Transcripts
1. Intro: What to Expect from this Course: Hi, I'm Eliah Trosien. In this course, you will learn how to improve your workflow in FL Studio to be able
to produce faster, more efficient, and get
your ideas down quicker. I will teach you
the most important shortcuts how, to organize your project and tricks that can save you a lot of
time when producing. This course is
aimed at beginners and more advanced producers. No matter your experience level, you will most certainly
learn something new. Additionally, I will provide you with cheat sheets for shortcuts and little tricks so you can access them quickly
whenever you need to. Take this course now and save yourself
hours in the long run. See you there.
2. Folder Structure: Hi, welcome back to class. This lesson we're going to talk about your folder structure. So you should start off
with a music folder. Where you have everything
production related store. That folder should split up
into three separate ones, projects, samples and plugins. The project folder
then splits up again. You can dump all your
project files in there. And if you have one project that you know you're
going to finish, you can put that in
a separate folder and name it likes the song. And there you can put in everything
related to the song. That means your cover if you do it yourself, your finished mix and
master, your export, your export, an MP3, and
everything related to that. So you have everything for
that song in one place. It will make it really
easy in the future to find everything for that song. In your samples folder you can
just put all your samplepacks in. There isn't that much to it. But it's just really helpful to have all your samples
stored in one place. Now why exactly
that is and how you can organize your samples even better I will explain in the next
lesson. In the plugins folder, again, you can store
all your plugins. I would suggest putting
all your plugins and separate folders because
it's just way easier to see. And some plugins
have multiple files, so you can have everything
organized that way. If you want this graphic
as a file in .png* form, I will have a link below
the lesson and resources. That was it for this lesson. So see you in the next one.
3. How to Manage your Samples: Hi, welcome back to the class. As promised, In this lesson, I want to talk about the simple structure. For this, I can highly
recommend ADSR, Sample Manager. I use this to organize
all my samples. And this is helpful because if you are
looking for a kick, for example, you can
just type in kick. And then all your
kicks get displayed from all your sample packs
you ever downloaded if you add them
here. And the best thing is that you can just drag
them straight into your DAW. And this is why I
said that you should keep all your samples
in one folder, because I have my main folder here and all my sample
packs are saved in there. Here are my splice sample packs, but I have them separate. But that's just my taste. You can do it however you like. But I can highly recommend this because you can find
everything you want. You can even put a heard
there so it's a favorite. Your favorite samples can be stored even better in one place. And they're all tagged, so whatever you're looking for, like a transition,
you can always find them really quick and
it saves you a lot of time. And the benefit is
that you don't have to look through all
your sample packs to find the perfect one, because this is a collection of all your sample
packs at once. So ADSR Sample Manager, I can highly recommend this.
4. Window Arrangement: Hey, welcome back to the class. Now I'm going to
talk about how you should set up your FL Studio. First of all, the
window arrangement is dependent on
your screen size. So I have a bit of
a bigger screen. I can have my playlist,
my channel rack, and my mixer on one screen at the same
time, at all times. This is really
helpful because I can obviously edit my
playlist and edit patterns and everything
I need to and arrange my song while
also adding plugins, for example, and changing the mixer track and accessing
the piano roll quickly. And I can have my
mixer down here to obviously, it affects,
mix the song. And this is really
helpful to have everything on the
same screen because I don't have to go here and switch between all of these
windows to access them. So that's a really quick way of moving around your workspace. And if you have a bigger screen, I can only recommend this. If your screen is
a bit smaller, It is no problem of course, but you will have
to take compromises. So what exact arrangement you want to use is obviously
dependent on your taste. You can move every
window as you wish, and they snap into place. And you can do everything
you want basically. If you, for example, don't have any place
for the channel rack you can just hover over the channel rack button over
here and check in the info box on the top-left
to see the shortcut. For example, pressing F6 will open and close it quickly
so you can get used to that shortcut and open it even though it's hidden basically
behind the arrangement. So you can access
it quickly anyways.
5. How to Tidy Up your Browser: Next, I'm going to show
you how you can clean up your browser to make
it look like this. So you have only the
folders there and the sample packs
you actually need and you actually use. For example, if
you, open FL Studio for the first time, it probably looks
something like this. And it is pretty annoying
in my opinion to have all these folders you don't even need and you don't
even know what they are. So you probably only want these folders there
you actually need. So let's say I have
my main folder here named clipboardfiles, and I only want this to be
shown when I see my browser. So what I'm gonna do is click on the folder, so it's opened. Then click on the little
arrow on the top left, and then click Show
only open photos. And what that does
is exactly this. Every folder except the
one you chose is hidden. And now your browser
nicely cleaned up. And you don't have to
look through all of your other folders
to find something. And it is a mess. To be honest. This is a really nice way
to clean everything up.
