Axe Fx II - Creating User Patches

J

joereel90

New Member
I have been an Axe Fx player for about 4 years, and I have always loved the factory patches and the user patches I find in Axe Exchange. When I typically find a patch I like, User or Factory, I tweak it to my taste, and add or remove what I want. I have however never really dove into creating user patched myself from scratch. Ive messed around with it, but I never seem to get great tones or what I want. From originally being a tube amp pedal board guy, I am always confused at the signal chain of some of the user and factory patches that I look through. I am always thinking in the physical terms of signal chaining, and when I see effects coming after the cab and other odd setups, I am dumbfounded. Is there any basic guidelines or tutorials I could watch to learn how to properly create my own user patches that sound amazing?
 
There are no rules, and in most cases there is no "proper way", though certain effects do sound different before or after an amp/drive block. Time based effects really don't matter if they are pre or post cab block, which is one of the nice things using modelers, opposed to the real world, where you can't really stick stuff post cab without a lot of extra gear/work.

Nothing you can do will hurt anything. If it sounds good, then it is good. Its as simple to move things around as a click of a mouse. Try a reverb or delay in front of the amp, ala a pedalboard effect, and then try moving to post amp, ala effects loops or post-production and see what sounds better to you.

Having the freedom of a limitless tool and then shackling yourself to how things can be done with hardware gear is silly
 
joereel90 said:
Is there any basic guidelines or tutorials I could watch to learn how to properly create my own user patches that sound amazing?
Click to expand...
Basic as it gets - lay out the blocks as you would on a pedal board and amp. Time based effects (anything that can be affected by tempo i.e. delay) go AFTER the cab block. Reverb goes LAST. Compressors, wah and pitch stuff goes first.

After that, it's down to you playing with the big parameters first, then the little ones, to get what you want.

Kinda like:IN/GATE-volume-comp-wah-pitch-phase-flange-drive-amp-cab-eq-delay-reverb-OUT

Make sure you're gain-staging and getting the amount of signal that you should be getting. Chris (AxeFXTutorials.com) has a tutorial somewhere from a few years ago that's still valid.

Make sure you're pushing enough signal - get as close to clipping as you can (all throughout the board here including a thread called "About Clipping")

This clip is all about getting to the right amount of signal for the first part. The second part is all about double tracking.


Here's a Cooper Carter preset creation video:


There are many others on YouTube. Like Tyler. He's kindofa legend around here, too:


Just breathe and have fun, get into the wiki

As has been said there's no one right way to do this.
 
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