Help creating a Throw-Delay on a 'midi event' vocal sample please?

Cubase
1

Hello,

I am new to working with vocals in Cubase, and in producing my latest track I decided to use Loopcloud to download some vocal samples into Cubase. I managed to locate them using the Media Browser on the right-hand side of the GUI.

After locating my saved samples in Cubase, I then learned how to create sample tracks from each wave form for manipulation within the sampler window. Then, following this I of course exported the finished sounds into Groove Agent to then create a standard instrument track for each of them.

This process has worked incredibly well, but I have now run into a problem, in that I want to add a delay throw to the last word of certain phrases to have that word repeat rhythmically. But, in all the tutorials I hunted down, the methods used to create this type of effect seem to require working with samples in their original wave form and not a triggered midi event on an instrument track.

I am at a total loss as to how to go about achieving this effect. But I did follow these steps:

1/ I created an FX channel in the mixer window and then added a mono delay module to it, (the Cubase stock version). I set the amount of delay to 100% wet as is often advised with an FX channel, and the feedback to about 50%.

2/ I then set up my chosen vocal tracks to send the vocals to that FX track specifying the amount of the effect to be applied, then also using an automation track to determine the point in the vocal phrase when the delay should start.

But no matter what I do using automation to create the delay at the exact point when the last word in the phrase is uttered, I get a really messy sound incorporating practically all of the phrase and not just the last word. It is passable in a garage track, but I would like to have it be really clean and sounding only the last word.

I hope my question makes sense and that there might be a ‘not too technical’ solution to achieving my desired outcome, although I will take whatever help you might give and try my best to work it out.

Thanks very much as always for reading :blush:

Cliff.

2

Gee, there are a lot different ways to approach this. Conceptually what you have setup can work. The issues you are having with it are likely due the specifics of how you’ve setup the Automation. So if you can describe exactly how you are doing it, what exactly is being Automated - that would be useful.

What I often do for echos like this is skip using a Delay entirely and brute force it. Put the clip on an Audio Track. Trim it down to just the desired word(s) & put that where I want the first echo. Copy & paste for additional echos. One nice thing about this approach is you can mess around with each individual echo, for example changing their pitch.

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3

From your description it sounds to me as if you’re doing it right.
When playing back the section with the throw delay, do you see the Send Level that you automated move in the Mixer when it’s suppose to?

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As @raino implied, I’m also wondering, if you may be inadvertently automated the wrong thing. i.e. if you automate the output volume of the delay, it will not have prevented it from “recording” the undesired parts of the phrase. You’d want to automate so, that you prevent the recording of the undesired parts of the phrase for example by automating the send volume to the delay.

But for ultimate precision, I also do like @raino: cut, copy and paste the exact desired phrase (if the phrases overlap, paste into multiple tracks) and manually reduce the playback volume of each successive clip by the desired amount. That allows for insanely pristine and customized processing while not really costing much extra workflow time compared to fiddling with the desired precise delay and automation settings.

5

Hello,

Firstly, you guys, thank you so much for replying to me so so quickly, I appreciate it very much.

raino:
That is wild, it never even occurred to me to chop the sample up further to obtain just the last word and then repeat it on a separate audio track triggering the word over and over with a gradually diminishing volume on automation. This would work perfectly in terms of precision, and could even allow a few additional insert effects on each track such as reverb.
I may just use this method, mostly because I can understand and visualise how to go about it. :slight_smile:
In terms of what I am automating with the send from the vocal channels to the FX channel with the delay on it. To be honest this is a bit beyond my level of understanding, and I think the whole signal is being recorded by the FX channel from the vocal track and not just one word. This may be being made worse by the fact that the vocals are triggered midi events, and so you don’t see the entire wave form unfolding across the timeline like you would in normal circumstances where samples are being used, if that means anything?

mlindeb:
I haven’t checked that specifically, because the throw delay isn’t really being achieved, I guess. But I will try to observe what you suggested when I go back into the project.

Nico5:
Thank you, I agree, for my purposes and with my present level of knowledge, this solution does sound like the best one, and it’s fantastic because in part I had already resigned myself to not having that effect in my track!

Thanks very much once again,

Cliff :slight_smile:

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