6. How to make Custom Templates: Now let's talk about
how you can change the FL Studio default template
to be whatever you like. Now let's say you have
made this template. It is how you always start your songs. You always add these. So it would be easy to
start off with them. So you don't have to edit them manually or change colors,
but it's already set up. You can do everything you want. So you can add plugins already color something,
name something. So it is no problem at all. You can do whatever you like. Now to save the template, you first have to go to Options, file settings, and see where your user data folder is stored. For this, you're
going to click on the little folder icon and then you are sent
it to the data folder. Then you will click onto FL
Studio on projects, templates, and here you have to
save the template. You can click on here. And with Control
C saves the path. So it's easier to save
the project there. We're going to go to Save As and paste the path
in there again. And then this, for example, tutorial template
and save it there. Now you're going to
restart FL Studio and now if you see file,
new from template, there will be the
tutorial template or however you named it. It will be right there. Now if you want to start
with a template, you're going to click on Change default
template right here. And then you can decide Startup Project, which
we wanted to be. You can just set it
as default template. And right above that
default template, you can set to the
one you just made. Now, if you click on New, it will already set you up
with a template you made. And you can save many
minutes probably, depending on how complex
the template is, it instantly start producing
and getting ideas down.
7. How to Reduce CPU Load: Hey, and welcome
back to the class. Now, I'm going to show you a
trick to save your CPU load. So if you are having this
struggle of your project crackling and stuttering
because your CPU overloaded, which you can see up here. Then these tricks are
probably worth it for you. So the first one and probably the most effective
one is to consolidate. So let's say you
have one pattern that is really CPU-intensive, like this one for example. You can select it with
Control and clicking on it, and then pressing Control
Alt and C. And then just, you should probably check 512 sinc because that's
the most high-quality one. And just click on Start. You have consolidated
your pattern. It's like freezing
in Ableton, so the CPU doesn't have
to load the plugin, just has to play an audio clip, which is way less intensive. So as you can see, it's
exactly the same as before. Next week is to switch
smart disable for all plugins. So in the channel link, if you click on unsorted, you'll see all your
plugins there. And the project always
has all of them loaded and has all
of them active, which is really
CPU-intensive because other plugins have to
be active at all times. Now, to disable that, you can go onto tools, macros, and switch
smart disable for all plugins. So pay attention to
the CPU load right here is a 27 from you right now, if I click the switch smart disable for plugins, drops down to two. So it is really good
in saving CPU, especially if you have
many plugins at once, but not all of them playing at the same time, but scattered
throughout your project. The next trick is to
use reverb sends. It doesn't have to
be only reverb. You can do that with other
plugins and effect as well. So what you're going
to do is rename any free mixer slot to, for example, reverb and change the color to red
so you can see it easily. Let's say you have
one instrument and another instrument here. So let's say you have two
instruments right here, and you want to apply the
same reverb to both of them, then you're going to
select the mixer slot. On the master slot.
Just uncheck the green arrow. But clicks it will
under the reverb send. That way, the signal isn't
centered the master, but through the reverb, the same thing is going to a play for the
other instrument. And the reverb send, you're just going
to add the reverb and adjust it however you like. And they go, you have
a reverb send, which in this case, you have just one reverb plugin
instead of two. And the more plugins
you add to that, and the more instruments and mixer
sends you add to that send, you're going to save
even more CPU load. The next steps are going
to be in the settings. For the first one,
go to Options, audio, and then you should
choose a device with ACO. So there are
multiple right here. For example, if you have an audio interface, choose audio interface which has
ASIO behind the name. Or if you don't, then just choose FL Studio ASIO because these just
tend to be faster. Next, you can change
the resampling quality, which is right here. And if you lower
that, the quality of your playing back the
sound will be lower, but obviously less
CPU-intensive. I have it on
thirty-two point sinc. The setting is quite
good enough and this doesn't change your
quality when exporting. One more trick is to increase the buffer length,
which is right here. If you increase that, your CPU will be less loaded, but there will be more delay
between you, for example, pressing a key on your keyboard and then you actually
hearing the sound. So the lower this number, the shortest the delay. But also it is more
CPU-intensive. I have it on 512. It's, it's in the middle,
It's quite good, I think. One more thing in
the audio options is to activate all these buttons in the CPU part. So this just improve your
performance for the CPU. Then one more setting
is in Project. And you can decrease
the timebase, which is basically the
resolution of your playlist. So if you have that
on 24, you will not be able
to zoom in as much as you would have it
on the setting 960. But it obviously
decreases the CPU load. And 96 is the default value, so you can keep it on that. And if you have to
do vocal comping, for example, you have
to do really precise cuts. I would personally
make the number a bit higher so you can
edit more precisely. One last job I have
for you is make sure your laptop or PC
is cooled enough. Because if your
laptop or PC overheating, your CPU will have
less performance and will throttle and you will have less performance
in your program. So that was it for
the CPU tips. See you next time.
