Sampling the Samplers....

Need some fresh sounds? Want to show off your sound design skills? Here's the place!
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jimmyklane
Posts: 740
Joined: 16 Apr 2018

10 Jul 2018

Hello everyone!!!

I’m in the midst of a labor of love....sampling the “top 25” sounds from my favorite sampler, the Ensoniq EPS 16+. I’ve got some general thoughts as well as some questions for the community regarding the refill I’m trying to make. Here goes:


1: Size:
I’ve got quite a few patches where I’ve sampled one of my analog monosynths to create a sampled polysynth. Long before I knew who JunkieXL was, I’d been using the same method: sample ONE note and loop it, playing it up and down the keyboard. The combination of a lowered sample-rate, no anti-aliasing filter, and interpolation “errors” has a very distinctive sound. Nothing else sounds like the EPS when using this technique. In order to accurately capture this sound, you’ve got to sample AT LEAST every 3rd key. If I were to let NN-XT do the interpolation I’d lose the sound (I’ve tried!). With a DEAD SIMPLE patch (a classic “analog polysynth” patch with 2-3 saw waves detuned at the source and sampled into individual waves in the same instrument) if I want to have the filter envelope controlled by (say) velocity, then not only do I have to capture every 3rd key, but I’ve got to capture every 3rd key 4/6/8 times at different velocities!!! Since I use the internal effects, I have to record 10 second samples to allow for decay. This quickly adds up to 400 or so samples and on top of being unwieldy in size it’s also prohibitively time-consuming to program in the NN-XT. Using the NN-XT filters dynamically IS an option, but doesn’t sound the same so I’ve not been utilizing the synthesis features (except for perhaps envelopes) at all.


2: Combinators:
I’ve got 4 knobs and 4 buttons to control an entire sample-set. Since I often record with the effects unit inside the EPS, I often am unsure of where to map these. If I’m adding an effect to the sound, this is the most obvious use of the programmer. Taking my cue from Reason Pianos, I map a single knob to multiple controls as a “macro” to (for example) give more compression by lowering threshold, increasing ratio and input gain, and balancing the output for the same perceived loudness. Another favorite trick is to utilize my own IR files in the RV7000mkII and then provide for some modulation in the tail by adding some subtle chorus. The buttons are useful for enabling the reverb and reverb modulation.


3: Instruments:
I have to make an individual Combinator for every single patch/instrument. I haven’t found a way to have a Combinator load patch changes in order to change the samples and macros. Can anybody tell me if this is possible and I’m missing something?



FINAL THOUGHTS:

What is frustrating for me is that even though I’m capturing an electronic instrument, I still cannot create simple and small ReFill files. To accurately capture the sound of this sampler is a huge undertaking. I offer my instruments for sale online as floppies/files for both the EPS as well as EOS files for the Emu Ultra hardware or Emulator X3 software samplers....but to get the sounds into Reason is a huge challenge. Programming and keymapping alone is an hour-long process for each instrument, and that’s if I’m taking 10-15 second samples that are using the EPS’ envelopes, filters, and amps. If I’m trying to loop in NN-XT (or in the sample-edit screen) it takes much, much longer and is akin to the libraries that used to be created for hardware samplers where you took the raw waveforms and used the synthesis functions of the sampler in order to reduce memory requirements. Since almost all of us have 8/16/32 GB of RAM these days, loading a couple of 2GB patches shouldn’t be a problem at all.


I’m interested in how the professional ReFill designers do this? I know many ReFills nowadays are simply presets for stock or RE synths....but there was a time when people were using the NN-XT as a main imitator of synths and samplers.

Any advice???
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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Oenkenstein
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11 Jul 2018

Just a few thoughts about your first point, effort and time: It took me about one month to rebuild a patch from a hardware Kawai K1. First made the mistake to sample every 3 notes from each patch (96 in total), resulting in a huge amount of gigabytes of samples/recordings. Not suitable for sound design and to pack a Refill. To reduce the size of the Refill, used as a test to develop a Rack Extension, the original samples on the apparatus were recorded. Holy mo, they are just 2 to 5 kb in size. Then most functions (39 in total) like tuning, vibrato and auto bend on the Kawai K1 were rebuild / emulated in the NN-XT. It took 12 months to transform the 96 patches on the Kawai K1 into NN-XT and Combinator patches.

