Limit your self - to get a startpoint...

strg+v

For me the possibilitys, all this factory-pre-created stuff... is mostly too much to get a "start/beginning...." point...

All is so "good/easy.... but without a soul... i could random choose a kit´pattern and take any preset of massive or sampler... and it will sound "nice", in a way of "professinell" but not in a way of "unique/has soul....)

The Start-point in MASCHINE is (for me) to easy... otherway the edit-point (if i have some "unique" material) is for me to wide-windowed/confusing/complicated... Most of my edits i would do in the weak SW, not in the great (pattern-creator) HW... BOOTH of this "JANUS" has its very own special feautures... for me, booth of them should focus on its unique/own... not to try to mirror each self... in this FORCED equal-pardigma. Male and female... each of booth has its own specials (also mis-aspects....) FIRST TOGETHER they will become an ideal unit! If you force-equal both... look around in our complete cränk world...

Same is guilty for HW and SW...

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However... do you use self-limitations to start/beginn a new project (the HW-Pattern/Scene/rough sketch.... part)??? What do you use as "limiter"????

Murat Kayi

Hi,

limitations are very inspiring!

Here's a few I tried:

• NO OTHER VSTs: only work with Maschine native plugins and sounds, no 3rd party VSTs, not even by NI. Just what you'd have if only Maschine and its library was installed. To be honest, that alone is already more than you can explore with many months of your time
• NO SEQUENCING: Don't sequence at all. Just put together 3 or 4 groups and finger drum your way into an arrangement, changing between groups on the fly. Really dig deep into the sampler plugin, zones and modulation. Set up Sounds/Pads just like you need so you don't have to program anything. Lose yourself just playing the Maschine like an instrument
• JUST ONE PART: Come up with one pattern in one group and let that be it. Set your Maschine up in a hundred ways to add all kinds of movements to this, from stacking perform FX over multiple groups, adding lock states for everything from tuning, fx parameters to mute/mix scenes, loading remix FX like Traktors12 (now only within guitar rig) or The Finger (there is also a free ensemble in the Reaktor User library by BLINKSONIC), sending sounds to Maschine multiFX groups, and so on and so forth. Just one part. If you add enough movement, it won't get boring for listeners. Also, again, you play the Maschine like an instrument.

have fun!

Impermanence

Quite often I do use some kind of self limiting idea. For example: I use only four sounds from the group, or I use just samples, or just factory plugins. Something like that. Just to make things interesting.

Sometimes I make a project file for live performance, sometimes I try to make an arrangement. It rarely works out though. I can’t finalize.

@Murat Kayi s list is really good. I enjoy a lot of those techniques in the last paragraph.

I have to add that working against the clock can be super fun.

Also: watch a tutorial or Trutorial and then implement it.

ozon

Although I have a lot of Expansions installed on my M+, I very rarely use Kits and never use their Patterns.

Instead, I have a large set of favorites for the Maschine Library. And after buying an Expansion, I go through the Samples and Sounds to pick more favorites. When starting a new idea, I restrict myself to only look for Samples/Sounds in my favorites.

Another approach is to limit myself to only use Soonds from a specific Expansion. Either to get a certain character or just for fun to see how far I get.

Also, I often just load an internal synth engine when I need a specific sound (Kick, Snare, Clap, Bass) and program suitable sounds for the track from scratch as I build the Patterns.

The Monark INIT preset is another favorite of mine: Creating a working or even perfect sound for the situation is rather easy on this ancient mono-synth, and it makes the tracks unique. Creating your own sounds also helps to get a feeling for potential modulations.

My favorite Maschine FX are: Beat Delay, Reverb and Distortion in Mulholland mode. Those can really make a whole lot of a difference even on simple sound sources.

Murat Kayi

Loving the tips and experiences, here. I would also stress that really following the trutorial video playlist as in actually repeating the steps yourself is really rewarding.

But something else struck me as important, because OP seems a bit frustrated and @Impermanence mentions difficulties with finalizing: I think that playing with restrictions and exploring should be kept as totally separate processes from actually writing/producing. It's meant to be playful and suprising, like playing a game. I would say there is no need to finish. It's just practical and joyful training for when you actually start to produce a track from start to finish and then you find all these new techniques under your belt, because you allowed yourself to just play!

Uwe303

Absolutely, limiting can be inspiring. Some good advice in here.