Mimic: New Creative Sampler

[bitley]

I don't make many orchestral passages but please show me what is needed, sounds like something I should know about Thanks in advance(d sampler techniques).

(Time stretching was something we were fully aware of already in 1988 btw; when the NNXT came out the notion was that everyone does that in audio editors anyway; fully possible by using an audio track for that though & export, as you know).

[joeyluck]

Legato, since day one, please explain what you need.

I had said "legato sample" handling, meaning separate legato samples triggered when you connect notes. Very necessary for realistic instruments such as vocals or strings, etc.

[AnotherMathias]

I don't get it. NNXT is not an old sampler; it's an unexplored sampler as far I've seen many use it. Ensoniq Mirage? Yeah that's a pretty old sampler. Mimic, a new sampler? Absolutely. Replacing anything? No, but I've not used the NN19 much since we did some timestretch funkiness with it (on a collab project with a guy producing as Tintin) so Mimic's more advanced stretching etc looks promising and will surely be giving Reason a new island to explore. Once I •really• learned my ways around the NNXT I realized how extremely powerful it is. It still surprises me. Would never call it dated! You know what's dated? Reading complaints about it!!! When it got sampling that was a huge addition / update too btw. The sample editor is awesome. But I look forward to exploring Mimic and the new R12! (Been happily sampling ever since the 80's). Bonus point: No sampler will ever get dated in my world, goes against the nature of these instruments. Example? Ok. If I sample the Take 5 into my 1988 Akai S1000KB it can sound like the Take 5, cool huh?

When NN-XT came out with Reason 2.0 in 2002, the Ensoniq Mirage was 18 years old (it came out in 1984).
So that means that NN-XT is actually older now, at 19 years old!

But I agree, the NN-XT is still awesome, which is why I wish so strongly for an update. Hopefully it wouldn't be a whole different device, but a major refresh, like with RV7000 MkII and Parsec 2.
I'm working on a big batch of samples now, and I pondered back and forth between using NN19 and NN-XT for them, and in this case I actually went with NN19. I didn't need any layering, and the speed that you can program creative subtractive synthesis in NN-19 is hard to beat. And there are one or two things in NN19 that you can't do at all in NN-XT, even if you don't count the ability to automate (almost) all knobs.

I'd be happy to start a wish list for a NN-XT Mk2, but that's probably for another thread.

[bitley]

Another M; that's true but hifi sampling came to us all with the EIII, the S-1000 and the ASR-10, so already back then the Mirage felt truly dated. As when you sample "hello" into a Mirage it almost plays back "goodbye" lol. I don't think it's "that" bad for the NNXT today - and the EIII and the others btw are still dope machines, praised by most.

[AnotherMathias]

Have you tried Halion or Sampletank?

Halion 6, yes, I did the 30 day demo. I almost gave up immediately, after all the hoops Steinberg made me jump through to even get started!
It's impressive, but way to big and cumbersome to be much fun. It's the victim of a massive feature bloat, and I really don't care for all the scrolling up and down to get to all the parameters. Kontakt and Logic Sampler have the same problem, as does Falcon.

I have not thought about SampleTank... I don't hear much about using it to make your own instruments, and the IK infrastructure seems a bit tedious . I'll check it out though, thanks!

A few others:
UVI Falcon: It looks impressive, but is probably nearly as bloated as Halion, and they don't offer any kind of demo, so that's probably out.

SFZ: I've recently learned to code SFZ files to use with Sforzando or Sfizz. I quite like that whole environment, but it's 100% text coding, and eventually I just missed twiddling virtual knobs too much. If I'm getting into making big key-switch type of instruments, I'll probably go that route. Sfizz, the newer (and better, I think) of the two players is only available as a VST3, which, as we know, won't talk (yet) to Reason.

ShortCircuit XT: THis is very promising - an upcoming free refresh of ShortCircuit 1 and ShortCircuit 2 of the past, from the people who brings us Surge XT. However, it's all made on a volunteer basis, and might yet be another year before it's done, if ever.

[bitley]

Did Motu stop making their sampler btw?

