I always thought that the funky wah effect I wanted was from a wah/auto-wah pedal and I couldn't achieve that sound no matter what I tried on my multi-effect board. until this video I finally understand it's the envelope filter. Thanks a lot!
Lovely video, just a little clarification regards "envelope filter" and "envelope follower": Every filter controlled by a filter is an "envelope filter", but it's a matter of how the envelope is generated - "envelope follower" or "envelope generator". Follower derives controlling signal from your guitar volume. Generator starts executing pre-defined decay (let's say 200 miliseconds, exponential curve) and it will do it regardless of you playing a long ringing chords or not, but it will start only when it's fired by a trigger, and a trigger is usually a certain threshold of volume when you hit the chord. "Envelope Follower" will sound more natural and reactive, but it could get "bubbly" trying to follow every nuance of guitar oscillation. "Envelope Generator" will be more synthy (in behaviour, not the sound), you can play quiet passages without filter, and they usually have attack/auto-swell setting as well as decay, but could get misstriggered. Trigger (and its cousin, "gate") is more common in keyboards because it's created upon a key press rather than a volume. But I've seen both in application, and adding an attack (to a follower) or slew limiter (signal smoother for bubbles) further blurs the definition.
Wow, thank you for taking the time to explain that 👍 The truth is I didn't know if there was a difference between an envelope filter and an envelope follower or if different companies called the effect by different names.
Cool video, I've played guitar for years, but have never used much more than a tube screamer, klone and reverb. I had no idea they even made auto wah, it's exactly what I need. Nice explanation!
Yes, it shure does not hurt to try one out and see if you like it. I tried the Snow White. 250.00. They work well. I have a "Clone" and an inexpensive Mooer-The sensitivty pedal. I think it was 60.00 or so. I do use one of my 6 standard wha the most. I enjoyed watching Robin Trower rig run down, on TH-cam. I would reccomend, just for the fact he is a living legend, and he does the Rig Run Down himself with Premier Guitar. I think John Bollinger is the PG rep going through it with him. Best of luck to you.
I recommend getting multi effects like a zoom unit with expression pedal. Then you have auto wah, wah, compression, all kinds of drive overdrive distortion fuzz, amp sounds, acoustic simulator, plus chorus phaser flanger pitchshifter, delay echo reverb and a tube screamer
This was a really informative video. I've watched a few of your other vids and they're equally informative. I can't believe it has so few views and that you don't have more subscribers. Well, you have one more now.
I honestly think that Mooer envelope pedal is faulty. I own the same pedal & the envelope effect can be very heavy & present, I couldn't hear anything from it in this example. Look at other reviews for the Mooer envelope, you'll see what I mean. Great demo of the difference between envelope & auto wah. Brilliant playing. Bless
I second that, I don't think that your Mooer envelope worked right. It sounded like fixed filter with no response to playing whatsoever. I mean, surely it's some cheap chinese build but in the other videos it really sounds different.
Great video. I thought I would never buy an "Auto-Wah". I think there are times where it makes perfect sense and there are -most of the moments a good old fashion Wah is a must. Eric clapton comes to mind, the good direct approach. The prices have become more reasonable. I like to have one on the side to throw in if I want to.
A note on the Manual knob... Essentially it affects the frequency that the wah effect starts from. At the lowest setting it starts from the "toe" of the wah effect, and as you turn it up it starts closer to the "heel" of the wah. It's easiest to hear with the Depth down around 9 o'clock while sweeping through the lower settings of the Manual knob. With the Depth and the Sens all the way down, the Manual knob is essentially a cocked wah filter (which is a nice feature to have). I wish manufacturers were more consistent with what they label an "auto-wah", whether it's an envelope filter or a modulated filter. It's hard to find effects pedals that do the modulated filter effect, and I'm always a bit surprised it's not as common as other modulations like phaser or vibrato. I've heard bands like Failure use it to great effect as modulation, especially when stacked with other modulation like a phaser or chorus.
