Does anyone know of a way to do fm synthesis inside of renoise without any vst. I been trying to figure it out myself but most of the information my found is several years old so maybe a new method has been found. Basically what I am trying to achieve is a simple dx7 style synth, and its just more convenient without vst. So if anyone knows let me know thanks anyway
also don’t know where to categorize this as it’s a possibility.
3 Likes
No real way, nothing has changed so far.
1 Like
Not sure if you could match a dx7 identically, with that said https://youtu.be/ahZKu4CACmA is a very good breakdown on how to make a general synth in ReNoise. I find myself going back to it and trying some variations of the same approach when sound designing for later use.
I also try to keep my main patterns pretty simple, and pushing myself to use instrument patterns with pattern effects you sometimes can’t achieve with native channel effect processing.
… On that rambling note, hope it helps! 
I’ve been begging for ANY kind of frequency modulation within Renoise for a while, even something rudimentary like turning the LFOs into devices that can modulate at an audio rate. I don’t need FM perfection, but it would turn the sampler (or anything else) into some sort of sonic monster; turning any sample(s) into timbral sculptures.
Imagine using an envelope to adjust the LFO’s rate (in audio range), modulating the pitch of an oscillator, from a higher pitch to a lower pitch, or a drum sample, would sound really neat, buzzy. All sorts of sounds could be made internally. There’d be some beautiful basic FM tones. DX7-style sounds might not be so easy, depends on what you’re looking for, but 2OP/4OP stuff would be attainable.
2 Likes
The difficulty here is based on how FM actually works, as apposed to what FM means.
FM as implemented in hardware synths is not actually Frequency Modulation, which
as you pointed out could be acheived by manipulating many ring-mod’s with LFO’s
and other ring-mod’s.
So, if hardware FM isn’t Frequency Modulation, what is it? Actually FM = PM as in
Phase modulation, and that presents a larger road-block since we dont want to
modulate frequency or pitch but rather the starting point of the oscillator.
Link below shows how ‘simple FM’ works and how it is difficult to first acheive
then scale up in Renoise:
2 Likes
What would an audio-rate LFO be doing to the pitch control of a sample, then? I’m interested in learning the difference!
1 Like
Thanks for the info. I wouldn’t even know where to begin with trying to do PM inside renosie though
That’s something I tried doing as well. Maybe they will someday allow lfos to be audio level, the most I could do was a really fast vibrato. But then there would still be the issue of how a lfo adsr could be done
1 Like
Regular pitch modulation , wchih can also sound good but is pretty uncrontrollable
The difference between pictch modulation and fm ( phase modulation in yamaha fm synths ) is exp pitch mod versus linear frequency modulation .
https://learningmodular.com/understanding-the-differences-between-exponential-linear-and-through-zero-fm/
1 Like
Thank you! I figured the LFO version would be uncontrollable, in a way, but I cannot imagine it is on par with say, a noise-music distortion/drone pedal. I’d imagine I’d have to fine tune it by hand or by controller to get nice buzz/zap/brawrrr sorts of sounds out of a simple sine wave. Not too far off from modules like these:
Yeah, I could use distortion, but it’s just not the same
I personally am not looking for DX7 sounds, but oddly modulated sounds 
1 Like
I love FM synthesis! The best approach right now is simply sampling vsts (Dexed<3), Let’s hope in the future renoise allows for waveform or wavetable scanning so we can emulate the harmonic movement of changing operator amplitudes/pitch. I attach an instrument I made as an example (using around 5 instances of Dexed and Render to sample each note)
Water Pseudopiano 2.xrni (3.0 MB)
2 Likes
If you just want oddly modulated sounds have a look at westcoast style synthesis , best of both worlds .
Reaktor blocks , and more specificaly the dwg blocks are absolutely amazing
Eventide/new fangled audio just realeased a freeware west coast inspired vst 'pendulate '( no ilock required ) , the full version does require ilok
2 Likes
Good things!!
in addition to FM, it would be great to add the PD the ability to work with single-cycle waveforms
1 Like
Pure Data? Single-cycle waveforms as a modulation source?
1 Like
Yeap, in renoise and realtime.
1 Like
It’s a great educational video, thx for sharing. As a Yamaha FM synth(this) user, I’ve never ever thought about theory. Thanks again for your comment, Jek
1 Like
Was just thinking about how much Renoise would benefit from a native FM synth … made a quick mock-up how I imagine an implementation …
2 Likes
Yep, we keep askin’…
Same goes for granular, it’s be fun to work with that natively.
I made a little crude testing vst, that will delay one input with a delay line by the amount of the amplitude of the sidechain input. You can make legit FM sounds with independent sample streams with it, only downside is it will have latency by the delay, and it is monophonic (actually it works in stereo with independent l/r modulation) only.
I wish this could be brought to the renoise sampler, like a mod set that would have another as input and allow phase distorting one voice with a first sample voice, the first sample modulating a delay to the read position in the 2nd sample. My crude version with linear interpolation sounds a little gritty, I guess the most demanding task about this would be to get aliasing in check and get clean highs in the sound when modulation is strong.
This, and the ability to generally route one mod set output to another one as input, to make serial processing, and a granular engine, would put the renoise sampler up on another level.
2 Likes