Forums ← Software ← Recipe for Vutu analysis

Analyzing a sound with Vutu to make a partials map is a complicated process. While some sounds open up right away, it can be hard to find the combination of control settings that reproduces your sound in 64 partials or fewer.

I have one video I made about the topic a long time ago, but I've never found the time to write up a good guide.

Enter Sumu user @pete12000, who uploaded the transcript of my video and the manual into ChatGPT. It generated this summary that I think is a good general-purpose recipe for analyzing a sound. Thanks Pete!

The Six Knobs: Balancing Sound Quality vs. Staying Under 64 Partials

1) Resolution (Hz)

What it controls: The minimum spacing (in Hz) between any two partials in the output.

What you'll hear/see when changing it:

• Higher resolution value (bigger spacing) → fewer partials → easier to stay under 64, but it gets "bloopy and synthetic" fast.
• Lower value (tighter spacing) → more faithful (more partials captured) → you can blow past 64 if you're not careful.

Use it like this: Treat Resolution as a last-mile partial-count reducer after you've done smarter filtering with High/Low cut and Amp floor.

2) Window Width

What it controls: Turning it up "increases the resolution in time" of each sample.

What you'll hear/see:

• Often, higher window width = more convincing playback ("great fidelity") for that sample.
• But if window width is high, you can generate "peaky sounds" that can start to sound noisy, especially depending on Frequency drift.

Use it like this: Window width is a quality knob first (time/detail), but it can create analysis behavior that you then tame with Frequency drift.

3) High Cut

What it controls: The highest frequencies that will be reproduced (i.e., you're telling the analysis/export to ignore content above this cutoff).

Why it matters for the 64 limit: This is one of your best "free" ways to drop partial count. In the video, turning High cut way down makes the sound simpler and he points out it may take only 13 partials to play back.

Use it like this:

• Lower High cut until you just start to feel you're losing important brightness/detail, then bump it back up a bit.
• Especially effective on noisy, bright recordings where the top end would otherwise "spend" lots of partials.

4) Amp Floor (dB threshold)

What it controls: How quiet the source can be before it gets captured into a partial.

What you'll hear/see:

• Raise Amp floor → strips quiet detail → fewer partials active → often still "very intelligible," and can drop playback partials a lot.
• Lower Amp floor a lot (e.g., very negative) → "all the noise from the original file is being turned into partials." That can sound cool, but it burns your partial budget quickly.

Use it like this: This is your main anti-noise / anti-hiss control for staying under 64 without wrecking tone.

5) Low Cut

What it controls: Strips out the low frequencies (a low-frequency cutoff).

What you'll hear: He calls out the "telephone effect" when you push it up.

Use it like this:

• Use Low cut to remove rumble, mic handling noise, HVAC, proximity boom, etc.
• If the sample's "identity" lives in mids/highs (voice snippets, many found sounds), Low cut can reduce wasted partials while improving clarity.

6) Frequency Drift

What it controls: How quickly partials are allowed to move in frequency.

What you'll hear/see:

• With drift high, partials can move very quickly; with some settings (notably high Window width) that can contribute to a noisy character ("noisy fast motion in the partials").
• With drift lower, quickly-changing traces are removed, so it won't play back those rapid movements, which can smooth out the analysis.

Use it like this: Drift is your "stability/smoothing" knob:

• If the resynthesis feels jittery, fizzy, or overly busy → lower drift to suppress the fast-moving stuff.
• If your source genuinely has expressive pitch motion you want to keep → allow more drift (but watch Max active).

The Workflow: Fast Way to Stay Under 64 Without Trashing Fidelity

1. Reanalyze, then read the printout — especially Max active.

   • If Max active > 64, you can't export a Sumu-friendly result.

2. Do the "cheap wins" first (usually best quality-per-partial):

   • High cut down to remove expensive top-end clutter.
   • Low cut up to remove rumble/boom you don't need.
   • Amp floor up until noise stops becoming partials.

3. Then tune for fidelity:

   • Adjust Window width for the most convincing playback.

4. Only then use Resolution as the blunt instrument:

   • Nudge Resolution upward only enough to get Max active under 64 (because too high gets "bloopy/synthetic").

5. If the result is peaky/noisy/jittery:

   • Lower Frequency drift to remove fast-changing traces and smooth playback.