How to Autotune Your Vocals Like T-Pain, Cher or Daft Punk
Tutorial Details
- Program: VST effects, FL Studio, Antares AutoTune VST
- Difficulty: Intermediate - Advanced
- Completion Time: 1-2 hours
Twice a month we revisit some of our reader favorite posts from throughout the history of Audiotuts+. This tutorial was first published in July 2008.
Ever heard a song by T-Pain on the radio and wondered how the robotic vocal effect is achieved? By the end of this tutorial, you will own the autotuning sound that is used on so many pop records right now.
Note: this article contains embedded audio that will not display in a feed reader. Click back to the site to read the tutorial with audio, or download the audio files at the bottom of the post.
Listen to some examples of this effect in action:
Cher – Believe (First Pop Instance of Autotuning)
You may assume that it takes a masterful engineer and a lot of money in hard effects to get that autotuned sound, but that’s not the case: using only a few steps and a simple plugin you will be well on your way. In this tutorial we’ll go one step further and show you how to create an autotuning effect that sounds as good as the pros.
This tutorial assumes basic knowledge of VST effects and FL Studio. You will need Antares AutoTune VST or a similar autotuning VST to perform this effect correctly, and of course, a microphone that is able to record into FL Studio. Besides that plugin, I will be using the effects packaged with FL Studio to finish shaping the sound.
Tutorial Setup:
- iMac Core2Duo 2.16ghz
- 2GB Ram
- Audio Technica ST90 Microphone ($25!!)
- Alesis IO 26
Step 1
Make sure you’ve purchased Antares AutoTune, a similar VST, or have picked up the demo. If you’re wary of purchasing this product, I’ve found that if you are working with any sort of vocals it pays for itself almost immediately.
We are going to setup a mixer channel in FL Studio to pickup our microphone. Mine is on Blobusound Channel 2, so I select that accordingly.
If done correctly, you should have activity on the input meter. If not, you’re going to need to check your ASIO/WDM settings, or make sure that you have a soundcard or interface that can support a microphone input.
Assuming you have activity coming in and that you can hear yourself, load Antares AutoTune onto the first slot of the mixer. Notice any difference? You probably can’t–we need to change some settings before going further.
This is the raw vocal I’ll be working with in this tutorial:
raw_vocal.mp3
Step 2
At this point, you’re going to want to change the “Input Type” at the top. This helps the tuning engine accurately adjust the incoming signal (in this case, your voice) to “tune” correctly. We are going to manipulate the tuning engine by changing it to “Alto/Tenor Voice”. This will trick the AutoTuner into shifting your voice upwards, and “filling in” your missed notes with a synthesized “voice.”
With the input type changed, it is now time to change the key and scale. T-Pain’s hit song ‘Buy U A Drank’ is in B-flat minor, so we’ll change the key to B-flat and the scale to minor.
You may notice some difference here, but the key to real auto-tuned vocals is to change the “Retuning” threshold to as fast as possible, in this case “0.” With it down at zero, when your voice fluctuates from note to note, it detects what note your voice is in, then jumps it to the next note in the scale, keeping it in key. With these basic settings in place, you should be singing your robotic heart out.
vocal_autotuned.mp3
But this is just the basic effect, and through my $25 “>Audio Technica mic, it is sounding a little dry.
Step 3
The spirit of this effect is to sound a little more robotic, so what we are going to do now is further create that robotic/artificial sound using other effects. These effects will change from microphone to microphone, so it is important to experiment until you get the sound you’re looking for.
The next thing in my FX chain after the auto-tuner is going to be an EQ plugin. I’ll be using this EQ to brighten up the highs, and exaggerate the artificial effect. Using EQUO, I’ve boosted all of the frequencies past 2.5khz to about 400%. This exaggerated EQ will add even more definition to the robotic effect. This may produce too much brightness on nicer microphones, so you may want to start at 400% and work your way down until you’ve got a reasonably bright vocal.
vocal_autotune_eq.mp3
Step 4
After the EQUO, I’ll add a Reverb effect to the chain. This is my standard vocal Reverb palette, and I’ve placed it at about 50% volume to make sure that it isn’t too overpowering on my vocals.
vocal_autotune_eq_reverb.mp3
Step 5
Optional: At this point, I’ve found that inserting the newly-added Soundgoodizer plug-in after the Reverb works very, very well on autotuned vocals. Give it a shot in the effects chain to get some interesting effects due to Soundgoodizer’s limiter. It also keeps the volume level high and limited, which adds to the artificial sound.
