A Discussion On Presets Which Has Been Deeply Bugging Me
My first ever post on here!
Please, i hope people read this though! It's long but i would be very grateful...
My opinion may not count much as i'm a new user, and only a bedroom producer. But please, this is something i'd love to discuss, need to discuss, and hear other opinions on the matter. As it has recently been deeply bugging me.
The thing that seems to get to me is how people look so hard for presets. They spend a great deal of there time looking for sounds other people have made.
But why is this?
If your looking for a certain type of sound or group of sounds, say you love an 80's bass sound or you want a few stabs with not much release, then why not make it yourself?
Or is it just easier to find presets of the sounds you want? Is that considered wrong to anyone?
If new producers just look for presets, they will never actually learn synthesis. And may not ever care too.
Perhaps one day, what you learnt from making those 80's basses yourself was learning the fundamentals of how to put together good bass sounds from scratch, and from experience you now know what steps work best step by step.
Perhaps you then, from that knowledge, come up with some great unique basses yourself?
The same could apply therefore to Plucked Synth sounds, Pads and drones, Sparkly bell sounds, etc etc...
With pads and drones, they are so much more complex and have so much variety that you could probably come up with many unique pads and drones yourself. It seems both entertaining and productively better to know how to, and then make unique pads based on what your after.
Looking around for pad and drone presets could be unproductive, and you may come across many that weren't what you were after but eventually you may use one anyway and bam, your creative idea you had for the track might have gone down the drain as now your just working with something that wasn't what you had in mind.
Or do presets by other people pretty much have it all covered now? Is synthesis pretty much dead now (Apart from really innovative, new and complex sounds made by sound designers) as so many new bedroom producers, studio producers, are just using presets by other people and not learning synthesis themselves?
I'm just wondering, as a producer of a handful of years who is now wanting to get into the more complexities of making electronic music, and who wants to spend much more of my time delving myself into Synthesis, and more professional Mixdowns, i have a lust for the idea of making my own synth sounds and it just feels right to me. The idea of 'Presets now covering most sounds, especially basic ones, and becoming the norm because it's all been done by someone else already so whats the point of making it yourself" saddens me...
Or is my view flawed?
I would really love to hear some opinions on this matter by people who have been producing for a long time / people who have much more knowledge than me on producing / been in the business for a long time etc...
As this has recently really been bugging me...
I guess the opinions on this could be very mixed though, with no real objective answer.
It's like the opinions on when sampling goes to far. Is small clippits of samples okay? (like making a collage)
Is sampling okay when you really manipulate it (Perhaps even making synth sounds out of a sample by stretching, resampling, effecting etc...)
Is taking a big chunk of a funk track and putting a dance beat on the top wrong?
What about using loops, like in Stylus RMX or Sample Packs etc.., to make tracks? Layering a pre made beat on top of a pre made bass riff which neither have you come up with yourself...
For me Presets on some occasions are great to take you instantly to a certain place. From their you can tweak off in your own direction. I don't think i ever settle for whats given.
But these for me are just to get you started. The real purpose of presets becomes apparent when you start to compile your own collection. Ive got absolutely loads and i use it almost instinctively. It saves a lot of time. You can instantly pull up your tried an tested and tweak them as required. Its a very efficient way of working.
Talking synthesis, I'm partly with you. In principle.
In practice, most modern analog modelling synthesizers are so complex, that truely understanding what's going on in a 300$ Alesis Micron takes quite some time, especially with the reduced knobs and sliders... So you end up going for a preset that roughly sounds like what you're going for and tweak it with the limited understanding you have of that particular synth. I know I've been guilty of this despite trying again and again to build what I imagined from scratch.
Indeed. Classic songs have been made with the same sounding guitar, bass, drums, brass instruments from the 60's on. It's the driver, not the car.
With that said, if you feel good about spending 4 days making a pad sound while someone else is churning out songs and getting placements, so be it.
