[nick batzdorf]

#49508

By the way, is the Wet/Dry knob always for parallel compression? I figured it depended on the mastering fx you have set up.

If it’s always parallel compression, I’d say calling it NY Drums might be better. But again, this is a fly poop issue, and you’re busy getting a product out the door!

[Sebastian K]

#49509

@nick batzdorf wrote:

By the way, is the Wet/Dry knob always for parallel compression? I figured it depended on the mastering fx you have set up.

If it’s always parallel compression, I’d say calling it NY Drums might be better. But again, this is a fly poop issue, and you’re busy getting a product out the door!

Right… it’s a parallel for whatever is happening in the Mastering FX preset. So in some cases compression, but also potentially a host of other effects. For instance, try it with Low 2 Peaks EQ -> Hi 2 Peaks EQ + Flanger

[Andrew K]

#49510

Hi Nick,

Following up on what Sebastian wrote, we will be having a lot of “creative” Morphing FX. The kind that would be a REAL PITA to program and “ride” as a chain of FX, but easy to do with LADD’s Morph Mastering knobs.

For example, going from a compressed and slightly distorted sound —> a crazy EQ preset + Delay + Screaming distorted Cabinet + a touch of Verb… all with the turn of a knob. That is where the power is for this simple interface. Then… you have the Wet/Dry knob to mix in the FX as you wish.

Of course, we won’t call it ” compressed and slightly distorted sound —> a crazy EQ preet + Delay + Screaming distorted Cabinet + a touch of Verb“… instead we’ll call it something like “Good Boy Nick –> Bad Boy Nick” :mrgreen:

Cheers,

Andrew K

[soulofsound]

#49511

First impression after an hour and i can say i think it’s pretty brilliant. On a sidenote the Victorian Steampunk interface somehow matches the sounds perfectly as i think the tuning can get you very exotic results very much like it must have been for the British Empire’s explorers.

Now -as opposed to what i presumptiously said before- the different presets for the tuning and mixer page are spot on, i think. It makes listening to different variations of a sequence easy as pie. Programming sequences is also a breeze.

[soulofsound]

#49512

Would it be possible to have a “save preset” on the KeyFX setup page where it then gets which tuning preset and mixer preset you’re on and perhaps read the length and other parameters, too?

[Andrew K]

#49513

@soulofsound wrote:

Would it be possible to have a “save preset” on the KeyFX setup page where it then gets which tuning preset and mixer preset you’re on and perhaps read the length and other parameters, too?

Hi Willem,

Thanks for the warm and kind words!!

I’m glad you like the Steam-Punk UI… honestly, we started working on this so long ago.. that by the time we finished, we were wondering if it was still fresh LOL.

Regarding your request, do you mean having a Save command that saves ALL the parameters on ALL scripts or something different. I’m not sure I’m following you.

Cheers,

Andrew K

[soulofsound]

#49514

@Andrew K wrote:

Regarding your request, do you mean having a Save command that saves ALL the parameters on ALL scripts or something different. I’m not sure I’m following you.

If the user likes a certain created sound and has saved the tuning, mixer, … preset, he has to assign it to a keyswitch by remembering which of the tuning, mixer presets were used, right?

So i wonder if it’s possible to have the Key FX setup check the different parameters, like which tuner preset, which mixer preset, CC83 value for the length and save it somehow, so the user doesn’t have to remember this when assigning the keyswitch? Do you understand what i mean? Like a “save keyswitch” button or something, based on the current config playing. If that would make sense somehow, of course.

[Sebastian K]

#49515

So basically a way to take a “snap” of what’s currently loaded and then populate one row of the KeyFX script with those values?

That’s possible – but might lead to some unexpected behavior if the user hasn’t saved what he’s listening to in the Tuner/Seq/Mixer first.

Interesting idea… we’ll mull it over a bit.

[soulofsound]

#49516

Yes that’s what i meant.

If it leads to unexpected behaviour if not everything that’s playing is saved in presets, would it also be impossible to have everything -every possible setting- of the whole instance saved (in a preset on a “presets/sounds” page)? That way you have the way the system is setup now -with quick comparing of tuner presets, mixer presets, but on top of that a quick way to save sounds without having to go through saving tuner, mixer, … presets first. That way the user can quickly save whole sounds, then take from those sounds the best tuner, mixer, … presets afterwards.
If that makes sense.

