Fatter vocals via Time+Pitch Machine?

Question

I'm looking to utilize the pitch change feature in Time and Pitch Machine to make a vocal "thicker". Now I understand this is gonna be a matter of opinion and one's ear, but I am not sure as to the settings and how to go from there. I can screw around and pick this or that till I hear something that sounds alright, but I'd rather have some background as to what I'm really affecting. Not sure how many cents to transpose or anything like that. Any suggestions would be well appreciated. Thanks

Answer 1

Do you mean to create a vocal double track to thicken the sound? In that case, I wouldn't bother with the time and pitch machine. Well, you could I suppose create a copy, then shift the pitch on the copy by a couple of cents up or down, and perhaps shift the formants a little to change the colour somewhat. But you may as well do this in realtime by copying the audio to another track and using the vocal transformer plug in. Or, another trick is to use the pitch correction plug in on your double track, with light settings (as in not too aggressive on the pitch correction speed), because the way it will adjust pitch in real time will make random variations happen compared to the original track. It will create more of a realistic sense that it was a separate vocal take because the pitch will have variation over time compared to your main vocal line. Then after the pitch correction plug, you could insert a vocal transformer (or AU pitch plug in) to just slightly adjust the overall pitch by a couple of cents and maybe mess with the formants slightly as well, to get some light chorusing.
If you want to spend some money, look at the latest Antares EVO plug ins, they make a whole range of plug ins specifically for doubling, tripling, or even creating a fake 'choir' out of a single line vocal. Might be worth a look.
Otherwise, you could also just use the classic mix techniques for vocal thickening.. Make copies of the original to new tracks, then use a bit of delay (in the inspector) to slightly shift the timing. Then set up an aux strip with plug ins such as chorus or ensemble, that kind of thing.