TT-KICK Kick Machine — User Manual

01The concept

TT-KICK builds one kick from three sequential segments on the time axis — TRANSIENT (the click), BODY (the punch) and TAIL (the room) — joined by equal-power crossfades. Unlike layered kick tools, the segments play one after another, so each stage can be crafted without the stages fighting each other.

Every segment is switchable between SYNTHESIZED and SAMPLE: mix your own sample attack with a synthesized body, or run the whole kick purely from the synth engines — no sample pack required (a fresh instance is all-synth and sounds immediately). The synth path carries its oscillators phase-coherent across the segment boundaries: a successor segment starts at the exact phase its predecessor holds at the boundary — phase-continuous by construction, not by phase-offset tinkering.

A fourth row below the lanes — FUSION — always shows the kick as it is currently built: the segments in sequence on one output time axis, the crossfade zones shaded, and the total chain length in milliseconds. Where a segment starts on that axis is set by the crossfade of its boundary and, if you want it, by the lane's OFFSET (see The time axis and OFFSET in section 04).

02Sound examples

All 44 factory kicks, each as eight hits (two bars of four on the floor) at 130 BPM with its natural tail. Filter by family, click a waveform to jump, and compare. All clips share one export gain, so louder kicks stay louder; there is no normalisation, EQ, compression or mastering on any clip.

The clips are rendered offline from the plug-in’s own code (the same EEL2 source that REAPER runs, played by an interpreter), not recorded in REAPER, so the sound in your project can differ in small details. Each kick is the factory preset at its default settings, played at the ROOT note with velocity 110.

TT-KICK // 44 factory kicks, eight hits eachReady

909 TIGHT

Punchy club kick — tail ≈ 110 ms, sub ≈ 45 Hz

130 BPMPreset 1909

0:00

0:00/0:05AUTO

Audio file not found. The examples are online at timtechlor.de/docs.

All4490978084HARD6RUMBLE5MINIMAL6ROLL4DEEP5CHAR7

1. 01909 TIGHTPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 110 ms, sub ≈ 45 Hz9091300:05
2. 02909 PUNCHPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 160 ms, sub ≈ 51 Hz9091300:05
3. 03909 DEEPPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 300 ms, sub ≈ 48 Hz9091300:05
4. 04909 SOFTPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 230 ms, sub ≈ 49 Hz9091300:05
5. 05808 SUBRound sub kick — tail ≈ 740 ms, sub ≈ 46 Hz8081300:05
6. 06808 LONGRound sub kick — tail ≈ 1150 ms, sub ≈ 48 Hz8081300:05
7. 07808 PUNCHYRound sub kick — tail ≈ 510 ms, sub ≈ 47 Hz8081300:05
8. 08HARD TECHNOHard, driven kick — tail ≈ 210 ms, sub ≈ 52 HzHARD1300:05
9. 09HARDERHard, driven kick — tail ≈ 190 ms, sub ≈ 51 HzHARD1300:05
10. 10HARDCOREHard, driven kick — tail ≈ 170 ms, sub ≈ 49 HzHARD1300:05
11. 11INDUSTRIALHard, driven kick — tail ≈ 400 ms, sub ≈ 50 HzHARD1300:05
12. 12MACHINE FUNKPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 150 ms, sub ≈ 53 Hz9091300:05
13. 13RUMBLE DEEPKick with a built-in rumble tail — tail ≈ 1300 ms, sub ≈ 46 HzRUMBLE1300:05
14. 14RUMBLE FASTKick with a built-in rumble tail — tail ≈ 740 ms, sub ≈ 49 HzRUMBLE1300:05
15. 15RUMBLE DRYKick with a built-in rumble tail — tail ≈ 950 ms, sub ≈ 49 HzRUMBLE1300:05
16. 16RUMBLE DARKKick with a built-in rumble tail — tail ≈ 1430 ms, sub ≈ 44 HzRUMBLE1300:05
17. 17MINIMAL CLUBTight, dry club kick — tail ≈ 120 ms, sub ≈ 55 HzMINIMAL1300:05
18. 18DUB DRYTight, dry club kick — tail ≈ 190 ms, sub ≈ 48 HzMINIMAL1300:05
19. 19CLUB PUNCHTight, dry club kick — tail ≈ 190 ms, sub ≈ 53 HzMINIMAL1300:05
20. 20BERGHAINTight, dry club kick — tail ≈ 490 ms, sub ≈ 50 HzMINIMAL1300:05
21. 21ROLL TIGHTShort kick for rolling patterns — tail ≈ 70 ms, sub ≈ 30 HzROLL1300:05
22. 22ROLL SHARPShort kick for rolling patterns — tail ≈ 70 ms, sub ≈ 30 HzROLL1300:05
23. 23ROLL DEEPShort kick for rolling patterns — tail ≈ 90 ms, sub ≈ 49 HzROLL1300:05
24. 24SUB FOCUSDeep, sub-focused kick — tail ≈ 450 ms, sub ≈ 44 HzDEEP1300:05
25. 25DEEP MELODICDeep, sub-focused kick — tail ≈ 690 ms, sub ≈ 45 HzDEEP1300:05
26. 26SOFT DEEPDeep, sub-focused kick — tail ≈ 840 ms, sub ≈ 45 HzDEEP1300:05
27. 27ACID GLIDECharacter kick — tail ≈ 320 ms, sub ≈ 51 HzCHAR1300:05
28. 28REVERSE BLOOMCharacter kick — tail ≈ 1000 ms, sub ≈ 45 HzCHAR1300:05
29. 29WAREHOUSECharacter kick — tail ≈ 570 ms, sub ≈ 49 HzCHAR1300:05
30. 30CLICK MINIMALCharacter kick — tail ≈ 90 ms, sub ≈ 55 HzCHAR1300:05
31. 31909 SLAMPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 200 ms, sub ≈ 51 Hz9091300:05
32. 32909 CLICKYPunchy club kick — tail ≈ 120 ms, sub ≈ 53 Hz9091300:05
33. 33808 TIGHTRound sub kick — tail ≈ 370 ms, sub ≈ 46 Hz8081300:05
34. 34HARD SCOOPHard, driven kick — tail ≈ 240 ms, sub ≈ 50 HzHARD1300:05
35. 35NOISE INDUSTRIALHard, driven kick — tail ≈ 430 ms, sub ≈ 49 HzHARD1300:05
36. 36RUMBLE SUBKick with a built-in rumble tail — tail ≈ 1240 ms, sub ≈ 44 HzRUMBLE1300:05
37. 37MINIMAL DRYTight, dry club kick — tail ≈ 100 ms, sub ≈ 55 HzMINIMAL1300:05
38. 38CLUB WARMTight, dry club kick — tail ≈ 230 ms, sub ≈ 51 HzMINIMAL1300:05
39. 39ROLL SOFTShort kick for rolling patterns — tail ≈ 70 ms, sub ≈ 80 HzROLL1300:05
40. 40SUB RUMBLEDeep, sub-focused kick — tail ≈ 1520 ms, sub ≈ 42 HzDEEP1300:05
41. 41DEEP PUNCHDeep, sub-focused kick — tail ≈ 390 ms, sub ≈ 48 HzDEEP1300:05
42. 42TECHNO CLASSICCharacter kick — tail ≈ 240 ms, sub ≈ 51 HzCHAR1300:05
43. 43WAREHOUSE TIGHTCharacter kick — tail ≈ 350 ms, sub ≈ 51 HzCHAR1300:05
44. 44REVERSE RISECharacter kick — tail ≈ 1570 ms, sub ≈ 44 HzCHAR1300:05

