Looking for input to create a vintage synth expansion

[SanderXpander]

Hey all,

My friend recently acquired a Kronos partly on my recommendation, and he's something of a vintage synth enthusiast. So he said to me he wanted some help sampling his OB-X. We started talking about it a bit and figured if we did it "the right way", as opposed to just for our own entertainment, other people might get some use out of it and if the library would become good enough, we might even be able to sell it.

Between us and one or two other friends we own most important Moogs (Mini D, Mini Voyager, Memory, Liberation, Micro, Prodigy, Little Phatty), we have his OB-X, I have a JX10, we know guys with various other classics such as a Jupiter and even a Prophet and a Synclavier.

We have all the needed gear and know-how to do this well, although it will be our first project of this specific kind.

So basically I'm looking for input on what kind of stuff you guys would like. Any specific synths that you would like to see in such a collection? Would you prefer the basic waveforms or longer samples with "fixed" envelopes so you get the sound of the original's filter as well? Are there any specific classic synth patches you would like?

Any and all comments and advice is welcome. Thanks in advance!

[GregC]

Hey all,

My friend recently acquired a Kronos partly on my recommendation, and he's something of a vintage synth enthusiast. So he said to me he wanted some help sampling his OB-X. We started talking about it a bit and figured if we did it "the right way", as opposed to just for our own entertainment, other people might get some use out of it and if the library would become good enough, we might even be able to sell it.

Between us and one or two other friends we own most important Moogs (Mini D, Mini Voyager, Memory, Liberation, Micro, Prodigy, Little Phatty), we have his OB-X, I have a JX10, we know guys with various other classics such as a Jupiter and even a Prophet and a Synclavier.

We have all the needed gear and know-how to do this well, although it will be our first project of this specific kind.

So basically I'm looking for input on what kind of stuff you guys would like. Any specific synths that you would like to see in such a collection? Would you prefer the basic waveforms or longer samples with "fixed" envelopes so you get the sound of the original's filter as well? Are there any specific classic synth patches you would like?

Any and all comments and advice is welcome. Thanks in advance!

If you want what ' sells ', my guess is that it might be useful to mimic a top 100 synth hooks/sounds. Just don't do Jump

[geiger167]

I'm always looking for sequential pro-one emulations (I have various kontakt ones etc) It's good for basses and lead lines etc (for example, yazoo's don't go, only you, situation etc)
The previous posters comment about a 'famous sounds' bank is also a good idea, they always seem to sell well, for example the new NI synth Monark Moog synth has a 'classics bank' with all the usual suspects from the minimoog like Numans Are friends electric lead etc.

[SanderXpander]

We would definitely do an assortment of famous patches, or at least that's what I was thinking too. Even so, we could use suggestions on which ones. Hits charts can differ somewhat between the US and Europe for instance, and we may simply have different repertoire in mind.

Good call about the Pro One. Pretty sure I can get my hands on one.

[geiger167]

Further to my pro-one wish list, Yazoo's vince clark released a batch of patch charts for programs from the hits Don't Go and Only You at the time of release and they are a good place to start on that particular synth
http://www.flickr.com/photos/84788821@N00/2251440600/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/neilvance/2241510035/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/84788821@N00/2251440514/
http://www.unease.se/proone.htm
Also if you need some good obx starting points, this company do a vst op-x which has a huge bank of famous sounds and a free demo version which will give you a good starting point for actually replicating the sounds on the real synth;
http://www.sonicprojects.ch/obx/opxdemo.html

[JonSolo]

The only issue I have with sampling them is that you are settling for the final product...instead of say emulating a sound via the AL1.

Still, I would pay a few bucks for 128 patches of a best of synth collection.

I would definitely include a variety from rock to new age etc.

Jon

[SanderXpander]

We have the same thoughts about the sampling process, but we'd like to bring the actual sound of the synth vs an AL1 emulation. We were thinking doing the basic waveforms and seeing how far we get with that using HD1 or MOD7, or if the filters etc really don't cut it, doing longer samples of the actual "signature sound" we're going for. Somehow I feel that many people interested in these libraries like to browse presets anyway, but that may be an oversimplification.

[AdDeRoo]

[
If you want what ' sells ', my guess is that it might be useful to mimic a top 100 synth hooks/sounds. Just don't do Jump

+1

[Kevin Nolan]

In my opinion, if you want this to sell, it had better stand out from the crowd, and be a quality product. From my perspective that would include:

- separate package for each synth you mentioned (and not some arbitrary hodge-podge of shallow cliches - there's far too much of that around)

- sample every note of the original synth (samples can be very small and looped to use the HD-1 filter on them - I just don't think you should attempt to capture filter characteristics - you can't really anyway unless you decide on the filter (and envelope) settings and that's too personal and too static). To me, it's far worse hearing sample points ever 3 or 4 notes - especially on analogue synth patches, and the HD-1 filter is about as respectable as it gets in workstations so it'll have to do

- sample every oscillator wave type possible on the original

- design 128 extremely well programmed voices across useful lines and provide excellent tone adjust and controller programming, with very clear documentation on the tone adjust and controller settings on each program (look at the quality of Karma-Lab karmafied combi's documentation as 'the standard')


Unless you want to sell only a very small number of copies for a few dollars, I recommend you take your time and do it properly, along the above (or similar) lines. Whatever your approach - make it truly useful. You might look to do all the quality work on the sampling end - and then package all of that across multiple workstations (motif, fantom, ...) to increase the potential market.


