How do you use Kontakt?

A note to all:
I'm just curious from reading all the posts on here...how does everyone use their sampler? I get a feeling that we vary a great deal in the end use. For example: professional use or hobby? Live or studio? Which instruments do you use primarily? I'm not asking for configuration details....just how it all comes together in your home/studio.
I use mine strictly in the studio as a VST with Cubase. Everything gets mixed into a VS880 hard disk recorder. I bought it so I could trigger sampled drums with my midi files, but now I'm finding more and more quality sampled instruments and this is encouraging me to do more on the computer and less on the 880. When I get a faster Mac & audio card, I'll probably do audio on the computer as well. I produce demos and some masters (mostly soulful/bluesy music).
It'd be great to hear from some of the "regulars" on this forum on how they use Kontakt - especially bduffy who seems to have all the right answers.
Care to share?

 

All the right answers!?! Thanks, but I have some really embarrasing posts up here too! Ha ha.

So I use Kontakt both professionally and privately. My uses of Kontakt vary greatly...the top uses are for Drums, Basses and Orchestral samples. But pretty much anything I need to play, I play with Kontakt. I love using it as a drum sampler, by far the most adaptable instruemnt I've used for that.

I don't have a studio per-se, I just compose and mix in the desktop environment with Cubase SX and Kontakt as a VSTi. Not really sure what else to tell you...I'm doing my band's album almost entirely with Kontakt acting as the backup band, playing drums, bass,etc. I love how you can get so many Outs from Kontakt, split up the drums into discreet groups and mix then in Cubase just like a real drum kit. I'm getting very impressive (IMHO) results with that, and bass guitars are sounding super-real too. I keep finding new ways of using Kontakt and changing the way I work. Wonderful relationship!

Don't know if that's of any use to you. Good luck with Kontakt, my friend.

 

This is a cool post..believe it or not I`m been using Kontakt soley for Orchestral stuff!!Havent been able to get GS to work properly and i cant be bothered(though the dimentions that arent importing into Kontakt would be nice).Some how i workaround all the bad imports and just play the samples raw.Ive done 4 T.V shows this way.I just love thats its a VSTi and u can run it on 1 computer(though it works great with systemlinked V-stack as well).Also the length of horn swells and shots can be easily changed with TIME Machine.I think once NI fixes/adds the right Programming features/proper dimention import its gonna kick GS`s ass(though GS 3.0 with rewire etc. will probably come out around the same time and up the ante).Also Kontakts monolith feature schedualed in 1.3 is gonna be amazing for importing huge amounts of Orch. stuff(Kompakt inst.).Kontakts definatley the most interesting soft samplerer on the market today!!! Rich, Toronto canada

 

Hi pdgood,

I use Kontakt as a Dxi2 in Sonar 2.2 XL in my home studio. I run it on a Netvista PC (1.8Ghz with 768 mg ram and 2 harddisks).
My preference is to use natural sounding instruments (strings, woodwind etc) in my songs so a sampler is perfect for my needs.
I control what I'm playing on Kontakt with Midi guitar (Roland GR30) which is great because I'm not much of a keyboard player (In fact I am NOT a keyboard player i can only manage a few clumsy stabs at best!). Luckily Sonar has WDM drivers to I can work at 1.5ms latency pretty much (M-Audio 1010LT sound card) all the time so I don't notice the delay too much when triggering with the GR30.

In the main, i use the sampler module the most. I'm experimenting with the time & tone machine at the moment but I haven't used them yet in any of my songs. I haven't used groups yet (still don't undserstand what they are for!). Now that DFD is working I stream from Disk for any larger instruments.

I migrated to Kontakt from vSampler (which I found too buggy and un-intuitive). I'd built up a lot of soundfonts for vSampler which I use in Kontakt. Now that Kontakt is working really well, I've been investing some cash in upgrading my sounds. I've recently bought the cb strings from Wizoo and they sound great.
The halion import seems to work well as far as I can tell.
One of the things I really love about Kontakt is the tempo sync'd features. They sound great and are so easy to set up.