What is inside a hit

The pictures below show one hit of five different designs: the waveform on top, the spectrogram (frequency on a logarithmic axis, 20 Hz to 2 kHz) below, and the three segments shaded on the time axis exactly as FUSION shows them.

03Quick start

1. Drop TT-KICK from your effects browser onto a track (REAPER 7.x; it is an instrument — feed it MIDI).
2. Play instantly: the factory state is pure SYNTH on all three lanes — press a note (or switch the built-in player on) and a complete kick sounds with no kit loaded.
3. Use your own samples: run one of the TT-KICK Load Kit actions (section 10) with the TT-KICK window focused (or its track selected) and assign one file per slot — that instance loads the kit at once. Or click a lane's CAP and record a source straight into the slot (section 07).
4. Watch the FUSION row for the assembled result, shape the master rack (section 08), dial in the player (section 09), pick a preset (section 11).

04The three segments

The lane header carries the segment title plus Mute, Solo and MAXimize. Below it sit the SYNTH|SAMPLE switch, REV (reverse), CAP (record into the slot, section 07), RAND (randomize the lane within musical bounds — CTRL+click resets it to INIT) and a GAIN fader (0–200 %). The START and LENGTH flags cut the sample window — on SYNTH lanes there is no start offset and the LENGTH flag sets the window duration against a per-type maximum (60 ms transient / 500 ms body / 2000 ms tail). The crossfade diamonds (0–100 ms) at the window edges edit two independent fades: the right-edge diamond is the lane's XF-OUT (its exit fade into the next segment — on the TAIL it doubles as the kick's fade-out), the left-edge diamond of lanes 2/3 is that lane's XF-IN (the entry side of the same boundary). A shared boundary fades over the minimum of the previous lane's XF-OUT, the following lane's XF-IN and both window durations. Empty or unplayable slots simply drop out of the chain — the remaining segments play on.

The status line under each waveform shows the file name plus S/L/XF values on SAMPLE, or the engine name plus F/C/XF values on SYNTH (section 06) — with the DUR (REC) check right-aligned in the same row. A muted lane is dimmed, title included; an engaged lane filter warns FILTER ON in the compact view (the knobs only exist in EXPERT mode). White lines inside a box are the playheads of sounding voices; a kick trigger fires up to three chained spans, and the 24-voice pool keeps about 8 kicks overlapping before stealing — enough for long tails at every player rate up to 1/8 at 174 BPM (stolen voices get a 64-frame fade-out, never a hard cut).

Mute / Solo (M / S)

The M and S buttons in every lane header are always visible — also on collapsed strips. Mute takes its lane out of the kick chain; Solo leaves only the soloed lanes playing (any solo drops all non-soloed lanes like mutes, and mute wins over solo on the same lane). The FUSION row follows the gate — it closes the chain without the excluded lanes — while each lane's own DUR readout stays. The gate applies to triggered kicks only: CAP recording and lane audition ignore it, so a muted lane can still be captured into or previewed. CTRL+click returns a button to its default (off). Solo lights warning-orange when active.

Lane maximize (MAX)

MAX blows one lane up to fill the whole lane area: its controls move into a toolbar row and the waveform box grows to full width and height for precise flag, diamond and zoom work (the EXPERT knob row stays on board). The other two lanes collapse to thin strips showing title, M/S, MAX and a short SYNTH/SAMPLE + DUR info. Click a strip — or its own MAX — to switch the maximized lane; MAX on the big lane returns to the three-lane view. The state is a pure view setting: it is not saved with the project and never enters the undo ring.