Nice explanations. I went to buy a wah and while I was there thought I'd maybe try and pair up an envelope filter with the expression pedal I already have instead. Tried out both options and went home with the electro Harmonix blurst. Still getting my head around it all as it's all new but I'm definitely enjoying it. Its bringing out new things. I straight away started hearing planet caravan by black sabbath. Playing the vocal melody on the guitar with the blurst and some stereo delay and reverb sounds great.
Compressor afterwards! Thank you so much for that advise! I kept playing and playing trulying to do it perfectly, and personally I'm not that great, so I was bummed. Funny thing is I have a compressor pedal, just sitting around. 😂
Nice demonstration of the various functions, but I will dispute your distinction between "auto-wah" and "envelope filter". The AW-2 is more what one would call a *modulated filter* than an auto-wah, and to be truthful, many commercial envelope-controlled filters are referred to as "auto-wahs", so we shouldn't confuse what one company calls one pedal with a broader class of pedals. The Electroharmonix Blurst pedal is another more recent example of a modulated filter. If one was running a modular synth, the LFO would be patched into the filter, and that's the sound you'd get. I've owned, used and built envelope-controlled filters since the late '70s, and enjoy them immensely, but have learned that what they are *called* is often not the same as what they do. In fairness, they are ALL modulated filters, except that some are modulated by instrument envelope-follower, some by LFOs, and still others by fixed one-shot envelopes. Some are *named* appropriately but thought of wrongly. For instance, the Electro-Harmonix Y-Triggered Filter gets used as if it were just a different sort of Mu-Tron/Dr. Q but it does *not* respond to the strength of one's picking. Rather, it provides a fixed envelope that can be "triggered" by picking hard enough, and the control adjusts how much that envelope drives the filter, either upwards or downwards. Set to the control midpoint, the upwards and downwards envelopes cancel each other out and the filter doesn't audibly sweep. It is functionally equivalent to feeding a filter with an attack/decay envelope generator that is, in turn, initiated by a gate. Modulation can be in different forms and even external to the filter pedal. Here's something I put together to illustrate that. A delightful chip from Electric Druid can output a repeating pattern of different waveforms, that fade out over time, triggered from a foot/tap switch. Here I use it to modulate a Chase Bliss Condor pedal, via the expression-pedal input. th-cam.com/video/ouqkQWhK5ZU/w-d-xo.html The Condor itself can be used like an AW-2 if set just right. For those interested, here's a piece I wrote some time back, looking at the inner workings of this broad category of pedals. www.geofex.com/article_folders/ecftech/ecftech.htm
Great comparison and tutorial! Thanks! You had me sold on the envelope filter, until you showed us how the Sensitivity knob effectively turns the Auto Wah into an envelope filter. In my mind, that’s two effects in one…or at least sort of. Thanks again.
thats crazy I thought envelope filter was an auto wah, i'm a jerry garcia fan and I'm familiar with the mutron and I have myself a beautiful qtron, now I have to get my hands on an aw-2 that thing is pretty cool
Very nice video. I love your straightforward information-based just-the-facts approach without feeling the need to talk a lot first or be "entertaining" or anything like that. As an aside, I love the colors on that guitar.. Looks like a Les Paul Special (on account of the P90s) which I plan to get in a couple of months but my only option is TV Yellow which I don't really love.
Envelope with distortion and delay is so sick. It is a very versatile effect once you get a feel for it. I have an dod fx25 and it is a beast. You really gotta dial the sensitivity in. There's nothing subtle about that filter.