Pre-Made loops? Just listen to TV and movies. Guys are making good livings placing pieces based on pre-made, license free loops. Everyone who had Logic knew the drum loop when they heard Rihanna's Umbrella.
It's a personal decision. Just remember the end user and execs who cut the checks don't care as long as it's hot.
What about synths like Omnisphere? I dont think 95% of people would get even a quarter of its potential without the guiding hand of presets. You can delve right in kinda thing. It would be nightmare to even consider without presets.
^ Will it really take that long to get to grips with, and learn how to make the sounds you want, in Omnisphere?
Omnisphere has a HUGE amount of presets. I worry that theres many, many new producers using it just for the presets like it's a giant midi sample pack that you can play up and down the keyboard.
Then again, i don't have anything against creative sampling, as long as it's not taking chunks of one song and putting a beat on it and calling it your own.
Perhaps i should be looking at these presets as i would with virtual instruments in Kontakt. They are there for you to play yourself musically, and incorporating them in your tracks and what to play is down to you, and so it is still creative.
I kind of see a flawed approach to my thinking, but it still saddens me to see synthesis go to waste by new producers wanting to just use presets.
To people who are adequate with synthesis, is there a point of knowledge and experience you reach where if you hear a synth sound, be it a pad or bass or anything like that from another song or in your head, you can work out which type of synthesis / synthesizer would be best to come about making the sound and can work out how to make it yourself?
If yes, do you still find yourself using presets because you can find what you want eventually within your preset library and simply because it's easier?
Or do you find it's just simpler to make it yourself due to it fitting your needs precisely?
To people who are adequate with synthesis, is there a point of knowledge and experience you reach where if you hear a synth sound, be it a pad or bass or anything like that from another song or in your head, you can work out which type of synthesis / synthesizer would be best to come about making the sound and can work out how to make it yourself?
To me, yes... which is mostly due to a limited number of synths (4 or 5 of those you can touch. with keys on them.) If you know your guns you eventually know which one to draw. With the unlimited amounts of virtual synths these days I can't see myself ever getting to know the individual instruments anywhere near close enough to start truly understanding them.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Everglade
If yes, do you still find yourself using presets because you can find what you want eventually within your preset library and simply because it's easier?
It really depends firstly on what you're going for (transparent sawtooth lead vs. complex pads or strings). And secondly on what synth you're plugging in... The Roland Juno for instance is really easy to come to grips and create something cool from scratch with. The Alesis Micron? I'll usually scroll through the presets at least once before attempting to build something completely original. It's just way too complex to start with a simple sine wave and work it into some funky drone.
Simple really. Presets allow one to sample hundreds of different ideas quickly and allow one to compare within the context of other instruments which road to take. Its rare for me to ever be satisfied with a sound i created the first time around.
One can spend so much time messing around with one instrument/effect/track that other tracks and the song as whole suffers because the thought of spending that much time on each instrument or track kills momentum.
Momentum is very important for me when tracking and rough mixing. Presets help keep that momentum going.
Of course during the final mix i slow down and get more critical. However by then its usually apparent that the initial presets i used were never that far off the mark.
I suppose music style has a lot to do with it. Good old rock n roll doesn,t really require anything but great performances, great tracking and a good song.
Geddy lee is a good example. Its his playing style that gives him that unique bass sound.
He sounds the same on rick as he does on a jazz. Same with Neil, large kit, small kit, tin cans, he always seems to sound like him....lol....
I'm heavily into Ambient music. So pads and synth sounds would be a major staple to my music.
Therefore, for me, it feels like if i used multiple presets for something that is the main element in my tracks, it would feel like i'm cheating.
It just feels right for me to make the pads and drones i want myself. It feels like a must. Especially when i'd rather work by getting down whats in my head, rather than shifting through a preset library and messing about with something, as that usually makes me hit a road block.
I guess theres many other ways to create ambient-esc music than just using synths anyway though. Time stretching audio, effecting the **** out of things...
Perhaps i just want to learn technical jargon to try and justify i'm a good producer a little more.
Please, i hope people read this though! It's long but i would be very grateful...