EXPERT mode — the knob row

The EXPERT switch next to MAIN|SYS (saved with the project, kept across presets and undo like the tooltip switch) reveals an indented row of eleven knobs under every lane. The waveform box shrinks to make room. Slots 0–3 hold the lane's engine parameters on SYNTH lanes — F0/F1 (logarithmic sweep start/target, per-type ranges), then NOISE on S1, CURVE on S2 and DRIFT+ROOM on S3 — and read NO ENGINE KNOBS (SAMPLE) on SAMPLE lanes. Slots 4–10 are the same on every lane and mode: PITCH (±24 st detune), LEN (window length — SYNTH shows milliseconds, SAMPLE per-mille of the slot), OFFSET (start of the lane on the time axis, in ms — see the next section), XF-IN and XF-OUT (the split boundary fades, 0–100 ms; XF-IN on S1 is locked dim — the chain head has no predecessor and the kick head always gets a short anti-click fade), and the lane filter CUT/RES (below). Drag a knob vertically (120 px = full travel, SHIFT = fine), CTRL+click resets it; all values are drawn under the knob and freeze into the trigger snapshot like every span parameter.

The time axis and OFFSET

The three lanes sit on one output time axis. Without OFFSET, a lane starts where the lane before it ends, minus the shared crossfade of that boundary: the two overlap by exactly the fade length. OFFSET moves the start of a lane from that place, in milliseconds with 0.1 ms steps (default 0).

• Positive — the lane starts later. If the offset is bigger than the crossfade, a gap of silence opens between the two lanes (the earlier lane fades out, nothing plays, the later lane fades in). The fade lengths stay the ones of the boundary (min(XF-OUT, XF-IN, both durations)).
• Negative — the lane starts earlier and overlaps the lane before it more than the crossfade alone would. It never starts before the lane before it. Where the lane before it is already short (for example S1 at 6 ms), a negative OFFSET on the next lane has nothing left to give.
• S1 (the head of the chain) has no lane before it: its OFFSET runs 0…+100 ms and delays the whole kick, silence in front. S2 and S3 run −100…+100 ms.
• Every lane after a moved lane moves with it, because each one is placed relative to the end of the one before. The total length shown in FUSION and WAVE includes the offsets, and FIT LENGTH TO counts them.
• For synth lanes the hand-over of the oscillator phase uses the frames the earlier lane has really played at the start of the next one, so a phase-continuous boundary stays phase-continuous with any OFFSET.

With OFFSET 0 on all lanes the kick is bit-for-bit the same as before the control existed, and projects saved without it load with 0. OFFSET is part of the lane state: it is saved with the project, restored by undo, and stored in user presets (factory kicks are all at 0; the 14 lane presets and RAND leave it alone, while the lane preset INIT and CTRL+click on RAND reset the whole lane, OFFSET included). You can also drag it in the wave: in the WAVE page and in FUSION EXPAND every lane has a small start grip (a triangle) at the foot of the lane's start, one step higher per lane because S1 and S2 often start at the same point. Drag it sideways to set OFFSET, double-click or CTRL+click it for 0.

Lane filter (CUT / RES)

Each lane carries its own resonant low-pass — a 2-pole TPT state-variable design (the same math as the master FILTER stage): CUT sweeps 40 Hz–16 kHz exponentially, RES drives Q 0.5–8. The knobs only exist in EXPERT mode, but the filter keeps working in the compact view, which then flags LANE FILTER ACTIVE - SEE EXPERT. At the default (CUT fully open = 16 kHz, RES = 0) the stage is bypassed bit-exactly — no processing happens at all; just below the stop the wet amount eases in quadratically, so there is no level jump at the top of the travel. The state lives per voice: overlapping hits of the same lane never push each other through the filter and stay click-free — that is what distinguishes it from the master FILTER, which sees the summed output.

DUR / REC — the duration check

Every lane prints DUR <ms> (REC <lo>-<hi>) right-aligned in its status line: the segment's effective output duration — at reference pitch ROOT — next to the recommended range for its role (the REC column above); on a tight layout the (REC …) part shortens away first. DUR is green inside the range and orange outside; a slot that cannot play shows DUR -. On the INIT preset all three lanes read green: the factory synth windows are 6 / 100 / 280 ms (S1/S2/S3), inside their recommended ranges.

The FUSION row

Below the lanes, the FUSION row shows the kick exactly as the chain builds it at the ROOT note: the segments in sequence on the output time axis, the equal-power crossfade overlaps shaded behind them. It draws the real waveform, rendered from the lanes (see The wave view below); until the first preview is ready it shows envelope bars. The header prints the total length (FUSION - 312.5 MS). The row mirrors the M/S gate — muted or non-soloed lanes drop out and the chain closes without them. Three switches in the header choose the view:

• SUM (default) — the finished kick as one wave. Each moment is coloured by the lane that is loudest there, so you see where S1 hands over to S2 and S2 to S3.
• STACK — one row per lane at its real place in the kick, the sum underneath. The crossfade zones run through all rows.
• EXPAND — FUSION fills the whole lane area (the lanes are hidden while it is on). In SUM you get one big wave with the next player hit as a red line, in STACK tall rows with M / S, OPEN (back to MAIN with that lane maximized), DUR and GAIN per lane. In both you edit right in the wave: drag a lane's END flag to change its length (the lanes after it move along), drag a diamond at a lane border to set that crossfade (it sets XF-OUT of the earlier lane and XF-IN of the later one to the same value, 0–100 ms) and the diamond at the end for the fade-out of the kick. the start grip (triangle at the foot of a lane's start) moves that lane in time (OFFSET, double-click resets it). CTRL+click resets a flag, diamond or grip. A click on the SUM wave plays the kick, a click on a STACK row plays that lane.

