How we use effects for sound design or music can make the difference between a memorable sound or a forgettable one. Now it’s possible to have all of the processing needed in one place…
Designing Sound
We can all think of those signature sounds that have made a production stand out, whether it’s the sound of a Lightsaber or even a drum sound à la In The Air Tonight. The very creation of those sounds takes vision, artistry, and technical knowhow beyond simple recording and/or and processing. Sound design is the journey that takes us to those sounds.
Some of the most famous examples involve found sounds or recorded instruments being bent far beyond their natural forms using multi-FX processing and/or time stretching to get the desired effect. Many of these sounds created before the digital age were created using tape speed manipulation with racks of processors and time-based FX in the background.
BOOM Library ENRAGE
BOOM Library has its roots in the game audio industry. Based in Mainz, Germany, the company has grown to produce high end sound effects for all media and audio professionals since 2010, with its list of users including Lucasfilm, Disney, Marvel Studios, and Netflix.
With plugins now doing most, if not all, of the heavy lifting in sound design, BOOM Library has now given us the ultimate one-stop tool. ENRAGE is the company’s multi-FX plug for sound design and music that gives you microscopic control over your processing from start to finish. Comprising over 50 individual processing blocks, it lets you build effects chains in a drag and drop rack which is 1 of 5 sections that make up the enormous modular synth style UI.
In the manual, ENRAGE is described as “rather complex”; the key to getting the best out of it is to understand its layout. The sections are:
PRESET BROWSER- Top and centre is the Preset Browser which is the best place to start to hear the sheer breadth of soundscapes available within Enrage. Its easy-to-use search engine is intuitive and lets you quickly get a handle on how the presets are constructed across 250 presets.
CONTROL- Many of the effects use LFOs or ADSRs for modulation and here you can select audio or MIDI triggering, as well as mono or poly modes for the latter.
MOD SOURCES here you can configure up to ten different mod sources to be routed into parameters elsewhere in Enrage, with a simple envelope follower being the default.
DEVICE LIST- this is where up to 50 blocks of processing can be instantiated to create your chain. It’s subdivided into a list of devices, Matrix and Rack tabs (the latter perhaps best for visualising and routing signal flow), with a dedicated panel for the selected device’s controls.
MACROS- These give you quick access to the most significant parameters within any patch for rapid tweakage.
Aside from the limitless options available in ENRAGE, in the video I focus on the quality of ENRAGE’s processing to create and recreate some unique standout sounds.
Final Thoughts
BOOM Library describe ENRAGE as “a highly complex, professional tool and the GUI is rather complex accordingly” and it must be said that the sheer scope of its functionality makes it not for the faint-hearted. That said, for sound explorers who know what they want to achieve in the first place, its high quality sounds and deep editability will keep even the most time-rich tweakhead happy for a very long time indeed…
To find out more, head over to BOOM Library, where you can save 20% on ENRAGE until November 1st, 2021, using code ode - PE_ENRAGE20 at checkout.
Photo by Manuel Geissinger from Pexels