My opinion may not count much as i'm a new user, and only a bedroom producer. But please, this is something i'd love to discuss, need to discuss, and hear other opinions on the matter. As it has recently been deeply bugging me.
The thing that seems to get to me is how people look so hard for presets. They spend a great deal of there time looking for sounds other people have made.
But why is this?
If your looking for a certain type of sound or group of sounds, say you love an 80's bass sound or you want a few stabs with not much release, then why not make it yourself?
Or is it just easier to find presets of the sounds you want? Is that considered wrong to anyone?
If new producers just look for presets, they will never actually learn synthesis. And may not ever care too.
Perhaps one day, what you learnt from making those 80's basses yourself was learning the fundamentals of how to put together good bass sounds from scratch, and from experience you now know what steps work best step by step.
Perhaps you then, from that knowledge, come up with some great unique basses yourself?
The same could apply therefore to Plucked Synth sounds, Pads and drones, Sparkly bell sounds, etc etc...
With pads and drones, they are so much more complex and have so much variety that you could probably come up with many unique pads and drones yourself. It seems both entertaining and productively better to know how to, and then make unique pads based on what your after.
Looking around for pad and drone presets could be unproductive, and you may come across many that weren't what you were after but eventually you may use one anyway and bam, your creative idea you had for the track might have gone down the drain as now your just working with something that wasn't what you had in mind.
Or do presets by other people pretty much have it all covered now? Is synthesis pretty much dead now (Apart from really innovative, new and complex sounds made by sound designers) as so many new bedroom producers, studio producers, are just using presets by other people and not learning synthesis themselves?
I'm just wondering, as a producer of a handful of years who is now wanting to get into the more complexities of making electronic music, and who wants to spend much more of my time delving myself into Synthesis, and more professional Mixdowns, i have a lust for the idea of making my own synth sounds and it just feels right to me. The idea of 'Presets now covering most sounds, especially basic ones, and becoming the norm because it's all been done by someone else already so whats the point of making it yourself" saddens me...
Or is my view flawed?
I would really love to hear some opinions on this matter by people who have been producing for a long time / people who have much more knowledge than me on producing / been in the business for a long time etc...
As this has recently really been bugging me...
I guess the opinions on this could be very mixed though, with no real objective answer.
It's like the opinions on when sampling goes to far. Is small clippits of samples okay? (like making a collage)
Is sampling okay when you really manipulate it (Perhaps even making synth sounds out of a sample by stretching, resampling, effecting etc...)
Is taking a big chunk of a funk track and putting a dance beat on the top wrong?
What about using loops, like in Stylus RMX or Sample Packs etc.., to make tracks? Layering a pre made beat on top of a pre made bass riff which neither have you come up with yourself...
Whats right? Whats wrong?
Oh man, it's too much for me too handle.
I think there's much merit in what you say about people relying on the training wheels of factory presets long after they should have learned to craft their own sounds and create their own patches -- but the ability to save those hand-crafted patches is golden, though! We sure wouldn't want to have to give up patch memory.
With regard to many electronica producers, though, creativity and innovation are not really what they are looking for. Just read these forums. Question after question about how to nick someone else's sound... How do I get this drum sound or that bass? What preamp do I use to sound like so-and-so? What patch did so-and-so use on such and such a track? (This last sometimes offered with little apparent awareness that many musicians -- particularly those at the forefront -- actually do craft their own sounds.)
With regard to right/wrong? Well, I reserve the moral outrage for stuff that matters. How someone crafts his sound isn't really of a lot of concern to me so much as whether or not it works musically.
(That said, if someone brags about what a genius innovator he is and then we find out he's actually just using factory patches, well, that's interesting, at the very least. I remember people falling all over this one track at the old mp3.com around the turn of the century. Then it turned out the 'artist' who released it had simply rippped a demo from Reason or Fruity or something into an mp3 and put his own name on it. That was... amusing.)
