Hi.
Ben suggested that I see what other users think of the following mod for DB velocity fader.
Request for a taller velocity fader popup pane, as tall as the height of a "bar block" if possible. Presently, the fader is kinda hard to handle on laptops or small screen desktops.
N.D.
On 06/04/2006 02:51, Normand Dionne wrote:
Request for a taller velocity fader popup pane, as tall as theheight of a "bar block" if possible. Presently, the fader is kinda hard to handle on laptops or small screen desktops.
Yeah, I haven't used the fader much (since I'm still doing velocity by using kits configured with multiple samples of varying velocity), but I see what you mean when I check it out on my little iBook's screen. A taller fader should work just fine.
I was also thinking of a introducing and option (perhaps setable in the prefs) that would make the fader display with a 0-127 velocity scale, useful perhaps for those accustomed to setting velocities in MIDI. (The future velocity fader settings would presumably control the MIDI velocities set in output MIDI files anyway.)
Cheers, Carl
These, alas, aren't free -- but they are pretty cheap: http://www.betamonkeymusic.com/Sample.html
I haven't bought them, but I have messed with some freebie Beta Monkey drum loops in GarageBand and they seemed pretty good. (I've sketched out some songs using premade drum loops, which is nice'n'easy, but increasingly find myself going back to write my own parts in DB.) Anyway, USD30 for a CD of drum samples from several different kits isn't bad -- you ought to be able to throw together some pretty good dbkits without quite pulling your hair out from the insane variety in something like the nskit7full samples :)
Cheers, Carl
ps - still crunching slowly towards a testable nskit7full (selection thereof!) dbkit ... gotta sort out the snares and a kick and then I should be at least close enough to try it out!
On 19/04/2006 15:37, Carl Edlund Anderson wrote:
ps - still crunching slowly towards a testable nskit7full (selection thereof!) dbkit ... gotta sort out the snares and a kick and then I should be at least close enough to try it out!
Well, I finally got enough a dbkit assembled using a modest subset of the ns_kit7 samples that I've been able to start trying it out :)
I picked a not terribly complicated dbsong file and converted it for use with the new dbkit. I stuck output from the dbsong using both the ns_kit7full and ns_kit7free dbkits as 192kbps MP3s on my web site:
http://www.carlaz.com/music/ns_kit7full_test.mp3 http://www.carlaz.com/music/ns_kit7free_test.mp3
There are some slight technical differences, such as the free version uses lots of fully open hats where the full version uses partially closed hats, but otherwise you can really hear the sonic differences between the full and free versions -- in terms of drum models, tunings, and perhaps mic placements -- quite clearly. You can also hear my simplisitc drum programming quite clearly ;)
I'm wondering actually, if the snares and toms come across a little too muted in the full version and whether I'll need to pump them up using DB's volume tweaking in the dbkit editor? Of course, I haven't actually tried the new version in a mix with other instruments yet -- I just cranked this out quickly during my lunch break :) Also, the samples themselves were somewhat brutally crunched down from 48KHz to 44.1KHz for use in DB.
I'll post up my "draft" dbkit for ns_kit7full as soon as I get a chance (though obviously you'll only be able to use it if you've got the right subset of samples available and downsampled to 44.1).
Cheers, Carl
Carl Edlund Anderson wrote at 3:34 PM (+0100) on 4/20/06:
Well, I finally got enough a dbkit assembled using a modest subset of the ns_kit7 samples that I've been able to start trying it out :)
Nice work Carl, those sound good.
Yeah, I am going to get to work soon on improving the kit editor, just for you. ;)
-b
On 24 Apr 2006, at 21:05, Ben Kennedy wrote:
Carl Edlund Anderson wrote at 3:34 PM (+0100) on 4/20/06:
Well, I finally got enough a dbkit assembled using a modest subset of the ns_kit7 samples that I've been able to start trying it out :)
Nice work Carl, those sound good.