[midphase]

#49517

I’m slowly collecting data and will post more in depth stuff. Overall this is a great library and I think it will be a huge hit.

I had a couple of initial thoughts:

1. Is there a logic behind the assignment of the FX keyswitches on the bottom octave? I guess what I mean is that are the variations randomly organized or is there some method behind the madness. For instance, I would prefer if the further the keyswitches get from the original sound (C0), the more wacky they get. I don’t want C0 to be normal, then C#0 to be really wacky, then D0 to be somewhat normal and so on. Ideally I would want to know that certain keyswitches (say F0) always lead to a certain type of sonic treatment regardless of the instrument that I pull up and get a predictable behavior so that when I learn one, I learn them all. Does this make sense?

2. Is there a way to swing the sequences? I was trying to figure it out and if the function is there, it didn’t pop out (and my memory from the videos is a bit hazy).

3. I feel like some additional level balancing might be helpful for some of the sequences/FX set ups. On some presets (say the Slats one for instance) one of the sequence loops will be really rather loud, while another is barely audible. While they sound fine by themselves, within a busy mix it can be a tad frustrating as some sequences/loops were so soft than I wasn’t even sure anything was playing.

4. On some instruments I find myself wanting a larger playable range for the individual hits. This is a small issue, I will have more details about the specific instruments I’m referring to.

So far so good, I look forward to exploring more of the sounds…there sure is a lot going on!!!

[Sebastian K]

#49518

Great notes, Kays!

1. Is there a logic behind the assignment of the FX keyswitches on the bottom octave? I guess what I mean is that are the variations randomly organized or is there some method behind the madness. For instance, I would prefer if the further the keyswitches get from the original sound (C0), the more wacky they get. I don’t want C0 to be normal, then C#0 to be really wacky, then D0 to be somewhat normal and so on. Ideally I would want to know that certain keyswitches (say F0) always lead to a certain type of sonic treatment regardless of the instrument that I pull up and get a predictable behavior so that when I learn one, I learn them all. Does this make sense?

This is something we talked about quite a bit. It’s a challenging area to balance consistency with what really works best for each instrument setup. I do agree with you about having (at the very least) some kind or ordered normalcy. It might be interesting to define what you might hear as “wacky” vs organic. For instance, would you consider a filtered sound wacky? What about heavily tuned stuff, or really choppy or bit-crushed? That would be the main challenge I think… defining the boundaries.

2. Is there a way to swing the sequences? I was trying to figure it out and if the function is there, it didn’t pop out (and my memory from the videos is a bit hazy).

Not as of now. It was in early on, but got removed due to Kontakt feeling very “square” in comparison to other swings we’d test. I can’t speak for everyone, but I’d certainly like to think we’d get swing back in there eventually. Probably not for 1.0, though.

3. I feel like some additional level balancing might be helpful for some of the sequences/FX set ups. On some presets (say the Slats one for instance) one of the sequence loops will be really rather loud, while another is barely audible. While they sound fine by themselves, within a busy mix it can be a tad frustrating as some sequences/loops were so soft than I wasn’t even sure anything was playing.

Good point… we’ll definitely go back through and check everything prior to release.

4. On some instruments I find myself wanting a larger playable range for the individual hits. This is a small issue, I will have more details about the specific instruments I’m referring to.

Also a good point. I’m not a big fan of pecking around the keyboard for sounds… especially in a template when you may not be looking at Kontakt at all. To play devil’s advocate, some people like layering multiple perc patches on one channel and then not having to deal with range conflicts. I’m not in this camp, but I think that was considered in the layout. Andrew could speak to this better.

Love all the notes guys… and am especially thrilled that you guys are enjoying the library so far!

Regards,
Sebastian

[Andrew K]

#49519

Hey Kays,

Thanks for the feedback. Here are my notes…

@midphase wrote:

1. Is there a logic behind the assignment of the FX keyswitches on the bottom octave? I guess what I mean is that are the variations randomly organized or is there some method behind the madness. For instance, I would prefer if the further the keyswitches get from the original sound (C0), the more wacky they get. I don’t want C0 to be normal, then C#0 to be really wacky, then D0 to be somewhat normal and so on. Ideally I would want to know that certain keyswitches (say F0) always lead to a certain type of sonic treatment regardless of the instrument that I pull up and get a predictable behavior so that when I learn one, I learn them all. Does this make sense?

