Karma-Lab "Reincarnated - Groove Nirvana" coming f

[Kevin Nolan]

Great news -

Stephen Kay at Karma Lab just sent out a mail indicating 32 new combi's for OASYS to come soon:

"...for the Korg M3 and M50 (with KARMA M50 software) Finally, it's here! "Reincarnated - Groove Nirvana," the brand new fully KARMA-fied Collection for the Korg M3 and Korg M50. (OASYS owners, don't feel left out - it's coming for the OASYS as well!)"

Details of these (for the M3 and M50) are at:

http://www.karma-lab.com/forum/showthread.php?t=17131

The last set for OASYS - "Catalyst Volume 1 - Creativity Xplosion!" is really excellent. For that, and the upcoming set, the documentation is really detailed and is great for learning the inner details of karmafied combi's.

Anyway, just flagging this because I received the email (I have no vested interest in mentioning this).

Cheers,
Kevin.

[Ultimate Dj]

Thanks Kevin!
Saw this in the M3 section and someone else pointed us to where Stephen said on Karma Labs that hes doin' em for the Oasys as well!!! super cool



Aelfo

[Charlie]

Is this Catalyst V2 or something completely different? I remember Eric saying he's waiting for a 2nd set of combis to be released together with Steven.

[EJ2]

Is this Catalyst V2 or something completely different? I remember Eric saying he's waiting for a 2nd set of combis to be released together with Steven.

Hi Charlie,
Catalyst collections are not the same as Reincarnation. The latter has been developed by Scott Raposa, who also designs combis for Karma-lab. And there is a third chap we all know from the Chemistry collections for the red Karma - Paul Osborn - who will, as far as I know be contributing material for the M3 as well (Yes, it can be converted for OASYS.).

It's true, I have completed Catalyst v 2 for the OASYS and volume 3 for the M3 (also convertible) is nearly finished too. But, I have to stand in line, just like Scott and Paul had to.

Stephen is super busy with KARMA OL putting the finishing touches on KARMA 3 for the Open Labs workstations. By the way, don't quote me, but as far as I know, KARMA 3 will not find it's way to either the OASYS or the M3 - unless Korg changes its mind.

Now, as for anything that comes from Karma-lab, nothing leaves the store unless and until Stephen has put his refinements and signature to it. It's perfect (or nearly so) or it doesn't get out at all. So, this means we all have to be patient for his blessings. And, as you may have observed, the wait is well worth it.

Cheers,
Jim (EJ2)
PS: I have reverted to the name I grew up with - my middle name, Jim/Jimmy. Eric is my first name, used only by the police, courts and my former wife.....LOL.

[Kevin Nolan]

E2J -

Wasn't Open Labs liquidated a few months back? I was under the impression they were gone?


Kevin.

[Dany]

Wasn't Open Labs liquidated a few months back? I was under the impression they were gone?

From the OpenLabs-Forum:

"A Word From the New Owners of Open Labs

Thank you for being a customer of Open Labs products. As you probably heard, there are new owners of Open Labs. The primary reason we acquired the assets was the outstanding relationship that the artists and producers had with the old company.

We want to assure you that we are committed to you and the products that allow you to create, produce and perform. We will honor the warranties, orders, and upgrades that were taken by the old company and look forward to servicing your needs in the future.

While the IP is impressive, the products are outstanding, and the customer service is world class, we know that the company is dependent upon you for success. Therefore, we would like to present you an opportunity to upgrade to RiFF 2.0 at a reduced cost. We are offering a 25% discount to all current customers that would like to upgrade the products to RiFF 2.0 in the next 45 days.

Thank you for your support in the past. We look forward to a mutually beneficial relationship going forward.

The Open Labs Team and Owners

Thank you for your support during this transition."

[Kevin Nolan]

Hi Dany -

Yep - that reads like a company gone into liquidation all right!

Kevin.