I don't think theres anything wrong with trying to find out and copy how a musician you like made a sound. At least your learning how to make sounds which are on the same wavelength towards what your after yourself.
I'd just hope that from that they create there own compositions with those sounds, or use that knowledge to create there own sounds of a similar style.
Perhaps i haven't explored presets enough, but from what i have found when it comes to pads and drones so far, a vast majority of them are complex sound designs which sound intuitive on there own, but are difficult to integrate into your tracks anyway. So i think i'll still stick with trying to make my own pads and drones.
I don't think theres anything wrong with trying to find out and copy how a musician you like made a sound. At least your learning how to make sounds which are on the same wavelength towards what your after yourself.
I'd just hope that from that they create there own compositions with those sounds, or use that knowledge to create there own sounds of a similar style.
Perhaps i haven't explored presets enough, but from what i have found when it comes to pads and drones so far, a vast majority of them are complex sound designs which sound intuitive on there own, but are difficult to integrate into your tracks anyway. So i think i'll still stick with trying to make my own pads and drones.
Imitation can be an important early step in learning how to do many things in music, from playing, to writing, to producing. Nothing wrong with learning to do things by the examples of those we admire -- as long as we don't allow that imitation to become a trap that holds us back from finding our own inner voice as an artist and craftsman.
I was saving my disdain more for those who just want a preset or 'easy' instructions (with no boring explanations that might actually teach one something) for nicking some sound.
(But, you know, there probably are times in a commercial engineer/producer's life when someone is going to come to him with some situation where the artist has determined he must have some precise knockoff of someone else's sound or he will not be satisfied and it's up to the knob guy to nail that as quickly as possible... in which case perhaps principle must play second fiddle to keeping the customer happy. )
I can play (professionally) in many styles; piano, drums, guitar, bass, vocals - that's a lifetime's work right there.
I'm happy for someone else to create my electronic sounds for me, in an ideal world I would never use any presets, but in the real world where time is a consideration and costs money, more importantly, sitting for hours creating sounds is a luxury I just don't have.
I use Omnisphere, Stylus RMX and Trilogy, I'd love to fly in Eric Persing to program unique sounds just for me (I think Sting did!) but fortunately his instruments come with so many presets that I can get close with just a few minor tweaks to a filter or VCA.
But in principle I agree with the OP, and think that programming your own sounds would be a positive thing.
In fact recently I was thinking of buying a library pass to AskVideo as they have a lot of instructional videos on programming synths from the ground up.
Time, time, time .... that's the big issue for for me.
Oh wow! Thanks for making me aware of "Askvideo". Had never heard of it before.
Looks great, i might look into this. Theres multiple courses in the audio section that i would like to watch.
I had heard of Audiotuts.plus, but this looks much more in depth and well layed out. Audiotuts.plus was just a good place for some free mini tutorials.
some people may like to grow their own wheat, grind the wheat into flour and use that flour to bake their own bread
if you are the Baker, you may want to take it that far, but if you are a Chef, you may be 'kind of busy' cooking the meat, sauteing the vegetables, and making the desserts.
You may rightfully feel that you are STILL "putting your stamp " on the meal by choosing the right bread and choosing the right wines to serve in your restaurant from a previously determined selection.
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“What you ask about is music. What you like is sound. Now music and sound are akin, but they are not the same.”
— Confucius
some people may like to grow their own wheat, grind the wheat into flour and use that flour to bake their own bread
if you are the Baker, you may want to take it that far, but if you are a Chef, you may be 'kind of busy' cooking the meat, sauteing the vegetables, and making the desserts.
You may rightfully feel that you are STILL "putting your stamp " on the meal by choosing the right bread and choosing the right wines to serve in your restaurant from a previously determined selection.
some people may like to grow their own wheat, grind the wheat into flour and use that flour to bake their own bread
if you are the Baker, you may want to take it that far, but if you are a Chef, you may be 'kind of busy' cooking the meat, sauteing the vegetables, and making the desserts.
