Music Lesson: Introduction to Warping

As already mentioned, in this video, we're gonna be talking about warping, also called time warping. This technique allows you to lock points in an audio sample to a specific place in the measure or beat.

Understanding the Warp Feature

• Here we've chosen a clip, and we can see the sample box.
• There's the warp switch, which is currently turned on. This means the clip is warped.
• When it's off, the clip plays at the original tempo, suitable for sounds without a rhythmic structure (e.g., atmospheres, individual percussion hits, or sound effects).

When the warp switch is on:

• The clip plays in sync with the current song tempo, which is ideal for sounds with a rhythmic structure, such as loops or whole songs.

Demonstrating Warping

I'm going to choose another beat to show you the warping process.

• You will notice little arrows indicating transients.
• When you hover over them, pseudo markers appear.
• If you double-click one of them, a warp marker is created.

You can drag the warp marker left or right:

• Everything between those two warp markers is shrunk or stretched accordingly.
• If you don't have another warp marker at the end, dragging will just shorten it without changing its length.

Creating Warp Markers

• To create a warp marker, double click in the desired position.
• To warp within the transients next to it, hold Ctrl on Windows or Command on Mac while double-clicking. Pseudo markers will then appear left and right of that transient as well.
• By double-clicking those pseudo markers, you can adjust only that specific area between the existing markers.

Example of Warping

Let's listen to the changes:

• This is how you can create glitchy effects or uneven beats.
• You can also drag a transient and click to create a warp marker.

To save your warp markers, click on the save button discussed previously.

Using Warping Creatively

Warping can be used to:

• Sync audio files.
• Change the flow of the music, as we've demonstrated.

Adjusting the BPM

You have two buttons:

• Divide by 2: halves the BPM, making it faster.
• Multiply by 2: doubles the BPM, making it slower.

In the preferences under Record Warp Launch, you can:

• Set default settings for Loop Warp (default is auto but can be set to unwarped one shot or warped one shot).
• Decide if long samples should auto-warp, which is useful for syncing whole songs or long stretches of samples.

Working with Warp Modes

Default Warp Mode

The default warp mode is set to Beats, but you have several options:

1. Beats: for everything rhythmic or percussive.
2. Tones: for monophonic sounds with a clear pitch structure.
3. Textures: for polyphonic sounds or all sounds with an unclear pitch contour.
4. Repitch: works like DJing, adjusting the playback rate (e.g., multiplying by two results in an octave lower).
5. Complex: no settings, good for different sounds.
6. Complex Pro: more settings and better for composite sounds like complete tracks.

Experimenting with Warp Modes

These modes are more CPU intensive but generally preserve the sound better when transposing.

• Play around with the settings and go by ear.
• I'll play you all the warp modes to demonstrate their differences.

Conclusion

Remember, you don't always have to use a warp mode the way it's intended. You can utilize them creatively to produce interesting sounds.

For example:

• Even though a sound is suited for the Tones mode, using the Beats mode instead can yield unique results.

Have fun experimenting with duplicates of clips and various warp settings. I'll see you in the next video!