[AnotherMathias]

I had said "legato sample" handling, meaning separate legato samples triggered when you connect notes. Very necessary for realistic instruments such as vocals or strings, etc.

So we're talking about a trigger condition for a group that either will EITHER only trigger when NO other notes are held, OR will only trigger when other notes ARE held, right? Yup, that goes on the wish list.
I'd also see an option where a group triggers when a note LOWER than the new one is held (for an up-legato), and a corresponding HIGHER not is already held (to legato downwards).

Regular legato is easily done in SFZ, but the lower/higher on is a feature request of mine.

[AnotherMathias]

Did Motu stop making their sampler btw?

I think technically, yes... for a ton of money. But I think that it's somehow superceded by Falcon, but I must admit that I don't quite understand how the two are related.

As for the old 8-bit sampler, love those things! Maybe not actually using them, but the sound is awful in the best way.
What I'm working on (the project in NN19) is porting a mid-size Fairlight IIx library, a pretty big Mirage library, and a totally massive Emulator II library!
I'd like to share them when I'm done, but as I don't own the rights to the old samples, I'm not sure if I'm allowed.

[bitley]

All three companies are gone now sadly but whenever their audio is used I'm sure they shine up a bit. When I started out I asked them all and they were very generous.

Your NN19 patches can be opened & polished later on with the NNXT by the way. I'd love trying them out, as I am a huge nerd for vintage sampler sounds. Naturally.

[bitley]

Did Motu stop making their sampler btw?

I think technically, yes... for a ton of money. But I think that it's somehow superceded by Falcon, but I must admit that I don't quite understand how the two are related.

Chickensys says it's like this;

http://www.chickensys.com/translator/do ... hfive.html

[AnotherMathias]

I think technically, yes... for a ton of money. But I think that it's somehow superceded by Falcon, but I must admit that I don't quite understand how the two are related.

Chickensys says it's like this;

http://www.chickensys.com/translator/do ... hfive.html

Aha, that explains everything, thanks!
v3.2 seems to be the latest version, which is from back in 2013, and they are still selling that. Brand spanking new, compared to NN-XT!
But clearly it's end-of-line, and not something I'd commit money and time to. Shame, really, it looks pretty nice.

About the 8-bit libraries I'm working on, the only one I'd be worried about copyright for is the Emulator II one. At least half of those samples (and the best half) are from the classic Universe of Sound third party library. It seems that they've been licensed to be used in at least one commercial library, about 5 years ago. I only use the raw samples though (no programming or sampling an actual Emu II), and I won't distribute them commercially, so it might be fine. After all, I found the samples free online (in a big disarray), so if that guy gets away with it, I probably can too.

I'm also doing a separate library of most of the raw samples from whole Proteus family, including the later deluxe ones. No programs, again, other than my own, just samples. For that one I'll need to use NN-XT instead of NN19, since I need to do a bunch of velocity switching.

For every instrument (hundreds, maybe over a thousand!) I hope to make an instrument patch making the best use of the samples, and also a combinator patch for each instrument to give it all a bit of polish, using stock Reason devices. A 0.2 second mono 8-bit sample stretched across a whole keyboard needs all it help it can get!

[QVprod]

I don't make many orchestral passages but please show me what is needed, sounds like something I should know about Thanks in advance(d sampler techniques).

(Time stretching was something we were fully aware of already in 1988 btw; when the NNXT came out the notion was that everyone does that in audio editors anyway; fully possible by using an audio track for that though & export, as you know).

Look up Legato for any Vocal or String library and you'll understand what it is. As far as time stretching, there are uses for it existing on the sampler itself. Having to edit in the sequencer or separate editor first is just more added work. Also some multi sampled instruments use time stretching as well. You're not pulling that off with a single audio track.

[EnochLight]

(Time stretching was something we were fully aware of already in 1988 btw; when the NNXT came out the notion was that everyone does that in audio editors anyway; fully possible by using an audio track for that though & export, as you know).

Sure, but "audio editors" didn't exist in 1988 (what, on your Commodore 64 or Atari and 20 MB of storage??). Also, back then the best samplers we had most definitely did NOT do time stretching, not like anything even close to what we expect in 2021. Can you expound a bit more on what you're talking about?

