off notes when layering ?

Ok so im doubling up on the same drums sounds on the program screen and sometimes i will get like one of the snare a little off ?.

you mean you're having phase problems?

sometimes if you layer the same sound on top of itself, it kind of cancels itself out at some points because they're not really playing exactly in sync. what's above the zero crossing gets added to what's below the zero crossing, canceling the sounds out and leaving you with nothing.

here's a little example of what it's actually doing. just ignore the dots and focus on the waveforms. i had to use the dots because multiple spaces get trimmed to a single space, and i can't use html code.

....._
\_/...\

+
........_
...\_/...\

=

\_____
..........\

there's a few things you can do to compensate.

one way is to make 2 copies of the sound. adjust the start point on one of the sounds until you no longer notice phase cancellation when playing them simultaneously.

another way is to make 2 copies of the sound, and invert one of them with wav editing software. inverting the sound does exactly what it sounds like, it flips the waveform upside-down. when you play the inverted sound with the original, the phase problems should hopefully go away.

Wow thanks for that good read.