Step 6
After the Fruity Reverb, I’ll add what is probably the most important and delicate effect in the chain, a chorus. Refer to the settings snapshot to recreate this wonderful effect: it will give your vocal plenty of depth, and it has convinced many of my listeners that I am not, in fact, recording on a $25 microphone!
vocal_autotune_eq_reverb_chorus.mp3
Step 7
Moving on from there, my next effect is the Fruity Delay Bank. I’ve kept this one simple, and it will create a little more atmosphere along with the Reverb that was added earlier in the chain. Notice that I’ve used some pretty crazy volume/mix values for the effects. Sometimes an effect becomes too overpowering at full volume, so experiment with turning it down until you achieve a nice balance.
To smooth everything out after the Fruity Delay Bank, I’ll throw a Fruity Compressor onto the channel and you are recording-ready and set to sound like T-Pain!
Listen to the final product:
vocal_autotune_eq_reverb_chorus_delay_compression.mp3
Download the Play Pack for this tutorial (1.4MB)
Contents:
- All audio files
- Printable PDF tutorial
- Bonus audio: autotuned vocal acappella.
Nic Bertino is a professional producer and recording artist from Sacramento, California with over 9 years of production experience.
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everybodys just starting to copy t-pain now
no, t-pain wasnt the start of the autotune effect. people may think that tho because he uses it so much because he obviously has a sh*tty singing voice and no talent. the music industry these days really pisses me off. its all about the money and who you know.
the first time i heard the autotune effect was in that Cher song, then in a kid rock song, and also famously by daft punk. if anyone should get the credit for this effect, its among them.
t-pain is the copy cat in this case.
we dont care
hey chelsi,
if you even read the article you would have seen
that he mentioned cher being the first to make it popular.
so quit being so negative. and t-pain makes some sick beats.he has some tallent. just not the old school type.
Chelsi you’re completely wrong…..T-Pain “Can” sing without autotune and he did it…..watch it on youtube get ur facts right…
Idiots here don’t know about how Chelsi was replying to Steevie.
I’m with Chelsi. Stop being complete dicks.
t-pain is actually a really good singer. when he sings without auto tune it’s really good. search it, you will find it.
the auto tune effect was originated by an old band called “ZAPP”, which the most popular song is “COMPUTER LOVE”
actually daft punk use vocoders so u must feel stupid :L
no. roger troutman (roger & zapp) originated it in the 80′s with songs like “computer love” and “i wanna be your man”
know your history before ranting.
ehm, didn’t zapp & roger used talkboxes?
seriously get a life: if the music industry pays you what they pay him- you would do it to!
Art is not about being perfect, its about being creative!
ironic how you think t-pain is creative.
actually Tpain can sing
find it on youtube
he sings good without autotune
but autotune was the gap in the market
and he started using it
which made him succesful
How would i thank you for this ?! Your Awesome ~!.
hey is there a way to download antares aoutotune vst for free
i’m kinda short cuz of the economi
Thanks for the tutorial, works like a charm, but does anyone know how to mute the dry vocal and have fl only output the wet (autotuned) vocal? The wet output is mixed with my dry vocals so it doesnt sound as clear as it should…
The effect used on Cher’s vocals in “Believe” was not autotune but an effect box called Digitech Talkbox Pro. Rick Snoman tells us that in his book “Dance Music Manual”
The producers lied about what effect they used early on because they didn’t want other people copying them. It was actually Auto-Tune but they told people it was a talkbox.
I make beats/Hits,,,, can make beats for you in exchange for a registered FL 8 or 9 software, autotune 5, or cubase sx 3,
Please God, no more “Cher” effect………..
2009 = year of the autotune
THANKYOU SO MUCH, IT HELPED SO MUCH. (ofcourse with some YT help in the beginning XD)
Can I make this in Audition 3?
Auto-tune is a blight on the music scene. Much like emo, goth, c-rap, hip-hop.
We have people who can’t sing on key or sing live lip-synching at their concerts.
Show how little talent we need to see to call it entertainment.
I’m glad I grew up listening to artist that could really sing and could play their instruments. Todays music sucks.
“Auto-tune is a blight on the music scene. Much like emo, goth, c-rap, hip-hop.”
Hey, hey, now. Just because you don’t know what emo and goth is, doesn’t mean you have to bash it like that. C-rap? Do you perhaps mean crunk? Or were you referring to g-rap? Hip-hop is a genre with rap of various kinds being subgenres to that.
It seems to me that you’re just another ignorant metal mongoloid when you write stuff like that.
Daft Punk uses a talkbox, not auto-tune. I’m pretty sure no vocalist could sing “Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger.”
