Hello, it's been a very long time since I posted here last, but after an exhausting search on the internet, I feel like I have to bow down to the masters of this stuff and humbly ask for help.
Note: TL;DR? Skip to "My Question"
My situation:
I write chiptunes and synth music, and recently I have been tasked with creating SNES music and sound effects for an upcoming project.
My philosophy on achieving this:
I want to take the aspects of SNES music I like, but apply my own song writing strategies to them. Sometimes this means I need to break or bend limitations, but always in the pursuit of the song writing. For me, the first snag in the song writing process and my creativity is shot. It makes it very hard to work for other people unless I can follow the path of least resistance. Because of this, I have historically preferred to use samples, and essentially gauge how closely I stay to the limitations in reference to how much it will completely kill my will to write. Whether or not that bothers people, I can't say I really worry about it any more (it used to bother me). I enjoy being able to go my own way just a little, but to balance it with having solid knowledge base of why the sounds are nostalgic or enjoyable in the first place. I never want to end up sounding like a youtube "8bit remix". You know the ones...
My dilemma:
While I have no issue ripping tagging and tuning SNES samples thanks to things like SPCTool. I had recently discovered that it also has a DSP Register Editor window which lets me actually research very key aspects of the sound. Such as the FIR settings and the actual value of the delay\ms.
However it was not until this very evening when I was ripping the sounds from Live A Live that I first noticed the Pitch Modulation check box being ticked, and hearing what it sounded like in the last track in the SPC called "Fall of the Demon King".
That sound... That amazing sound. This sound is used in all kinds of sound effects on the SNES, most notably for me is with the "Voice of Lavos" track from Chrono Trigger (and all throughout that game, really).
My question:
Is there a way to utilize this Pitch Modulation to create my own original sound effects using my own samples? Either in code, or rigging up something close. The ideal solution for me would be an application or even a VST that just applies SNES brand pitch modulation to a wav file exactly as easily as SPCTool can with that tick box, and spits out an effected wav file for use in things like Cubase or Modplug. Does anyone know of any such application tool or VST\processor?
And, if such a tool does not exist, can anyone tell me how this effect is achieved in technical terms, so that I might try to fabricate some signal chain of VSTs to process a sound in a similar way? Assuming such a thing is even remotely feasible.
I would love to hear my own voice ran through this hellish processor, as well as all sorts of tones. Something to tie the modern back in to the old.
Conclusion:
If you read this far, I appreciate your time. I am up so late that my eyes are stinging, but I wanted to get this question out there so that I would be able to sleep tonight, rather than lie awake wondering. If anyone has any info that could help me, it would be very much appreciate. Though, I must pre-warn you that my technical experience is deeply limited. I am good a fiddling with applications and song writing, but when it comes to the technical stuff, I am not only hopeless, but drastically out of time to be able to learn it all. Worst case scenario, I record some sounds and convert them to brr. But if I can get that Pitch Modulation going, that would be such a secret weapon of cool sound creation... I get so excited just wondering what stuff could sound like.
Note: TL;DR? Skip to "My Question"
My situation:
I write chiptunes and synth music, and recently I have been tasked with creating SNES music and sound effects for an upcoming project.
My philosophy on achieving this:
I want to take the aspects of SNES music I like, but apply my own song writing strategies to them. Sometimes this means I need to break or bend limitations, but always in the pursuit of the song writing. For me, the first snag in the song writing process and my creativity is shot. It makes it very hard to work for other people unless I can follow the path of least resistance. Because of this, I have historically preferred to use samples, and essentially gauge how closely I stay to the limitations in reference to how much it will completely kill my will to write. Whether or not that bothers people, I can't say I really worry about it any more (it used to bother me). I enjoy being able to go my own way just a little, but to balance it with having solid knowledge base of why the sounds are nostalgic or enjoyable in the first place. I never want to end up sounding like a youtube "8bit remix". You know the ones...
My dilemma:
While I have no issue ripping tagging and tuning SNES samples thanks to things like SPCTool. I had recently discovered that it also has a DSP Register Editor window which lets me actually research very key aspects of the sound. Such as the FIR settings and the actual value of the delay\ms.
However it was not until this very evening when I was ripping the sounds from Live A Live that I first noticed the Pitch Modulation check box being ticked, and hearing what it sounded like in the last track in the SPC called "Fall of the Demon King".
That sound... That amazing sound. This sound is used in all kinds of sound effects on the SNES, most notably for me is with the "Voice of Lavos" track from Chrono Trigger (and all throughout that game, really).
My question:
Is there a way to utilize this Pitch Modulation to create my own original sound effects using my own samples? Either in code, or rigging up something close. The ideal solution for me would be an application or even a VST that just applies SNES brand pitch modulation to a wav file exactly as easily as SPCTool can with that tick box, and spits out an effected wav file for use in things like Cubase or Modplug. Does anyone know of any such application tool or VST\processor?
And, if such a tool does not exist, can anyone tell me how this effect is achieved in technical terms, so that I might try to fabricate some signal chain of VSTs to process a sound in a similar way? Assuming such a thing is even remotely feasible.
I would love to hear my own voice ran through this hellish processor, as well as all sorts of tones. Something to tie the modern back in to the old.
Conclusion:
If you read this far, I appreciate your time. I am up so late that my eyes are stinging, but I wanted to get this question out there so that I would be able to sleep tonight, rather than lie awake wondering. If anyone has any info that could help me, it would be very much appreciate. Though, I must pre-warn you that my technical experience is deeply limited. I am good a fiddling with applications and song writing, but when it comes to the technical stuff, I am not only hopeless, but drastically out of time to be able to learn it all. Worst case scenario, I record some sounds and convert them to brr. But if I can get that Pitch Modulation going, that would be such a secret weapon of cool sound creation... I get so excited just wondering what stuff could sound like.