8. Plugin Number Shortcut: Hey, welcome back to the class. Now I'm going to talk about tips and tricks regarding plugins. I'm going to start with number shortcuts for your plugins. That means putting a number before your plugin name to
open it really quickly. So for example,
if I need a reverb or an EQ or OTT it is really quickly, or the same goes
for serum and LABS. So as you can see, I'm able to open
it really quickly. And that's because I have
these numbers and make these shortcuts for me to
open them really quickly. So if you pick an effect
plugin, for example, and press any key, for example, f. It will Scroll through
all the plugins with an F at the beginning. And if you put a number at
the beginning, for example, the fruity reverb two
with a one before, I can just press the one key
on my keyboard and it opens. So to do this, you're going
to go to the browser and pick any snap that displays
the standard folders. Then you're gonna go into Plugin Database and right-click
on it and click Open. And there you have
all your plugins. And for example,
if you want to use this trick on an effects plugin, you double-click
on effects and look for the plugin
you want to use. For example, if I want
to use the magic switch, I'll just rename it with a four at the beginning,
for example. And just press Enter. And now it's already
in FL Studio. You will see here
four magic switch. And then I can just click
on here to open the picker, press 4 on my keyboard
and it instantly opens. So this trick is really
good to open your plug-ns quickly without having
to look for the plugin. Because this could take
a really long time and could be pretty annoying. So you can name the most
important plugins or the plugins to use the most with the number before and
open them quickly.
9. Plugin Presets: Now I'm going to show
you a trick with which you can choose Presets
really easily. So let me show you what I mean. So if I open the
EQ, for example, often I will use a low cut
EQ because it is really essential for any mix and you have to use it often. You can get around that. And to do that, you usually have to either
right-click on here, click low cut or high-pass. Then edit this curve. Maybe drag it to where
you want it to be. Maybe even do
something like this. And this obviously
takes a lot of time. And to make your
life a bit easier, you can just save the preset
and it's two clicks away. And you have your lowcut filter. And doing that is really easy. You just adjust your
EQ however you like. Then click on this little
arow, then Save Preset as, name it however you like, and just click on save. And then you will have the preset here and
the drop-down menu. You can view this
if you right-click on one of these arrows. And you will see the one you've just made on the very top here. And what that
allows you to do is just click on the arrow and it will open your preset
and saves you a lot of time.
10. Patcher: There's one trick that can
save you a lot of time too, but it's maybe a
bit more advanced. It will be about the
plugin patcher. It is an FL Studio plugin, so it comes with your DAW. And what this
allows you to do is basically make your own plug-in. There are many presets
to choose from. For example, the one knob delay. There can just turn up one knob and you'll have
delay really easily. And like I said, there
are many presets here. And on the internet
you can find hundreds of presets too,
really high-quality and plug-ins that
didn't really seem possible using only
normal stock plug-ins. But you can make
your own as well. Like I said, for example, I have one named vocals. There. I have all my important vocal
effects in one plugin. For example, I have a
little alterboy here. I have OTT, I have reverb, I have a deesser, I have Auto-Tune. And you can map it all
this right here. And you can just right-click
to add a plugin, whichever you want,
and then create a chain basically where
the signal runs through. So the orange chain
is the signal chain. So wherever it goes, this is where the signal is coming from and
going through. So it's first going
to the auto tune then the little alterboy,
OTT, magic switch, spitfish, so my
deesser, the reverb, And then finally, the output. And all these red things are to map the knobs from
the plugins to the knobs. Let me make an example. If I would add an
EQ, for example, and I would want to do this movement on a knob
in the surface tab here. Then I would right-click
and press activate. Then here I can add,
for example, enough. And I'll just choose the
default knob for now. And I can look on
the map and here is another red button
and here is one. So we just connect these
two with each other. And that's basically it already. If I open the plug-in
and put it right here, I go to the surface, deactivate this edit mode. I can turn the knob and you'll
see that in the plug-in. One thing I wanted to move, moves. And now it's not taking
effect that the sound, because it's not implemented
in the signal chain. So for example, I can choose this yellow line connected to the EQ and then connect
it back into the chain. So now it's implemented. Now this will take effect and FX chain. This is, like I
said, a really nice way to make your own plugins, to have all your plugins
in on one place. So now if I mix a vocal, I don't have to add each
effect I have here individually. I can just add this
patcher and choose this preset, and can tweak everything how
I like right here. And it makes everything really
quick and easy to edit. And you can do
whatever you like, you can do for drum
processing bass processing, vocal processing, like I've done here, the possibilities
are endless.
