Simple Pitch: drop 5 half steps to emulate 5-string bass, but keep pick attack unprocessed?

[decreebass]

Hi, all; just curious if anyone has a trick to emulate a 5-string bass AND keep the natural pick attack. I tried doing a freq split and sending the high freqs around the pitch shifter, but I'm not sure it worked. And I wasn't sure what frequency to split it at.

 

EDIT: to clarify, I'm using a 4-string bass and wish to preserve the pick attack and/string-fret clacking without those high-pitched bits being dropped 5 semitones as well. I think I'm on the right track with the crossover split, just need a little bit more guidance/tips/EQ/settings help.

[DunedinDragon]

Pitch shifting has nothing to do with the actual number of strings you're playing.  It simply works on the note you play and adjusts it accordingly.

[decreebass]

On 3/22/2023 at 11:28 AM, DunedinDragon said:

Pitch shifting has nothing to do with the actual number of strings you're playing.  It simply works on the note you play and adjusts it accordingly.

Haha, yeah, I'm well aware - I think you misunderstood: I'm just seeing if anyone has a trick to preserve the natural pitch of the pick attack so THAT doesn't get pitch-shifted as well. Just trying to make the 5-string bass emulation on my 4-string bass sound a little more natural in the immediate pick attack and/or strings clacking on the frets while pitch shifting the majority of the bass tone. I realize that some of the bass note's frequencies will be included in the higher freqs passes around the pitch shifter, but that shouldn't be too big of a deal.

 

Thanks!

[PierM]

I'd try to shape the attack through compressors and a bit of eq and see what you can get, not an easy task.

 

Also depends on the nature of the attack. An heavy and thick pick produce a huge transient at the attack which may be really hard to hide to the Pitch Block.

 

You could also try experimenting with a split dynamic block, placing the pitch only to path A and see if you can manage to send the attack noise transient to path B, without the pitch block. The hard task here is to isolate only the noise transient, without getting any harmonic mix between the two paths, otherwise you'd always get some harmonized transient...:)

 

Split > Dynamic Settings

1. Threshold; Any signal below the Threshold volume level is routed to Path A; any signal above the Threshold is routed to Path B.
2. Attack; Determines how fast the signal is routed to Path B once reaching the Threshold.
3. Decay; Determines how fast the signal returns to Path A once falling below the Threshold.
4. Reverse; When on, reverses the path assignments (any signal above the Threshold value is sent to Path B, any signal below the Threshold value is sent to Path A).

[decreebass]

@PierM - Interesting idea. I think someone came up with something like this on the Fractal forum; or maybe it was a 100% wet delay mix spit path thing... Either way, I know it can't be too complicated of a setup because I only have like one spare block lol. I'll try your idea and mess around with some other ideas. I think I can throw a looper at the beginning so I can A/B the natural attack with the split come/freq tricks and see if I can't get it sounding pretty similar while pitch-shifting the note... PS: love the ZOIA!

[theElevators]

You shouldn't not transpose the initial attack, while transposing everything else.  On bass, you never really play one note at a time a 100% of the time... once you start playing multiple pitches at once, that will have weird artifacts... as notes that should be sustained may start jumping around in pitch....

[decreebass]

On 3/22/2023 at 2:27 PM, theElevators said:

You shouldn't not transpose the initial attack, while transposing everything else.  On bass, you never really play one note at a time a 100% of the time... once you start playing multiple pitches at once, that will have weird artifacts... as notes that should be sustained may start jumping around in pitch....

I think I get what you're saying. I'm not too worried about that, though, as it will be such a tiny fraction of the sound after it's been through an overdriven preamp and EQ and stuff. Again, I'm only concerned about preserving the immediate attack - routing that around the pitch shifter and everything below whatever Hz or initial attack (if I use the compressor method suggested above) will be routed through the pitch shifter.

 

Anyway, looks like this is a pretty niche need and no one's actually tried it, so I guess I'll be the pioneer here and report back after I try a bunch of different things out :)

[bassbene]

The frequency range you are targeting is roughly 1k-2,5k. Unfortunately, that is not only the attack, but also a lot of harmonics, especially those added by amp models or distortion boxes.
To keep the original "clank", I would start off with pitch-shift the fullrange signal, send that through your signal chain and add a clean, parallel path to that merges at the end of the chain. In this clean path you can boost/shape the parts of the signal you wanna add again, so likely a massive low cut* to 1k or even higher, and boosting the frequencies you wanna add back. 
That may not sound that natural in solo, but in the context of a band, you won't notice.

*You can use a 3-band eq as flexible low cut/crossover as well. Just set the threshold to 0db to deactivate the actual compression and adjust the gains and crossover points...

[decreebass]

On 3/24/2023 at 2:31 PM, bassbene said:

The frequency range you are targeting is roughly 1k-2,5k. Unfortunately, that is not only the attack, but also a lot of harmonics, especially those added by amp models or distortion boxes.
To keep the original "clank", I would start off with pitch-shift the fullrange signal, send that through your signal chain and add a clean, parallel path to that merges at the end of the chain. In this clean path you can boost/shape the parts of the signal you wanna add again, so likely a massive low cut* to 1k or even higher, and boosting the frequencies you wanna add back. 
That may not sound that natural in solo, but in the context of a band, you won't notice.

*You can use a 3-band eq as flexible low cut/crossover as well. Just set the threshold to 0db to deactivate the actual compression and adjust the gains and crossover points...

This is an interesting idea. The only issue I see with it is that I want the un-shifted clank to be processed by the signal chain, not brought back in raw at the end. So ideally, the merge would be right after the pitch shifter (and possible EQ on path B) so that it could all be sent through the preamp as one signal.