MIXING & EFFECTS

Recording External and Internal Audio

This section covers everything you need to know about recording external audio sources connected to your soundcard input/s and internal audio generated by instruments.

Recording FAQ

Where does external audio enter FL Studio? External audio inputs are selected from the FL Studio mixer INPUT menu. The 'IN' menu shows a drop-down list of the available soundcard inputs (mic, line etc). The screenshot below shows a microphone (Mic L/R) input selected. Input options will only be visible if an ASIO soundcard driver is active. Note: Input names shown in the drop-down list are provided by the soundcard driver and are often unclear (experimentation may be required to find the correct input).

How do I record audio? There are two methods - 1. Edison: Place an instance of Edison in the mixer track receiving audio and record into memory or 2. Playlist: Arm a mixer track by selecting an input or clicking on the disk recording icon (see below). Any internal or external audio fed to that mixer track will be recorded to disk. Audio recorded by both these methods can come from external sources, internal sources or a combination of both. For details, see below.

How do I record multiple independent inputs (multi-track record)? Each of the 64 mixer tracks can be independently loaded with an Edison recorder or armed to record external and/or internal audio sources. It is possible to simultaneously record the full number of audio inputs on your soundcard.

Can I record using a USB microphone or headset? Yes, USB microphones require special setup discussed here.

Are there video tutorials for recording audio? Yes, click here to jump to the video tutorial website.

Prerequisites for recording external audio

Before you can record external audio sources all the following conditions must be met:

Using FL Studio Producer Edition or higher.
An ASIO soundcard driver is in use by FL Studio for your soundcard. See System - Audio Settings, press F10 with FL Studio open to select an ASIO driver.
A sound source is connected to your PC via your soundcard input/s or to a USB/Firewire interface input/s.
The recording filter is set to record audio (right-click the Transport Panel record button).
An input must be selected on the mixer track into which the audio is to be recorded.

Using a USB microphone or headset

USB microphone & headsets cause some special problems that can be resolved by following the steps in the section on recording USB audio-inputs. The solution is to select independent input (USB mic) and output (soundcard) devices using the ASIO4ALL soundcard driver.

Detailed Instructions for recording external audio (microphones, guitars etc)

Three main methods for recording external audio are explained below, the first two record into an Edison plugin loaded into the mixer track of your choice. The third method records audio into an audio clip displayed in the Playlist - please note that the clip will not be visible until the recording has been completed.

1. Quick audio recording procedure (using Edison)

If the pre-requisites for external recording have been satisfied (as described above), FL Studio will provide a wizard for audio recording which uses the Edison recording method:

Select One-click audio recording from the 'Tools' menu.
Follow the prompts.
If you are recording an external audio source then record on a mixer track that only has the external audio on it. If you have internal audio routed to the same track it will be blended with the external audio. Once blended, it can't be undone.

Note: One-click recording selects the input on the Master mixer track. If you have any other sounds playing in FL Studio they will be mixed with your recording. To avoid this, record on a mixer track with no other sounds routed to it (see below).

2. Edison recording procedure

If the pre-requisites for external recording have been satisfied (as described above):

Load Edison: Load Edison in an FX slot in the mixer track that you want to record. Don't use the Master track (all audio from all tracks is routed here).
Input selection: Select an external input (6 see below). Loading Edison before selecting an input will disable the auto-arming if the disk-record function. It is possible to turn this back on (if you wish) by clicking on the disk icon (17) associated with the track you are using.
Effects: You have the option of placing multiple instances of Edison on the same mixer track with or without other effects loaded before or after each instance. In this way it is possible to record dry and wet (with effects) versions of your external audio, or monitor with effects while recording without effects (just place an effect after Edison).
Record using Edison: Click here to see the Edison help and normal recording setup options. You will be able to record into Edison, where it is stored in memory, and then export the audio to a sample or audio clip.
Exporting recorded audio:
There are three main methods to export Edison audio to FL Studio:
1. Tools > Sequencing
  - Send to playlist as audio clip (Shift+C) - Dumps the selection to the Playlist as an Audio clip.
  - Send to selected Channel - Dumps the selection to the selected Channel.
2. Drag / copy sample / move selection - Left-click on the button and drag to the desired location. The selected region in the Sample Edit Window (or whole sample if no selection is made) will be copied and moved to any compatible location in FL Studio, e.g. Sampler channels, Fruity Slicer, DirectWave, the Playlist etc. Right-click to copy the selection to the clipboard.
3. Save and load - Saves the audio/selection to a file and re-imports it through the Browser.