My advice is, when it is possible to recreate functions on the Ensoniq EPS in the NN-XT, to go the basic waveforms route. However, if you want to publish your work commercially, ask permission on forehand at Ensoniq for the use of their copyrighted samples.

"We do this, because it is not easy, but because it is hard."

jimmyklane
Posts: 740
Joined: 16 Apr 2018

11 Jul 2018

Oenkenstein wrote:
11 Jul 2018
Just a few thoughts about your first point, effort and time: It took me about one month to rebuild a patch from a hardware Kawai K1. First made the mistake to sample every 3 notes from each patch (96 in total), resulting in a huge amount of gigabytes of samples/recordings. Not suitable for sound design and to pack a Refill. To reduce the size of the Refill, used as a test to develop a Rack Extension, the original samples on the apparatus were recorded. Holy mo, they are just 2 to 5 kb in size. Then most functions (39 in total) like tuning, vibrato and auto bend on the Kawai K1 were rebuild / emulated in the NN-XT. It took 12 months to transform the 96 patches on the Kawai K1 into NN-XT and Combinator patches.

My advice is, when it is possible to recreate functions on the Ensoniq EPS in the NN-XT, to go the basic waveforms route. However, if you want to publish your work commercially, ask permission on forehand at Ensoniq for the use of their copyrighted samples.

"We do this, because it is not easy, but because it is hard."
I don’t even OWN any Ensoniq sounds....to me, a sampler is for sampling. So I’m using it for its “flaws” which to me, are features! No need to ask permission when I’m actually creating my own samples and then using those as the basis for patches.

And there is the rub. As a vintage sampler, it has a sound that the NN-XT was fundamentally built to NOT have. The NN-XT is clean and colorless, great for reproducing acoustic instruments or even your basic synth waveforms....but it cannot provide the odd digital artifacts that come with a sampler from the 80’s.

I’m going to post some sound examples, using just one single saw wave from an analog synth....the differences are dramatic....

Does anybody know if the NN-XT can take 8bit/32kHz input samples? I may be able to reduce file size by borrowing a page from the early ROMplers.
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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bitley
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11 Jul 2018

https://www.digitalsoundfactory.com has (& owns the licenses for) the original E-mu and Ensoniq libraries, by the way. As long you are sampling and programming your own work that is not a problem.

jimmyklane
Posts: 740
Joined: 16 Apr 2018

11 Jul 2018

bitley wrote:
11 Jul 2018
https://www.digitalsoundfactory.com has (& owns the licenses for) the original E-mu and Ensoniq libraries, by the way.
I’m sure some of them are great, but I’d have to guess that many sound pretty dated and stale to modern ears. I’ve got an HDD in my e5000 jammed full of factory and expansion libraries that came with it. They would have been marvelous in 1998 when the sampler came out, but 20 years later I’m not so sure.

Also, why in God’s name would I want to take all the time and effort to “translate” pre-made libraries into Reason format? That just sounds dumb. What I’m talking about is giving people my own personal sounds from samplers they probably don’t own.
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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Boombastix
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12 Jul 2018

Guess sampling is a "lost" art now that the "quality" of a sample set is based on its Gb size. Back in the days small memory forced you to create samples, sometimes as short as 1 sec, loop up, then apply envelopes. Analog sounds usually sounds good by sampling 2 keys / oct. Acoustics typically needs denser. A bit of trial and error actually to find what works for you. The early ROMplers (Korg M1 et al) used extremely short samples, heavily compressed, so loop points could be found w/o a tremolo effect. Short filter envelopes are usually sampled/filtered as a single sample, but long sweeps can be set from the sampler's filter as the difference in filter characteristics is smaller for long sweeps. For pre-filtered sounds adding a 6dB filter in the sampler often works well. Another idea is to use the NN-19 as it has more modulation capabilities and NN-XT can read NN-19 if you plan to do layers, but I would probably build combinators with multiple NN-19 instead to put in som F/Xs for creative patches.
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QVprod
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12 Jul 2018

