recording. That way if you mess things up or change your mind, you can go back to the clean copy.

* Save your loop frequently during live recording. If you accidentally tweak something and erase some events, you can always go back to the previous version.

* Get yourself an External MIDI Controller to make your life easier (See the section on External Controllers for more info!)

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TTHHEE EEVVEENNTT EEDDIITTOORR

Unless you're a real pro, and you have a buffer length of zero milliseconds, you'll probably find that the live recordings don't always sound exactly perfect. That's where the event editor comes in. Each time you move a wheel during a recording session, the new setting is stored as an "event" for that wheel at that moment in the loop. With the event editor, you have complete control over how the sound is tweaked during playback.

1. Record Some Live Tweaking on a Particular Wheel. The cutoff on the TS-404, for instance. Let's assume you already did that in the previous section. If you prefer you can look at the event editor for the INS Cutoff Wheel in GettingStarted1.flp for either the Ins_Round or Ins_Square sample.

2. Stop FL Studio and Open the Event Editor. Right-click on the wheel you modified, and select Edit Events from the pop-up menu. The screen you are looking at now is a lot like the Graph Editor described earlier. One difference is that this graph controls the level of a single wheel or slider at a particular point in the song. (OK, it's actually more complicated than that. Remember how we told you to keep all your live recording in a single pattern (Pattern 2) and place this pattern once at the beginning of a song? If you do that, then the bars in the Event Editor will match the bars in the Playlist. If you don't do that, you're on your own!) The other main difference is that this graph is used to set Events (bright vertical lines corresponding to the value of the wheel you are setting) that persist until the next event.

Edit mode selection

Play Indicator

Edit menu

Vertical/ Horizontal Zoom (click + drag)

Events

(Each sets the level until the next event)

TThhee EEvveenntt EEddiittoorr

3. Event Editor Modes. The event editor has several modes, which are explained below.

a. Draw Mode. In this mode, the mouse pointer looks like a pencil

. You can add new single events by left clicking in the main window. You can also left-click and drag to draw multiple events, or right-click and drag to draw a line of events.

b. Brush Mode. This mode (

) is very similar to Draw mode, but ignores snap distance the

mouse.

c. Delete Mode. Click on the delete symbol

to change to this mode. You can delete events by clicking on them, or click and drag to delete a series of events (the events are the bright vertical lines on the main window.)

d. Smooth Mode. Click on the smoothing (interpolation) symbol

to change to this mode. You can click and drag to highlight a region. When you let go of the mouse button, the events will be smoothed out, instead of looking choppy. Try it! You can also turn on Auto-Smoothing from the edit menu, so that events you draw in Draw Mode are automatically smoothed out.

e. Select Mode. Click on the select symbol

to change to this mode. When you click and drag, you will see a red region highlighted on the Play Indicator Bar. You can also right-click on the Play Indicator Bar in any mode to expand the highlighted region. You can cut and zoom to this region from the Edit Menu.

f. Zoom Mode. The zoom mode -

allows you to select an area in the event editor an

automatically zoom fit to that area.

4. Miscellaneous Facts. Here's some stuff you should know about the Event Editor.

a. Undo. There is a limited form of undo available for the Event Editor. Use CTRL-Z to undo the

last action.

b. Setting the Initial Event. You will notice that after live recording, the wheel you recorded

sometimes doesn't start in a sensible place when you play back the loop. This can be fixed by turning the wheel to a good start position, and then right clicking the wheel and selecting Init Events With This Position. This sets the very first event so that the wheel will always start where you want it.

c. Getting a Feel for It. It takes some practice to master the event editor, and to be able to get a song

to sound exactly the way you want it, but it's definitely worth it. Keep practicing until you get it right!

TThhee EEvveenntt EEddiittoorr

d. Live Recording Defeats Static Tweaking. If a wheel has some events recorded on it, you can no

longer just set it anywhere you want and expect it to stay there. You have to go through the Event Editor or start a new live recording session to change it.

5. Introducing the Event LFO. Earlier on, we explained how to use the LFO (Low Frequency Oscillation) controls on TS404 channels (it's also available for Sample Channels on the INS panel). But it's sometimes hard to control exactly how this oscillation is going to fit with the song. That problem is solved with the Event LFO, which lets you simulate the perfect oscillation inside the event editor.

6. Using the Event LFO. Open the event editor for some control (perhaps the Channel Settings INS Panel Cutoff for Ins_Round in GettingStarted1.flp). Make sure you're on the right pattern in the pattern selector (pattern 2 for GettingStarted1.flp). Now select an area to oscillate using Select Mode or by right-clicking on the Play Indicator Bar. Now hit ctrl-l or select LFO from the Tools Menu. This will pop up the LFO Settings window and immediately apply the LFO to the selected area. See below for an example.

