To appreciate what FlexibeatzII can do for you, let's consider a couple of applications that inspired it.
You may be familiar with Bram Bos' Hammerhead Rhythm Station. It is still a great little X0X drum sequencer application, but extremely limited in the per-sound synthesis department, and you can only sequence short patterns with it. Similarly, I've always liked 'Master Zap' Andersson's Stomper: it's still a good synthesizer for percussion sounds and all manner of sound effects, but it has no sequencer - you have to import the sounds you create in it into something like Hammerhead. Conceptually, what FlexiBeatzII does is overcome the limitations of both programs and then combine the capabilities into the one application. The whole however, is far more than the sum of the parts. Let's get into the details which explain why:
You can open up a versatile synthesis panel for each of FlexibeatzII's channels independently, via which you can draw in volume, frequency and filter envelopes for your sample or waveshape your sample by manipulating individual harmonics, and combine the result with sounds created from scratch using subtractive synthesis on a variety of standard and specialized waveforms. This 'combining' needn't be limited to simply adding the processed sample with your synthesized waveforms - you can also FM one with the other. Or you may decide your sound shouldn't even contain any aspect of the loaded sample at all, and that it should purely be your synthesized waveform.
You can then put the sonic result through an arsenal of effects independently for each channel eg reverse, chorus, delay, reverb, various types of distortion, stutter, filter, compression, bit reduction, sample rate reduction and separate level settings for the positive and negative parts of the waveform.
A 3-band Parametric Equalizer is also provided for each channel to enable you to finely EQ the sound. Use it as an effect, or as a means of getting each sound to sit just right in the mix.
You can vocode, ring-modulate and auto-wah. You can dynamically vary the start and end points of the sound while it's playing (besides the standard adjustment of pitch, volume and pan). You can have a sample chopped into segments of varying lengths and have the segments pasted together again randomly. You can have a percussion loop chopped into individual ‘hits’ and then open these up in separate channels.
When programming a sequence, you can opt to see notes to 32nd resolution instead of the standard 16, and you can copy and paste patterns around the composition (which can be upto 999 Measures long). You can swing notes, accent notes, and have the application record your level slider movements on each sound as the sequence plays.
You can have FlexibeatzII randomize sound and notes selection. This rather cool feature lets the application load random sounds (from the 'data' folder containing all your .wav files) into each channel, or randomize the notes set in the current measure for the selected channel, for that extra bit of inspiration.
FlexibeatzII can simulate arpeggios by automatically opening up the same sound in multiple channels but setting both the Frequency slider of each sound and the notes sequenced for each sound, in such a way as to sound like an arpeggio pattern when the sequencer is run.
If you have multiple audio interfaces/soundcards installed on your system, you can select which one to send the audio playback through.
Once you are satisfied with your pattern or song, you can record it direct to a .wav file as the sequence plays (together with any other sounds being played through the soundcard at the same time). In the case of a pattern, you can open up its .wav file in your sampler or DAW. If you save the pattern into the 'data' folder containing all your sounds, you can of course select the pattern again as a sound in a channel.
You also have the option of exporting just the FlexibeatzII sequence as a .wav file without actually playing it and recording it.
If it is a complete song you've created, perhaps the only thing you may need to do is master it in your favourite audio editor (typically the only additional tasks I perform in the free editor Audacity is to trim, add fade in/out, normalize and maybe add a touch of dynamics compression) and burn the .wav file to CD, or compress it to mp3 and post on the Merrie Internette.
FlexibeatzII can be midi-synced, so your final recorded .wav file can be of a song you have made completely in FlexiBeatzII, or FlexiBeatzII midi'd up with your DAW or other gear.
You may be familiar with Bram Bos' Hammerhead Rhythm Station. It is still a great little X0X drum sequencer application, but extremely limited in the per-sound synthesis department, and you can only sequence short patterns with it. Similarly, I've always liked 'Master Zap' Andersson's Stomper: it's still a good synthesizer for percussion sounds and all manner of sound effects, but it has no sequencer - you have to import the sounds you create in it into something like Hammerhead. Conceptually, what FlexiBeatzII does is overcome the limitations of both programs and then combine the capabilities into the one application. The whole however, is far more than the sum of the parts. Let's get into the details which explain why:
You can open up a versatile synthesis panel for each of FlexibeatzII's channels independently, via which you can draw in volume, frequency and filter envelopes for your sample or waveshape your sample by manipulating individual harmonics, and combine the result with sounds created from scratch using subtractive synthesis on a variety of standard and specialized waveforms. This 'combining' needn't be limited to simply adding the processed sample with your synthesized waveforms - you can also FM one with the other. Or you may decide your sound shouldn't even contain any aspect of the loaded sample at all, and that it should purely be your synthesized waveform.
You can then put the sonic result through an arsenal of effects independently for each channel eg reverse, chorus, delay, reverb, various types of distortion, stutter, filter, compression, bit reduction, sample rate reduction and separate level settings for the positive and negative parts of the waveform.
A 3-band Parametric Equalizer is also provided for each channel to enable you to finely EQ the sound. Use it as an effect, or as a means of getting each sound to sit just right in the mix.
You can vocode, ring-modulate and auto-wah. You can dynamically vary the start and end points of the sound while it's playing (besides the standard adjustment of pitch, volume and pan). You can have a sample chopped into segments of varying lengths and have the segments pasted together again randomly. You can have a percussion loop chopped into individual ‘hits’ and then open these up in separate channels.
When programming a sequence, you can opt to see notes to 32nd resolution instead of the standard 16, and you can copy and paste patterns around the composition (which can be upto 999 Measures long). You can swing notes, accent notes, and have the application record your level slider movements on each sound as the sequence plays.
You can have FlexibeatzII randomize sound and notes selection. This rather cool feature lets the application load random sounds (from the 'data' folder containing all your .wav files) into each channel, or randomize the notes set in the current measure for the selected channel, for that extra bit of inspiration.
FlexibeatzII can simulate arpeggios by automatically opening up the same sound in multiple channels but setting both the Frequency slider of each sound and the notes sequenced for each sound, in such a way as to sound like an arpeggio pattern when the sequencer is run.
If you have multiple audio interfaces/soundcards installed on your system, you can select which one to send the audio playback through.
Once you are satisfied with your pattern or song, you can record it direct to a .wav file as the sequence plays (together with any other sounds being played through the soundcard at the same time). In the case of a pattern, you can open up its .wav file in your sampler or DAW. If you save the pattern into the 'data' folder containing all your sounds, you can of course select the pattern again as a sound in a channel.
You also have the option of exporting just the FlexibeatzII sequence as a .wav file without actually playing it and recording it.
If it is a complete song you've created, perhaps the only thing you may need to do is master it in your favourite audio editor (typically the only additional tasks I perform in the free editor Audacity is to trim, add fade in/out, normalize and maybe add a touch of dynamics compression) and burn the .wav file to CD, or compress it to mp3 and post on the Merrie Internette.
FlexibeatzII can be midi-synced, so your final recorded .wav file can be of a song you have made completely in FlexiBeatzII, or FlexiBeatzII midi'd up with your DAW or other gear.