Karriem Riggins Drums - Making a custom preset / kit from scratch?

BrothelWaffles

Is there a way to create a blank preset that I'm missing? The only way to create your own kit with these seems to be just taking a preset and having to go through and change all the individual pads to what you want. The problem with this is that as I'm browsing the sounds and previewing them, there are no effects put on them, but when I change the sound on a pad, any effects that were on that pad in the first place are inherited and I end up having to go through and change all the different macro settings to their defaults just to get the pad to sound the way I expected it to when I picked the sound I wanted to assign. I hope that makes sense. Would be great if I could just load a blank preset with all the macros defaulted, or if pads just didn't retain their previous settings when loading a new sound. Even just having a checkbox when changing sounds to toggle whether it retains the previous settings or loads with zeroed out defaults would be nice.

EvilDragon

You can easily clear the whole FX chain like this:

You can do this on Insert FX, Global FX and Send FX tabs just the same. Most of these kits don't contain any effects in Insert FX, but it's still worth a check. Clearing the FX chain will also remove the macro assignments that were targetting FX parameters.

Ctrl+clicking the macro dot in top left of each macro knob removes all the macro assignments. This is all mentioned in the help text which you get when hovering above each control.

If you don't see this, you need to have the Info line enabled:

You can have your own clean init snapshot in a few minutes like this. Pretty easy to default all kitpiece parameters by Ctrl+clicking each knob then selecting Empty sound from the soundsource browser.

That said I do agree it would probably be a good idea to supply init snapshots with these products, but this is not my call. However, I've now given you the tools to make your own init very quickly, much quicker than the time it would take for NI to decide if they want to supply init snaphots with these releases or not :)

Jeremy_NI

@BrothelWaffles Indeed, there is no blank or initial preset. I've asked for more information or insight to our Kontakt Instruments team, will get back to you as soon as I've got something to share.

BrothelWaffles

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/57382#Comment_57382

Thanks Jeremy, much appreciated. Not being able to add sounds to "clean" pads is really slowing down my workflow, and after working with it some more, I've found that there are some pads on some presets that just don't sound right even when I match the settings it had on one pad to another pad, i.e. the same sound with the same settings on pad 3 sounds different than the same sound with the same settings on pad 7. It's honestly been a bit frustrating at times.

BrothelWaffles

@Jeremy_NI Any word on whether or not this is going to be addressed in a future update? I've honestly just stopped trying to use these drums at this point, it's just too much of a hassle trying to build my own kits with it, I was spending way too much time fighting with all the individual pad settings every time I would pick a new sample for a pad. There really needs to be an option you can toggle on and off for pads to reset to a default state when switching the sample assigned to them, the way they work right now is a serious workflow killer. Would also make a lot more sense if there was an option to preview samples using that pad's current settings. It's really strange that when you're browsing samples and previewing them they don't have that pad's effects applied, but then the pad inherits those effects anyway.

LostInFoundation

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/62531#Comment_62531

Is this the only program you have? I think this series is not the best option to build own kits.

Programs like Battery or Maschine are better suited for this task

BrothelWaffles

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/62541#Comment_62541

No, I have other kits that I'm using now, but I bought this because I wanted new kits, and also wanted some new drum sounds to build my own kits with. There are certainly much better options for building your own kits, but since I paid for this, I'd like to actually be able to use it. At this point I'd be happy to just be able to drop the samples I want into my Ableton drum rack, but as far as I know NI doesn't allow you to access the sample files directly like that. Honestly I'd prefer that just so I didn't have to deal with routing my drums from Kontakt into different tracks so that I can put channel strips onto the kicks and snares individually. The more I use NI software the less I actually want to be bothered with using it.

LostInFoundation

At this point is not so clear to me if what you want to do is to use your sounds or Karriem Riggins sounds…

In any case, Karriem Riggins Drums has a quite extensive kit editor and a sample editor too, so you should be able to refine things pretty deeply. I thought what you were saying is that you wanted something simpler where you can throw in your samples without having too much work to do (which would “eliminate” why this instrument sound so nice respect to others, that is the fact you can redefine many aspects of how the samples get played)

Sorry but I’m getting quite confused

BrothelWaffles

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/62612#Comment_62612

Do you have these drums as well? If so I can give you an example to follow along with to show you what I'm talking about. I'll use the Undisputed kit for this example since that's the default kit that it loads when you load them up. So, open up the drums in Kontakt and navigate to the Kit tab, between the Main tab and the Pattern tab. Now click on one of the three Hat pads. Notice how there are all those settings to the left, and each pad has it's own settings? Now double click on one of these pads to open the sample browser. Go through and pick another sample to apply to that pad. Play it a few times in the sample browser so you know what it should sound like. Once you've changed the sample on the pad, try the pad again. Notice how it sounds way different than it did in the sample browser? Now look at those settings on the left again... they're the exact same settings that were applied to the pad when it had the hat sample on it, and they're now being applied to the new sample you've chosen, causing that new sample to sound completely different than it did when you previewed it in the sample browser. Do you understand what my issue is now?

Basically I'd like to be able to choose whether or not a pad's previous settings are inherited when I choose a new sample for a pad.