Your video is brilliant : instructive, concise, well-structured. Hats down 💪 However, when the Boss AW2 had both options (auto-wah + env filter), the new AW3 is an env filter and that's all. I don't understand why they made that decision, an auto-wah mode may be useful at times. Mooer might be inferior to Boss, but now they've filled the blank by making a pedal with both modes, it's the Mooer Audio @Wah. The AW2 was quite fine because you could get both effects at the same time ("Rate" and "Sens" knobs), when on the @Wah you either get one or the other ("Auto" and "Touch" modes). But the AW2 is no longer produced, the only way to get it now is second-hand market. Let's dry our eyes, though : the @Wah costs half the price the AW2 did, and it's less spacy in one's pedalboard. What's more, it seems to sound quite decent ( th-cam.com/video/CH1BFZPjdoY/w-d-xo.html ). In fact, before the @Wah release, Mooer offered an auto-wah pedal (Funky monkey), and an other one for env filter, both of them the same price, and now they offer both functions on one single pedal at still the same price. The only (minor) issue is that on the @Wah there seems to be no Sens knob. The Gain one adjusts the decay.
He's somewhat of an idiot. He did dial the tone knob at around noon at 6:03, turned it right back to where it was before, and then claimed it wasn't reacting to the pic attack. Facepalm.
I really like envelope filter effects, and I think auto wah effects are annoying and useless. The "compressor" that I use after my envelope filter effects is always a distortion or overdrive... I don't really see the point in using a dedicated compressor after an envelope filter if you are using distortion, because a distortion is pretty much a compressor.
It depends if you want to run it clean or not. You're right about the overdrive acting like a compressor. They give the filter more grit, it's very cool.
@@JasonAyalaSpare it also evens things out, so the quiet notes are boosted and able to be heard. I do like adding a bit of "grit" or "crunch" too, so for me it's a "win-win" to compress by using a drive instead of a designated compressor.
@@JasonAyalaSpare or with an overdrive it could be a "clean boost". When I use a designated compressor, I'm usually just trying to get my guitar to "quack".
I always thought that the funky wah effect I wanted was from a wah/auto-wah pedal and I couldn't achieve that sound no matter what I tried on my multi-effect board. until this video I finally understand it's the envelope filter. Thanks a lot!
Lovely video, just a little clarification regards "envelope filter" and "envelope follower": Every filter controlled by a filter is an "envelope filter", but it's a matter of how the envelope is generated - "envelope follower" or "envelope generator". Follower derives controlling signal from your guitar volume. Generator starts executing pre-defined decay (let's say 200 miliseconds, exponential curve) and it will do it regardless of you playing a long ringing chords or not, but it will start only when it's fired by a trigger, and a trigger is usually a certain threshold of volume when you hit the chord. "Envelope Follower" will sound more natural and reactive, but it could get "bubbly" trying to follow every nuance of guitar oscillation. "Envelope Generator" will be more synthy (in behaviour, not the sound), you can play quiet passages without filter, and they usually have attack/auto-swell setting as well as decay, but could get misstriggered. Trigger (and its cousin, "gate") is more common in keyboards because it's created upon a key press rather than a volume. But I've seen both in application, and adding an attack (to a follower) or slew limiter (signal smoother for bubbles) further blurs the definition.
Wow, thank you for taking the time to explain that 👍 The truth is I didn't know if there was a difference between an envelope filter and an envelope follower or if different companies called the effect by different names.
Cool video, I've played guitar for years, but have never used much more than a tube screamer, klone and reverb. I had no idea they even made auto wah, it's exactly what I need. Nice explanation!
Yes, it shure does not hurt to try one out and see if you like it. I tried the Snow White. 250.00. They work well. I have a "Clone" and an inexpensive Mooer-The sensitivty pedal. I think it was 60.00 or so. I do use one of my 6 standard wha the most. I enjoyed watching Robin Trower rig run down, on TH-cam. I would reccomend, just for the fact he is a living legend, and he does the Rig Run Down himself with Premier Guitar. I think John Bollinger is the PG rep going through it with him. Best of luck to you.
I recommend getting multi effects like a zoom unit with expression pedal. Then you have auto wah, wah, compression, all kinds of drive overdrive distortion fuzz, amp sounds, acoustic simulator, plus chorus phaser flanger pitchshifter, delay echo reverb and a tube screamer
This was a really informative video. I've watched a few of your other vids and they're equally informative. I can't believe it has so few views and that you don't have more subscribers. Well, you have one more now.