FIT LENGTH TO / FIT NOW sit in the row's header. Choosing a note (1/1, 1/2, 1/4, 1/4T, 1/8, 1/8T, 1/16) scales the lane lengths of all playing lanes once, with one common factor, so the whole kick — the total shown in the title — lasts that note at the current host tempo (120 BPM if none is reported). The proportions between the lanes stay as they are and the crossfades are respected. Synth lanes stop at their type maximum (60 / 500 / 2000 ms), sample lanes at the end of their slot, so very long notes may fall short. Later tempo changes do not rescale anything; FIT NOW applies the selected note again after you edited lanes or changed the tempo. Muted lanes are left untouched, and the change is a normal undoable edit.

AUTO (left of FIT LENGTH TO, saved per instance; not the OPTIONS zoom) fits automatically: while it is on, every preset load — arrows, list or user slot — fits the new kick to the selected note at the current tempo, in the same undo step as the load. Switch it off to keep presets exactly as stored.

The wave view

TT-KICK shows the real waveform of every lane and of the finished kick. It is rendered in the background from the lanes, with the same chain, crossfades and phase hand-over as the sound, at velocity 127 and at the ROOT note — before the master section, so FILTER, DRIVE, CLIP and OUT GAIN are not in it (the OUT SCOPE shows the output after them). No hit is needed: after every edit the preview renders again within a fraction of a second (a 0.3 s kick takes about 0.25 s, long tails up to about 0.5 s). It does not change the sound in any way. The three lanes keep their colours everywhere — S1 lime, S2 the accent colour, S3 mint in the ACID scheme; the colours follow OPTIONS > colour scheme.

Lane boxes: ENV / WAVE / BOTH

Every lane header has three small switches for its wave box. ENV shows the pitch and level curves of a SYNTH lane, the sample of a SAMPLE lane. WAVE shows the rendered wave of this lane, as it sounds inside the kick (with its fades). BOTH (default) draws the wave dimmed with the curves on top. The wave sits in the lane window, so zoom, skew, pan and the flags work as before; a reversed lane shows its wave the way the window plays. A muted lane still shows its wave, dimmed, rendered on its own.

The WAVE page

The WAVE tab in the header (between MAIN and SYS) shows the whole kick on one time line, like a dedicated kick editor; the player, master rack and scope stay on the right.

• The wave — S1, S2 and S3 sit as coloured bands behind the kick. SUM draws the finished kick coloured by the loudest lane, LAYERS the three lane waves on top of each other. A red line marks the next hit of the player at its RATE and the host tempo — you see at once whether the tail runs into the next kick.
• Editing — END flags and crossfade diamonds work as in FUSION EXPAND. A click selects the lane under the mouse and plays the kick.
• Zoom — the mouse wheel zooms around the pointer, SHIFT+wheel scrolls, dragging the background scrolls a zoomed view, FIT shows the kick and the next hit again. The overview strip under the wave shows the visible part as a frame; click or drag it to move there.
• LUPE — a magnifier for the first 20 ms (the transient and the S1 > S2 crossfade, only a few pixels wide on the full kick). Switch it off with LUPE; it hides while you are zoomed in closer than 60 ms.
• Segment strip — below the wave, the tabs S1 / S2 / S3 pick a lane. The strip has the lane's own controls (SYNTH/SAMPLE, REV, CAP, RAND, GAIN, M / S, the lane preset browser), its readout and DUR, the EXPERT knob row (always open here) and the lane alone on its own time scale, normalised to its peak. START / END / XF / PEAK on the left tell where the lane sits in the kick. The PEAK readout under the wave is the level of the rendered kick before the master; above 0 dB it turns orange.

All view switches (ENV/WAVE/BOTH, SUM/STACK, EXPAND, LAYERS, LUPE and the page) are saved per instance and never create an undo step. Lengths and crossfades you drag in the wave are normal, undoable edits.

05Editing conventions

• Drag the START/LENGTH flags in a lane to cut the sample window. START is SAMPLE-only — on SYNTH lanes the LENGTH flag sets the window duration against the type maximum.
• Diamond markers set the crossfades: the diamond at a window's right edge is that lane's XF-OUT (its fade into the next segment), the diamond at the left edge of lanes 2/3 is that lane's XF-IN — the same boundary handled from the entry side (0–100 ms each; the boundary fades over the smaller of the two).
• Lane zoom: every lane has its own zoom bar — under GAIN in the normal view, at the right end of the tool row in a maximized lane. - and + zoom out and in around the middle (1× to 64×), the readout next to them shows the factor. FIT (ZOOM FIT, lit while on) makes the view follow the lane window: the window fills the box with a small margin and the view adapts when LEN or START change. Any manual zoom or scroll switches FIT off; click it again to snap back. While zoomed, a scroll bar under the wave moves the view (click to jump, drag the thumb).
• Mouse wheel zooms horizontally around the pointer (up to 64×), CTRL + wheel scrolls a zoomed view, Shift + wheel skews the waveform vertically (up to 16×) — a Z/SK readout in the box corner of a SAMPLE lane reports the factors — and dragging the dimmed background pans a zoomed view.
• Millisecond ruler: every wave box — the normal lanes, a maximized lane and the FUSION row — draws vertical scale lines in the background. The tick spacing follows the zoom on a 1-2-5 ladder (0.5 / 1 / 2 / 5 / 10 / 25 / 50 / 100 / 250 / 500 / 1000 / 2500 ms, at least 55 px apart), with fainter half-alpha intermediate lines when there is room. Integer ms labels sit at the bottom edge, and the lane start is drawn as the stronger line. The ruler shares the waveform's mapping, so zoom, skew and pan move content and scale together.
• Click the waveform to select the segment (acid frame) — releasing without a drag auditions it solo; on SYNTH lanes you hear the engine itself. A pan drag never fires the audition, and the audition ignores the M/S gate.
• Drag an EXPERT knob vertically to change it — the value follows the movement relative to where you grabbed it (120 px = full travel); holding SHIFT gives a 4× finer ratio. A click without movement changes nothing. The mouse wheel steps it too: one unit per notch on short ranges (PITCH, XF-IN/OUT, the narrow F0/F1 ranges), 2 % of the travel per notch on the long ones (LEN, CUT, RES, NOISE/CURVE/DRIFT/ROOM, wide F0/F1 — on the log scale).
• Mouse wheel on the other controls: the master knobs and the lane GAIN / SWING sliders move 2 % of their travel per notch, the RATE and CLIP combos step one entry, the lane preset name box steps the lane bank.
• CTRL+click resets almost everything: all master and lane faders (incl. SWING), the START/END flags, the crossfade diamonds, every EXPERT knob and the M/S buttons return to their default — one shared default table feeds both the reset and the INIT state, so they can never diverge. CTRL+click on RAND resets the whole lane to INIT.
• Hover any control for a short tooltip in a floating panel (English, up to three lines — CTRL lines highlight in acid). Every control of the front has one, including the preset bar, the OPTIONS button and the read-only displays (trigger LED, kit status, player status, meters, scope, FUSION row). Tooltips stay out of the way while you drag and can be switched off with OPTIONS > TOOLTIPS ON / OFF (saved with the project); the SYS page's INTERFACE section only shows that state.
• Edits never disturb a sounding kick — the span parameters (window, fades, gain, pitch, curve) are frozen at trigger time and apply to the next hit. The exception are the small synth parameters NOISE, DRIFT and ROOM (section 06), which are read live.
• Every ended drag or button edit pushes one undo state (section 11), and so does every mouse-wheel step that changes a value; pure view changes (zoom, skew, pan, lane selection, page, lane maximize, the wave view switches ENV/WAVE/BOTH, SUM/STACK, EXPAND, LAYERS, LUPE) never create one. Each pushed state also gives REAPER an undo point (Edit FX), so the project is marked as changed.