Previous to 1.2.1 I found Kontakt too buggy and resource hungry to really put it at the centre of my studio. I haven't invested too much time exploring its deeper features because it wasn't worth it.
However now with the latest release, I really feel it is a creative and worthwhile tool and it will be as central to what i do in the future as Sonar. I genuinely think Kontakt will become the King of Samplers and I'm now delighhted to see it start to fulfil its potential.

cheers
Michael

 

Hello pdgood,
I make experimental electronic music in my small studio, a small room I rent last year.
Kontakt helps me to be experimental, it has so many small things that inspires me day by day. The time machine on vocals, multiple assigns for midi controller, for example MW on Cutoff and Resonance not to forget the great Saturation unit or the nearly endless envelopes and step sequencer for never repeating pads. Some Kontakt work on a poor pad sample can end in a huge complex moving pad.

The design of Kontakt supports the work with it, you can see what you hear. The sound of the filters are great and I can reach and combine all units in a fast way.

Beside this experimental side I use Kontakt to load a huge Grand and or other "real" instruments, too.
All in all Kontakt is a very flexible, maybe the most flexible, sample based Synth I bought ever, together with Absynth.

Mostly I use Kontakt with Cubase were all my mixing/mastering is done, sometimes I use kontakt stand alone with my creamware cards when I program sounds only.

I´am curious how the Kontakt features will expand in the future, what comes next? A vocoder unit?

Best regards.

 

A Vocoder Unit!?! I doubt that; wouldn't help Vokater sales at all!

 

I'm using Kontakt 1.2.1 with Sonar on an Athlon PC. I produce backing tracks for local theatre, small demos for girl singers, and I have a few clients like a Barbra Streisand impersonator. I use Kontakt alongside Edirol stuff for convincing strings, brass, etc. I'm using battery for drum sampling, as I've been converting Real Giga Drums and many other gigas drum kits into Battery format. That's been working well. I love all the Roland samples and still have been using lots of those with Kontakt. Roland brass, when well programmed (and used with a breath controller, like I do!) actually sounds damn good. I find many giga samples to be bloated beyond belief, though all the Scarbee stuff is perfect. He knows when too much is too much and overkill for the sake of size and not sound quality. (don't get me started on Purrrfect Drums...) So I guess I'm yet another person on this thread that is emulating live instruments with Kontakt, though not always in an orchestral sense for me, I tend to be doing more rhythm-section oriented stuff. Oh, and I never use sampled guitar--real guitar is always 1000% better. More people should pick it up!

One issue I do have with kontakt still is that, in doing lots of background tracks (especially Barbra stuff where I have to match rubato sections, etc...) I have to tempo match an entire track, and with Kontakt, that seems to screw up all the releases (well, any releases that aren't dictated by a sustain pedal!). I guess in its lookahead algorithm it doesn't foresee tempo changes... argh...

Jon

 

Hello Kontaktists,

After the release of Kontakt 1.21, she has become my flagship, of my Cubase SL system for Windows. The DFD option has improved greatly and soon it will be rock solid stable. I am confident about that one. I use Kontakt as an instrument player for various instruments. I use it mainly for drums, basses and piano. All those are big and RAM intensive samples. I also use the time machine for loops. I am really starting to like Kontakt, as a practical solution for a singer/songwriter like me (without a band at the moment, but that can be arranged). I am an enthuthiast now at the moment, but later I will maybe check on the commercial scene. Y´know make commercial demos from my songs, advertizements, movies and so forth. But, it´s all fun now at the moment. Making money is just an extra bonus...

I think it´s great loading all the Drumkit from Hell (add-on pack included), into only one instance of Kontakt, using multiple stereo outputs, like in the good old mixing deck days. And changing a single snare or a kick drum is no problem, allowing you to find the right kit. Kontakt´s envelope section has come in handy for drums. And the 6 pole low pass filters are superb for bass. Not to mention the release trigger button, making nice release of ambiance for piano. The temposync has done things right for loops, using the Timemachine. Kontakt is a good loop player also, even though things could improve there. The effects of Kontakt are ok too. Finally, I have to praise the mapping editor. Very visual and user friendly. Doing velo cross-fades seems to be no problem at all. Kontakt, a sampler for instruments, of ultra realism.

Best to all of you.

 

dansibjorninn - If I remember correctly, I thought you didn't like using Kontakt for Drums? Change your mind?