Thank you for your kind words.
I honestly think that Mooer envelope pedal is faulty. I own the same pedal & the envelope effect can be very heavy & present, I couldn't hear anything from it in this example. Look at other reviews for the Mooer envelope, you'll see what I mean.
Great demo of the difference between envelope & auto wah. Brilliant playing.
Bless
I actually liked both Mooer pedals when I first played them. But when I went back to back with the EHX I thought 'man it's really missing something'.
I second that, I don't think that your Mooer envelope worked right. It sounded like fixed filter with no response to playing whatsoever. I mean, surely it's some cheap chinese build but in the other videos it really sounds different.
Love the shirt, precisely why I’m looking at these types of pedal, Andy used a Mutron at times too!
Great video. I thought I would never buy an "Auto-Wah". I think there are times where it makes perfect sense and there are -most of the moments a good old fashion Wah is a must. Eric clapton comes to mind, the good direct approach. The prices have become more reasonable. I like to have one on the side to throw in if I want to.
This was super helpful. I've wondered about this very issue and product videos never address the difference between the two effects. Much thanks.
A note on the Manual knob... Essentially it affects the frequency that the wah effect starts from. At the lowest setting it starts from the "toe" of the wah effect, and as you turn it up it starts closer to the "heel" of the wah. It's easiest to hear with the Depth down around 9 o'clock while sweeping through the lower settings of the Manual knob. With the Depth and the Sens all the way down, the Manual knob is essentially a cocked wah filter (which is a nice feature to have).
I wish manufacturers were more consistent with what they label an "auto-wah", whether it's an envelope filter or a modulated filter. It's hard to find effects pedals that do the modulated filter effect, and I'm always a bit surprised it's not as common as other modulations like phaser or vibrato. I've heard bands like Failure use it to great effect as modulation, especially when stacked with other modulation like a phaser or chorus.
Thanks for making this video. I am waiting for my Tone City auto-wah to arrive in the post, and it can double as an envelope filter.
Excellent video - educational, real music and great guitar playing, with excellent explanations for the differences in these effects.
Thank you very much
Thanks for the video, it was very educational. Now I the difference between envelope filter and auto wash.
To avoid chopping off someone’s head on the envelope filter, run it through the low pass (LP) setting
Also, The ehx blurst is a
modulated envelope filter &
The zvex ooh-wah is a sequencer-wah
..All very awesome and different FX
Nice explanations. I went to buy a wah and while I was there thought I'd maybe try and pair up an envelope filter with the expression pedal I already have instead. Tried out both options and went home with the electro Harmonix blurst. Still getting my head around it all as it's all new but I'm definitely enjoying it. Its bringing out new things. I straight away started hearing planet caravan by black sabbath. Playing the vocal melody on the guitar with the blurst and some stereo delay and reverb sounds great.
Compressor afterwards! Thank you so much for that advise! I kept playing and playing trulying to do it perfectly, and personally I'm not that great, so I was bummed. Funny thing is I have a compressor pedal, just sitting around. 😂
Nice demonstration of the various functions, but I will dispute your distinction between "auto-wah" and "envelope filter". The AW-2 is more what one would call a *modulated filter* than an auto-wah, and to be truthful, many commercial envelope-controlled filters are referred to as "auto-wahs", so we shouldn't confuse what one company calls one pedal with a broader class of pedals. The Electroharmonix Blurst pedal is another more recent example of a modulated filter. If one was running a modular synth, the LFO would be patched into the filter, and that's the sound you'd get. I've owned, used and built envelope-controlled filters since the late '70s, and enjoy them immensely, but have learned that what they are *called* is often not the same as what they do. In fairness, they are ALL modulated filters, except that some are modulated by instrument envelope-follower, some by LFOs, and still others by fixed one-shot envelopes. Some are *named* appropriately but thought of wrongly. For instance, the Electro-Harmonix Y-Triggered Filter gets used as if it were just a different sort of Mu-Tron/Dr. Q but it does *not* respond to the strength of one's picking. Rather, it provides a fixed envelope that can be "triggered" by picking hard enough, and the control adjusts how much that envelope drives the filter, either upwards or downwards. Set to the control midpoint, the upwards and downwards envelopes cancel each other out and the filter doesn't audibly sweep. It is functionally equivalent to feeding a filter with an attack/decay envelope generator that is, in turn, initiated by a gate.