06Synth engines & phase

The three engines are tuned to their segment role:

• S1 TRANSIENT — click oscillator + noise burst: a sine click with a fast internal decay, blended with a noise burst. The noise is a deterministic position hash, so every trigger renders bit-identically.
• S2 BODY — pitch-envelope oscillator: the core of the kick; the frequency glides from F0 to F1 across the window along the curve set by C (0–1000 ‰ → exponent 0.125…16; 500 ≈ the classic kick sweep).
• S3 TAIL — sine + drift + room: a sustained sine under a slow amplitude drift (≈5–14 Hz), plus a room component — a slightly detuned beating copy and a noise share that lives in the decay.

A SYNTH lane draws the engine's frequency trajectory F0 → F1 inside the window (bright curve) over its dim internal amplitude envelope, labelled CLICK OSC + NOISE BURST, PITCH-ENV OSCILLATOR or SINE + DRIFT + ROOM. The readout <F0>><F1> HZ  <note>><note>  <dur> MS  PHASE LINK sits in the box, and the status line below shows ENGINE: <name>  F <f0>><f1>  C <curve>  XF <ms> MS.

PHASE LINK is the phase-coherence badge: chained synth segments share one phase trajectory — the oscillator phase is a closed-form function of position, so a successor starts at the exact phase its predecessor holds at the boundary and the fusion stays click-free and tight. The chain head, and a synth segment following a sample, start at phase 0 by convention; a per-segment phase offset (PH) exists in the serialized state. A reversed synth segment runs the same trajectory backwards. Keytrack and the played note scale the engine frequencies — window durations stay absolute in time. The per-lane PITCH knob (section 04) detunes a single engine ±24 st on top of keytrack.

07Capture (CAP)

Each lane carries a CAP button (next to REV) that records the plug-in's audio input straight into that lane's sample slot — no file dialog, no disk, no Lua. Capture ignores the M/S gate: a muted lane can be recorded into, and the audition of its result plays regardless.

1. Click CAP on a lane — the waveform box blinks REC ARMED - PLAY YOUR SOURCE and the input is now monitored at the output so you can aim.
2. Play the source into the plug-in's audio input (the track's input or items before it on the track). Recording starts when the mono input exceeds −40 dBFS for three consecutive samples — the two samples just before the threshold crossing are kept, so the attack is not cut.
3. Recording stops after 8 s, after 1 s of silence (with at least 0.2 s captured), or at the bank limit at very high sample rates — the silent tail is trimmed back, a 32-frame fade is applied, and the lane switches to SAMPLE automatically.
4. Clicking CAP again on the armed/recording lane aborts (discards). Arming another lane moves the arm; a running recording is never interrupted by a different lane.

Outside an armed/active capture the input is not passed through and the instrument stays bit-identical to a pure kick generator — silent on MIDI-only tracks. If the extended memory is unavailable (embedded/limited hosts) the button shows N/A instead of arming.

08Master rack

All stage switches and faders are click-free — every change glides over a ~20 ms slew, and bypassed stages keep tracking the live signal so re-engaging never jumps. Every fader resets to its factory value on CTRL+click (the shared default table, section 05).