I've been messing about a bit more, ironing some bugs out the dbkit and such. I've got another example where the sound works a bit better, I think. I toned back the defaults for the ride velocities a bit, likewise crash cymbal velocities to about 75%, and the hat velocities way back to about 50%. These seem to sit better; who hits the cymbals and hats as hard as possible all the time anyway? But we're still whaling the heck out the kicks and snares ;)
Here are links to the plain drum part, and then the drums imported into GB as part of a song arrangement I've been kicking around:
http://www.carlaz.com/music/Colour_Out_of_Space-drums.mp3 http://www.carlaz.com/music/Colour_Out_of_Space.mp3
(Try to ignore the fact that the "song" has no vocals and kind of drifts to an "end". It's just a pile of multi-repeated guitar and bass loops that I move around whilst mucking with the arrangement, and I'm just using it as an example here because there's enough of it to set against the sample drum track from Doggiebox :)
Yeah, I am going to get to work soon on improving the kit editor, just for you. ;)
Bespoke shareware, that's what we like to see! ;)
I've posted the current "draft" of my ns_kit7full dbkit in zipped form here: http://www.carlaz.com/music/Carls_nskit7full.dbkit.zip
It's not much use to anyone unless they a) have ns_kit7 full, and b) have downsampled the samples my dbkit uses to 44.1. But perhaps one can open it and get an idea. I will say that it's a real b@$t@rd making a bazillion drum icons with a bazillion different velocity numbers on them and also a real b@$t@rd trying to select from a huge string of possible hi-hats of different velocities and degrees of openness in the UI (and this is a highly simplified version). But there would be a lot of control introduced by giving the current UI's velocity scale selector the ability to pick from a set pool of samples; this would also make kit editing something like this much simpler! :)
Cheers, Carl
-- Carl Edlund Anderson http://www.carlaz.com/
On 20/04/2006 15:34, Carl Edlund Anderson wrote:
I picked a not terribly complicated dbsong file and converted it for use with the new dbkit: http://www.carlaz.com/music/ns_kit7full_test.mp3
I've tweaked the velocities on this file, and made new "drums only" and now also "with other instruments" versions: http://www.carlaz.com/music/On_the_Hill-drums.mp3 http://www.carlaz.com/music/On_the_Hill.mp3
The version "with other instruments" is done in GarageBand (using an imported DB-produced AIFF). I kind of resent the lack of ability to tweak tempos in GarageBand (so these files are at a dead steady 110bps), but it's just so easy to use when you want to mess around changing things all the time :)
I still find DB struggles on playback in passages that contain a bunch of big samples (the nskit ride samples just decay _forever_), in which case other samples start to "fade" or drop out, though I don't know if this symptom really a limitation of DB or just my iBook's CPU and RAM. Trying to handle a pile of fat WAV samples quickly can't be easy .... But things sound fine and normal in the output AIFFs in any case! :)
Cheers, Carl
Carl Edlund Anderson wrote at 4:47 PM (+0100) on 4/6/06:
I was also thinking of a introducing and option (perhaps setable in the prefs) that would make the fader display with a 0-127 velocity scale, useful perhaps for those accustomed to setting velocities in MIDI.
That's a good idea, probably makes more sense anyhow. Cool.
-b
On 24 Apr 2006, at 21:06, Ben Kennedy wrote:
Carl Edlund Anderson wrote at 4:47 PM (+0100) on 4/6/06:
I was also thinking of a introducing and option (perhaps setable in the prefs) that would make the fader display with a 0-127 velocity scale, useful perhaps for those accustomed to setting velocities in MIDI.
That's a good idea, probably makes more sense anyhow. Cool.
Personally, I find the MIDI range of numbers not terribly intuitive -- a percentage-style scale does me better -- but I guess there are lots of folk who've been using MIDI for ages now!
Cheers, Carl
-- Carl Edlund Anderson http://www.carlaz.com/
-
Ben Kennedy -
Carl Edlund Anderson -
Normand Dionne