11. Playlist Shortcuts: Hey, welcome back to the class. Now I'm going to
show you the most important shortcuts
for the playlist. So we're going to start
off with the shortcut to open and close the
playlist, which is F5. The next one is to
consolidate, which is Control, Alt and C. That
means if you have one pattern that is
quite CPU-intensive, you can select it with
control and left-click, and then press Control, Alt, C and click start. And it's going to render
out this pattern. So it's less CPU-intensive, so we can work with
it even better. Then you can hold
the mouse wheel and drag your mouse
to move freely around the workspace.
To change the horizontal scaling you can press Control
and scroll up and down. You can change the
vertical scaling with alt and scrolling
up and down. To select one whole trek, you can press Control and click
on the track on the left, and it will mark
the whole track. You can switch between the
different tools really easily. If you hold right-click
and scroll, this will make it really
easy to switch between the tools without having
to click up here. You can toggle the stretch
mode with Shift M. So select any audio clip
and look up here. Then if I press Shift and M, you will see that
the stretch mode will be toggled on and off. That means if it's on, you can drag your samples out. And if it's off, you can
shorten or lengthen the clip. If you want to duplicate a
pattern right behind it, you can select it and press Control B it'll
paste the pattern right behind. To
move something off grid for some
little adjustments, for example, lining
up the transients, you can hold Alt and
drag the sample. So now it's off grid and you can move it
anywhere you want.
12. Mixer and Channel Rack Shortcuts: Now I'm going to
show you the shortcuts for the Channel Rack and the Mixer, which is not going
to be a whole lot, but at least some. So the Channel Rack, you can open and close with
F6 and the mixer with F9. In the Channel Rack, if you
have two instruments in one pattern and you
want to separate them, you can click on one of them. Press Control X, go
into the next pattern, and press Control V
to paste it there. If you have a new instrument,
you can select it, press Control L, and it will link to a new and
free Mixer insert. You can do it as well. If you select the
instrument here, choose any Insert, and
then press Control L.
13. Piano Roll Shortcuts: Next are the piano roll shortcuts. You can open and
close it with F7. You can hold the
mouse wheel and drag the mouse to move around freely. To change the
horizontal scaling You can hold Control
and scroll up and down. If you want to transpose the melody one
semitone up and down, hold Shift and press
the up and down keys. If you want to do that
with the whole octave, you can do that with control
and up and down keys. If you played in a
melody quite poorly, you can press Control Q to quantize the
notes to the grid. And then you can work
with them more easily. Like in the playlist,
you can hold right-click and scroll to switch between
the different tools. If you want to move
a node off grid, you can hold Alt
and drag the note.
14. General Shortcuts III: Now for some general shortcuts, you can press Alt and one to open your most
recent project, which can see here. And also it works with all
plus 1234 and her zero. So the last ten recent projects, you can save a new version
of the file pressing Control N. This will
save a new instant, putting a number like
123 and so on behind it, and saving it as a new file, which then allows you to do whiskey operations
and big changes. You're unsure what
yet the menu, e.g. if you right-click a plugin, you see all these dotted
lines under some letters. These are shortcuts, e.g. if I want to delete a plugin, you'll see that the
d is underlined. I can just click D. And it asks me if it
should be deleted. To close any open
to Window a plugin, you can just press Escape. To reset any novel slider. You can just click it. Or in the case of most plugins, press Control and click it to start playing
a sound instantly. E.g. if you have a long reverb, you can press Control H.
No further my opinion. Best shortcut. You can Shift-click on an
insert on a channel, on a track to rename it quickly. There was a further shortcuts. See you in the next lesson.
15. Outro: So that was it for this class. You may ask yourself,
what's next? First of all, I would
highly appreciate it. If you follow me on Spotify
and checkout my music, you can find Mass General on Spotify and all other
streaming platforms. Also, you can follow
me on Skillshare so you don't miss out
on any future classes. If you want to provide
me and other learners with your own self-made
Petra presets and templates, if may do in this class,
feel free to do so. Besides that, remember to download the cheat
sheets I've made, which you can find in the
recesses of this class. You can also find some
bonus tips there. That was it for me. My name is Lydia atrazine and
thank you for watching.
Eliah Trosien, Music Producer