7. Play with the Main LFO Settings. Notice the dialog has three sections. If you play with the controls in the Start and Shape sections, you should be able to create all kinds of cool effects. In the Start section, you can alter the value (height), range (depth), and speed (length) of the waves. In the Shape section you can alter the shape of the wave (sine wave, saw-tooth, or square) and the phase (basically moves the waves left and right.)

TThhee EEvveenntt EEddiittoorr

horizontal position

8. What About the End Section? If you want to make the LFO change as it progresses, turn on the End section by pressing the red button. Once the light is on, you can modify the parameters for the beginning (left) and end (right) of the LFO, and FL Studio will smoothly morph the settings from start to end. This lets you create really cool changing LFO effects like below. In the picture, a square wave LFO starts at bar 2 and ends at bar 4. As the LFO progresses, the speed increases and the value and range decrease from their Start to their End values.

TThhee EEvveenntt EEddiittoorr

9. What is in the Edit Menu? In the Edit Menu you can delete all events (Edit > Delete All), select all events (Edit > Select All), and change the color and look of the editor (Settings). You can also turn Snap on and off. Use Snap to make sure your highlighting and event placement is always right on a beat or bar. The grain of Snap can be changed on the main toolbar (see below). Try the different settings to see how it effects highlighting and event placement. The finest grain is Tick, which will cause you to snap to extremely fine-grained locations between notes. If you select Auto, then FL Studio will decide for you where the best snap location is.

Snap Toolbar

Time for more tips

* You can undo an LFO with Ctrl-Z.

* If you record tempo changes, the delay line for the TS-404 will automatically be reset at every change. The delay lines for the sample channels will not, but the delay length will change with the tempo, making it sound a little weird at first.

TTHHEE PPIIAANNOO RROOLLLL

You may have already realized that there are some things that the Step Sequencer doesn't do very well. It gets tricky to use when you have melodies that are longer than 1 bar. It's also tricky if you want to use a single-note sample to play chords. Finally, it's nice to be able to slide notes like on the TS404, but you can't do that with any other type of channel. The Piano Roll solves all of those problems!

1. Open the Piano Roll. Load up GettingStarted6.flp and select pattern 3. Notice that the Step Sequencer view is very different. That's because the Ins_Round and Ins_Square channels contains Piano Roll data instead of normal dots. You can open the Piano Roll for any, channel either by right- clicking the channel name or by left-clicking the Mini Piano Roll. Open it for the Ins_Round channel.

ht Click Here

(Channel Name)

Left Click Here

(Mini Piano Roll)

2. What You're Looking At. First thing to notice is that this screen looks a little like the Event Editor. See the Play Indicator Bar, the Edit Mode Buttons, and the Edit Menu Button? But the "events" in the Piano Roll are notes to be played at the given location, rather than level settings for various FL Studio controls. Each horizontal green line shows where a note should start and end, and the Piano Keyboard on the left shows the pitch of each note. The note labeled below is a C5 (C in the 5 octave), which will start on the second beat of the first bar and play for 3/4 of a beat.

Edit Menu

Edit Mode Buttons

Play Indicator

Zoom

Display Mode

4. Important Advice. Before we go any further, here's a tip. Make sure you always keep your Piano Roll patterns separate from your regular patterns. You'll just avoid a lot of confusion that way.

5. What Kinds of Channels Can Have Piano Rolls? You can have a Piano Roll for any type of Generator. But there's something you should know about Sample Channels. You can use the Piano Roll on any Sample Channel, but it will always work best when you are using Looped Samples. Ins_Round, for instance, contains loop points that let the sample play over and over again to create a smooth sound that lasts as long as you want. If you don't have a looped sample, you can still use the Piano Roll, but your notes may not actually last as long as you wanted them to.

Usin Loop Points

Man, this thing

ust keeps

gettin' better!

Loop Points

6. Basic Piano Roll Editing. Here's a run-down of how to edit your melody line.

a. Entering Notes. To enter a note, make sure you're in Draw Mode by clicking the Draw Mode

Button (see the Event Editor section) or the Paint Mode Button, click on the canvas, and drag the note to where you want it to start. If the loop is not playing, you should hear the note you are entering as you drag it around. The length of the note will match the length of the last note you placed. To change the length, grab the right hand side of the green bar and drag it.

b. Note Snap. You may find the note snaps to a place you didn't want it to go. If so, change the

Snap Level on the main toolbar the same way as you did for the Event Editor (see previous section). Sometimes you just can't get the note length to snap where you want no matter what you do. In this case, shrink the note to the left as far as you can and then drag it out to the right again. This often fixes the problem.