Modulation can be in different forms and even external to the filter pedal. Here's something I put together to illustrate that. A delightful chip from Electric Druid can output a repeating pattern of different waveforms, that fade out over time, triggered from a foot/tap switch. Here I use it to modulate a Chase Bliss Condor pedal, via the expression-pedal input. th-cam.com/video/ouqkQWhK5ZU/w-d-xo.html The Condor itself can be used like an AW-2 if set just right.
For those interested, here's a piece I wrote some time back, looking at the inner workings of this broad category of pedals. www.geofex.com/article_folders/ecftech/ecftech.htm
I liked it better without compression.
Great comparison and tutorial! Thanks! You had me sold on the envelope filter, until you showed us how the Sensitivity knob effectively turns the Auto Wah into an envelope filter. In my mind, that’s two effects in one…or at least sort of. Thanks again.
No worries, I think the Boss AW-3 has more envelope options.
Options aren't great if it sounds like junk like the aw3
Very informative, solid video thank you
I just fell more in love with guitar playing effects.
THANKS fir the demo.
i think 'll stick with my wahs, though
The “manual” knob on my AW-2 seems to adjust the frequency the signal starts at before the envelope opens up. Hope that helps.
No song uses AW-2? What about mysterious ways by U2? AW-3 seems quite useful if you don't have a Korg A3
thats crazy I thought envelope filter was an auto wah, i'm a jerry garcia fan and I'm familiar with the mutron and I have myself a beautiful qtron, now I have to get my hands on an aw-2 that thing is pretty cool
Always great! Thorough but concise
this is exactly what i'm googling right now!
Very nice video. I love your straightforward information-based just-the-facts approach without feeling the need to talk a lot first or be "entertaining" or anything like that. As an aside, I love the colors on that guitar.. Looks like a Les Paul Special (on account of the P90s) which I plan to get in a couple of months but my only option is TV Yellow which I don't really love.
Muito bom! Parece que o AW-2 e o EHX-Qtron podem soar bem parecidos. Me interessei pelo AW-2.
Pessoalmente prefiro o Qtron bastante mais porque eu consigo controlar o filtro enquanto eu toco
Envelope with distortion and delay is so sick. It is a very versatile effect once you get a feel for it. I have an dod fx25 and it is a beast. You really gotta dial the sensitivity in. There's nothing subtle about that filter.
I recently got into that, it do feel like jimi hendrix setup
Your video is brilliant : instructive, concise, well-structured. Hats down 💪
However, when the Boss AW2 had both options (auto-wah + env filter), the new AW3 is an env filter and that's all.
I don't understand why they made that decision, an auto-wah mode may be useful at times.
Mooer might be inferior to Boss, but now they've filled the blank by making a pedal with both modes, it's the Mooer Audio @Wah.
The AW2 was quite fine because you could get both effects at the same time ("Rate" and "Sens" knobs), when on the @Wah you either get one or the other ("Auto" and "Touch" modes).
But the AW2 is no longer produced, the only way to get it now is second-hand market.
Let's dry our eyes, though : the @Wah costs half the price the AW2 did, and it's less spacy in one's pedalboard. What's more, it seems to sound quite decent ( th-cam.com/video/CH1BFZPjdoY/w-d-xo.html ).
In fact, before the @Wah release, Mooer offered an auto-wah pedal (Funky monkey), and an other one for env filter, both of them the same price, and now they offer both functions on one single pedal at still the same price.
The only (minor) issue is that on the @Wah there seems to be no Sens knob. The Gain one adjusts the decay.
