> Step by step

2. Using CM Pluck

1

To install CM Pluck within MSoundFactory Player, head back into that plugin and hit the bottom bar called ‘Install Manually Downloaded Products…’.

2

Now navigate to wherever you downloaded the CM Pluck folder from FileSilo (Step 8 last page). Find CM Pluck and load it in. (You’re looking for a file called ‘CM pluck.mproduct’). You’re there!

3

CM Pluck should now be available to load in as one of the instruments in MSoundFactory Player, in the instrument section, bottom right as shown. Ours wasn’t there first time around, but closing and opening our DAW revealed it so try that if you can’t see it.

4

Double-click on CM Pluck and it will load in the main MSoundFactory Player window. Our very first CM DIY plugin! Here’s a quick run through of the main controls.

5

There are two main sections on CM Pluck. On the left you get the main Oscillator controls and on the right the Filter section. It’s a simple but effective string sound producer.

6

The Oscillator controls help fatten the sound up – Unison especially which adds thickness, while Shape adds a bit of movement to the sound.

7

Pulse Width Modulation tends to sound more dramatic and hollow the furthest left you dial it, while Sub introduces a nice, weighty sub oscillator to proceedings.

8

On the right, the sliders are controlled by mousing up and down (not left to right). Filter and Resonance do as you might expect, increasing the high-end frequencies of a bass sound to turn it into a lead, for example.

9

Length and Warmth are more about the envelope of the sound, defining how quickly it resonates or reaches its particular frequency band – these are well worth experimenting with to get some added movement.

10

We’ve created some presets for CM Pluck which we will attempt to supply at FileSilo. However the Player is restricted in certain areas of this to only licensed users, so just in case our presets aren’t available, we’ll show you how to create your own.

11

It’s a good idea to create your presets within the 15-day trial period as when MSF reverts to the Player version after this time, some functionality will be lost. Firstly you can just play with the controls until you come up with a good sound – CM Pluck does basses, leads and some pads too. Tweak and when you want to save, just hit the preset window as shown.

12

The left hand window allows you to specify a folder to save your presets to and the right hand window allows you to name them. Hit OK and your preset will save in the desired locations.

13

You can create most of your preset changes using the front controls of CM Pluck, although we found more flexibility using the effects. Once again, some editing like this will be lost when MSF reverts to Player, so make sure you explore these options within your 15-day trail – or pay for the upgrade.

14

To call up an effect, double click on the title (Distortion, Lo fi, Amp, Flanger and so on) and press the Enable button on each one. Here’s the Distortion. Once enabled, its available parameters become available to tweak.

15

We generally used the top three effects in the Effects block to filth up our sounds; the Lo-Fi option is capable of taking things too far if you push it!

16

The Delay effect was also used in some of our presets as it quickly transforms a dull single bass sound and can also be sync’d to tempo. The Reverb was tempting to put on all of our presets, so go easy!

17

The bottom three effects are used for more subtle compression and EQ, and Enhancer allows you to focus on specific frequencies. We’ll have more on MSoundFactory in future issues plus more updates (free of course!) to CM Pluck. Our DIY plugin is at v1 now but we have big plans for it!