The KeyFX presets are supposed to be creative spring-boards for the patches. However, not all sample material reacts the same way to processing as others so I think your suggestion of a “loose” road-map may be a good one. Predictability is key. HOWEVER… I will say this… if ALL KeyFX presets are symmetrical across all patches… then the interplay between them can be much less exciting. If you have 3 patches on the same MIDI channel and Play Seq 1 and then play the same Key FX Key switches, it’s sometimes nice NOT to have everything doing the same FX pattern (if you see what I mean).

Also, I was eager to get feedback before I over committing anything… because programming these things wasn’t easy. :shock: Now with others chiming in, we are getting some interesting suggestions – Craig suggested it might be a good idea to have a couple KFX switches be do Double Time/ Cut Time. So, as we gather more info… we’ll do a final pass on these patches.

That said… there IS somewhat of a logic. As a VERY general rule:

• The first Key switch is usually a fairly neutral (but good sounding) mix.
• Then C# and D are usually some kind of tuning FX. This can be tricky when dealing with really high or tiny sounds since transposing by octaves seems to make them all sound clicky. So, depending on the source, there may be more or less tuning.
• Then D# – G# are usually variations of Filters, Delays, Lo FI…whatever works.
• Then the last few usually have some sort of Length control to make the Sound very short… maybe with some verb too.

2. Is there a way to swing the sequences? I was trying to figure it out and if the function is there, it didn’t pop out (and my memory from the videos is a bit hazy).

So far, using Kontakt’s built-in timing divisors, their swing swings like a lead boot (to borrow an expression from bobby). If/when we do a swing, we’d like it to be more in line with the MPC60.

3. I feel like some additional level balancing might be helpful for some of the sequences/FX set ups. On some presets (say the Slats one for instance) one of the sequence loops will be really rather loud, while another is barely audible. While they sound fine by themselves, within a busy mix it can be a tad frustrating as some sequences/loops were so soft than I wasn’t even sure anything was playing.

Totally… If you could post the names of patches and KFX (C# for example) that would really help. Sometimes I programmed stuff to give Dynamic variety. That may be interpreted as “low”… but it may also be a mistake

Usually grouping all the Mixer channels and adjusting with the Master Fader will solve this.

4. On some instruments I find myself wanting a larger playable range for the individual hits. This is a small issue, I will have more details about the specific instruments I’m referring to.

Everyone has their own preferences on this. However, I mapped at least 2 white keys for every sound so you can “drum” with you fingers. Also, I wanted duplicate mappings on various keys so that I could tune one down (say) an octave and still have 2 white notes available for “drumming”. That is why some black keys are relegate to tuning.

So far so good, I look forward to exploring more of the sounds…there sure is a lot going on!!!

Thanks… and keep up the feedback. Really! We totally appreciate you taking the time to write down your thoughts!

Cheers,

Andrew K

[Craig Sharmat]

#49520

OK,

This is not going to be particularly helpful but I have now used it on a number of cues to see how it goes in my work flow and and I am just loving it.
I can tune notes easily to match my sequences, tighten things unnaturally easily to make organic percussion sound hybrid, wet things, dry them up etc with minimal hassle.

Really great!

I am beginning to notice if I load a bunch of patches in K5 my logic sequence will begin to sputter a little…this is not reflective of LADD though as it happens with many other libraries.
If you come out with a light version of patches it might be helpful in case of big loads of course.

[Andrew K]

#49521

@Craig Sharmat wrote:

OK,

This is not going to be particularly helpful but I have now used it on a number of cues to see how it goes in my work flow and and I am just loving it.
I can tune notes easily to match my sequences, tighten things unnaturally easily to make organic percussion sound hybrid, wet things, dry them up etc with minimal hassle.

Really great!

I am beginning to notice if I load a bunch of patches in K5 my logic sequence will begin to sputter a little…this is not reflective of LADD though as it happens with many other libraries.
If you come out with a light version of patches it might be helpful in case of big loads of course.

Thanks Craig!

Thanks for posting this.

Outside of simply developing this tool, our biggest resource was probably spent on optimizing code and keeping an eye on CPU…. since this is a beast of code. I was actually curious as to how long it was going to take before the CPU questions started popping up. I think now is as good a time as any to share CPU experiences. Also, the beta tester’s CPU experiences will help us shape a CPU Optimization chapter in the manual.

