Who are the best patch designers?

[Oquasec]

Good question. Only ones I know the name of currently were exode.

[Zac]

I like AF - Adam Fielding - patches.

[Catblack]

No more answers so lame

"“Its like a finger pointing away to the moon. Don't concentrate on the finger or you will miss all that heavenly glory.”

[Oquasec]

Patch designing teaches you so much. A guy can spend days doing nothing but turning knobs and adjusting faders seeing what every function can do.
With that being said I do not know, but I have heard many pleasing patches from exode.

[turbopage]

I really like Harald Karla's work (Soundcells)

[Ostermilk]

I really like Harald Karla's work (Soundcells)

+1 to that recommendation!


However, I don't think it's the best question to ask either TBH, as there are some undoubtedly fantastic designers from a technical or just about any other standpoint, the only question you can really ask is who is producing the sounds that inspire me to use them and when I do use them to do they work in the context of what I'm producing?

The only way to find that out is to listen to examples or pick out some likely sounding designers work and try them out yourself. You'll soon grasp whose stuff you dig and whose stuff ends up gathering dust and it won't necessarily come down to who is the 'best' designer.

[Oquasec]

It would take you a month of reading the manual and experimentation, not years.
And plus, when you learn a type of synthesis it translates to all synths of the same type.

[adfielding]

I like AF - Adam Fielding - patches.

Thanks mate!

As others have said most of my patch work has been through Nucleus SoundLab, though I've contributed patches to Alchemy and a few other VSTs as well including a Massive bank.

Probably goes without saying that my favourite Reason patch designer is Tom Pritchard - I used his Vast Refill on everything for YEARS after it came out, and his patches still get a ton of use even with the plethora of new REs and now VSTs in Reason. Second would be Bitword because, again, I used Wavefront on pretty much everything for a good year or two after I got it, and I don't think my first two "proper" releases would have sounded anything like they did without that Refill.

On a personal note, I much prefer patches that are designed to be useful in a mix rather than ones that sound immediately super impressive out of the box but are, in practicality, totally useless without a ton of tweaking. I've noticed a lot of people seem to lean more towards favouring the latter because of the immediacy of the sounds, but what good are impressive sounds if you have to spend ages carving at it to make it sit properly in an actual tune? I'll take a decent, useable sound over something that's clever for the sake of it any day.

[Karim]

I really like Harald Karla's work (Soundcells)

+1000 for him!

[Karim]

I really like Harald Karla's work (Soundcells)

+1000 Karla and Tom Pritchard!

[Ashpool]

Can't tell who's the best.
But I was really sad when Marc (Van Borc) decided to not to continue with Bitword.
I was always hoping to see Wavefront V.2

I also like the work of Navi Retlav. He made some really nice patches I really enjoy.

[aeox]

i just start every synth at INIT and build the sound i have in mind. once you understand synthesis, it opens up a new world for music creation.

[fotizimo]

Jeremy Jansen from Nucleus Sound Lab. What that guy can do with Thor is astounding.

[avasopht]

Reason has so many brilliant patch designers.

The best seem to be the ones who do.

It's why I always encourage doing.

[aeox]

Reason has so many brilliant patch designers.

The best seem to be the ones who do.

It's why I always encourage doing.

doing is doing, i heard.

[Arrant]

Without a doubt the best patch designer I've ever heard of is Manuel Schleiss of Vengeance Sound (now famous for the Nexus and Avenger VSTs etc)

[elMisse]

I really like Harald Karla's work (Soundcells)

+1 to that recommendation!

+10

[ModSource]

I really like Harald Karla's work (Soundcells)

+1000 Karla and Tom Pritchard!

Agreed. Those two have skills.

[Daniel36]

I really like Speo, as he also shows in his YouTube vids how to make certain sounds, and he is also really friendly!