[AnotherMathias]

Sure, but "audio editors" didn't exist in 1988 (what, on your Commodore 64 or Atari and 20 MB of storage??). Also, back then the best samplers we had most definitely did NOT do time stretching, not like anything even close to what we expect in 2021. Can you expound a bit more on what you're talking about?

Time stretching, as far as I know, was first seen on the Akai S950, indeed in 1988.

But it’s important to note that for a long it was an offline process, and the operation took a little while.

However, what we tend to talk about these days are samplers with real-time time stretch (or pitch change without changing the length), obviously a much more CPU dependent process, especially when playing polyphonically.

Any new Reason sampler should probably have that functionality, but even the best ones sound a bit crap once you get a few notes off the original pitch, so I don’t think I’ll use it much myself.

As for computer audio editors, Sound Designer (an early grandfather of Pro Tools) for the Macintosh existed as early as 1985. It would hook up through SCSI to an Emulator II (and later many others), and was surprisingly capable!

[TheGodOfRainbows]

I agree about NN-XT. And I hope it gets some attention in the future!

All NN-XT really needs IMO is legato sample handling...

Even if it had that feature, who is going to make the refills that could take advantage of it? Can an amateur like myself make decent patches that utilize 'legato sample handling'. I would have no idea how to approach creating my own sampled instrument that makes use of that. If I tried sampling my guitar, is it even feasible to program hammer-ons and pull-offs?

[bitley]

Another M: Regarding UOS I was in contact with them and their demand would have been a large percentage of sales - not considering the huge amount of programming needed & also somehow thinking we sold soundbanks for $10m per year... So I threw all their samples away.

Enoch: The Fairlight & Synclavier systems around 1985 had stuff "like" timestretching - and other more fancy audio tricks such as converting samples to synthesis. Timestretching then came to the EIII - if I remember correctly - which was released in 1987, and then came to the masses with the S1000 in 1988, followed by the S950 in 1989. This was an artificial sound - probably mostly appreciated a bit later by jungle & drum'n'bass artists, who truly embraced it. An early and popular software solution was Steinberg's Time & Pitch machine. Bias Peak was also widely used around 1999-2000, supporting third party plugins even back then.

[bitley]

pulling that off with a single audio track

...is of course only to export that sample / those samples only to re-import them into the sampler.

[avasopht]

Have you tried Halion or Sampletank?

Halion 6, yes, I did the 30 day demo. I almost gave up immediately, after all the hoops Steinberg made me jump through to even get started!
It's impressive, but way to big and cumbersome to be much fun. It's the victim of a massive feature bloat, and I really don't care for all the scrolling up and down to get to all the parameters. Kontakt and Logic Sampler have the same problem, as does Falcon.

I see where you're coming from.

NNXT and NN19 did a great job of offering a 90s sampler experience with 21st century CPU might.

It's advanced and not too complex to have fun with, but lacks a few small features that could bring it to the next level.

What I'd really like to see is something more like an xv-5080 where you can construct more complex tones, but it's still feels as simple as a more basic sampler (along with the stretch modes found in mimic).

Bonus points for allowing purely synthetic tones.

As for mimic, I think it still has a lot to offer for instruments when layered, but it would be nice to have an clean and built in easy to manage things like legato and reversing.

Grain breathed new life into my library of instrument sounds, and mimic could do the same thing for you.

But the RE SDK is open to all, as is the VST API for a more tailored solution.

[QVprod]

pulling that off with a single audio track

...is of course only to export that sample / those samples only to re-import them into the sampler.

But why would someone want to do that in 2021? I’m sure things were done like that before because real time stretching inside of a sampler wasn’t possible or reasonable to do yet. It now is. People are doing this within the context of creating a song. The shorter the process the better.

[selig]

(Time stretching was something we were fully aware of already in 1988 btw; when the NNXT came out the notion was that everyone does that in audio editors anyway; fully possible by using an audio track for that though & export, as you know).

