Processing Musical Instrument Files

Sound Forge Pro can open and save DLS, GigaStudio/GigaSampler, and SoundFont 2.0 musical instrument files, allowing you to add effects and processing to existing samples and edit individual samples.

When you open a musical instrument file, you'll notice some additions to the data window:

The left pane lists the banks, instruments, note ranges, and recorded samples in the instrument file. Click a bank or sample to select it in the waveform display.

Markers represent each sample in the waveform display.

File Properties metadata cannot be edited for musical instrument files.

Open a musical instrument file Closed

You can open musical instrument files just like any other file type:

  • Drag a musical instrument file to the workspace.

  • From the File menu, choose Open, and then use the Open dialog to browse to the file you want to open.

  • Double-click an instrument file in the Sound Forge Pro Explorer window.

The following musical instrument file formats are supported:

  • .dls: DLS level 1.0 and 2.0

  • .sf2: SoundFont version 2.0

  • .gig: GigaSampler/GigaStudio version 1/2/3

Compressed and encrypted GigaSampler/GigaStudio samples are not supported.

If you want to open a sample's audio data, browse to an instrument file in the Explorer window. Click the down arrow next to the Views button and choose Region View from the menu.

Each wave is then displayed at the bottom of the Explorer window. You can double-click a wave to open it as a wave file:

Preview samples Closed

Playback for musical instrument files behaves slightly differently than playback in a normal data window.

  • If no samples are selected, click Play All to play all samples in the data window. Click Play to play all samples from the cursor position to the end of the data window.

  • If you have samples selected, click Play All to play all selected samples in the data window. Click Play to play all selected samples from the cursor position to the end of the data window.

Select samples Closed

Each sample in an instrument file is contained within an event in the data window. The data window selection determines which parts of the waveform will be processed.

Event positions are locked; you cannot move events within the data window.

Effects and processes can be applied to individual events or multiple selected events.

You can select an individual sample by clicking the event in the data window (hold Ctrl or Shift to select multiple samples):

You can select all samples in a bank by clicking the bank in the left pane:

You can select all of an instrument's samples by clicking the instrument in the left pane:

You can select all samples within a note range by clicking the note range in the left pane:

You can select individual samples by expanding a note range or the Sample Pool list and clicking a sample in the left pane:

Process a selection Closed

  1. Select the samples you want to process. If no samples are selected, processing will be applied to all samples.

  1. Choose a command from the Process, Effects, or FX Plug-Ins menu.

  2. Choose a preset from the Preset drop-down list or adjust the dialog controls as needed.

    For more information, please see Using Processing Dialogs.

Plug-ins that can change the length of audio data (such as reverb or delay) will use Insert Tail Data mode. Tails will be added to the waveform, and audio to the right of the tail will be moved to accommodate the extra audio.

  1. Click the Preview button to hear the effects of your processing settings. Select the Bypass check box to hear the unprocessed signal.

  2. Click OK.

    During processing, a progress meter is displayed at the bottom of the data window. You can cancel the operation at any time by clicking the Cancel button to the left of the progress meter, or you can press the Escape key.

Event selection is not exposed to scripts. When applying an effect to a file via scripting, you can specify the current time/channel-selection (DoMenu) or a new time/channel-selection (DoEffect).

When processing musical instrument files, all events in the time/channel selection will be processed. If no selection exists or the entire file is selected, all events will be processed.

Edit samples Closed

In addition to applying processing and effects, you can also edit the samples in an instrument file.

For example, if you need to remove a glitch or replace a sample in an instrument file, you can open an individual sample in a new editing window.

  1. Select the sample you want to edit.

  2. From the Edit menu, choose Event, and then choose Edit from the submenu. The selected sample is opened in a new window. If you selected multiple samples in step 1, each sample is opened in a separate window.

    TIP Press E (or right-click a sample and choose Edit from the submenu) to open the edit window quickly.

  1. Perform edits as needed.

NOTE

Notes:

  • If you want to replace sample data, you can clear the data in the edit window and paste data from another window.

  • Changes to bit depth, sample rate, or number of channels cannot be saved back to the original musical instrument file.

  1. From the File menu, choose Save to close the edit window and save your changes back to the musical instrument file. If you want to save the edited sample to a different format (other than a musical instrument file), you can use Save As.

Save your changes Closed

After you're finished processing a musical instrument file, you can use the Save or Save As commands to save your changes to the original file or to a new file.

Musical instrument files must be saved to the original format.