c. Note Color. See the row of 4 colored buttons under the Edit Mode Buttons? These let you select

the color of the notes you enter. This may seem foolish right now, but color-coding can really help you out when you're trying to make sense of the notes you entered. Plus, the Edit Menu lets you Select By Color so you can Delete or Copy and Paste only those notes.

d. Deleting Notes. Two options here - either right click the note you want to delete or go into

Delete mode with the Delete Mode Button (see the Event Editor Section).

e. Undoing Changes. Like the Event Editor, there is a limited undo available from the Edit Menu

or by pressing Ctrl-Z.

pping

f. Cutting, Copying and Pasting Notes. Go into Select Mode with the Select Mode Button (see

Event Editor section) and click and drag to highlight some notes. Then use the Cut, Copy and Paste options in the Edit Menu or use Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X, and Ctrl-V. Pasting can get a little tricky, though. The notes will paste to their identical locations in the first bar that is currently displayed on the screen. So to paste from bar 1 to bar 2, select the notes in bar 1 and hit Ctrl-C to copy, then scroll over to bar 2 and hit Ctrl-V. If the notes don't appear, they probably went into bar 1. Press Ctrl-Z to undo and try again.

7. Chords and Harmonies. One of the really nice features of the Piano Roll is that you can have notes sound on top of each other to create chords and harmonies. Here, we're getting into sophisticated stuff that you need some kind of musical intuition for, but FL Studio does make life a little easier by giving you a Chord option on the Edit Menu. Select the type of chord you want, and then go into Draw Mode. You can now drop entire chords onto the canvas. GettingStarted7.flp is an example of a melody with harmonies. The picture below is a snapshot from that project:

Overla Notes

8. Pitch-Bending Notes. This is really cool. If you click on the Slide Icon in the top left just under the Edit Menu Button, you can insert pitch-bending notes (also called Slide Notes). To see how this feature works, place a long note on the canvas, and then place a slide note above or below it. Make sure the two notes overlap. The long note will play until it reaches the slide portion. Then the pitch will rise towards the Slide Note and stay there until it reaches the end of the original note. The longer the Slide Note, the longer the slide. In GettingStarted8.flp, we've added another Ins_Round Piano Roll in pattern 4 that uses slides. Check it out.

Slide Icon

Note Starts

Slides Up

Slides Down

Event Select

Then Stops

9. Tweaking the Notes. Remember the Graph Editor from way back in the Step Sequencer section? It let you individually change Volume, Cutoff, Resonance and so on for each note. The Piano Roll has a similar function, laid out in the bottom part of the Piano Roll Editor. Every time you enter a note, you get a spike in the bottom graph that shows the level of the parameter selected by the drop down box on the left (labeled Event Select above). After you enter the notes, you can change the values of any of the parameters by grabbing the top of the spikes and dragging them. GettingStarted8.flp has volume tweaks in the Piano Rolls for both pattern 3 and 4. You can set Velocity, Pan, Cutoff, Resonance, and Pitch. As an added bonus, you can also use this graph as the Event Editor for Channel Pan, Pitch, and Volume. NOTE: You can also change a note’s properties by double-clicking it.

10. Importing MIDI Tunes. In the File Menu under MIDI, you'll find two methods of importing MIDI sound files directly into the Piano Roll Editor. There are tons of MIDI files for various popular melodies floating around out there. Now you can suck them directly into FL Studio and use them in your songs. How cool is that?

AAUUDDIIOO TTRRAACCKKSS

IMPORTANT REMARK:

are not available in some editions. The FL Studio Fruityloops Edition doesn’t have Audio Track or the Integrated Wave Editor capabilities. Please check our site

FL Studio Producer Edition let you work with Audio Tracks and automation envelopes.

Audio / Automation Switch

Audio tracks

Automation Tracks

The bottom section of the playlist contains the audio/automation.

The bottom section of the playlist contains the audio/automation tracks (9). The tracks provide the user with an easy visual way to place, arrange and edit a set of audio clips and parameter automation splines, with an intuitive preview of the data held in the clips (waveforms/automation splines - see the picture). It is also possible to cut and split clips in multiple pieces and arrange the pieces independently on the audio tracks.

Each clip available in the tracks view is in fact an instance of the Audio Clip generator or the Automation Clip.

Audio clips: are a special version of the Sampler channels. Automation clips: are a dedicated internal controller plugin.

Each clip channel you add in the Step Sequencer becomes available in the tracks view and vice versa dropping samples on the audio tracks generates an Audio Clip channel (unless a channel exists with the same sample). The audio tracks provide you with an easy visual way to arrange a set of large audio clips, while seeing the

This guide is a general Getting Started guide for all existing FL Studio Editions. Some features however,

www.flstudio.com for upgrade conditions.

waveform preview inside the tracks. You can cut and split the audio clips in multiple pieces and arrange the pieces independently on the audio tracks.

