Bitcrusher Node

The Bitcrusher Node adds controlled amounts of distortion, audio fidelity reduction, and quantization noise to an audio signal, to produce an output intentionally reminiscent of lofi music.

A Bitcrusher Node with with a moderately strong effect configuration

Inputs

Audio Input

An audio signal to bitcrush.

While the Bitcrusher Node is primarily for audio, a control signal can also be used here, in which case the Node will apply the same effects.


Settings

Amount

Wet/dry signal ratio. That is, the higher this setting is, the more the bitcrushed signal is present in the output (and the less the original signal is present in the output).

Bit Depth

★ With AudioNodes HD

Simulates the maximum audio bit-depth in the audio signal, as if it was represented with fixed precision.

Simply put, a lower bit depth makes the audio signal sound more noisy. However, this slightly different from just adding noise with a Noise Generator Node.

Downsample

The amount of downsampling to apply, as a percentage. As you increase this effect, it adds increasing amounts of quantization noise to the output.

0% means no additional sample rate reduction, while 50% means reducing the sample rate by half. While 100% means a complete sample rate reduction, it essentially makes the output silent, because it’ll hold the last sample indefinitely.

Note, that the result of this effect depends on the sample rate used. The most noticeable difference is that the added quantization noise manifests at different frequency ranges.

Normalize effect

When enabled, the effect added by the Bit Depth setting is automatically increased for louder parts of the signal, and decreased for quiet parts of the signal, resulting in a lot more consistent effect.


Outputs

Audio Output

The bitcrushed audio signal (or control signal, if that’s what you connected to the input).


Technical Details

Downsampling

The downsample setting does not actually result in a reduced sample rate in the output signal. This is because all audio connections in AudioNodes use the same sample rate. Instead, it simulates a sample rate reduction using a sample-and-hold algorithm.

Similar Nodes

  • Noise Generator Node – generates noise, similar to that caused by a low Bit Depth setting
  • Sample And Hold Node – produces the same effect as the downsample setting, but with better options to support control signals for longer periods of time