TIPS

 

 

Notes:

Links marked red are for the R3

Links marked silver for RADIAS

 

Click on to hear the audio samples (mp3)

 

Improving the Vocoder on the R3 and RADIAS:

Here is a way to improve the vocoder effect. Since one important fact is to have a good quality modulator (besides the carrier of course) here is a way to enhance the mic signal:
  • - Starting from your favourite vocoder program, activate timbre 2 by setting Voice Mode to Layer
  • - Edit Timbre 2 setting it to Mono, Oscillator1's Wave to Audio In, Gain to 0 (or adjust) and Balance to 0 or left (mic input)
  • - Set Mixer to max for Oscillator1 , and 0 for Oscillator2 and Noise
  • - Set LPFilter (24 or 12 dB) Cutoff to max and Resonance to 0 (clean)
  • - Adjust Amp level to 100 or more.
  • - Set the vocoder's Modulator Select to Audio Source (as usual) and Audio Source to Timbre2

By doing this the mic signal is now routed thru Timbre2 to the vocoder. And what is the benefit of this?
We can now use timbre2's EFX to improve the mic signal i. e. inserting the compressor, pitch shifter, etc. and we can adjust the EFX EQ. This way we will have an entire EFX tuning for the mic signal before it reaches the vocoder. Even we can use all timbre2 parameters to adjust more.

To hear, experiment and adjust the mic signal and its effects, turn the vocoder off and press Shift+Timbre2. When finished set the vocoder on again and hear/adjust the results!

Now there is a small drawback on this: Using timbre2 and layering it, will use one voice (that why it is set to Mono) leaving  only 7 (R3 only) voices of polyphony for the vocoder.

And here another trick:

Gating the Vocoder 

  • - Once the vocoder is finished, set the Voice to split
  • - Set the split key to the upper C (i.e.C6 or other key which maybe you never will play)
  • - Set the Arpeggiator On, to Trigger and Timbre Assign to Timbre2
  • - Edit the arpeggiator settings to Latch, Range to 1, Last Step to 1 and Gate to Tie (max).
Now the vocoder will be gated. When you press the split key you defined, timbre2 will be hold, opening the gate.

But take care: if you play more than 7 voices, then timbre2 will be closed (no vocoder because no modulator=timbre2) and the only way to reopen it, is pressing the latch button Off and On and then pressing the split key again.
If you disable the Arpeggiator then you can use the split key as a gate for the vocoder in which case you can use timbre2's EG2 (Amp) to smooth the gates attack and release if you want.