Boombastix wrote:
12 Jul 2018
Guess sampling is a "lost" art now that the "quality" of a sample set is based on its Gb size. Back in the days small memory forced you to create samples, sometimes as short as 1 sec, loop up, then apply envelopes. Analog sounds usually sounds good by sampling 2 keys / oct. Acoustics typically needs denser.
Don't think I'd call it a lost art. The art simply evolved as most things do. For acoustic/real type instruments the GB sample layering has clear sonic advantages. I agree with you though on the account of seeing large GB sample sets for synths or oldschool workstation emulations, but it's worth noting that sampling then wasn't necessarily about getting the same exact sound as the source to the degree that it is today.
jimmyklane wrote:
11 Jul 2018
Also, why in God’s name would I want to take all the time and effort to “translate” pre-made libraries into Reason format? That just sounds dumb. What I’m talking about is giving people my own personal sounds from samplers they probably don’t own.
It's pretty much the way synths are recreated via sampling. There's advantages to it as well being that you have more flexibility sound design with the samples, even if you're not recreating the original presets. It also keeps sample size down if you're reusing the smae elements. Pinknoise Studio (makers of the Maia and Luna REs) did this for a now free refill they originally released in 2003. Id recommend downloading it for inspiration on this project. The whole refill is only 291MB ,including the refill size compression of course. http://www.reasonbanks.com/refill_QS20th.html

Here's what they had to say about their method in the product description:
QuickSilver is based on the sounds of the Yamaha QS300 synthesizer.

QS300 is a rich-sounding synthesizer, because it uses a multi-layer structure, every layer has its own envelope, filter, etc. We can create wonderful pads, endless morphing textures and some other warm and fat patches... but!

If you record these sounds, you will loose the possibility of alteration later: you can not change the parameters of each layer independently, only for the whole mixed samples. It's just like a snapshot... sounds good but less versatile.

Instead of this method, we have choosen a more complicated way. The QS300 uses small parts (in Yamaha terminology: elements) to build its sound: every layer is based on an element. We broke down the sounds of the QS300 to these elements, recorded all of them, and then we completely rebuilt the multilayered patches in NN-XT.

The result was very surprising for us and defenitely it proves the power of NN-XT advanced sampler! The NN-XT provides a lot of very sophisticated options, many of these features and nuances probably remain hidden from the users unless somebody programs NN-XT for 8 months on every blessed day...;-)

jimmyklane
Posts: 740
Joined: 16 Apr 2018

12 Jul 2018

I’m in 100% agreement with both of you, QVProd and Boombastix....and I agree that the samplers inside of Reason actually very capable....if I just want to sample an analog synth....say, my Moog....all I need is a VERY small snippet of sound. Slightly longer if I include PWM. I’m actually very good at that, because all of my samplers except for the Emu (and Maschine of course) have less than 2MB of memory. Vanishingly small amounts in today’s world that must be used with care if you want to hold more than one instrument in memory at a time. So, the lost art is alive and well at my place.

Where I’m running into the issue isn’t in taking the original samples....that’s easy, and the EPS has more looping options than you can shake a stick at....the extremely challenging part is recreating what the EPS does to the sound! It’s colored and can be pretty dirty. If Reason had an “offline process” command I might attempt using something like Decimort on each sample, but unless I can find a batch processor that loads VSTs (for free) then I can’t go that route either.