Sharp is THE expert on sampling, it'd be definitely worth consulting with him (formally?)

But there's no denying it - you have an amazing collection of synths - especially the Oberheim and older Moogs - I'd bet people would pay real money to get a high quality, per-note sample set of, say a Minimoog.

Good luck!!

[QuiRobinez]

I agree, don't sample the filter characteristics, it would limit the possibilities of the raw wave forms. If you want to sell it commercially then i think the suggestion of creating signature patches will make it more appealing for customers.

Good initiative and i hope that you create a killer package for the kronos community

[SanderXpander]

Thanks, your first point especially is interesting. We had thought about it but not decided whether we would do it per synth, brand, era, type (mono/poly), etc.
I suppose we may combine some synths. Or just do smaller, cheaper collections. I'm not sure I could come up with 128 usefully different Micromoog patches for instance.

The main reason we thought to consider sampling the filter is that for instance the Mini's is so distinctive. But we would definitely do it only as an add-on to the raw waves. I'll see how close I can get with HD1 or MOD7 filters.

Thanks for the input so far guys, keep it coming!
This is a big project for us and it will be on the side of "normal life" so it won't be done in a month. But I'm excited about it!

[QuiRobinez]

Thanks, your first point especially is interesting. We had thought about it but not decided whether we would do it per synth, brand, era, type (mono/poly), etc.
I suppose we may combine some synths. Or just do smaller, cheaper collections. I'm not sure I could come up with 128 usefully different Micromoog patches for instance.

The main reason we thought to consider sampling the filter is that for instance the Mini's is so distinctive. But we would definitely do it only as an add-on to the raw waves. I'll see how close I can get with HD1 or MOD7 filters.

you are right on the filter charistics of specific synths, we are doing the a comparable project so we had this kind of conversations also. Our end conclusion was to create raw samples per synth with the cutoff fully open and reso set to zero. This gives the most possibilities for using those samples for several kind of patches instead of a dedicated one (which is more cloning).

Now the hard part will be to mimic the filter behavior with the AMS mixer, i didn't try it yet and don't think it will be easy, but if you can mimic the behavior then you should get a sounds that looks like it (but never will be a cloned sound because the filters will always be different). But this is theory at the moment until i start to create the programs, were in the sample phase right now.

For us it's also a less issue then for you since we won't recreate those signature sounds. My idea is to create new patches based on the samples of those old analog synths. So it's a different project than you have in mind and i'm really interested to see how far you get.

You could also go a more easy route, and that is just clone the signature patches. Basicly you just sample the sound that everyone knows from the original synth. There are two advantages to that approach. Programming time is limited since you sample the patch and probably commercially i think you have something that many people want.

[jimknopf]

I can see your point about utmost flexibility with the raw waveforms, Qui.

But the filters belong to the most essential sound shaping elements of these synths, and right now can't be emulated on a Kronos in a convincing way IMHO. The Kronos has it's own (well working, but other sounding) filters in it's VA engines. I use the KK synth since some days and am surprised how much easier than with the Kronos VAs it is to get close to the classical sounds with it's dedicated filter models, even if they also can't deliver a 1:1 image. But they allow a much faster and closer approximation.

So I would rather be interested in complete sounds (without additional effects of course) than in the raw waveforms.

The essential part of this project is to make a good choice of classical patches (at best linked to famous songs) over several decades.

[QuiRobinez]

I can see your point about utmost flexibility with the raw waveforms, Qui.

But the filters belong to the most essential sound shaping elements of these synths, and right now can't be emulated on a Kronos in a convincing way IMHO. The Kronos has it's own (well working, but other sounding) filters in it's VA engines. I use the KK synth since some days and am surprised how much easier than with the Kronos VAs it is to get close to the classical sounds with it's dedicated filter models, even if they also can't deliver a 1:1 image.

So I would rather be interested in complete sounds (without additional effects of course) than in the raw waveforms.

The essential part of this project is to make a good choice of classical patches (at best linked to famous songs) over several decades.

true, that's why i said that for signature patches you probably better just clone the sound through sampling that signature patch. Our goal is different so in our case that isn't really an issue. But for signature patches i would take the clone approach if it was my call

[SanderXpander]

We will have to see how things progress, but I am thinking we would do both. We do want the raw waves, but I was thinking for the typical short decay bass sound or stabby synth brass it might be worth cloning the original sound with the filter sweeps, and people might not mind the fixed envelope so much for those sounds.

EDIT: So it's good to see people agreeing on both sides