14 wavetable synthesis tips
01 WAVETABLES AS MULTI-SAMPLES
The ability of advanced samplers to load and work with wavetables presents new options for working with multisamples too. Let’s say you want to sample the pulse wave oscillator of a classic synth. With a traditional sampling workflow you may choose to create multiple sample layers, one for each pulse width that you sample, and crossfade between these to mimic pulse width modulation. The same source samples combined into a wavetable are both easier to manage within the sampler, and result in a smoother, more convincing emulation of the original synth.
02 MULTIPLE CYCLES PER FRAME
There are circumstances where we may want to include more than a single waveform cycle within a wavetable frame. This may be because the sound source cannot produce notes that are within range of the target wavetable frequency, or where a collection of related waveforms include sounds that should be one or more octaves lower or higher than its counterparts, such as with a synth’s sub-oscillator. In such cases it’s OK to include more than one waveform cycle per wavetable frame; simply double the number of cycles for each octave you go above the wavetable’s nearest note.
Multiple cycles per frame are sometimes needed