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Techniques › Sound Design

Sound Design

Synthesis, sampling, and building sounds from scratch.

46 articles

Sound design fundamentals

oscillators, filters, envelopes, and LFOs.

What a synthesizer is, how it works, and the main types explained.

what it is, how it works, and how to use it.

Sampling in music

how it works, clearance, and creative use.

What sample packs are and how to use them in your productions.

VST plugins explained

what they are and how they work in a DAW.

what changed from VST2 and why it matters.

Layering synths

stacking sounds for width, depth, and power.

Chord progressions

theory, movement, and production techniques.

hooks, phrases, and production workflow.

Building 808s from scratch

synthesis, tuning, and processing.

Sample chopping

slicing, rearranging, and flipping loops.

Making your first sample pack

recording, processing, and exporting.

Lo-fi sample pack creation

texture, degradation, and character.

MIDI in your DAW

recording, editing, quantizing, and routing.

sends, buses, sidechains, and signal flow.

volume, effects, and movement across a full track.

Building a plugin chain

order of operations and signal flow.

the difference and when to use each.

The frequency spectrum

bass, mids, highs, and what lives where.

why level management is the foundation of a clean mix.

White noise in music production

texture, transitions, and synthesis.

Music arrangement

structure, tension, release, and arrangement tools.

What EQ is and how it works in music production.

What compression is and how it works in music production.

What a compressor is used for in music production.

the updated wavetable synth tested in full.

the benchmark wavetable synthesizer assessed.

Serum 2 vs Vital

wavetable synthesis compared.

which wavetable synth is right for you.

Vital synth review

the free wavetable synthesizer tested.

Arturia Pigments review

the visual wavetable synth tested.

Omnisphere 3 review

the flagship software synth updated.

Kontakt 8 review

Native Instruments' sampler platform tested.

Kontakt 7 vs Kontakt 8

what changed and is it worth upgrading.

The best synth plugins for any genre or style.

The best drum machine plugins for beat making.

The best plugins for sound design and synthesis.

The best sample packs for any genre or production style.

The best sample libraries for producers and composers.

The best free VST plugins

quality tools that cost nothing.

The best guitar amp simulator plugins tested.

The best vocal presets and chains for fast results.

The best plugins for vocal production and mixing.

The best vocal plugins in 2026

The best plugins for realistic and expressive strings.