let's talk about synths and other musician-ish things
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Nestor
- Posts: 6688
- Joined: Tue Mar 27, 2001 4:00 pm
- Location: Fourth Dimension Paradise, Cloud Nine!
That’s a big open question, but irresistible for me...
Pads are an essential part of my music and definitely can’t live without them. I constantly need to search fore new textures that will fit better a particular song. What do I do when I don’t find the right pad? (This may happen quite often now) I do them myself to my uttermost satisfaction. I have done about 12 of them last week, and got the results that I was truly looking for. No synth ore preset would give me that feel.
Perhaps the problem I face when looking for ready made pads, is that I like soft, warm pads very much, or at least, a mixture of them with some more aggressive pads, but it seems that most pad machines and samples are made under pressure and tension, as they tend to be too sharp, aggressive or, very similar to each other, so much, that when you have to decide what to use, you finish not choosing anything at all, and decide to stop because you get lost. The BIG problem most of us experience when deciding which pad to use in a song, is luck of patience, because for you to listen clearly to a pad, you need to stand there and pay attention till the whole movement of it passes by, and so you can feel it, but it is difficult because after 20 or 30 presets, you start loosing the sense of what you are looking for, even if you have it clear in your mind, but no longer in your feelings.
I have starting using mixtures of Pulsar MII with my KORG X5, recorded both to wav at 32float, then I build about 4 to 6 layers depending on the complexity of the pad. Then I mix them carefully, then apply several FXs to every layer till I get the sound I’m looking for. The next step is to add to the level of deepness I am looking for with a good quality EQ. Then I mix the layers with some “natural” sounds that I record at home, sort of a library that I am building, while my wife is doing anything: washing the dishes, using the hover, etc., I record sounds from the outside world like birds, a lorry, etc., then through extreme transformations, I achieve truly amazing, unique textures that inspire me much.
Then, when I have the textures ready bounced down to a single wav file, I transform them a bit more with a perfect amount of reverb, to my understanding and use, and put a fade out to the last second or so. BTW, they can sometimes be as long as having one minute, a big heavy sample, but effective because of the movement I tend to add to it.
Finally, it is the moment to build an instrument; very simple by the way because everything is already in the sample itself, I don’t need to transform it at all and so, I keep lots of horse power for other VSTi. All I need is to make it playable.
Now I may add something along with the pad I have made, to thick it a bit, so that would normally be a rather deep, dark pad to cover some of the end, drone kind of thing for instance.
Another solution, much more expensive in resources to your mail host and PC, is building several layers of VSTi and Pulsar synths, but this is not always effective, because you need lots and lots of time and the end is not always what you want.
So, as a conclusion, if I don’t find ready made what I am looking for, I made it myself, I have much fun doing it, I learn constantly about what I do, and my personal sound gives me full satisfaction.
Now, I have created about 40 “VST and SCOPE” templates, so I have all the things I want, when I want them. These took me weeks to build, but now I have an assortment of full studios ready to be used, with the right combination of synths, drums, samples and effects, so the only thing I have to do is to plug & play. I strongly recommend to do it to everybody with a clear idea of what they want, as long as they have recurring tastes with instruments and their mixture, this is my case.
Pads are an essential part of my music and definitely can’t live without them. I constantly need to search fore new textures that will fit better a particular song. What do I do when I don’t find the right pad? (This may happen quite often now) I do them myself to my uttermost satisfaction. I have done about 12 of them last week, and got the results that I was truly looking for. No synth ore preset would give me that feel.
Perhaps the problem I face when looking for ready made pads, is that I like soft, warm pads very much, or at least, a mixture of them with some more aggressive pads, but it seems that most pad machines and samples are made under pressure and tension, as they tend to be too sharp, aggressive or, very similar to each other, so much, that when you have to decide what to use, you finish not choosing anything at all, and decide to stop because you get lost. The BIG problem most of us experience when deciding which pad to use in a song, is luck of patience, because for you to listen clearly to a pad, you need to stand there and pay attention till the whole movement of it passes by, and so you can feel it, but it is difficult because after 20 or 30 presets, you start loosing the sense of what you are looking for, even if you have it clear in your mind, but no longer in your feelings.