[Savante]

Regarding the Combis being sold by KarmaLabs, I have the following questions: Combis are dependent on the programs used in them. Do the KarmaLab Combis make use of the Korg factory preset programs? Or are original programs supplied with the Combis?

I have made many changes and edits to the preset programs on my M3. I've even rearranged them in various ways. This will affect any preset Combis that use these programs, but I am aware of that and do my edits and changes accordingly.

However, if the KarmaLab Combis assume that the Korg preset programs are unchanged, they will not work as intended on any system where the programs have been changed. Thus, they might be useless in this case.

What is the deal with the KarmaLab Combis? Will they work properly on a system that does not leave the Korg program presets unchanged?

[Kevin Nolan]

Savante -

Unfortunately, the combi's depend on the factory banks being in place. They may assume you do not own LAC, MOD-7 or ESx3. But all other banks will have to be in place.

I agree this is an issue for those using their OASYS in a highly personalised state - but what else can anyone releasing Combi's do?

Personally, I'm nearing a nearly two year effort to optimise my OASYS across all available resources and i have decided to leave ALL HD-1, ESx1, ESx2, Al-1, ESx3 and CX3 orignal programs and combis in place - to allow for new combi's but most especially in case I need to use one of the original combis (or to learn from it for a particular genre composition / synthesizer technique).

I then have the following regime:

U-A - Added sample based programs from numerous libraries / resources
U-C - Optimised MOD-7 bank (internal + Korg, DX-FM and personal programs)
U-D - Optimised LAC (Internal + Korg, Personal programs)
U-E - Optimised STR-1 (Internal + Korg, Personal programs)
U-G - Optimised AL-1 (Personal programs).

But - relevant to your question - to retain all of this live, every time a new library of Combi's is released, I have to:

- go through the combi library and identify the ones I want on board. All of the intact internal programs in place mean that most of the combis will work first time.
- if a combi uses STR-1, MOD-7 or LAC, I have to identify which programs from those banks I need, find whether I have them in my banks and if not load them (I only have 100 programs per optimised bank so there's space to load extra programs). I then have to load the new combi's I want and then revoice them to have their program pointings to where I've places the required programs.


On the Hard Disk, I have all libraries organised into separate folders; and also have a work flow for composing projects and so on so I can retrieve added programs and combis's if needed in an organised manner.

I find this works very well because it means that at any time I have, for my needs, the very best of all available resources loaded into the OASYS.

It is definitely worth the time going through the newly released combi's to identify the ones you really want and then revoice them. The point being - its the hundreds of hours of programming in the karmafied combi's; coupled to those incredibly detailed 70+ page documents accompanying them, that provide for significant and in-depth new perspectives on, and capabilities for, the OASYS.

The key to managing new resources for the OASYS is to leave about 16 – 20 slots free in several program banks (so as to add extra required programs needed for new combi’s (or for when tweaking programs when composing for that matter)). If you leave ‘program buffer’ space like this, you can have a highly configured OASYS and benefit from new combi’s.

In summary - with a night's work on revoicing the combi's you want - you get the benefit of the huge programming expertise and insight you want/need – fully integrated into your highly configured OASYS. Given the very lean price of $32 , to me it's a no brainer.


Kevin.

[Savante]

Hi Kevin,

Thank you for the detailed and helpful response. As you have described very well, there is some real labor involved in making efficient use of third-party Combis, but it may well be worth it to gain many advantages.

I have posted some comments about the limitations of the present Combi/Program structure (mostly with reference to the M3, but it applies to the OASYS and most workstations also). As I have described there, I would love to see a Combi structure like that used in the Korg Radias to be implemented in workstations also. It's a better system and the amount of extra memory required to implement it on a workstation should be trivial these days. The old system, unfortunately still in widespread use, was devised to minimize memory usage in days when such memory was very costly. This is no longer the case and I think the structure used by the Radias points the way to the future -- which I'd like to see happen now!

http://www.korgforums.com/forum/phpBB2/ ... 241#344241