Note: Take the time to read the next section on Mono inputs (3.4) and Monitoring (3.7) as they are also relevant to Edison recording.

3. Advanced Playlist audio recording procedure

This section provides a more detailed description of the external audio recording procedure in FL Studio:

Pre-requisites: The pre-requisites for external recording must first be satisfied (as described above).
Don't record on the Master mixer track: When recording external audio on a mixer track, internal audio routed to that track will be mixed in with the external source so it is best to use a mixer track with no internal generators routed to it. Remember that the Master mixer track has all the other tracks routed to it, so this is definitely not the place to record external audio sources.
Input selection & Mixer track arming: Select an external input (6 see below). The options that appear in this drop-down menu will depend on your soundcard, most soundcards have at least one mic and one line input, however you may need to experiment to find the input that carries your external audio. Selecting an input will auto-arm the track for recording, as indicated by the orange disk icon (17). If you wish to use a USB mic or headset to record audio, follow the steps outlined here first.
Mono inputs: If you have a mono sound source that appears in only the L or R stereo channel, you will notice that the input options (6) are divided into 'Stereo' in the upper section and 'Mono' in the lower section. By selecting the Mono version of your input, FL Studio will record the signal into both the L and R mixer channels.
Naming & save location (optional): If you want to select the name and location of the saved WAV file as something other than the default then press the disk icon (17) TWICE, firstly to de-select the arming and secondly to re-select it and open the file-name/location dialog. Select a location in the browse dialog and name the .WAV file to be recorded. If you use right-click, an automatic file name will be assigned to the track. Do the same for all mixer tracks you want to record.
Recording Options: Open the Mixer pop-up menu. In the Disk Recording sub-menu select ‘Auto-create audio tracks’. This option will auto-create audio clips in the Playlist when you press stop after recording. Bit-depth: The '32 bit floating point recording' is only necessary if your soundcard is set to record in a bit-depth higher than 16 bit (24 bit for example). 32 bit will preseve the full quality of the soundcard quantizations above 16 bit. Note: FL Studio receives audio from the soundcard as a pre-digitized stream, the bit-depth set in the mixer here has no effect on the recorded bit-depth (that is set in the soundcard's own options), this setting only affects the stored and saved bit-depth of the sample.
Monitoring the sound being recorded: Let's assume you are monitoring FL Studio through headphones and not getting an echo caused by feedback from your speakers into your microphone. By default, live inputs to the mixer are routed to the Master track and back to the soundcard outputs. As the audio path through FL Studio is delayed by an amount equal to the soundcard latency settings, the monitored sound may echo against the live source. Latency echo can cause problems for performers (e.g. vocalists) who need to hear their live performance mixed with the song. Latency echo can be eliminated in three ways:
Recording with effects: We recommend that you record all incoming sources without FX, add them later, as this provides maximum flexibility during post-production. However, you may wish to monitor the incoming signal with effects while recording the dry signal. If so, deselect the 'Send to master' knob from the armed track to the Master track, route the armed track to a second mixer track with the FX you wish to use, and allow that track to pass to the Master.
The Record Button: Prepare for recording. There are two functions associated with the Record button on the Transport Panel. 1. Recording filter: There is a recording filter pop-up menu, right-click the Record button and make sure Audio data has a tick (all data-types with a tick will be recorded, click to select/deselect items). 2. Arming: Left-click the record button to arm for recording. The button will light to indicate that record mode is activated (orange).
Start Recording: Finally! Press the Play button to start recording.
Stop recording: When you are finished, press the Stop button. If you want all armed tracks to unarm enable the Disk Recording > Auto-Unarm option in the Mixer popup menu. If tracks remain armed and you press record again new audio-clips will be created leaving previously recorded audio-clips intact.
Where's my audio? If you are in pattern mode, the recording will appear as an Audio Clip channel. If you are in song mode AND the Mixer Menu setting, Auto-create Audio Clips is on, your recording will appear as an Audio Clip wave display in the Playlist window. All new audio clips are routed to the master mixer track by default.

Loop recording

Loop recording is the process of repeatedly laying down audio-takes while FL Studio loops a project, there are two options:

Edison method: We recommend using Edison for loop-recording duties as described in the Edison Recording Options section. This will provide glitch-free recordings with the advantage that Edison will place region markers at the start of each loop-back for precise selection of the preferred loop.
Playlist method: If Loop recording is selected, FL is in Song mode and a Playlist range is selected, you will be able to automatically record layer-upon-layer of audio into the Audio Clip section of the Playlist. When FL Studio reaches the end of the Playlist range it will automatically create an Audio Clip and start at the beginning recording a new audio-clip. Previously recorded Audio Clips will be muted. As there is quite a lot for FL Studio to do each time around the loop (saving wav files, creating channels and creating new wav files) there may be audio glitches in the first few ms of each loop. Placing a bar lead in at the start of the loop section will avoid this problem.

