yhow can i create atmosphere

i am trying to cretae an atmosphere in my song .

what i mean is there are songs that you listen to and there is that atmosphere sound in the back ground or used through out the song.

1)how do i create that,

2)what do i use as far as effects,

any ideas are appreicated

I use Reverb sometimes, it can make your atmosphere come alive with spatial characteristics.. that's my 2 cents on that..

Sometimes I will play strings or harps at very low volume so it sounds like it's faint with heavy reverb and the result for me is as if it was far off in the distance.. Woodwinds are good also..

For a little ambience I found that you could sample a wind sound and filter it down to a rumbling and go to the parameters screen and press the open window key to edit in some note variations. You can press open window on the filter, tuning, and the envelope options to create a sound that changes in pitch and in filter level and also decay all at the same time by just pressing just one pad! The harder you press, the louder and clearer the wind will sound, and the softer presses make the sound lower, duller, and more filtered. It's a dope ass effect, try it out.

they are called pads, search for some samples and you'll see.

If you've got a portable recording device of some kind (tape recorder,minidisc) try walking around outside (I live in a city, it works well) and just recording the sounds and ambience of wherever you live.. you can get some killer results this way. Especially on the subway!

rep