1st to the author, you have good skills, and are very informative, do not take my coming rant towards you, because it is infact towards what we call the “music biz”.
/rant on
So, now all we have to do if find our own “look”, write a few “songs” about money and women and liquor and bling, and we can soon retire!
I suspect the culling of actual musical instruments from modern “music” within the next decade.
What happened to music…oh yea, it died, because greed took over (just like everything else).
Bye bye, Miss American Pie.
garbage, complete garbage. learn to sing or play an instrument. if you don’t want to devote the time to learning how to make music you are not a musician. and learning how to autotune your voice has about as much integrity as learning to play air guitar or lip sync. i cant wait for this trend to die.
Horrible
this a best tutorials, i got others b4 n they wa plain shallow, av tried n really enjoyed. Infact i was doing nothing b4, cheers men, IP Records Kenya
Phat stuff, a enjoy it
Nic,
I am not a producer, sound engineer or anything of the sort, but I am looking for a service to autotune a video from work for a prank. I read your great tutorial and realized there is no easy way to do it (especially because I don’t know the first thing about music) and haven’t found any way on the internet to do it (like uploading my sound file, getting it processed and downloading it back). Would you be willing to autotune a short video (no more than a minute long) for me? Let me know if you are interested and what you would charge. You should be able to see my email in the comment details.
This rocks! Havent seen this guide before, Eqao really makes my mic sounds 10 times clearer and louder. This is amazing.
Actually I’m pretty sure T-pain and others don’t use this, it’s actually a talk box they use – as you can hear extra harmonies and sometimes full scales, which are almost impossible to sing that quickly.
Sorry to rain on your parade!
Haa, ok. Well it’s been well documented on TV, Radio and the Antares website, that T-Pain uses AutoTune. The iPhone app is based off of the plugin.
Sorry to piss on your party.
death of auto tune
t-pain wasn’t the first one to use auto tune tech. in the music industry. it was this old band. i forgot the name of the band but they were the first
thanks a lot nic…u rock!
Auto Tune is making a lot of pretty no talent schmucks and their labels rich. Wise up to the fact that your pop music is processed to the point of fantasy. This is a great example of using it to distort and effect the voice. When it is used to make bad voices better it is a bane.
YaW pplZz!! .. i need help with that!! .. any one CraZzy … !? anyOne Wanna riSk helpin Me?! .. ;D …
ooooW .. yeah anD … HoMiieiieie!!! <3!! me LoooooooooooooooVe ya 4 thiSs SerioSlly .. ThankYou .. :):D
I think one of the first bands to use autotune was Roger with Zapp EG: More bounce to the ounce…computer love…the list goes on… that was late 70s early 80′s if my DJ memory serves me correctly…other bands played with it as well, beastie boys, RFTW…but that was back when underground was really underground and MTV would only play mainstream canned music.
Actually, Roger Troutman, of Zapp, used a Talk Box…..They even have a song titled “I Play The Talk Box”….Look It Up!
The person who invented auto tune must hate music. I am a blues rock and jazz musician and i love the classics. I have respect for the very few bands left that play there own instruments and sing and can write a song. If you can’t sing you shouldn’t try there many people out there that are born with a talent to sing, and auto tune is like saying that talent is useless. If you had a talent to do something incredible and then a computer program came out so everyone can do it you would feel terrible like that one thing you are good at that made you unique is gone. Auto tune is going to be the death of music. Get ready for the funeral of music because the world has no taste anymore. I am not saying blues is the only thing to listen to I’m just saying that people should listen to something talented that is not computer generated sound. I am not to found of 90′s punk music but at least they could sing.
ok look, im 16 and i have more sense than you…the world doesnt revolve around you…stop trying to make people change, because they arent…you think because you let out a couple words means that people will change, no, sorry…and you can go back to your crappy ac/dc and what not and leave new age people alone, so what if they can’t sing well..can you? your just another one of those closed minded, haters who doesnt give a rat’s ass what you think and are pissed because what we call music doesnt fit your preferances, and that we like what we like, and we stick to it…unlike you, you try to convert people to see your side of the picture, and for what purpose?? sure i agree that some can’t sing and some can…but no one is forcing you to even think about new music, let alone listen to it…so keep your little dusty cd’s and records and leave today’s generation alone, because we are who we are and the same goes for you…so lets keep it that way…now go crawl back into your mom’s ass where all the other people who are pissed because they’re not in control live at, and thats All i have to say, bye
“… Your crappy AC/DC..?” I’m pretty sure Alex mentioned Blues and Jazz music. And insulting people for their opinions just makes you look like a narrow minded idiot. Personally, I prefer music where people are musicians who studied musical theory and learned to play an instrument (or more), but I still think there is some merit in being able to manipulate technology and being good with that side of Auto-Tune. We can’t look at traditional musicianship and say: that’s the be all and end all of music. Likewise, we can’t say the same about Auto-Tune and completely computerized music. There’s something to be learned with every era of music, even going as far back as the Romantic or Baroque periods.