I have starting using mixtures of Pulsar MII with my KORG X5, recorded both to wav at 32float, then I build about 4 to 6 layers depending on the complexity of the pad. Then I mix them carefully, then apply several FXs to every layer till I get the sound I’m looking for. The next step is to add to the level of deepness I am looking for with a good quality EQ. Then I mix the layers with some “natural” sounds that I record at home, sort of a library that I am building, while my wife is doing anything: washing the dishes, using the hover, etc., I record sounds from the outside world like birds, a lorry, etc., then through extreme transformations, I achieve truly amazing, unique textures that inspire me much.
Then, when I have the textures ready bounced down to a single wav file, I transform them a bit more with a perfect amount of reverb, to my understanding and use, and put a fade out to the last second or so. BTW, they can sometimes be as long as having one minute, a big heavy sample, but effective because of the movement I tend to add to it.
Finally, it is the moment to build an instrument; very simple by the way because everything is already in the sample itself, I don’t need to transform it at all and so, I keep lots of horse power for other VSTi. All I need is to make it playable.
Now I may add something along with the pad I have made, to thick it a bit, so that would normally be a rather deep, dark pad to cover some of the end, drone kind of thing for instance.
Another solution, much more expensive in resources to your mail host and PC, is building several layers of VSTi and Pulsar synths, but this is not always effective, because you need lots and lots of time and the end is not always what you want.
So, as a conclusion, if I don’t find ready made what I am looking for, I made it myself, I have much fun doing it, I learn constantly about what I do, and my personal sound gives me full satisfaction.
Now, I have created about 40 “VST and SCOPE” templates, so I have all the things I want, when I want them. These took me weeks to build, but now I have an assortment of full studios ready to be used, with the right combination of synths, drums, samples and effects, so the only thing I have to do is to plug & play. I strongly recommend to do it to everybody with a clear idea of what they want, as long as they have recurring tastes with instruments and their mixture, this is my case.
Here's something. I bought a G5 in November, built a WinXP machine in December. I love Logic (hence I bought a Mac). I love CW (hence I built a basic windows machine to run it). My plan was to buy an interface for my Mac with ADAT so I can use my Win machine as a CW synth & effects unit. I haven't been able to afford to buy an interface for my Mac. I haven't used CW since October of last year. I miss it dearly. Sure, Logic Pro comes wih a bunch of synths. The ES1 & the ES2 are down right terrible. When you put them up against CW stuff it's laughable. I love Logic for the effects & vintage keyboard emulations though.
Before my previous WinXP machine died, I would always "build" the sound I was looking for with the Modular(especially incl. Flexor). For now, that isn't an option for me.
For those who've been around for a while, even though I'm not an active poster all the time, know I've had my cards for a while (6 years). I still have yet to hear a host-based synth (with very few exceptions) even come close to the quality of even the Freebie synths available to a CW user.
Be sure & tell your DSPs you love them today! They have loved you from the moment you started to make them do math.
On a side note, the FM synth in Logic 7 is very cool. probably the funnest FM synth I've ever programmed.
Before my previous WinXP machine died, I would always "build" the sound I was looking for with the Modular(especially incl. Flexor). For now, that isn't an option for me.
For those who've been around for a while, even though I'm not an active poster all the time, know I've had my cards for a while (6 years). I still have yet to hear a host-based synth (with very few exceptions) even come close to the quality of even the Freebie synths available to a CW user.
Be sure & tell your DSPs you love them today! They have loved you from the moment you started to make them do math.
On a side note, the FM synth in Logic 7 is very cool. probably the funnest FM synth I've ever programmed.