If your soundcard does not have factory ASIO drivers, try the www.asio4all.com driver on your system. Please note that since ASIO4ALL is a 3rd party work-around to provide ASIO for soundcards that don't have a native ASIO solution, Image-Line cannot guarantee that it will work, but it usually does. Note: The ASIO4ALL driver has a number of internal options that can be adjusted if the default settings don't work for you. Click on the 'Show ASIO panel' button in the F10 Audio Settings to access them.

Recording Internal Mixer Audio (Freezing)

FL Studio allows you to record the output of one or more mixer tracks to WAV files and to auto-insert the resulting audio clips in audio tracks (optional). Mixer track recording, or freezing, enables you to quickly replace real-time effects and instruments with pre-rendered audio, thereby reducing CPU load. This type of recording also allows easier rendering of separate mixer tracks for additional processing in 3rd party applications. Users of ASIO-enabled soundcards can also route ASIO inputs to the track input (e.g. microphone, line-in) and record them in a WAV file (see Audio Input/Output Routing above).

There are two ways to record a track - realtime recording (interactive), which allows recording of ASIO inputs, and non-realtime recording, which generally results in faster rendering and better audio quality.

Non-realtime recording

To perform non-realtime export of Mixer track(s), also known as 'track freezing':

Mixer track arming: Press the disk icon (17) on mixer track you wish to record. In the browse dialog that opens, select a location and name for the WAV file to be recorded. An orange disk icon indicates that the track is ready to be recorded. Repeat the arming procedure for each of the mixer tracks you want to record.
Recording Options: Open the Mixer popup menu (1). In the Disk Recording sub-menu check 32 bit floating point recording if you want to render to 32 bit WAV files, or Auto-create audio tracks to insert the resulting audio clip in the Playlist audio tracks, once recording has finished.
Rendering ( Alt+R): Open the Mixer popup menu (1) and from the Disk Recording sub-menu select Render to Wave File. In the rendering settings dialog, adjust the relevant settings and press OK to render the track. NOTE: Some of the options available for rendering a full song are not available for track recording (e.g. rendering to MP3 or MIDI file, saving an NFO file with the audio clip, and saving ACIDized audio.
When recording has been completed, all tracks that were activated for recording will return to their normal state.
Where's my audio? If you are in Pattern mode, the recording will appear as an Audio Clip channel. If you are in Song mode AND the Mixer Menu setting, Auto-create Audio Clips is on, your recording will appear as an Audio Clip wave display in the Playlist window. All new audio clips are routed to the master mixer track by default.

NOTE: ASIO inputs are disabled while recording in non-realtime.

Realtime Recording Playlist/Audio Clip

To perform realtime recording of Mixer track(s) that allows you to capture live performance aspects:

Mixer track arming: Press the disk icon (17) on the mixer track you wish to record. If you use left-click, select a location in the browse dialog and name the WAV file to be recorded. If you use right-click, a file name will be automatically assigned to the track. The orange disk icon indicates the track is ready to be recorded. Repeat this procedure for each of the mixer tracks you want to record.
Recording Options: Open the Mixer popup menu (1). In the Disk Recording sub-menu check 32 bit floating point recording if you want to render to 32 bit wave files, or Auto-create audio tracks to insert the resulting audio clip in the Playlist audio tracks once recording is completed.
Rendering: In the Transport panel, activate Record Mode and press the Play button to start recording.
When you are finished, press the Stop button. At this point, all armed track will become unarmed, depending on whether you have enabled the Disk Recording > Auto-Unarm option in the Mixer popup menu.
Where's my audio? If you are in Pattern mode, the recording will appear as an Audio Clip channel. If you are in song mode AND the Mixer Menu setting Auto-create audio clips is on, your recording will appear as an Audio Clip wave display in the Playlist window. All new audio clips are routed to the master mixer track by default.

Realtime recording Edison

As an alternative to using audio clips, as described above, you can use Edison to capture audio from any FX slot in one or more mixer tracks:

Load Edison: Load Edison into an FX slot of the mixer track you wish to record.
Effects: You have the option of placing multiple instances of Edison on the same mixer track, with or without other effects loaded before or after each instance. In this way you can record dry and wet (with effects) versions of your mixer track audio (to record a dry version, make sure Edison is in slot #1).
Record using Edison: Click here to see the Edison help and normal recording setup options. You will be able to record into Edison, where it is stored in memory, and then export the audio to a sample or audio-clip.