Each audio clip, available in the audio tracks, is in fact an instance of the Audio Clip generator. Each Audio Clip channel you add in the Step Sequencer becomes available in the audio tracks and vice versa - dropping samples on the audio tracks generates an Audio Clip channel (unless a channel exists with the same sample).

To place an audio clip, switch to draw or paint mode and left-click in an audio track (if no Audio Clip channels exist, you will see a dialog where you can browse for a sample to be used). Paint mode allows you to draw multiple instances of the audio clip at once (hold the mouse button and drag).

To erase an audio clip, click it with your right mouse button or use the left mouse button in erase mode.

To switch an audio clip instance to play another Audio Clip channel, open the clip menu (left-click the arrow in the top left corner of the clip) and from the Select Channel menu, pick an Audio Clip channel to switch to.

To open the Channel Settings of the channel associated with the audio clip instance, open the clip menu and select Channel Settings.

From the clip menu, select Preview to listen to the audio clip sample (hit the Stop button in the Transport panel to stop the preview).

Automation clips can automate any editable parameter over the complete song (instead of pattern based automation). A common use of these automation clips is to make a fade-in/out for an audio clip by automating its volume. However, the use of automation clips has a much bigger scope than controlling the clips volume. Feel free to experiment with its use.

Use the appropriate switch to switch between Audio clips handling and Automation clips handling.

IINNTTEEGGRRAATTEEDD WWAAVVEE EEDDIITTOORR

IMPORTANT REMARK:

are not available in some editions. The FL Studio Fruityloops Edition doesn’t have Audio Track or the Integrated Wave Editor capabilities. Please check our site

This guide is a general Getting Started guide for all existing FL Studio Editions. Some features however,

www.flstudio.com for upgrade conditions.

FL Studio Producer Edition includes an integrated wave editor, which allows you to edit samples quickly and effortlessly without having to use external applications.

The editor allows you to do all basic operations over the samples, such as fade in/out, record normalize volume etc. You can edit any sample by opening its Channel Settings and pressing CTRL+E, or by opening the Channel Settings menu and selecting the Edit command.

TTHHEE BBEEAATTSSLLIICCEERR

In yet another awesome FL Studio team-up, you can now import beats sliced up into separate drum hits using the BeatSlicer. This is really handy if you're into break beats. Here's how you do it…

1. Select Import→Beat to Slice from the File menu.

2. Select a Beat. The first thing you'll be asked to do is select a wav file to slice. Make sure it's at least a 1 bar (1 pattern long) beat. You can slice a file that's not a beat, but it won't work very well…

3. Decide where to put the sliced beat. Next you will be asked to choose the directory for the sliced beat. This is where the separate wave files (each containing one drum hit) will be put. FL Studio already has a default directory you can use, called “Sliced Beats”.

4. Decide How You Want the Beat? You will get the dialog box shown below. You have the choice of: a) using a single sampler channel for each slice of the beat (“Sampler Channels”); b) using a Layer to group the channels (“Layered Sampler Channels”); or c) putting the whole beat in a single channel using the Fruity Slicer (“Slicer Channel”).

5. To Merge or Not To Merge. Final question - do you want to merge the beat with the current project? If so, click off the light on the above dialog that says “Start New Project”. The beat will be inserted into the first pattern of your song. Because of this, you should probably insert a blank pattern at the start of the song before you slice. You can do this with ctrl-insert in the Playlist.

6. Save Your Changes. If you start a new project, you will be asked whether to save the current one (if it was altered since last save).

7. The Final Result. On the next page is a picture of what a sliced beat (using the “Sampler Channels” option) looks like in FL Studio. Note that if you choose to start a new project, the tempo is automatically chosen to match the tempo of the original beat. Also, since no beat ever quite fits exactly onto the notes, FL Studio has used the shift function (see the graph editor pane) to match the beats exactly. Now rearrange the beat for funky breaks!

8. Don’t forget about the Fruity Slicer Plugin that we told you about in the Generators section. It’s another handy way to use the FL Studio/BeatSlicer team-up without going through the elaborate process detailed here.

Importing ReBirth RB-338 Songs. You might have noticed this option in the Import Menu... This feature allows you to open a ReBirth song, configure it to FL Studio Format, and listen in FL Studio. Of course, it's not a perfect conversion see the pop-up window for details about what parts of the song might not be converted properly. The playlist and pattern layout also needs some explaining. The first 32 patterns are TB303 #1. The next 32 are TB303 #2. Then you have 32 patterns for the TR808 and another 32 for the TR909 for a total of 128 patterns. Of course most of these will probably be blank for any given song, so your song ends up prett

spread out, but it's all there if you hunt for it.