LostInFoundation

Got it. Not an unreasonable request, but still…probably you bought the wrong program for what you want to do. This series has been made and advertised as something that shines in customization of the way drums are played, to make them different from other programs. Now what you want to do with it is go back to the functionalities other products were already offering (and you can do it, only it requires more work cause you have to change all the parameters to make a sample sound as you would like (which in facts is the strength of this product, but it requires work).

As I said, not completely an unreasonable request, but quite strange, since you could already buy something like Battery and having the sample been reproduced exactly how it sounds in its original version, unless you start tweaking it

EvilDragon

You can easily clear the whole FX chain like this:

You can do this on Insert FX, Global FX and Send FX tabs just the same. Most of these kits don't contain any effects in Insert FX, but it's still worth a check. Clearing the FX chain will also remove the macro assignments that were targetting FX parameters.

Ctrl+clicking the macro dot in top left of each macro knob removes all the macro assignments. This is all mentioned in the help text which you get when hovering above each control.

If you don't see this, you need to have the Info line enabled:

You can have your own clean init snapshot in a few minutes like this. Pretty easy to default all kitpiece parameters by Ctrl+clicking each knob then selecting Empty sound from the soundsource browser.

That said I do agree it would probably be a good idea to supply init snapshots with these products, but this is not my call. However, I've now given you the tools to make your own init very quickly, much quicker than the time it would take for NI to decide if they want to supply init snaphots with these releases or not :)

BrothelWaffles

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/63487#Comment_63487

@EvilDragon This is definitely helpful information, but not the information I was looking for. The settings in the red circle in the image below are specifically what I'm talking about.

Even when I switch the pad's sample to "None" and make it a blank pad, it still retains those settings when I load another sample on to it, causing the sample to sound anywhere from slightly different to completely different depending on the settings. I even just tried saving a snapshot with pads set to none and then reloading Kontakt and the snapshot to see if maybe that would default everything, but no dice. I just want to load samples on to pads and have them sound the way they sound when I'm previewing them in the sample browser. It's crazy to me that I seem to be the only person that thinks this functionality should be built in from the start. Like, it seems pretty basic to me that you should be able to load a sample on to a pad and have that sample sound the way it sounded when you previewed it. If I can't do that within Kontakt, at least let me get at the samples themselves so I can use them with Ableton's Drum Rack or something. As it stands I have to meticulously adjust every little setting on every pad I change and hope I can get the sample to sound like what I heard in the preview browser. Sometimes I can't even get close no matter what I do. It's maddening, especially since this is the first time I've shelled out a decent amount of money on drums. Granted, I know $50 is nothing compared to some other sample libraries, but it still sucks to feel like I wasted money. It's just not worth the time and aggravation for me to use these the way they are.

EvilDragon

Default those settings first by Ctrl+clicking them BEFORE you empty the pad. Then any other sample you load will sound exactly the same as when you previewed it.

BrothelWaffles

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/63665#Comment_63665

That's not exactly a solution either. Ctrl-clicking some of those macros resets them to "default", or 0, while some of them get cranked to 100% (like Spring and Room, for example). It still requires me to go through and fine tune everything, especially since attack and release get 0'd and then the pad just doesn't make a sound at all. It makes absolutely no sense to me that parameters like pitch, attack, and release aren't loaded on a sample-by-sample basis. I shouldn't have to play with things like the attack and release to try to get samples to match with their previews. It's insanity. Please don't take this the wrong way either, I very much appreciate that you're trying to help me here, it's just frustrating that I'm even having to deal with this. The more I try to use this kit, the more it's UI functionality just absolutely baffles me. It's almost like they don't want people to make their own kits with it, even though "craft your own custom kits" is one of the features advertised. It almost feels intentionally difficult. I should've just listened to my gut and waited till I had the money to buy Tympo...

EvilDragon

As I suggested already, FIRST Ctrl+click all the macro dots above each macro knob to completely clear all assignments. Then Ctrl+click parameters in each pad. Then clear all FX chains. 2-3 minutes and you have your init snapshot. Literally doesn't take much more than that...

And I will reiterate I agree with you that init snapshot should come with these. But again, this is not my call. I am just trying to help you here.

BrothelWaffles

https://community.native-instruments.com/discussion/comment/64199#Comment_64199

I apologize for the tone of my last post, I really do appreciate that you're trying to help out here. I've tried every combination of the things you've suggested in every order I can think of, I literally cannot get these samples to sound like they do in the sample browser. Looking at the sample browser in your screen shot, it doesn't seem like you're using this specific drum pack, and I'm thinking this just may behave differently or have more options than the one you're using. Either way, thanks for taking the time to reply.

EvilDragon

Butch Vig Drums, 40's Very Own Drums, Empire Breaks and Karriem Riggins Drums are all built on the exact same script and all have the same functionality.

Note that Karriem drums also utilize Stems, which is a blend of up to 4 different signals. Previews will only play one stem (the first one).

Now that I remember, there is also a known bug in the soundsource browser: if you click on the SAME sound as the one that is already loaded into the currently selected pad, it will NOT play the previews of that sound, but the last sound you clicked before it. I have just found a fix for that one, let's see how soon can we get that out...