Mixer reference diagram

Mixer Menu - Contains view, recording, Track linking, renaming and coloring options, click here to learn more about the options.
Mixer Track Scroll Bar - This will slide the visible range tracks within the mixer window.
Mixer Insert Tracks - The output of all audio instruments in FL Studio is routed to one of the 64 available insert tracks. In the default Mixer setup, once the audio signal is processed with the integrated filters (equalizer, volume and panning - 9) it is then sent to the master mixer track (10). It is also possible to route the audio of a mixer track to any ASIO output (7 - for users with ASIO enabled sound cards) or even another insert track (18). This internal re-routing is a very powerful feature allowing you to create advanced mixer setups with groups and subgroups of insert tracks.

The labels can be right-clicked (or press F2) to rename the track or recolor it. Quick linking of channel/s: From the Channel window use the Channel selector to select the channel/s you want to route to the mixer track, then select the desired destination mixer track and click Ctrl+L. There is also an option to sequentially link Channels to tracks starting from the selected track. Shift+Ctrl+L.
Send Tracks & Selected Track - Send: There are 4 mixer tracks dedicated to send functions, although any track can serve as a send, (18). The send tracks can't be directly linked to instrument channels, but they can receive audio from other mixer tracks (1 to 64). Adjust the amount of signal sent by each Send track with the Send Level knobs (15). The purpose of send tracks is the ability to setup common effects (for ex. reverb and delay) once in a send track and then being able to route multiple insert tracks audio to it, as opposed to adding the same effect in each insert track, wasting CPU power. Selected: This is a special track that automatically receives the currently selected mixer track. Use this to host an instance of Edison for easy recording of any track OR the Wave Candy visualization tools.
Big Peak Meter - Can be hidden using the Mixer menu (1) > View > Options. Output is in dB. See Levels and Mixing to learn more about using peak meters in FL Studio.
External mixer input - ASIO hardware inputs and some VSTi inputs can be selected here.
External mixer output - ASIO hardware outputs can be selected here. Typical uses include live-use where one channel is sent to headphones for monitoring previewed samples/mixes while the main mix goes to the PA OR to create a surround sound sub-mix by sending several mixer tracks to the relevant surround channels of your soundcard.
FX slots - Up to 8 independent FX may be added to each mixer track. To load an Effect: Left-click on pop-up menu arrow at the left end of the slot and use the 'select' option. If you need more than 8 Effects, use the 'Send' feature (18) to route the output of one mixer track to another. To open an Effect GUI interface: Left-click on the name of a loaded Effect, a loaded Effect is displayed in FX slot 7 above.
Mixer Track Properties - For more detail click here. Parametric EQ, Stereo Separation , Pan , Swap Stereo Channels, Invert Phase . The All these features are automatable. Panel (A) is the graph for the Parametric EQ, left-click to control center frequency (left-right)/amplitude(up/down) or right-click to control bandwidth (left-right)/amplitude(up/down). Panel (B) can be left or right clicked to gain simultaneous X/Y control over Pan and Volume. Panel (C) holds the controls for Plugin Delay Compensation.
Master Mixer Track - All audio output of FL Studio is routed through the master mixer track for final processing before the final output (unless an insert track is routed out of the mixer to an ASIO output - 7). In light of this, the Master track isn't a good place to record external ASIO inputs (6) as the external and internal audio will be mixed together and recorded to disk.
Small Peak Meter - See Levels and Mixing to learn more about using peak meters in FL Studio.
Mute Switch - left-click to mute/un-mute the individual track, right-click to solo/un-solo the individual track.
Pan Knob - this function is also duplicated in the Mixer Track Properties area.
Level Fader - Can be automated right-clicked and linked to controllers. This function is also duplicated in the Mixer Track Properties area.
Send Knobs - When the 'Send' switch is activated (18) this knob (on the destination track) controls the signal level received from the source track.
FX Enable/Disable Switch - When deselected this disables all the FX in the FX slots (8). This only becomes active once an FX is added to a FX slot.
Track Recording Switch - When selected (orange) the track is armed and any audio (internal or external (6)) will be recorded to disk.
Track Send Enable Switch - Left-click to enable audio to be passed from one track to another, turns orange. Right-click to route to a specific track, master routing disabled.

NOTE: Most controls are automatable (right-click and select 'Create automation clip').