SSHHAARRIINNGG YYOOUURR WWOORRKK

So now you’re done with your song – you probably want to bring it out of FL Studio so you can put it on a CD, post it on the Internet, or edit it in another program. The Export function exists for this purpose. Here's how to use it.

1. Export to Wav or MP3. This option is available from the File menu. Whether you choose Wav or MP3, you will be asked to specify the name of the file and then the dialog below will appear. There's a lot to choose from here, and we're not gonna go into it. If you want an explanation of every button, go to the on-line help under File Formats. It's all there. If you want to just get your song rendered, leave the settings the way they are (trust us - we picked the defaults for a reason!)

Dude! That looks complicated…

2. Should I Use Wav or MP3? Wav is a raw sound file format. Huge files, excellent sound quality (expect to use about 10 MB per minute depending on Depth). Wav files are suitable for burning onto CD. MP3 is a compressed format. Smaller files, but sound quality may be slightly compromised (expect to use about 1 MB per minute depending on Bit Rate). If you want to share files on the Internet, MP3 is the way to go.

3. Should I Use "Background Rendering?" Rendering can take a long time and hogs the CPU, especially if you choose the high-quality options in the Quality section of the window above. But if you click on Background Rendering, FL Studio will iconify itself and continue to render unobtrusively in the background. It takes longer, though.

SShhaarriinngg YYoouurr WWoorrk

4. Exporting to a Zipped Loop Package. This feature is useful if you want to transmit your FL Studio files over the web. It takes your FL Studio file, plus all the samples used in that files, and puts them into one zip file.

5. Project Bones and Project Data Files. These options let you save a lot of the information about your track. The Project Bones option saves a file with all your presets, automation information, and so on to be loaded later. Project Data Files saves all the samples and other raw data you used to a single location on your hard drive.

6. Where Can I Put My Songs? There are a number of places on the web where artists can place their music in MP3 format for free. amateur looper to get buried there in all the high-profile commercial stuff.

www.mp3.com is probably the best-known site, but it's easy for an

www.sectionz.com is an

option if you are more interested in feedback from other musicians who use FL Studio. The site is a musical community with people like you reviewing every song that is placed on the site. It's a great way to get feedback. If you don't like either of these options, you can always create your own site using one of the many free hosting services out there. Good luck!

Now go get that record deal!

EEXXTTEERRNNAALL CCOONNTTRROOLLLLEERRS

An External MIDI Controller is kind of like a big fancy joystick to control the wheels and switches in FL Studio. The main difference is that you have to tell FL Studio ahead of time what you want each knob on the controller to do (a minor inconvenience for the luxury of changing both cutoff and resonance at the same time!) Each knob on the controller can be linked to a different wheel or slider on FL Studio. If you have a controller, this section will tell you how to make it work with FL Studio. If you don't have one, get one! First we'll introduce a few of the more popular controllers, and then we'll tell you how to set them up.

1. A Few Examples of MIDI Controllers.

a. The PhatBoy. The PhatBoy is one of the most affordable (hence most popular) MIDI controllers,

made by KeyFax at people will ever need (you've only got two hands!).

www.keyfax.com. It's small, with only 13 knobs, but that's as big as most

Who you callin' phat?

TThhee PPhhaattBBooyy aanndd OOtthheerr CCoonnttrroolllleerrss

b. The DrehBank. Another popular choice is the DrehBank from Doepfer at

www.doepfer.de.

This baby gives you 64 knobs instead of 13!

Only I may own a Drehbank. They are not for manual writers!

The Boss

c. Other Controllers.

The Korg MicroKONTROL, Edirol PCR-50 and MC-505 by Roland (

www.rolandgroove.com)

are some of the many other controllers that can be used with FL Studio. The MC-505 is a lot more than a MIDI controller. It's a hardware synthesizer and sequencer specially built to replicate classic techno sounds like the TB-303, TR-808 and TR-909. But it also has full MIDI controller capabilities, so you can link some of the knobs to FL Studio controls.

Whoa! Talk about bringin' a gun to a knife fight!

