5 Tips for Serum 2 You Probably Didn’t Know
- Noise Harmony
- 2 days ago
- 3 min read
Updated: 1 day ago
Serum 2 is full of small features that are easy to miss. Some of them are hidden behind right-click menus, while others are tucked away in corners of the interface. If you know where to look, you can unlock new ways of shaping your sounds. Here are five Serum 2 tips that show both what the feature does and exactly where you can find it.
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The first one is Oscillator Pitch Modes. Normally you just turn the pitch knob on OSC A or OSC B to shift notes up or down. But if you right-click on that pitch knob, a hidden menu appears. Here you can switch between modes like Semitones, Harmonics or Ratio. Semitones is the classic half-step transposition. Harmonics multiplies the base frequency to create organ-like overtones and rich additive layers. Ratio is especially useful for FM synthesis, because instead of pitch in notes you set a mathematical relationship between oscillators like two to one or three to two.
The second trick is something I call Macroception. At the bottom of Serum you will see the four Macro knobs. Most people use them to control parameters such as filter cutoff or reverb mix. But in Serum 2 you can also assign a macro to other macros. For example, take Macro 4 and drag it onto Macros 1, 2, and 3. Now turning Macro 4 will move all three at once. This gives you a super-macro that can evolve your sound in several directions at the same time, like detuning the oscillators, opening the filter, and adding more reverb with one movement.
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Next is Oscillator Mapping, which feels almost like having multiple instruments in one preset. Just above the virtual keyboard at the bottom of the interface you will notice a button called OSC MAPPING. When you click it, a new editor opens where you can decide which oscillators should play on different parts of the keyboard. You could make OSC A play only the lower notes for a sub bass, OSC B take care of the midrange, and OSC C play on the high keys. There is also a Fold option inside this window that forces notes into a certain range, and you can even restrict FM interactions to only specific note zones.
The fourth tip is a creative way to use the Noise oscillator. Look to the left of the filter section and open the Noise tab. Here you can choose a noise sample by clicking on the waveform box, for example White Noise. Once you have a noise loaded, drag an LFO onto the Pan knob inside the Noise section. Set the LFO speed to something fast like a sixteenth note. This makes the noise move left and right across the stereo field. If you then run it through a high-pass or band-pass filter, it turns into a soft hi-hat-like texture that adds motion to pads or ambient sounds.
Finally, Serum 2 allows you to draw your own filter shapes. Go into the Filter section and choose PZ SVF from the new S2 filters in the drop-down menu.
When you do this, a small pencil icon appears next to the filter display. Click it and the Filter Pattern Editor opens. Here you can sketch your own Filter curve with the mouse, shaping dips, peaks, and shelves wherever you like. The X axis represents frequency and the Y axis controls gain.
These are just a few of the hidden tools that make Serum 2 so flexible. If you want to dive deeper, we’ve put together a free E-BOOK with seventeen advanced Serum 2 tips available here.
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