Synchro Hits is a trailer hits instrument for creating massive impact sounds for media, featuring synchronized hitpoint detection, three riser and hit channels, and extensive sound design controls.
Purpose and Core Concept
Synchro Hits is a thematic trailer hits library designed to build custom impact sounds for productions, games, and movies. It combines risers and hits to create colorful yet massive sounds, ranging from booms and impacts to smashing, knocking, punching, rumbling, kicking, and shooting effects.
The instrument comes with three riser and three hit channels, allowing layering of multiple sources for complex textures. With over 1GB of content, it includes 482 WAV files: 233 epic hits, 126 layers for customization, and 123 risers. This provides a broad palette for sound designers seeking unique, brutal, or even beautiful sounds.
Key Capabilities and Sound Design
Each source offers independent controls: a 3-band EQ, pitch shifting up to plus or minus 12 semitones, panning, and width adjustment. Sample selection can be randomized for both risers and hits, with parameter randomization for further variation. The hits section includes a release control and timing functions for synchronized hits.
Additionally, filter sweep controls allow shaping the sound over time, and separate FX chains for risers and hits include reverb, delay, and distortion. A global FX chain—with compressor, limiter, reverb, stereo, cabinet, and delay—applies final processing to the combined signal, offering deep sound design flexibility.
Workflow and Synchronization
Synchro Hits features an innovative hitpoint detection engine that synchronizes the effect’s hitpoint with project intervals. The engine detects when the next bar or half-bar will land, regardless of when a key is pressed, and automatically adjusts the riser’s start position so the hit lands exactly on time. This simplifies trailer scoring and cue creation.
The workflow involves selecting or randomizing riser and hit samples, adjusting individual filters and FX, then using the global chain to glue the sound. Snapshots—181 presets categorized into Big Hits, Singles, Low Booms, Jump Scares, and FX—provide quick starting points. Sound sources were recorded by destroying cars, walls, and custom drums, plus synthesized digitally.
Practical Applications and Limitations
Synchro Hits is suited for adding impact to movies, TV shows, games, trailers, and teasers. Its synchronized hitpoint detection is particularly useful for timing impacts to musical downbeats or visual events. The randomization features help generate variations quickly, while the layered channels allow for unique combinations of hits and risers.
The library ships as WAV files for flexibility, but the instrument’s full capabilities, including synchronization and snapshots, are accessible within a host. Users should note that the hitpoint engine works with bar/half-bar intervals, which may require tempo-synced projects. Sounds were designed to be brutal yet can also be enticing, expanding creative options.
Key features
- Three riser and three hit channels for layered sound creation
- 181 snapshots categorized by type, including Big Hits and Jump Scares
- Over 1GB library with 482 WAV files: 233 hits, 126 layers, 123 risers
- Independent 3-band EQ, pitch shifting, panning, and width per source
- Sample and parameter randomization for risers and hits
- Hit timing functions and synchronized hitpoint detection engine
- Individual FX chains (reverb, delay, distortion) and global FX chain (compressor, limiter, reverb, stereo, cabinet, delay)
Best for
Synchro Hits is best for media composers and sound designers working on trailers, movies, TV shows, or games who need to quickly craft impactful, synchronized hits and risers with extensive sound design control and randomization for fresh variations.