Thanks for the video. Just ensured once again that none on these 2 effects are of my taste.
Que buen vídeo! Muchas gracias por aclarar tantos conceptos de manera sencilla 🫶🏼
Gracias, fue muy divertido hacer este video.
A REALLY good demo - thanks !
🤙great video going to try the new AW-3, I had the QTron and really did not like it (seemed to harsh for my ears)
Let me know what you think of the AW-3
Uma música que está presente o wah wah e envelope filter nitidamente é a jamming do Bob Marley a versão original 1977 tem isolado as guitarras
Good video ,I saw that john and Jimi posters on your wall👀👀👍👍👍
What compressor settings are u using?
I got to ask what happens if you have a qtron without a compressor? Can you still play it?
Yes you can, you just have to be careful how hard you pluck.
Brendan Brown from Wheatus used an auto wah for a number of things
Wow. I think I just discovered the best guitar channel on all of TH-cam. Keep up the work and you will go far!
Does the Q Tron respond to volume or attack? Would a volume pedal effect it?
If the volume was rolled off then it probably would affect it.
volume pedal before would limit the filter dynamics yes but you could also “play” it like a wah pedal
What’s best on the chain before or after overdrive
I proffer before drive
Not sure if you listen to PARADISE LOST? AutoWah all over it! Great tones, great band! Listen to Ash & Debris !
I can see that the envelope filter is definitely better for my playing over an autowah
Me too.
@@JasonAyalaSpare Have you thought of getting the Kangra Filter fuzz by walrus audio. Or Dr. Scientist Dusk, or the Keeeley Neutrino v2
@@The504lego I don't use it often enough to justify buying something like those. It's something I use sparingly but to good effect.
Really love AutoWah. However I don’t like the destructive effect on the tone that Envelope Filters have.
Hundreds of Neo Soul songs use the AW-2.
Amazing!
Good Test 👍... (thanks)
Hehe can I purchase the envelope filter 🙏
They just came out with a new one.
Very nice!
Thank you! Cheers!
Awesome!
There is a tone knob on the mooer envelope. Tone. Carl. You haven't even tried... (((
He's somewhat of an idiot. He did dial the tone knob at around noon at 6:03, turned it right back to where it was before, and then claimed it wasn't reacting to the pic attack. Facepalm.
thats one of the prettiest les pauls ive ever seen
i hate those small body pedals, i genuinely don’t think they do anything most of the time
What a W vid
U2 the fly uses auto wah doesn't it
I'm not sure, I'll have to listen to it. I think Higher Ground by the Chili Peppers uses it on bass.
I am just to know this channel exists.
I hope you enjoy it.
Lovepedal Rubber Chicken! You're welcome.
A ustedes también les aparece el pelado bajista hasta abajo de la cama vendiendoles el curso para ser el mejor bajista del mundo??
Jerry Garcia uses them a lot
John Frusciante!
Insane insight. Thank you very much.
No Problem.
I really like envelope filter effects, and I think auto wah effects are annoying and useless. The "compressor" that I use after my envelope filter effects is always a distortion or overdrive... I don't really see the point in using a dedicated compressor after an envelope filter if you are using distortion, because a distortion is pretty much a compressor.
It depends if you want to run it clean or not. You're right about the overdrive acting like a compressor. They give the filter more grit, it's very cool.
@@JasonAyalaSpare it also evens things out, so the quiet notes are boosted and able to be heard. I do like adding a bit of "grit" or "crunch" too, so for me it's a "win-win" to compress by using a drive instead of a designated compressor.
It depends if you want your filter effect clean or not. You're right, using drive does act as a compressor of sorts, it also gives it more grit.
@@JasonAyalaSpare or with an overdrive it could be a "clean boost". When I use a designated compressor, I'm usually just trying to get my guitar to "quack".
Usually, yes... but
Take any delay with an insert/FXloop and put an auto-wah (that can sweep slowwww) in there...magical