I’ll muddle through it until I’m happy and then release to the world.
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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QVprod
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12 Jul 2018

jimmyklane wrote:
12 Jul 2018


Where I’m running into the issue isn’t in taking the original samples....that’s easy, and the EPS has more looping options than you can shake a stick at....the extremely challenging part is recreating what the EPS does to the sound! It’s colored and can be pretty dirty. If Reason had an “offline process” command I might attempt using something like Decimort on each sample, but unless I can find a batch processor that loads VSTs (for free) then I can’t go that route either.
You're right in thinking that to get the kind of saturation you want you have to intentionally saturate it. Sampling it as is won't give you the same exact sound. If you have a mac, grab Mainstage. It's $30 in the app store and contains an autosampler (originally from Redmantica). Because it's loads as an audio effect, you can place plugins like Decimort before it so that every sample gets run through it individually. It's primary use is for creating Exs24 patches but you have access to the individual samples to use wherever you wish.

jimmyklane
Posts: 740
Joined: 16 Apr 2018

12 Jul 2018

QVprod wrote:
12 Jul 2018
jimmyklane wrote:
12 Jul 2018


Where I’m running into the issue isn’t in taking the original samples....that’s easy, and the EPS has more looping options than you can shake a stick at....the extremely challenging part is recreating what the EPS does to the sound! It’s colored and can be pretty dirty. If Reason had an “offline process” command I might attempt using something like Decimort on each sample, but unless I can find a batch processor that loads VSTs (for free) then I can’t go that route either.
You're right in thinking that to get the kind of saturation you want you have to intentionally saturate it. Sampling it as is won't give you the same exact sound. If you have a mac, grab Mainstage. It's $30 in the app store and contains an autosampler (originally from Redmantica). Because it's loads as an audio effect, you can place plugins like Decimort before it so that every sample gets run through it individually. It's primary use is for creating Exs24 patches but you have access to the individual samples to use wherever you wish.
That’s interesting about mainstage. I do have a Mac mini that I don’t often use, but this seems like a great use for it.

I’ve got both Sample Robot as well as the Emulator X3 (“synth swipe”) so it’s easy for me to automate the actual sampling process, but using a plugin in front of each sample (to simulate the saturated and degraded “oscillators” in the EPS) sounds like it might be a neat sound in and of itself! I’ll check that out, thank you.
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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selig
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12 Jul 2018

jimmyklane wrote:
QVprod wrote:
12 Jul 2018


You're right in thinking that to get the kind of saturation you want you have to intentionally saturate it. Sampling it as is won't give you the same exact sound. If you have a mac, grab Mainstage. It's $30 in the app store and contains an autosampler (originally from Redmantica). Because it's loads as an audio effect, you can place plugins like Decimort before it so that every sample gets run through it individually. It's primary use is for creating Exs24 patches but you have access to the individual samples to use wherever you wish.
That’s interesting about mainstage. I do have a Mac mini that I don’t often use, but this seems like a great use for it.

I’ve got both Sample Robot as well as the Emulator X3 (“synth swipe”) so it’s easy for me to automate the actual sampling process, but using a plugin in front of each sample (to simulate the saturated and degraded “oscillators” in the EPS) sounds like it might be a neat sound in and of itself! I’ll check that out, thank you.
One quality you won’t get (and one of my favorite things to do with vintage samplers) is the pitch interpolation when playing samples above/below root note. It’s typically something we try to avoid, by taking a few samples per octave. But if you’re going for a “sound”, it could be cool to include a few sources sampled from the original sampler intentionally at different pitch shift amounts. The newer samplers do this so much cleaner you never get that same ‘grungy’ sound (especially when pitching down).


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jimmyklane
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Joined: 16 Apr 2018

12 Jul 2018

selig wrote:
12 Jul 2018
jimmyklane wrote:
That’s interesting about mainstage. I do have a Mac mini that I don’t often use, but this seems like a great use for it.

I’ve got both Sample Robot as well as the Emulator X3 (“synth swipe”) so it’s easy for me to automate the actual sampling process, but using a plugin in front of each sample (to simulate the saturated and degraded “oscillators” in the EPS) sounds like it might be a neat sound in and of itself! I’ll check that out, thank you.
One quality you won’t get (and one of my favorite things to do with vintage samplers) is the pitch interpolation when playing samples above/below root note. It’s typically something we try to avoid, by taking a few samples per octave. But if you’re going for a “sound”, it could be cool to include a few sources sampled from the original sampler intentionally at different pitch shift amounts. The newer samplers do this so much cleaner you never get that same ‘grungy’ sound (especially when pitching down).