09Player & MIDI

• MIDI: a note-on triggers the whole segment chain — the note sets the pitch relative to ROOT (when keytrack is on), velocity sets the level. Note-off is ignored (one-shot), CC 120/123 kill all voices, and everything else (CC, pitch bend, clock) passes through.
• PLAYER: the built-in 4/4 player fires the chain at ROOT pitch on the rate grid — 1/1, 1/2, 1/4 or 1/8 — at a constant velocity (every kick equally loud). SYNC follows the project timeline: it plays only while the transport runs and re-anchors on real position jumps (SYNCED BAR n.m). FREE RUN ignores the transport state — it still runs at the host tempo (FREE RUN n BPM, 120 BPM if none is reported).
• SWING shifts the off-grid (odd) eighths later by SWING/200 of an eighth — 66.7 % lands exactly on the triplet point (TT-303 convention: on-grid eighths stay strict). At rates 1/1–1/4 every hit sits on an on-grid eighth, so swing is deliberately inaudible there. CTRL+click on the fader returns it to 0 %.
• BPM→ms reference: the panel prints a live note-length table for the host tempo — 1/4 @ 125.0 = 480.0 MS with the 1/2 and 1/8 values below — so segment lengths and crossfades can be tuned against the groove.
• ROOT & DETECT: ROOT is the keytrack base (−/+ steppers with a note readout). DETECT is a one-shot autocorrelation of the BODY segment — the loaded window on SAMPLE, the settled fundamental at the window's end on SYNTH. The result line reports the source (SMP/SYN), the detected note, the cent offset, Hz and a CONFidence percentage; ROOT is written only at CONF ≥ 30 %, otherwise the panel answers NO BODY SIGNAL instead of guessing. An octave guard picks the first strong correlation peak rather than a subharmonic.
• KEYTRK: the global keytrack switch — OFF pins every note to ROOT (factor 1 on any key), and the header flags KTRK OFF.
• Header readouts: a TRIG LED with the last note and its source (MIDI/PLAYER/LANE), and the kit state (KIT n/3).

10Sample kits & loaders

JSFX has no file dialogs, so kit assignment runs through companion ReaScripts. A loader sends the kit to one TT-KICK instance: the TT-KICK window that has (or last had) the focus, otherwise the first TT-KICK on the selected track. So every instance can carry its own kit. The script waits for the instance to confirm (it then reports the track) and adds one undo point TT-KICK: assign kit. If the instance does not answer (audio engine stopped, FX bypassed or offline), it loads the kit as soon as it runs again. Each file is resampled to the project rate, mixed to mono and capped at 20 s per slot. The assigned paths travel inside the project — after a reload the WAVs are pulled from the stored paths again. A new instance starts without a kit (it plays the synth lanes). The protocol carries 255 characters per path: a longer path is rejected with a message naming the slot (that slot keeps its previous sample), and if no slot can be loaded nothing is sent and no undo point is set.

Install the scripts once via Actions → Show action list → New action → Load ReaScript, then run them from the action list (or bind them to keys/toolbar).

11Presets, undo, system page

Preset bar & user bank

The bar loads and saves the whole kick in one step: all lane and segment data of the three lanes (including the lane preset assignments), the master rack (filter, drive, clipper, output) and the player head (rate, sync, root, swing, keytrack) — exactly what a factory preset replaces. Not part of a preset: the kit paths (sample assignments stay), the colour scheme (OPTIONS), the player ON switch, the page, the lane selection and the TOOLTIPS / EXPERT switches. The lane view (zoom, skew, scroll position and ZOOM FIT) is stored with a user preset and comes back when you load it, but changing it never marks a preset as modified. Factory presets and INIT open with ZOOM FIT on all three lanes. Presets load with UNDO like every other edit. A running player keeps running when you load a factory preset or INIT; a factory preset still sets rate, sync, swing and keytrack, but leaves your ROOT note alone (it belongs to your kit and the DETECT result, not to the sound design); INIT is the way back to the factory state and still resets ROOT to C2. User presets load ROOT exactly as saved, and so does a project. With keytrack on, MIDI notes are transposed relative to ROOT: the factory presets are tuned so that C2 plays the designed pitch, with another ROOT it is the ROOT key that does. The built-in player always fires at ROOT and is not affected.

Where the user bank lives. Plug-ins cannot write files, so the 32 user slots are part of the plug-in state: they are saved with the project, with FX-chain and track-template copies, and in every REAPER preset of this plug-in (the + button in the FX window toolbar). To take your bank to another project or computer, save a REAPER preset once (+ → Save preset) and load it there: the whole bank comes with it.

Typing names. REAPER keeps Space for the transport, so type Shift+Space for a blank. Depending on your REAPER settings Esc closes the whole FX window; use CANCEL instead. (The + menu of the FX window also has Send all keyboard input to plug-in.)

The factory bank holds INIT (the factory state) plus 44 designs in eight families: 909 (7), 808 (4), HARD (6), RUMBLE (5), MINIMAL (6), DEEP (5), ROLL (4) and CHAR (7 — glide, reverse, warehouse and classic characters). Every one of them is purely synthesized — license-free, and they sound with no kit loaded; each candidate has a short transient, a pitch-swept body and a tail designed for its style. Level and mix balance were checked on real REAPER renders, but a kick always has to work with your bass line, so judge the presets in your own arrangement. On the SYSTEM page the FACTORY PRESETS panel still groups the collection into tabs: pick a family, click a name to load it (the bar follows).

Choose a tail for the groove: ROLL and dry MINIMAL sounds leave short gaps for fast patterns; 909 and CLUB sounds are balanced starting points. The long 808, DEEP, RUMBLE and REVERSE designs are intentional effects. At faster tempos or with a continuous bass line, shorten S3 TAIL or make space for it in the bass arrangement. REVERSE BLOOM and REVERSE RISE run S3 backward. Check the kick with bass and hats at your actual project tempo.

Factory kicks at a glance

Every factory kick as a waveform of its first 900 ms, grouped by family, with the measured tail length (time until the hit has dropped 40 dB below its peak) and the sub frequency of the body. The numbers are measured on the rendered hit, they are not preset settings.

The names describe a style, not a promise: use them as starting points and bend them with the lanes, the EXPERT knobs and the master rack.

