128s Method with Maschine

Hi all,

First I just want to say hi, I've been reading these forums for months now and it has helped me alot, especially through the early learning stages... so I thought I'd share something in the hope it might help someone else out there...

I've been using a variation of ill.gates '128s' method for managing samples which I adapted for Maschine. For those not familiar he basically uses instrument racks in ableton with 128 samples loaded in them, which lets you use a rotary dial to select the sample that you want. This lets you load up say, 128 kicks, and then scroll through them with the knob. You can even use this to change your samples on the fly, or use an arpeggiator to create different patterns with the samples...

I liked the idea, but wanted a way to implement it in Maschine. Basically what I have done is made single audio files where 128 one-shots of different samples play one after the other. Just using the standard library I have made half a dozen files that play 128 kicks, about the same of snares, then open hats, closed hats, and so on. The reason 128 samples make up each file is that this means they can then be sliced, and mapped to each of the 128 notes on the midi keyboard/piano roll inside Maschine.

This is great for a couple of reasons

I don't have to look at the screen at all and sift through the library to find the right drum sound I'm after, I can just hold 'pad mode' and change the root key, which changes the sample being played. Or I go into pad mode and preview the next 15 samples to see if there's any on that 'page' I like... I can also change the sample being played in real time while the song plays by pressing the +\- semitone or octave buttons.

Basically you can have entire kits on the one pad if you like, and play them in piano roll mode!

I hope someone finds this method useful, peace out

 

Wow that's brilliant! Thanks for sharing

 

Unless I misunderstand what you're doing, doesn't BATTERY do this even better?, besides 128 sample pads, you can also apply FX to each individual sound and then master FX to all and Battery has 1% of CPU.

 

Yeah Battery probably does do this better, and you're right the method I described has limitations, applying fx to different 'one shots' in your sample is one of them.

You could work around this by duplicating the Sound and then applying different fx to each, but it's a workaround.

The method has pros and cons, but I find for my main drum kit it's a winner. My drum types (kicks/snares/open hat/closed hat) are always in the same place, which has helped with the finger drumming. And for the main drums, I usually don't use heaps of fx except mastering stuff which usually comes later.

Also - I don't have Battery, and I'm sure there are others who don't either

Glad this helped someone!

 

my man said yeah battery probably does do it better but **** battery:lol:










I'm just kiddin
---
thanks for the tips both of you

 

^ lol

 

Great tip....gonna start making up my kits this way. Cheers

 

I use this exact method on my elektron octatrack, this allows me to crazy **** like modulating which slice gets played using LFOs and the octatracks A/B scene slider.

Much like in this video, but with custom percussion kits rather than an amen break.

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpkwuM8PkNI"]Elektron Octatrack DPS-1: How to slice an Amen break - YouTube[/ame]

 

128's in battery 3

Hey I am having trouble setting up 128's in Battery 3. Are you layering 128 samples in one cell and just stacking the zones? As far as I can tell it takes away the velocity function because now 0-127 of the velocity has been replaced with 128 samples. If you set up 128 different cells how are you using a knob rather than the piano roll to select them?

this has been driving me nuts for weeks. any help would be great.

 

I think the OP means setting up 128's inside Maschine not Battery as you can map multiples samples to single sounds/slot.

 

Basically I make templates for various uses; for using B3 with maschine I make 4,5,6,7,8 octave templates and save them. Max of notes is 96 A-Hx16.
Since I map them C-1 and up, it depends where you place samples like BDs, Hats etc.
What I like about Battery is that each cell has it's own FX you can do whatever to it and then you have master FX ( like Impulse) for the kit.

I don't think I am telling you anything new, this is just how I do it, also I record Battery notes from my midi keyboards.

 

Thanks for your help, it's great to see how people go about things. Especially with production the is always more than 1 way to skin a cat. I have a feeling I am over thinking things. All these different samplers I have tried have gotten me close and have something in common. They all naturally distribute the range to the piano roll. I guess to maintain control over things Like velocity and the ability to treat each sample uniquely I need to figure out how to route a knob to 128 positions on the piano roll. the problem with that as far as I can tell is that a knob or slider is treated as a single CC input where on a midi keyboard or drum machine each pad or key is treated as a single CC and not as a whole. I am going to try on the FL forums and see what I can come up with. I was hoping to figure it out on a universal vst that can be translated across DAW's. If I do I'll make a tutorial an post it here. In the mean time thanks again everyone. I'm glad other people are thinking about this as well.

 

@ PENNO - great tip really and i bet people have not considered the options behind using pads this way.

has anybody thought that using this method actually turns maschine into a kind of wavetable synthesizer if using sounds other than kicks, try it with waveforms and your pitch bend wheel used as the modulation source, i have been at it for a while and get some pretty cool results.

 

Very nice. Thanks Widowmaker!

 

^^That sounds awesome and I'll have to try it! I've sliced synths to the piano roll but I normally then play these longer samples on the pads... using it as a wavetable is a great idea. If you're modulating which wave is playing using the piano roll though, how do you choose which note you're playing?

 

i so much enjoy your secret i try this long ago but i fuzzed
out but its creative again .thanks
saves a lot of time
imma make tons of kits .copy them and add effects
tottaly cool

 

If you have Reaktor you can use some of the excellent samplers like the one I use from TWISTED TOOLS.
Each sampler is filled with 128 samples. VERY low CPU=1% each...

Just imagine, I have 5 Reaktors opened, each with a TT sampler of 128 samples, tthat takes less! CPU then the 8 groups filled with 16 samples each.
The 5 samplers don't show any cpu activity.
Try to fill the 8 groups with samples

 

To further elaborate, you should download the map maker for Reaktor5, to create maps. (Windows)
http://relivethefuture.com/choronzon/software/reaktor-sample-map-generator/

It is great, all you need to do, is to create a Folder, (or point MFB to an existing folder) with samples and then point the MFB to it, and it is done.
Furthermore, MFB can make "looped" maps, root 60 maps, and normal=0-127root maps.
Also any sample can be dragged across an area to play a pitch, based on root note, be overlayed, the mapping in reaktor is pretty sophisticated.
May be old news to many, but hopefully someone finds it usefull
cheers

 

Am doing this now!

 

Good idea, thanks for posting it. I do something similar using Battery 3 and a Korg PadKontrol. I bought the PadKontrol specifically because you can change the MIDI notes assigned to each pad in real time instead of just being able to scroll a root note for an entire page of pads like Maschine.

Maschine badly needs to allow changing the specific MIDI note for each pad without using MIDI mode and the controller setup software. This would allow better custom kits, scales, etc. to be setup, and maybe I can get rid of the PadKontrol.

I suppose I might keep the PadKontrol when Maschine gets this feature since its pads are even more sensitive and better feel than Maschine (which are quite good) and great to play synth parts on. Not like those horrible bricks that Akai/MPC call pads.