2. Setting Up Your Controller.

a. Get a MIDI Cable and Plug in your Controller. Look on the back of your computer. If you see

two or three round, 5-pin connectors labeled "MIDI", then you're in business. If not, look for a 15pin trapezoidal joystick port. If you have the round connectors, you need a cable to go from "MIDI Out" on your controller to "MIDI In" on your computer. If you only have a game controller connection, you'll need a special cable that has two round MIDI plugs at one end and a trapezoidal plug at the other. Both these types of cables should be available at any music store specializing in keyboards and synthesizers (but if you ask for them in a computer store, you may just get blank looks.)

b. Turn on the Controller and Start Up FL Studio. If you have a PhatBoy, make sure the power

switch is set to mode "III". If you have a DrehBank, hold down the "Bank 1" button when you plug in the power cable. For the MC-505, make sure the MIDI mode is set to MODE 2 (Shift 12, Edit TxRx = Mode2). Try turning the knobs on your controller. If everything is ok, you should see a little red "Midi" light flash beside the Hint Bar of FL Studio every time you turn a knob. If that works, great! You can skip steps c to e. If not, read on my friend.

TThhee PPhhaattBBooyy aanndd OOtthheerr CCoonnttrroolllleerrss

The Little Red Light

c. Enable MIDI Remote Control. Check the Options menu to see if there is a check mark beside

MIDI Remote Control. If not, click on it and see if you get the light now. If not, read on.

hERETIC

Sam: Yo, check it out. I need a cable with

MIDI connections on one end and a joystick plug on the other.

Computer Store Guy: What's mee dee?

TThhee PPhhaattBBooyy aanndd OOtthheerr CCoonnttrroolllleerrss

d. Set Your MIDI Input Device. If the light is still not coming on when you turn knobs on your

controller, go into MIDI Settings (from the Options menu or by hitting F10). Check out the Remote Control Input box. If you see the word "none" there, then you've got to select an input. Typically, you will be presented with a number of choices, and you'll just have to try them all to figure out which one is right.

re you

ready to rock?

e. Troubleshooting Checklist. If the red light is still not coming on when you turn the knobs on

your controller, here's a list of things you should check.

* Did you select the correct PhatBoy

or DrehBank mode in step b? * Did you enable "MIDI Remote Control" in step c? * Did you select the correct MIDI input in step d? * Are your MIDI In and Out cables reversed? * Did you plug the controller into a power outlet?

If your Midi controller seizes up on ya… Try this as a last resort: quit Fruity, then select

Programs > FL Studio > Advanced > Reset settings from the Windows Start menu. Then

relaunch Fruity and try again…

Jaha

3. Linking a wheel to Your Controller. OK, load up any loop you have that uses the TS-404 channel. GettingStarted4.flp might be a good one to start with.

a. Right-click on the Control You Want to Link to the MIDI Device. In this case, we're trying

the main volume control on a TS404. Now click on Link to MIDI Controller, to pop up the Remote Controlling Settings window.

TThhee PPhhaattBBooyy aanndd OOtthheerr CCoonnttrroolllleerrss

b. Turn a Knob on Your Controller. You should see the Channel and Controller numbers

change. Now click OK, and turn the same knob. You should see the volume control turn back and forth and hear the volume of the instrument change. You're in business!

c. Set the Buffer Length as Low as You Can. Earlier, we explained the buffer length slider (get to

it by hitting F10 and clicking the Audio tab). This slider determines the delay time between you turning a knob and the sound of FL Studio changing. So you want to set it low. But if you set it too low, the sound will become choppy. So try to find a happy medium. If you can't get it low enough to do what you want, then I guess you need a faster computer. Sorry, dude.

4. Which Controls Can I Link? Pretty much all of them, actually. For reference, though, it's the same set of controls that can be changed in Live Recording. Again, if you want to know whether a control can be linked externally and live recorded, mouse over it and look for the two red dots in the Hint Bar.

TThhee PPhhaattBBooyy aanndd OOtthheerr CCoonnttrroolllleerrss

5. What About Internal Controllers? Finally, we can tell you about the Internal Controller Plugins listed in the Effects section (the Formula Controller, Peak Controller, and X-Y Controller). These are plugins with controllers, which can set other controls. Did you follow that? Let’s take the Fruity X-Y Controller as an example. Open the plugins window (F9) and put a Fruity X-Y Controller on the master FX track.

a. The Fruity X-Y Controller lets you control two wheels at once by linking one wheel to its X

(horizontal) dimension and one wheel to its Y (vertical) dimension. Then you can grab the circle in the main window and as you pull it around, it changes both controls that it is linked to. It’s particularly handy for controlling cutoff and resonance at the same time. Load up GettingStarted7.flp again, re-install the Fruity X-Y Controller as in step 5 and open the INS panel of the Ins_Round channel. Then right-click the Cutoff and select Link to External Controller.

TThhee PPhhaattBBooyy aanndd OOtthheerr CCoonnttrroolllleerrss

b. Link the Cutoff wheel to the X value of the internal controller, as shown above. Now link the

Resonance wheel to the Y value. Then open up the Fruity X-Y Controller window, start the loop, and drag the circle around to listen to the Cutoff and Resonance changing at the same time. Cool, huh?