Haydn chord progression anyone?
You’re not too fond of punk rock but at least they can sing? I thought the point of punk was they couldn’t sing but still had a message and wanted to shout it as loud as possible to get the point across.
Autotune isn’t the death of music, like most art forms, they just evolve and grow. One new thing doesn’t kill off all the progress that went before it. People will continue to sing and autotune doesn’t instantly rend a good voice useless.
It wasn’t even originally intended to create robotic effects! It was to adjust recordings if the singer was a bit off occasionally so that you didn’t have to spend hours and hours in recording to get that take perfect.
Little-known fact: If someone’s rich because of it, -someone- out there must like it.
Stop moaning about your outdated traditions that hardly anyone cares about and realize that this world -is- about making money. Don’t be fussy just because some people have figured out how to make thousands more than you ever will with less than half of the effort.
For you “Anyone can do that!” people, have you ever considered grabbing one of these nifty software packages and making it big for yourself? I mean, you found this site somehow, didn’t you? Who knows, if you get rich, you might not have so much trash to say! ;D
Or…wait. Maybe you’re on this tutorial site because you DID try to do and you COULDN’T! But…that would mean that you suck even more than the people you can’t stand!
LOL, okay, I’m done.
and realize that this world -is- about making money.
Reeeeeaaaaallllllly? How is this working out for you?
Auto Tune is making a lot of pretty no talent schmucks rich.
Men guyz auto tune’s d bomb
Americans have always considered themselves the creators of the effects, even though these effects were raised before by others.
Enough complaining guys, This is the next step to evolution. Autotune is our saviour. Most of us cant sing on point, but we have great passion for music. Are you autotune haters telling me that just because im having difficulty singing I should give up? or go to singing classes and pay those rediculous prices they charge? screw that idea. Im gettin me some AUTOTUNE
Yeah, give up. Please!!! I long for the day when people with no ability to sing kept their mouths shut and let the people who could sing do the singing.
To all the geniuses who think they’ll get rich from Autotune…if you can use it to cover your complete lack of talent SO CAN EVERYBODY ELSE.
It’s like people jumping in their cars at rush hour and thinking they’ll be home fast. But because everybody is doing it, a traffic jam forms and nobody goes anywhere. Because it’s so easy to enter the fray, everybody gets in each other’s way and winds up basically standing still.
You might as well buy a lottery ticket.
If u dont like Autotune, dont use it…..and leave the rest of us alone, we just wanna have some fun with technology. (is there a way of downloading the full version, im tired of these 10 day trial versions).
Id also like to know if it is illigal to download autotune, I dont feel like being sued after i become rich or atleast famous.
Antares Autotune is a really expensive program to get. They have a trial version but after a week or so its useless and you have to buy the program. My band used this guy on the website fiverr to autotune our vocals cheap.
great post really appreciated it. I’m an aspiring singer/ rapper song writer and I’ve just been using garage band. I have a message to share and people tell me my lines are clever and catchy but my limited knowledge of editing makes this difficult to put it on a track. I’m feeling what Drake and Kid Cudi are doing right now but obviously don’t have the access to that type of equipment. Could anyone point me in the right direction to what to download, buy, or read to make my first mixtape? Appreciate any feed back.
lol i agree…..
thankyou very very much…its worked for me in mixcraft……
yeap.it really worked but how does t pain hit that high pitch and still mantaining the natural tone.someone help me……
just want to say that even with all of the fancy shmancy computer work you did, your voice still sounds a little retarded when you say “whats yer neme” autotune does not keep you from pronouncing words incorrectly
wow some ppl AUTO-TUNE has been around since the 70′s no1 cares for it enough to use on every single song so to all here cares auto-tune = cant sing if you could sing there would be no need for it
Thanks for this article.