Here are some tips:

1) This is not common knowledge, but distributing the heavier patches (or most often used) on multiple instances of Kontakt will more evenly distribute the CPU tasks among the multi-core processors.
2) Purging notes you don’t need (clicking on the blue button Mix Mics below) will purge those sounds from memory ad also will not be played if certain Mic mixes are un-muted in the mixer.
[attachment=0:bbzvh4zr]Screen Shot 2014-09-24 at 10.03.00 AM.png[/attachment:bbzvh4zr]
3) I’ve kept an eye on voice count for all patches (at the group level), but you Max Voice Count can be lowered if you believe there is a culprit.

If there are CPU heavy patches (more heavy than you think is necessary), then let us know so we can take a look. But all-in-all, this library should spec-out very highly efficiency wise. IMO, the real problem is that it’s so easy to load multiple patches and then hit busy sequences, it becomes easy to lose track of how much you are actually pushing the machine (regardless of the LADD patches) simply from a voice count and FX standpoint.

Cheers,

Andrew K

[midphase]

#49522

@Andrew K wrote:

1) This is not common knowledge, but distributing the heavier patches (or most often used) on multiple instances of Kontakt will more evenly distribute the CPU tasks among the multi-core processors.

I did notice some clicking yesterday on a particularly busy Logic Pro session. Sorry if this is slightly off-topic, but based on your expertise, is it better to have Multi-Processor enabled or disabled in the Kontakt plugin settings? And if so, is there a benefit in limiting the number of cores it will access (say to 10 if you have 16 cores)? I assume you guys have probably run all sorts of tests with and without. From my experience, I can’t tell much of a difference with either multi enabled or disabled.

[Andrew K]

#49523

@midphase wrote:

@Andrew K wrote:

1) This is not common knowledge, but distributing the heavier patches (or most often used) on multiple instances of Kontakt will more evenly distribute the CPU tasks among the multi-core processors.

I did notice some clicking yesterday on a particularly busy Logic Pro session. Sorry if this is slightly off-topic, but based on your expertise, is it better to have Multi-Processor enabled or disabled in the Kontakt plugin settings? And if so, is there a benefit in limiting the number of cores it will access (say to 10 if you have 16 cores)? I assume you guys have probably run all sorts of tests with and without. From my experience, I can’t tell much of a difference with either multi enabled or disabled.

I’ll let Sebastian answer this… since he really is the Tech Guru here… and also the Logic Guru… (and he’s reached Guru status in other areas too )

Cheers,

Andrew K

[Andrew K]

#49524

Hey Guys,

Let’s continue CPU and Optimization discussions in this new thread I created specifically for those topics:

viewtopic.php?f=53&t=3549

Cheers,

Andrew K

[daveyboy]

#49525

This library is really amazing. I’m having a lot of fun just playing around with the patches as is. I did have a dynamics question. When I click on the “d” in the mixer, on some patches it turns off on multiple channels as if it were grouped. Is this normal or should one be able to turn it on/off on a mixer channel by channel basis?

[Andrew K]

#49526

@daveyboy wrote:

This library is really amazing. I’m having a lot of fun just playing around with the patches as is. I did have a dynamics question. When I click on the “d” in the mixer, on some patches it turns off on multiple channels as if it were grouped. Is this normal or should one be able to turn it on/off on a mixer channel by channel basis?

Hey Dave,

This is a great question!

Actually, this is the way it should work. When the mics are staggered across multiple channels like close, stage, verb, full, then they are in essence assigned to the same sound. Because of Kontakt’s internal workings, we need to link those channels together so when you ride the dynamics on the snare close mic, it is also riding it exactly the same on the verb mic.
I hope this makes sense. Bottom line is that this is the way it should be working.

I should probably clarify this in the manual.

Cheers,

Andrew K

[midphase]

#49527

Here is a small annoyance, every time that I open a LADD instrument, and adjust something, then if I close the instrument Kontakt asks me if I want to save the changes.

I realize it’s a catch-22, because yes, I want Kontakt to inform me about the fact that I’m about to lose my changes, while at the same time LADD is the type of library where the user is inclined to make some tweaks before deciding if they really want to use the instrument or move on to another one.

Is there some scripting indicator that tells Kontakt when to pop-up the save alert or not? I realize that this might seem like a dumb question, but for some reason on libraries like LASS or others, the alert doesn’t come up, but with LADD I feel like Kontakt is constantly asking me if I want to save and it’s a bit of a nuisance when trying to work quickly before the inspiration leaves the room.

Anyone else noticed this?

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