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That’s actually my entire point. That’s what I use these old samplers for...I sample ONE note of something tonal and spread it out on the keyboard. That’s the “sound” I’m after....which is why I’ve got to multi-sample the sampler!!! I get the original grungy sound in the hardware, and to replicate it in software then I’ve got to sample every 3rd key or so.
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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selig
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12 Jul 2018

jimmyklane wrote:
selig wrote:
12 Jul 2018
One quality you won’t get (and one of my favorite things to do with vintage samplers) is the pitch interpolation when playing samples above/below root note. It’s typically something we try to avoid, by taking a few samples per octave. But if you’re going for a “sound”, it could be cool to include a few sources sampled from the original sampler intentionally at different pitch shift amounts. The newer samplers do this so much cleaner you never get that same ‘grungy’ sound (especially when pitching down).


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That’s actually my entire point. That’s what I use these old samplers for...I sample ONE note of something tonal and spread it out on the keyboard. That’s the “sound” I’m after....which is why I’ve got to multi-sample the sampler!!! I get the original grungy sound in the hardware, and to replicate it in software then I’ve got to sample every 3rd key or so.
Oh, I get it now - sorry for being late to the game, and can’t wait to hear the results (especially as a big time EPS user back in the day).


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Oenkenstein
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13 Jul 2018

jimmyklane wrote:
12 Jul 2018
selig wrote:
12 Jul 2018


One quality you won’t get (and one of my favorite things to do with vintage samplers) is the pitch interpolation when playing samples above/below root note. It’s typically something we try to avoid, by taking a few samples per octave. But if you’re going for a “sound”, it could be cool to include a few sources sampled from the original sampler intentionally at different pitch shift amounts. The newer samplers do this so much cleaner you never get that same ‘grungy’ sound (especially when pitching down).


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That’s actually my entire point. That’s what I use these old samplers for...I sample ONE note of something tonal and spread it out on the keyboard. That’s the “sound” I’m after....which is why I’ve got to multi-sample the sampler!!! I get the original grungy sound in the hardware, and to replicate it in software then I’ve got to sample every 3rd key or so.
You could sample each third note without all the velocity changes, load the samples in the NN-XT and just set the output of each zone to different channels. Then apply pitch changes, velocity changes (with a certain curve), ADSR, LFO and FX in the signal chain with Rack Extensions or preferably Reason stock devices to get that EPS coloring. It reduces the size of the Refill and you got a very modular approach. It also opens huge possibilities when programming combinators. I have not tried, it is just an idea.

EdGrip
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13 Jul 2018

Boombastix wrote:
12 Jul 2018
Another idea is to use the NN-19 as it has more modulation capabilities and NN-XT can read NN-19 if you plan to do layers, but I would probably build combinators with multiple NN-19 instead to put in som F/Xs for creative patches.
Good shout!

There's a free library for the TAL Sampler, by Hollowsun. It's just bits and pieces from all sorts of old samplers and keyboards and drum machines, all sampled at very low density with some use of the internal filters.
But I love it so much! I find so much inspiration in that library. It's honestly worth buying the sampler for that library alone. It's a good example of getting maximum fun into minimum megabytes.
It's really turned me on to the vibe of sampling and resampling and having fun with it. I never connected with the NNs in that way.

Anyway, this project sounds like a good one and up the same creative street!

jimmyklane
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13 Jul 2018

selig wrote:
12 Jul 2018
jimmyklane wrote:
That’s actually my entire point. That’s what I use these old samplers for...I sample ONE note of something tonal and spread it out on the keyboard. That’s the “sound” I’m after....which is why I’ve got to multi-sample the sampler!!! I get the original grungy sound in the hardware, and to replicate it in software then I’ve got to sample every 3rd key or so.
Oh, I get it now - sorry for being late to the game, and can’t wait to hear the results (especially as a big time EPS user back in the day).