 

i use a compewter with mine

;-)

 

Hello bduffy,

They really need to do something about this forum. Everything I wrote was erased!!! Not the first time. I recommend everybody, writing on this forum, to do backup copy! Internet tecnology. A total crap! I understand now, why all these dot.coms got bankrupt.

Anyway, I started using Kontakt for drums just couple of weeks ago, after the release of the Add-on Pack, for the Drumkit from Hell. The Add-on Pack includes very useful Kontakt mappings. Also, I was encouraged by some NI users of the forum, like you. Thanks for a good tip! I realise now, Kontakt is great for drums! Not to mention the DFD option working significiantly better.

I do now think, it´s better to concentrate on the core products, like the Kontakt family, Reaktor family and Absynth, if I take the NI´s example. Those sell better, and will most likely be upgraded or updated periodically, in the near future. I can understand, why NI shouldn´t waiste time and resources, in further development of products like Battery. It´s not economical anymore. Besides, I have learned a lot recently, in how to use Kontakt in a decent manner.

Gonna stay tuned for a further improvement of Kontakt 1.3 and Absynth 2.

Kontakt rocks...

 

I'm glad you're using Kontakt for drums now. Using anything else gives me a headache! Glad to have been of any help, too.

I still have to pick up DFH one of these days...spent too much money on summer-fun!

Later

 

I use Kontakt in a variety of ways, mostly because I write in a variety of musical styles.

I use it as a drum sample player, with DFH (and yes, the new add-on instruments and Kontakt mappings are very convenient). With DFD working so well for me now, I can load both close and room mic'ed full kits simultaneously.

I also use it more traditionally with large piano, nylon guitar, bass and other "real" instrument samples.

I've created my own instruments with it, including Mellotron strings and choirs, Taurus bass pedals, and a few "special purpose" instruments.

And finally, I use it as a sound design device, creating some really fascinating pads, effects and textures that are truly unique. Sometimes I'll just get a weird sound in my head, and with Kontakt I've been able to create that sound.

Between Kontakt, FM-7, Pro-53 and now Absynth, for less than $1K I've got an incredible pallette of sounds to choose from, and so much more flexibility in sound design than I ever had with any hardware device. Next purchase: Reaktor and B4.

 

Paul,
Buy Reaktor, it's an adventure!!!!
Then take a year off to dive into it - the
waters are deep, but incredibly packed with
wonder!!!!
aip

 

Reaktor...man, they should provide a class for that thing. I couldn't make head or tail of it.

 

i mainly use battery for drums, but kontakt is there for all my pianos, strings, some bass, and other samples of that nature. In my host, FL studio4.11, sf2 support is native, so I will throw them in there. I mostly do one man band stuff, bordering on grunge rock, and also experiment with many techno elements. I have yet to explore the reallly deep features of Kontakt, but it does everything i need it to do, esp. with the dfd working!

 

reaktor

couldn't agree more - I tried to use it - it's for serious eggheads, professors and the like.

Without doubt superb sounds but try to program it and it's more difficult than c++ memory management.

It completely ate my cpu as well.

 

B.duffy and MUSICALSCIENCE,
REAKTOR is a sort of world in its own, but each element is easily accessible, and on the
REAKTOR forum there is a growing, co-ordinated users' effort to put together a series of realworld tutorials to render it more user friendly - the same sort of group effort may someday spring up here in KONTAKT land - one never knows!
Sorry to mention all that here, but it flowed from a comment higher up in the thread!
aip

 

aip - Hey, that's OK! I know Kontakt's advanced features were boggling at first - it is of course unfair to slag something you don't understand! We just didn't know that our Reaktor brethren were watching

I'd like to try Reaktor again sometime, if there were tutorials like that around. Someone on this Forum long ago assured me that you can create the best pads with Reaktor - I just couldn't figure out how to do it when I tried it!

Thanks for the info.

 

I bought Reaktor couple of months ago. A good spacecake to have on the side with Kontakt. As an Absynth user, I went only for the Session thing. I use it mainly as a module for synth and effect presets. This cpu hog, must be used moderately, and I have noticed a few minor bugs, without having problems with it. The synths and the effects are deep and great sounding, but as a sampler it sucks! Anyway, a good value for 200 bucks.

Best Kontakt.