Lane preset browsers

Every lane header carries its own small preset browser — < n/14 NAME > on the right. The three lanes have three independent banks of 14 lane presets each, one level below the factory kicks: S1 holds attacks and clicks (NEEDLE, RIM CLICK, METAL EDGE …), S2 tonal bodies (TIGHT 909, ACID GLIDE, 808 ROUND …) and S3 tails (STUB, TECH TAIL, HEAVY SUB …). The banks are ordered by character: S1 from dark to bright, S2 and S3 from short to long. The arrows step through the lane's bank, the mouse wheel steps too, and clicking the name opens the lane's list:

A lane preset is a recipe for exactly that lane: it sets the 16 engine parameters of the segment (level, pitch, length, fades, phase, sweep, curve, noise/drift/room, the lane filter) and switches the lane to SYNTH — your sample window, MUTE/SOLO and everything else stay untouched; the lane's zoom switches to ZOOM FIT so the new window is in view. Position 0 = INIT resets the lane to the factory state (CTRL+click on the name does the same). After loading, the usual edit rules apply: dragging any lane control (or running DETECT) adds an asterisk * in the name box — the entry is modified since load. The starred state survives save and reload, and UNDO walks lane preset changes back like any other step.

The whole state rides in @serialize (blob 'KICK' v8, 994 words, followed by the user bank). UNDO (header and SYSTEM page) walks back through the last 20 edit states: a snapshot is pushed when a drag or a button edit ends — preset changes included. Lane view (zoom/skew/pan, maximize), segment selection, the current page and the interface switches never enter the ring, and there is deliberately no redo.

The SYSTEM page (MAIN|SYS tabs in the header) hosts the factory preset row, the undo depth readout (n/20 SAVED), a short export guide, the INTERFACE section and the status block. INTERFACE shows the TOOLTIPS ON/OFF state (switched in the OPTIONS box; saved with the project, default on) next to a compact recap of the editing conventions — hover hints, CTRL+click reset, RAND and MAX. Both interface settings are pure view settings: EXPERT (header) and TOOLTIPS are serialized but kept out of the undo diff and survive preset changes untouched. The status block lists sample rate, serialize format, sample RAM incl. the undo head, kit slots, last trigger source and note, player/swing/keytrack state — plus a navigation hint and build info.

12Exporting a kick

Select the track holding TT-KICK, put the edit cursor at the start (or make a time selection), then run TT-KICK Export Kick.lua from the action list. The script fires a single trigger note at the current ROOT pitch across the export range — the time selection, or four bars from the cursor — and renders it in place through the track's FX chain ("Item: apply track/take FX"). The resulting audio item is named TTKICK_<preset>.wav after the last loaded factory preset (kick as fallback): the REAPER-native equivalent of drag & drop export — drag the item wherever you need it. Cursor position, time selection and your item selection are restored.

13Options / Color

Options / Color. The OPTIONS button opens the box; COLOR offers ten schemes: ACID, CYAN, ORANGE, MAGENTA, YELLOW, RED, BLUE, VIOLET, MINT and ICE. A scheme changes the accent colour (active switches, knob rings, waveforms, LEDs), the warning colour (a DUR outside its target range, SOLO) and, for RED to ICE, the slightly tinted panel background of the whole front at once — on both pages (MAIN and SYS) and in EXPERT mode. The choice applies per plug-in instance, is saved with the project and with FX-chain copies, and is not touched by factory presets, lane presets, RAND or undo. The factory colour is ACID (the classic acid green). The colour is stored in the hidden slider 65 (UI Color, 0–9); it is the third listed parameter after the two Lua mirrors.

TOOLTIPS ON / OFF sits at the right of the OPTIONS box's title bar. Every control of the front shows a tooltip after you hover it briefly; the switch turns them off for this instance and is saved with the project. The SYS page just shows its state.

FONT SIZE scales the two font slots independently: FONT 1 (TITLE) is the panel/headline slot, FONT 2 (TEXT) feeds all four text slots — each steps −4…+8 around the kit default (+0). CUSTOM COLOR overrides a scheme per target: pick FONT 1, FONT 2 or BG (panel background) and drag the HSV field and the hue strip; the preview swatch on the right shows the current pick, the label under the box names the active scheme. RESET clears the selected target back to the scheme, RESET ALL clears every override and both font steps. Font steps and custom colours are also per instance and ride in the same serialized style block — presets, RAND and undo never touch them either.

Font steps above +2: the TT-KICK front has a fixed grid of rows; from step +3 on, texts would run into their neighbours. The front therefore draws with at most +2 for FONT 1 and FONT 2, even if OPTIONS is set higher (the setting itself is kept and shown as chosen). For a bigger front use UI SIZE, which scales everything together.

14Recipes & quick reference

Four ways to start

• From a factory kick. Load a preset from the family closest to your genre, press a note and look at the FUSION row. Change one lane at a time: S2 BODY decides the weight, S1 TRANSIENT the click, S3 TAIL how long the kick rings.
• Your own click on a synth body. Set S1 to SAMPLE and load or capture a short click, keep S2 and S3 on SYNTH. Cut the sample window with the START and LENGTH flags so it ends before the body takes over, then set the crossfade diamond between S1 and S2 until the hand-over is smooth.
• Fit the tail to the groove. Switch the player on, open the WAVE page and watch the red line: it marks the next hit. If the tail runs past it, shorten S3 or choose a note in FIT LENGTH TO and let AUTO keep every loaded preset in tempo.
• Record a source. Click CAP on a lane, play a hit into the track input and the recording lands in the slot by itself. Bounce what you want to keep with the Export action, because captures are not saved with the project.

Quick reference

15Release notes

TT-KICK 1.1.0 adds OFFSET per lane (see The time axis and OFFSET): the start of every lane can be moved on the time axis, in milliseconds, with an EXPERT knob and a grip in the WAVE page and FUSION EXPAND. At 0 the kick sounds exactly as in 1.0.x. TT-KICK 1.0.0 was the first release; the sound engine was verified by measurement, the front, the loader scripts and the state handling were checked in REAPER.