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No, it’s cool, my initial post was probably confusing! The start of the thread was me seeking a way around what I see as inevitable. As you know, the EPS 16+ has a few things I can make up for in NN-XT (digital filter without resonance can be faked in NN-XT, as can Velocity to EG amount, ) the pitch interpolation “errors” simply cannot be synthesized, nor can the specific sound of the effects (they are very distinctive, and I actually use the EPS as a Mono-In—->Stereo Out processor for almost every mix)

So, having created patches for my Emu Ultra and successfully imitated the EPS there I know it can be done. To get the grinding top-end and the thunderous low-end, it’s GOT to be sampled every 3rd key. There is even the bonus that when playing chords you’ll get a thicker sound due to slight differences in playback speed due to interpolation in NN-XT. Taking something like the BSII where the filter resonance doesn’t reduce low end but (with the filter wide-open) adds a sheen and sparkle to the highest octaves of the waveform....sampling that at 22.3kHz and taking the AA filter out of the circuit adds more dirt that becomes more and more apparent as you play down the keyboard!

My first patch so far is a set of detuned saws from the (excellent) Novation Bass Station II on two layers...panned hard left/right, ran through the chorus and reverb and sampled for 10 seconds. One single layer of about 34 samples that are then dynamically filtered in the NN-XT. It makes for a big, wide EP or “Polysynth” patch that has a distinct 80’s sampler sound to it with the dark and aliased low end and gritty and peaked high end....if I “mix samples” and merge the entire sound into one layer/wavesample, then I can use an additional effect like the 44.1kHz compressor or the EQ in the “Voder” effects disk. All of these functions are completely unique to the EPS 16+....

My idea is to make 4-5 presets with each set of waveforms/samples, and also give a “raw” patch where there are no synthesis functions engaged to allow easy experimentation by the user.

Some of my favorites that I’ve got saved:

A PWM disk, with samples from the Prophet ‘08 stacked and sampled at multiple rates giving varied levels of grunge from almost perfect to downright nasty

An MS20 ring modulated “doorbell chime meets grandfather clock” sampled by tuning one note perfectly using a strobe tuner then playing one sample up and down the keys

2 MS20s played in sync and sampled twice, 4 oscillators per side.

Moog Brass, both a single saw wave as well as ensemble sounds using multiple saws.

Matrix-12 strings, narrow pulse waves mixed with saws to give a really nice “string machine” sound.

All of these get to run through not only the internal effects, but also through great Lexicon and Eventide boxes on their way into the computer. I’m considering sampling everything into the Emu Ultra first just to use its internal processing (aphex aural exciter, compressor, convolution, etc) and give the samples that little bit of extra sheen that the Emu puts on everything it touches, then simply sampling those patches at slightly different keys to get the cumulative effects of both hardware units.

Interesting thing about the Emu: it’s got custom ASICs (or LSIs) for each function. An interpolation chip the G-Chip, and the filter chip, the H-Chip, a modulation chip, as well as the normal 32-but RISC processors used at that time. These allow for the advanced functionality (which is still good even today) it has
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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selig
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13 Jul 2018

One idea for the sweeping/detuned samples is to take 3-5 different samples and use the “alt” mode so that you can get the full random effect the original synths provide (really sounds fantastic IMO!).
You can also provide versions with one sample per note for a key-trig effect (and to save space).


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jimmyklane
Posts: 740
Joined: 16 Apr 2018

13 Jul 2018

selig wrote:
13 Jul 2018
One idea for the sweeping/detuned samples is to take 3-5 different samples and use the “alt” mode so that you can get the full random effect the original synths provide (really sounds fantastic IMO!).
You can also provide versions with one sample per note for a key-trig effect (and to save space).