Well, that’s it. Have fun! Don’t forget there’s more help available inside FLStudio and on line at

www.FLStudio.com.

CCRREEDDIITTSS

Programming and Graphics

Additional Help / SDK Translation

Didier Dambrin (gol)

Frédéric Vanmol

TS404& Wasp Engine

Richard Hoffmann

SimSynth 1 & 2 Renderers

David Billen

DrumSynth Renderer

Paul Kellet

BeatSlicer Engine

Peter Segerdahl

Speech Engine

SoftVoice

A big round of applause for the FLStudio team!

Web Site

Jean-Marie Cannie

Frank Van Biesen

Getting Started Guide

Sam Scott

Tutorials, Help, Manuals

Frank Bongers (The original LemonBoy!)

Robert Conde (Jaha, Doo-D-Rox)

Sam Scott (hERETIC, Burton Coggles)

Stanislav Vasilev (mmlabs)

Image-Line Staff

Jean-Marie Cannie

Frank Van Biesen

Ief Goossens

Miroslav Krajcovic

(More complete credits and

thanks in the product itself.)

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321 countdown, 52 3xOsc, 25, 26, 27

compression, 48 countdown, 52 cut itself, 21 cutoff & resonance, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 42,

48, 51, 52, 54, 56, 63, 69, 74, 75

amount (AMT), 16, 17, 42 Aphex Twin, 27 arpeggiator, 15, 37 attack (ATT), 14, 16, 42 Audio Settings, 7, 52, 73 automation, 24, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52, 56, 68, 73 auto-smoothing, 55

background rendering, 67 balance, 11, 48 bass, 20, 23, 27, 40, 48 BeatSlicer, 30, 39, 64, 65 BeepMap, 25, 26, 27 bit rate, 67 BooBass, 25, 26, 27 browser, 8, 13, 23, 38, 39 buffer length, 7, 50, 52, 54, 73 Buzz Effects, 48 Buzz Generators, 25, 26, 28 BuzzMachines.com, 28, 48

channel selector light, 13, 18 channel settings, 12, 14, 15, 20, 25, 26, 37, 41,

42, 44, 46, 49, 51, 52, 56 func panel, 15, 27, 37, 42 instrument panel, 16, 20, 27, 51, 54, 56, 74 misc panel, 16, 27, 42

sample panel, 14, 27, 42 choppy sound, 7, 29 chords, 37, 59, 62 chorus, 44, 48

decay (DEC), 14, 16, 42 delay (DEL), 16 delay (echo), 15, 16, 19, 42, 44, 46, 47, 48, 52,

73 depth, 56, 67 DirectMusic Software Synthesizer, 49 DirectSound streaming buffer, 7 DirectX, 30, 49 discussion forum, 9 distortion, 14, 42, 48, 49 Doepfer.de, 70 dots, 10, 11, 18, 19, 20, 22, 24, 52, 59, 73 DreamStation, 35 DrehBank, 70, 71, 72 DrumSynth, 38

echo (delay), 15, 16, 19, 42, 44, 46, 47, 48, 52,

73 envelope, 16, 17, 42 environment settings, 7, 8 Equalizer, 44, 47, 48, 49 event editor, 52, 54, 55, 56, 59, 61, 62, 63 events (initial), 55 export, 67, 68

FAQ, 9 fat mode, 15 Fatboy Slim, 29, 48 feed, 15 filters, 18, 20, 48, 49 fit, 14

flanger, 44, 48, 49 Force Feedback File, 30

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internal controllers, 4, 48,

49, 50, 74, 75

Fruit Kick, 25, 26, 28 Fruity DrumSynth Live, 25, 26, 29 Fruity DX10, 25, 26, 29 Fruity effects, 11, 27, 35, 44, 74 Fruity Granulizer, 29, 39 Fruity Scratcher, 39, 49 Fruity Send, 49 Fruity Slicer, 30, 39, 64, 65 Fruity Soft Clipper, 49

Jaha, 72

keyboard editor, 20, 40 Keyfax.com, 69 kvr-vst.com, 36

Fruity SoundFont Player, 25, 26, 30 Fruity Vibrator, 30 Fruity Wrapper, 34, 35 Fruity X-Y Controller, 50, 74, 75 FruityLoops.com, 2, 6, 9, 35, 36, 38, 75 fx 1, 14 fx 3, 14 FX Tracks, 5, 44, 46, 47

layer channel, 32, 33, 34, 64 Lemon Boy, 4, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 17, 21,

23, 24, 36, 37, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 52, 53, 58,

60, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 72, 75, 76 LFO, 16, 17, 42, 48, 56, 57 live recording, 48, 49, 54, 55, 56 loop point, 22, 24, 60