• Sound: three sequential lanes with phase-coherent synth engines or samples (loaded or captured live), equal-power crossfades, master rack with filter, drive and clipper, 24 voices, INIT plus 44 factory kicks, 14 curated lane presets per lane.
• Editing: EXPERT knobs incl. OFFSET, lane filter, mute / solo, RAND, lane maximize, 20-step undo, CTRL+click reset and tooltips on every control.
• Wave view: the real waveform of every lane and of the finished kick, FUSION SUM / STACK / EXPAND with draggable flags and diamonds, the WAVE page with the next player hit, LAYERS and LUPE; FIT LENGTH TO with AUTO.
• Workflow: built-in 4/4 player (SYNC / FREE RUN, swing), DETECT ROOT, 32-slot user bank in the project and in REAPER presets, loader actions per instance (Load Kit, Folder, from Items, Recent Kits) and the Export action; scripts can hand lane sounds to one instance through the hidden Lane request parameter (section 11).
• Front: ten colour schemes, font sizes, UI SIZE 25–400 % with AUTO FIT.

Known limits

• The per-segment phase offset (PH) is serialized and written by presets and undo; the front has no control for it.
• Capture is volatile (RAM only, never serialized) and capped at 8 s — ~7.3 s at 192 kHz, less at 384 kHz; the button shows N/A if the extended memory is unavailable.
• Kit assignment needs the Lua actions — there is intentionally no in-plugin file dialog. Kits loaded with the plain TT-KICK Load Kit do not appear in Recent Kits (no folder copy). The undo ring has no redo.
• The wave preview renders a kick up to about 10 s; a longer chain is cut off in the preview only (the sound is not affected).
• A seek from a bar line that has just fired onto another bar line within 0.02 of an eighth (about 5 ms at 120 BPM) cannot be told apart from a loop wrap and counts as the same transition.
• With strongly overlapping lanes (long crossfades) the total length is not strictly monotonic in the FIT scale factor; FIT NOW then lands within about 0.5 ms of the nearest reachable length instead of exactly on the note.
• Layout and legibility below 100 % UI size are not tuned (AUTO FIT still works down to 25 %, the function is kept).

16Troubleshooting

• A loader reports that TT-KICK did not answer or found no TT-KICK — click into the TT-KICK window (or select its track) and run it again; the audio engine must be running.
• A loader says Path longer than 255 characters — that slot was skipped and keeps its previous sample; move the WAV to a shorter path and load it again.
• EMPTY SLOT - ASSIGN WITH TT-KICK Load Kit.lua — the slot has no path; LOAD ERROR - NOT A READABLE WAV/AIFF — the assigned file is unreadable or the path moved; reassign via a loader.
• DETECT: NO BODY SIGNAL — the body is too quiet or toneless (confidence under 30 %); BODY TOO SHORT — lengthen the body window; LOADING - TRY AGAIN — a kit scan is still running.
• Orange DUR values — the segment sits outside its recommended range; fine if deliberate. On INIT all lanes read green (the factory windows are 6/100/280 ms, inside their ranges).
• Player shows SYNC - WAITING FOR TRANSPORT — SYNC mode only plays while the transport runs; switch to FREE RUN for an always-on beat.
• CAP shows N/A — the host denied the extended sample memory; capturing is unavailable, everything else still works.
• A recording never starts — the input must exceed −40 dBFS at the plug-in's pins: check that audio actually reaches the track input or items before the FX (MIDI-only tracks carry no audio).
• A lane stays silent — check its M/S buttons first (a muted or non-soloed lane drops out of the chain; audition still plays it), then its SYNTH|SAMPLE state (SAMPLE needs a loaded slot or a committed capture), its window length, and the master OUT gain; KTRK OFF in the header is only a reminder that every note sounds at ROOT pitch.
• A lane sounds darker than expected — its lane filter may be engaged: the compact view flags FILTER ON; open EXPERT and set CUT fully right / RES to 0 (or CTRL+click both) to bypass it bit-exactly.

UI Size & Saved Options

Updated in v1.1.0. New instances open at 125% UI size for clearer text. The controls and text are redrawn at the selected size; the colour scheme and background retain their appearance.

Open OPTIONS and choose UI SIZE: 100% / 125% / 150% / 200% / 300%, or click the percentage field and enter a whole number from 25 to 400. Enter or a click outside the field applies it; Escape cancels the edit. Values outside the range are limited to the nearest supported value.

AUTO FIT. When you drag the edge of the FX window, the front rescales to the new window size (the largest whole percentage that shows the whole front, 25 to 400 %) and the scrollbars disappear. The UI SIZE buttons and the percentage field still set a fixed size, which stays until you change the window again. AUTO FIT ON / OFF in the UI SIZE row of OPTIONS switches the rescaling off for this instance; the setting is saved with the project. Switching it on fits the front to the current window at once.

If the enlarged front exceeds the host window, use the horizontal and vertical scrollbars to reach every control. The mouse wheel over a scrollbar moves that view. OPTIONS stays visible at the upper right. You can also enlarge the REAPER FX window to show more of the front.

All OPTIONS settings are saved per instance: UI size, colour scheme, title and text font sizes, custom title/text/background colours, colour-picker target, and TOOLTIPS ON / OFF. Closing and reopening the FX window keeps them; saving and reopening the project restores them. They also travel with FX chains and native REAPER FX presets. Save the project to keep changes between sessions.

The sound presets in the plugin's own preset bar retain the instance's appearance settings. Older projects and style blocks remain readable; projects that predate UI SIZE use the new 125% default.