Sure, but "audio editors" didn't exist in 1988 (what, on your Commodore 64 or Atari and 20 MB of storage??). Also, back then the best samplers we had most definitely did NOT do time stretching, not like anything even close to what we expect in 2021. Can you expound a bit more on what you're talking about?

“Sample editors”, however, DID exist in that time frame, from the mirage editor Sound Lab (1985) to Sound Designer and Alchemy, both of which I used for my S900 samples. But no stretching yet at that time.

[AnotherMathias]

Even if it had that feature, who is going to make the refills that could take advantage of it? Can an amateur like myself make decent patches that utilize 'legato sample handling'. I would have no idea how to approach creating my own sampled instrument that makes use of that. If I tried sampling my guitar, is it even feasible to program hammer-ons and pull-offs?

Absolutely you can!
"Deep sampling" an instrument is not difficult, but it's a pretty labor consuming task, but some of us weirdos do it for fun.
Check out pianobook.co.uk, where hundreds of hobbyists sample instruments to share. Mostly their grandmother's old piano.

But another appeal of an updated advanced sampler in Reason could be that one or two the commercial companies choose to use it for their new releases, partially because the nice new combinator. Better than Kontakt, in my opinion. With RRP it might open up for attracting some new pro users.

And of course, Reason Studios could use it for their factory sound bank. Which ironically might be why they DON'T want to make a new advanced sampler - the expectation would be that they would make a new fancy sound library to go with it, which would be quite labor intensive.

[EnochLight]

Time stretching, as far as I know, was first seen on the Akai S950, indeed in 1988.

But it’s important to note that for a long it was an offline process, and the operation took a little while.

^^ True ^^ Forgot about the S950. It certainly wasn't the sort of time-stretching we can do in Mimic, though.

Enoch: The Fairlight & Synclavier systems around 1985 had stuff "like" timestretching - and other more fancy audio tricks such as converting samples to synthesis. Timestretching then came to the EIII - if I remember correctly - which was released in 1987, and then came to the masses with the S1000 in 1988, followed by the S950 in 1989.

Right, right. My bad. That said, Fairlights and Synclaviers were out of reach for virtually all home producers/musicians unless you were rich or knew someone in the industry. Akai certainly made some semblance of it more affordable, at least.

“Sample editors”, however, DID exist in that time frame, from the mirage editor Sound Lab (1985) to Sound Designer and Alchemy, both of which I used for my S900 samples. But no stretching yet at that time.

True, but could Sound Lab, Sound Designer, and Alchemy handle several minutes of actual audio to edit, or were they just a short sample editors?

[AnotherMathias]

“Sample editors”, however, DID exist in that time frame, from the mirage editor Sound Lab (1985) to Sound Designer and Alchemy, both of which I used for my S900 samples. But no stretching yet at that time.

For fun, we can take it to the logical extreme, that digital time stretching existed even before samplers did!
Although it would be extremely glitchy, and very expensive.

In 1975, the Eventide Harmonizer H910 came out. You could transpose your sound from -1oct to +1oct, in realtime.
This means that if you transposed your music 1 octave up, and recorded it onto your tape recorder (reel to reel, of course) at double speed, when later played back at the normal speed you'd get the original pitch, but at half the speed. And digitally garbled to bits!

Sampling, of course, wouldn't come around for another 4 years.

[AnotherMathias]

True, but could Sound Lab, Sound Designer, and Alchemy handle several minutes of actual audio to edit, or were they just a short sample editors?

Sound Designer II could, in 1989. It was among the first direct-to-disk recorders/editors, and was used a lot in professional recording and mastering studios.

Just a year later the same company introduced their multitrack system, Pro Tools.

[selig]

True, but could Sound Lab, Sound Designer, and Alchemy handle several minutes of actual audio to edit, or were they just a short sample editors?

Sound Designer II could, in 1989. It was among the first direct-to-disk recorders/editors, and was used a lot in professional recording and mastering studios.

Just a year later the same company introduced their multitrack system, Pro Tools.

1991 for PT - I got the first one in Nashville, IIRC…
I did a shit-ton of work back then with my AD/IN and DATio in Sound Designer. Loads of folks were mixing to DAT, but no one could edit them.