Ableton Forum

Okay, call me a noob (alright, I am a noob), but I'm having trouble with Live's Operator.

I just got Welsh's Synthesizer Cookbook, which has two oscillator synth patches to recreate a bunch of common instruments and cool sounds. I know Operator has got more than enough Oscillators to get this stuff rolling, but I can't seem to translate all of the parameters. This is due, I'm entirely sure, to my feeble understanding of synthesis, and I'm sure would be very easy to do if I knew exactly what each parameter meant. I am learning, and have faith I'll be proficient soon enough, but for now the Cookbook has arrived and I want to get to using it.

My question for all you pros, is can you help me take one of these generic two oscillator synth patches, and make the parameters fit nicely onto Operator?

Here's a random page, has a harp and something called hurdy gurdy. All of the patches follow the same layout, so if I figure out how to make one I can make them all.


Thank you so much in advance, this is going to be really helpful in my comprehension of synthesis.

also, I'm not related to the Welsh that wrote the cookbook, as far as I know, though he has the same name as one of my uncles. And I highly recommend the book to anyone, has some cool info at the beginning and my copy came hand signed when I got it off ebay.

Thanks again!

also if you notice the DEPTH: section, some of the patches it lists it as "45%" for example, but other patches it says things like "8 Cents light" or "3 cemts shallow" or for frequency: "8h fast"

These are pretty confusing to me, but I hope make sense to you.

I can post scans of more patches too later if it would be helpful or there's just one you're interested in seeing.

Thanks a lot.

for me it looks rather like a job for ANALOG.

aeon_flux wrote:for me it looks rather like a job for ANALOG.

Right, this is substactive synthesis rather than FM.

do a browser search in live for 'harp operator'
theres a few operator harp presets in there
now look at operator to see what settings are making the sound

That's tits, I thought it was FM. Definitely doesn't mean you can't use it on something other than analog, just operator isn't subtractive.

what makes it subtractive, you're still combining two oscillators, is it the low pass filtering that makes it subtractive?

anybody know a good subtractive synthesis VST?


@emef, if it's subtractive then I doubt I can find a good way of translating what operator is doing to what the cookbook is saying, but if you have some idea how to do this I'd love to learn.

Thanks guys

hwelsh wrote:anybody know a good subtractive synthesis VST?

get ANALOG. it's clever. no clutter. quickrouting solves 90% needs. ableton stylee.

give it a try.

Operator can be used as a subtractive synth you just have to change the output section the there is no freq modulation.
Subtractive basically means you have a sound and your "subtracting parts from it. Like when you apply a low pass filter your are "subtracting the high parts from the sound.

aeon_flux wrote:

hwelsh wrote:anybody know a good subtractive synthesis VST?

get ANALOG. it's clever. no clutter. quickrouting solves 90% needs. ableton stylee.

give it a try.

lol missed the reference to ANALOG in the earlier comments.

is it pretty intuitive how to punch in the cookbook patches using ANALOG?

also who makes ANALOG? When i google ANALOG subtractive vst a bunch of stuff comes up

ANALOG is the name of one of Ableton Live's instruments (can buy seperately or as part of Suite package).

http://www.ableton.com/products

Bout halfway down the page.

For free Vst that emulates some classic analog gear
dontcrack.com has a good list
http://www.dontcrack.com/freeware/downl ... L-Elek7ro/

Have patience... keep learning, it will all make sense.

free synth1 for analog pc vsti

hwelsh wrote:is it pretty intuitive how to punch in the cookbook patches using ANALOG?

to tell you the truth i tried those two and it is not easy task

http://www.ableton.com/analog

by looking at picture you can see that almost everyting is there, but my knowledge is too weak in certain points. but there's a lot of ready patches you can explore. you can also download some made by other people and tweak. lots of fun. i always prefer ableton native instruments and effects. i do not use alternatives - my vst/au are things that are not by default in ableton suite.

you can try analog and other instruments for 14-days (get a live suite) - then saving is disabled but you can still bend knobs.

The "Sync" parameter is something ususally found on analogue synths although it can be done on other Synths anyway Operator doesn't do it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscillator_sync

I'll be googling some tutorials, but I'll ask here too.

Anybody know any good tutorials on using ANALOG?


and are there any pros on here that could give some tips or anything on moving these patches over to ANALOG?

much appreciated

Harrison