Getting Started Loops, 9, 44

GettingStarted1.flp, 9, 10, 12, 15, 17, 18, 19,

20, 40, 51, 54, 56 GettingStarted2.flp, 20, 22, 23 GettingStarted3.flp, 24 GettingStarted4.flp, 41, 43, 73 GettingStarted5.flp, 43, 46, 52 GettingStarted6.flp, 59 GettingStarted7.flp, 62, 74 GettingStarted8.flp, 62, 63

graph editor, 18, 19, 20, 54, 63, 65

hERETIC, 71 hint bar, 9, 22, 52, 71, 73 hold, 16 HTML Notebook, 49

import, 63, 64, 66 initial event, 55 installation, 74

main window, 8, 9, 55, 74 MC-505, 70, 71 mda DX10, 35 menu bar, 9 MIDI

cables, 71 controllers, 32, 69, 70, 71, 72, 73 drivers, 7 files, 63 MIDI Out channel, 32, 49, 71

settings, 72 MP3, 67, 68 mp3.com, 68 mute, 40, 49

NewStuff.flp, 8 notebooks, 49

on-line help, 9, 14, 16, 27, 37, 48, 67

oscillator (OSC), 27,

oscillators, 42

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shift, 18, 20, 65, 71 shortcuts, 9, 22 SimSynth

Live, 25, 26, 31, 37

pan, 11, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 48, 49, 63 pat/song, 22, 23 pattern selector, 22, 23, 56 phase inversion, 49 phaser, 44, 49 PhatBoy, 69, 71, 72 piano roll, 5, 43, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63 ping pong, 15 pitch, 14, 15, 16, 18, 20, 39, 43, 59, 62, 63 pitch bend (slide), 19, 43, 59, 62 pitch width (PW), 42 play indicator, 22, 55, 56, 59 play switch, 8, 10 playlist, 22, 23, 24, 51, 54, 65 Plucked!, 25, 26, 31 plugin, 12, 25, 29, 34, 35, 36, 44, 45, 46, 47, 49,

50, 65, 74 polling, 8 presets, 26, 38, 49, 50, 68 project bones, 68 project data files, 68

standalone, 38 sine fx, 14 slide (pitch bend), 19, 43, 59, 62 snap to grid, 58, 61 song/pat, 22, 23 SoundBlaster, 7 SoundFonts, 25, 26, 30 spectrum analyzer, 27, 49 Speech Synthesizer, 39 speed (SPD), 16, 42 speed (tempo), 65 step sequencer, 8, 10, 13, 21, 22, 26, 39, 59, 63 stereo delay, 14 sustain (SUS), 16, 42 synth channels, 37

TB-303, 27, 66, 70 tempo, 65 tick, 52, 58 tool bar, 22, 58, 61 TR-808, 66, 70 TR-909, 66, 70

ReBirth, 66 release (REL), 16, 42 remote control input, 72 resonance & cutoff, 14, 15, 16, 18, 19, 20, 42,

48, 51, 52, 54, 56, 63, 69, 74, 75

reverb, 14, 44, 46, 47, 49

troubleshooting, 72 TS-404, 25, 26, 27, 40, 41, 43, 44, 46, 52, 54, 56,

59, 73 tutorials, 9, 49

undo, 21, 55, 58, 61, 62

RolandGroove.com, 70

s.del, 14 sample browser, 13, 23, 38, 39

velocity (volume), 18, 19, 63 volume, 8, 9, 11, 14, 16, 18, 19, 44, 48, 63, 73 VST plugin, 35, 36

samples, 3, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17, 20, 21, 23, 25, 26,

29, 30, 38, 39, 40, 46, 48, 49, 54, 56, 59, 60, 68

SectionZ.net, 68

Wasp, 25, 26, 31 wav

export to wav, 67

files, 64 Windows, 8 www.mda-vst.com, 38

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zipped loop packages, 68 zoom, 54, 55, 60

Please don’t forget to consult the extended and detailed online help that comes with your FL Studio. Just push F1 to call the context sensitive online help.

This guide is only intended to get you started. If you are in need of more details, the online help will tell you everything you need to know about the FL Studio features, the generators and its effects.

If you have troubles getting started with FL Studio and your hardware, just try the ‘Setup Wizard’ in the online help.

Don’t forget that our website a lot of information. You will find interactive tutorials, video tutorials, F.A.Q section, technical support forum and a lively FL Studio community.

Be a part of this community and register your version at our site.

www.FLStudio.com contains

Image Line Software FRUITY LOOPS-FL STUDIO 5 User Manual

Specifications and Main Features

Frequently Asked Questions

User Manual

Audio tracks

Speech Engine

Tutorials, Help, Manuals