Couple of synthesis questions (hard and soft synths)
I can never seem to get a decent sound out of a synth, and hate using presets because i dont want to sound the same as everyone else , however i only ever use one at a time, does anyone here use a soft synth ârackâ if you like to chain sounds in/out of other soft synths, and if so how do you do it?
also, i passed on an offer of a cheap moog slim phatty, purely and simply because i dont have a CLUE about hard synths, i could probably get a decent âsoundâ out of it because i know a bit about subtractive synthesis and how it works etc, but how do i get the ânoiseâ i have created to play a tune?
do you sample the sound into ableton and play it into there?
Do i connect my keyboard to the midi in?
whats the USB port for? o.O
What are the control inputs for and how do you program them.
Couple of newbie questions because google is little help.
For the first question, uhhâŚno. I have one soft synth that I donât hate, and I use it for everything. Well, I use the demo that canât open patches and use screenshots as recall sheets if I need to. Itâs kind of cheating them out of their money, but it fits their demo license and Iâm not willing to pay for soft synthsâŚthat money is going towards hardware.
As for your questions about integrating hardware.
The USB on a lot of synths is for MIDI over USB. I think the slim phatty works like that, but Iâm not sure. As for how you get it to workâŚyou create a MIDI track and just donât put an instrument on it. Send the MIDI out to your synth (either over USB if you can or through a MIDI interfaceâŚor a MIDI output port on your audio interface if it has one). And run the synthâs audio into your audio interface, which becomes the input for an audio track.
I think Ableton has a device called something like âExternal Instrumentâ which has the MIDI output and audio input configuration right there. It might be simpler to use it that way. I could be making that up. I remember it had an âExternal Audio Effectâ device and kind of assumed there was one for instruments.
Either way, set up your channels, and use it just like you would a soft synth. Just make sure your input monitoring is set correctly.
Itâs one of those things thatâs easier to do than to explain, so I hope that was clear.
Thereâs nothing wrong with using presets as a learning tool. If you want to learn how to make a âbounceyâ bass for example, you would find a preset similar and then reverse engineer it and so on for other sounds. They really are great learning tools to be honest.
As for the Slim Phatty, it can receive midi via USB from your DAW, itâs pretty straight forward like Mostapha said.
As for putting money towards hardware vs software, thatâs a sticky debate with proâs and conâs on both sides. But unless youâre already making a decent amount of change off the music gig soft synths just make more sense Iâd say. Bottom line, itâs all about the music first and foremost. People could care less if you made the sound with a Soft ARP2600 vs a real ARP2600. As long as the music is good, it shouldnât matter how you made it.
Agreed. The only reason to buy hardware at this point is to have the experience of using hardwareâŚâŚwhich I think counts for a lot. Iâm not the only one, but Iâm also not automatically right either.
Computers did make a lot of things better, but programming synths wasnât one of them. At least, not in my opinion. Then again, I donât think the Slim Phatty is worth itâŚitâd work, but it doesnât have a lot of controls to tweak at once. Itâd be almost as annoying as software.
There are VAs that would make me happy: nord lead, virus, radias, etc.. It takes me a lot less time to get sounds I like out of a VA than a soft synth, even if theyâve got essentially the same controls and are using very similar methods.
, however i only ever use one at a time, does anyone here use a soft synth ârackâ if you like to chain sounds in/out of other soft synths, and if so how do you do it?