Anybody who disses on auto tune… you ignorant hypocrites. You’re telling me that you’ve never combed or blow dried your hair to make it look softer, or cinched your belt tight when you’re wearing a suit to make you look more trim, or whitened your teeth, or shaved the hairs that grow on your face every day, or changed your shirt in the middle of the day if you got ketchup on it, or sucked in your gut when a cute girl walked by, or… you get the point. All these things that we do daily to be a part of society are the same as auto tune. They make things look/sound/feel better than nature allows them to be. If your voice needs a little push to sound confident, give it. Practice for a few more years and you’ll get it eventually, but the fact that your voice is a little off is no reason to not make music today. If you decide to crank up the “auto” knob and make yourself sound like a robot, who the fuck cares? It’s not like you were trying to sound natural anyways. Nobody sang like a robot until our lifetime, and the history of music dates back like 50,000 years. If you want to diss on a music technology evil, how about the overdub? It didn’t exist when my Dad was buying records, but it’s a mainstay now. And thank fucking God cuz without it we wouldn’t have dub, or hip hop, or any of the biggest bands in the last 30 years. The music comes from your soul, not from your vocal chords or some magic box, and if your attitude and energy is golden, who the fuck cares about your vocal quality. Anybody listen to the Clash?
+1 to the people who said “do your research”. Legit auto tune is only a decade old, and the other things that you think-you-know-what-your-talking-about are called a vocoder (invented in WWII to mask the voices of important political figures) and the talkbox (basically a speaker you put in your mouth, which allows you to use your mouth ombiture as a formant filter effect on re-amped sounds). Learn before you speak, newbs. I’ve been on the vocoder, talk box, auto tune bandwagon since Peter Mother Fucking Frampton, and it’s an amazing tool for more than just vocals. Put a drum loop through a vocoder and try and tell me you don’t get a boner.
T Pain has his own distinct sound, which is more than most of you WoW bitches will ever accomplish with your star-fucking lives. And if you’re stupid enough to say shit like “T Pain isn’t creative”, how bout you post some of your own music and let it speak for itself as a “better recording” instead of lurking on message boards insulting people who made a great tutorial for aspiring music technologists. Sure, maybe I don’t “respect his methods”, but he’s fucking extra original, super entertaining, and he’s probably fucking your mom right now.
Again, thanks for the tutorial, and apologies for the super long post. :)
Tune on!
/counter rant on
For all the so-called purists whining about the level of processing, I expect you immediately to go sell all your modern equipment. You want purity, go kill a pig and spoon its guts into your delicate, sensitively-manicured ass-prodders. Let it sit out in the sun while you scribble buffalos on the cave wall. After a day or two, you can twang your little heart out and gain the favor of the Gods who may grant you a better harvest than the one that apparently fed your parents.
And don’t forget, if you want that snappy effect that all the Neanderthals are clamoring for, be sure to play it inside the cave.
As you were…
/counter rant off
flame war! :D
Thanks for a great article. It was easy to follow and apply even though I don’t have the exact same plug-ins.
Also, why is it that it’s always the loser never-been musicians that rant about effects? If you don’t like Auto-tune, then you don’t like reverb, chorus, delay, EQ, etc. Stop being phonies.
-vik
It’s like extra reverb on elvis , vocal doubling on any Phil Specter record , echo as an effect , overdriving the speaker on an amplifier , anything considered innovative for it’s time . It will run its course until we say we don’t like it anymore. And that may take years. Its all about sales and if the public is buying it we’ll keep producing it.
Check http://www.voicepitcher.com to add a free auto tune effect to your voice, online
voicepitcher has no robotic tuning capabilites whatsoever
I think T-Pain is good but you guys don’t have to get so mad about it. Its just Chelsi’s opinion. If you think differently you don’t have to get so mad. I’m sure T-Pain, Cher, and Daft Punk wouldn’t get to mad. To them you guys are nobodies. But go ahead and get mad like you reallly know them. Shows how childish you are.
At 32, I’m still young enough to appreciate new direction on things. I’m all for unique effects, but the autotune abuse needs to stop. Every fuckin’ pop song has auto tune vocals in it somewhere…but you idiots are eating the binary-coded shit up. The people who actually like the autotune shit, are the same people who rub themselves down in peanut butter and masturbate while playing WoW.
The soul and culture are being stripped out of music every day. Fuckin’ kids today are too lazy to learn an instrument….or how to sing in key. Now they just push ctrl+alt+tab+shift and a program spits out a logarithmic “song” with a shitty vocal effect…and the mistakingly dub it to be “music”.
Learn how to play an instrument, learn how to sing…or take up another hobby, you talentless fucks.
Cher sucks and so does t-pain neither can sing o and by the way daft punk blows too
Yeah, well you suck because those are my favorite bands and performers. You should jump off a cliff into a river of Cher music and butterflies!!
welcome to the digital age cavemans!!!!