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Alt mode is a round-robin type effect? I’ve never actually used it before!
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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selig
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13 Jul 2018

jimmyklane wrote:
selig wrote:
13 Jul 2018
One idea for the sweeping/detuned samples is to take 3-5 different samples and use the “alt” mode so that you can get the full random effect the original synths provide (really sounds fantastic IMO!).
You can also provide versions with one sample per note for a key-trig effect (and to save space).


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Alt mode is a round-robin type effect? I’ve never actually used it before!
Yes, round-robin, which works great for drum samples but also can “fake” non-key triggered LFO/OSC effects if you have the room to sample a few extra takes on each note. I find it to be a good idea to have many samples to choose from per note even if only ending up with one, just like a photographer takes many shots just to get “the one” because it’s easier than going back and re-doing it later if need be.

Maybe consider doing smaller ReFills focusing on a single instrument or family of sounds, to keep sizes down?


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Marco Raaphorst
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13 Jul 2018

selig wrote:
12 Jul 2018
jimmyklane wrote:
That’s interesting about mainstage. I do have a Mac mini that I don’t often use, but this seems like a great use for it.

I’ve got both Sample Robot as well as the Emulator X3 (“synth swipe”) so it’s easy for me to automate the actual sampling process, but using a plugin in front of each sample (to simulate the saturated and degraded “oscillators” in the EPS) sounds like it might be a neat sound in and of itself! I’ll check that out, thank you.
One quality you won’t get (and one of my favorite things to do with vintage samplers) is the pitch interpolation when playing samples above/below root note. It’s typically something we try to avoid, by taking a few samples per octave. But if you’re going for a “sound”, it could be cool to include a few sources sampled from the original sampler intentionally at different pitch shift amounts. The newer samplers do this so much cleaner you never get that same ‘grungy’ sound (especially when pitching down).


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NN19 with High Quality Interpolation OFF still shows nice artifacts when using the old 'one sample per 6 octaves' trick :D

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selig
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13 Jul 2018

Marco Raaphorst wrote:
13 Jul 2018
selig wrote:
12 Jul 2018


One quality you won’t get (and one of my favorite things to do with vintage samplers) is the pitch interpolation when playing samples above/below root note. It’s typically something we try to avoid, by taking a few samples per octave. But if you’re going for a “sound”, it could be cool to include a few sources sampled from the original sampler intentionally at different pitch shift amounts. The newer samplers do this so much cleaner you never get that same ‘grungy’ sound (especially when pitching down).


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NN19 with High Quality Interpolation OFF still shows nice artifacts when using the old 'one sample per 6 octaves' trick :D
I suspect I know the answer to this, but isn't that like saying "a Peavy amp distorts when you over-drive it too, so why do you want to use an old Fender amp?" (or substitute any two amps).
Selig Audio, LLC

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Marco Raaphorst
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Joined: 22 Jan 2015
Location: The Hague, The Netherlands
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13 Jul 2018

selig wrote:
13 Jul 2018
Marco Raaphorst wrote:
13 Jul 2018


NN19 with High Quality Interpolation OFF still shows nice artifacts when using the old 'one sample per 6 octaves' trick :D
I suspect I know the answer to this, but isn't that like saying "a Peavy amp distorts when you over-drive it too, so why do you want to use an old Fender amp?" (or substitute any two amps).
don't know. nothing wrong with Peavey imo :) it's just an amp. play them strings, bend them, sing that tone out of the guitar!

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14 Jul 2018

NN19 *does* have a tone to it, but to my ears it’s doing its level best to be a clean sampler using late 90’s technology instead of late 80’s technology.

There is a WORLD of difference between my Emu Ultra and my EPS....one very dirty unless you baby it the other super clean until you abuse it....

And the old Peavey amps were fantastic....but once you got into the 90’s they were all underpowered and over-spec’ed...or at least that’s my opinion on them.
DAW: Reason 12

SAMPLERS: Akai MPC 2000, E-mu SP1200, E-Mu e5000Ultra, Ensoniq EPS 16+, Akai S950, Maschine

SYNTHS: Mostly classic Polysynths and more modern Monosynths. All are mostly food for my samplers!

www.soundcloud.com/jimmyklane

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