You may rightfully feel that you are STILL "putting your stamp " on the meal by choosing the right bread and choosing the right wines to serve in your restaurant from a previously determined selection.
Good point, but that said, what if the music your making is almost entirely based on synths? (For example Ambient music)
Is it still okay if your music is a massive collage of presets?
I'd personally think theres fun and importance within ambient music to make your own pads and drones but i guess thats my opinion.
I'm too busy or tired to make patches, i'd rather knock out 5 or 6 rough tracks the spend that time making a preset. Gonna be real hard to make an original sound, fx are your friend. I will tweak here or there but really most people arnt interested in your original sounds more of what the tune sounds like so I focus on that. Perhaps when I can afford to sit and tweak , which I'd love I'd give it more a go..
Good point, but that said, what if the music your making is almost entirely based on synths? (For example Ambient music)
Is it still okay if your music is a massive collage of presets?
I'd personally think theres fun and importance within ambient music to make your own pads and drones but i guess thats my opinion.
Well maybe there's a thought, you might have to add something more musically meaningful if the only thing you can be proud of at the end of it is the sound of the synths you're using.
By the way I think that everyone should have a sonic palette, which you should work on for a while before you make the music. However, whether you did the sound or someone else, nobody in 5 years will give a crap.
Nobody reinvents the wheel.
A string sound can vary immensely, but to get there you will almost certainly be taking the same route as a preset.
On a modular synth you are forced to start from scratch (usually) which is cool for some stuff and certainly what I like about it, but presets are fine.
Where I agree with you is people looking for EXACT copies of sounds from records. I like being inspired by other sounds but chasing it down so I have the same sound as nick rhodes or whoever, is not my thing.
With presets (if I use one), I tend to choose one and then fine tune it to fit the track I'm working on, rather than fit a track around a sound I made. But everyone works differently and these days there seems to be a huge market in music that sounds (musically and/or sonically) almost identical to existing songs, but has JUST enough differences to not really be a rip off. Sad.
I'm not a preset fan, not for any philosophical reason, but because I find that many preset sounds are just too over-the-top to suit my taste. If you actually intend to play a patch or use it to play an interesting line or role in an arrangement, it can't sound like a one-man-band when you push one key.
One thing I do like presets for is learning tricks. Take a preset that surprises you, and take it apart to find out what makes it tick. You can learn some really good tricks that way.
I found a patch on the Virus that had an attack a lot like the scratch you get from a pick that's going quickly over a wound guitar string. Grrrrrrrunchmmmmmmmm. That kind of thing. I wondered how the sound designer did it. Turns out that he used the filter envelope to quickly switch through a bunch of wavetables, with interpolation set to maximum "not smooth". Very nice trick. So, it's a trick I can use in my own patches. I've learned a lot of cool stuff like that from taking apart presets.
Good point, but that said, what if the music your making is almost entirely based on synths? (For example Ambient music)
Is it still okay if your music is a massive collage of presets?
I'd personally think theres fun and importance within ambient music to make your own pads and drones but i guess thats my opinion.
For the listener, perhaps!
For the "creator" it's lazy and ultimately un-rewarding I would think.
Then you get to the question of layering. If you layer 2 sounds, the sum can be unique and highly creative.
But ultimately as a listener, I either like something or I don't. The methods of the creator shouldn't really affect my opinion of the music.
I recall I had to learn sound synthesis back in the day. I hated it, because it wasn't so much about actually creating music (harmony, melody, rhythm, dynamics, etc.). It seemed more like studying physics and mathematics the way it was taught. Now, looking back, I wish I had studied it more seriously and went deeper into it, because it is very useful for creating instruments and effects and it is very interesting. I think my interest now includes this much more than back in the other day. Physical modelling was perhaps the most interesting of the bunch of synthesis methods. Just imagine being very good at sound synthesis, having a particlur sound in mind and quickly getting good results because you are very skilled at the subject. Having some knowledge about it, I may get around a bit, but unfortunately not as well as certain others. It is a subject I would not mind to know very well.
In regards to making music and the moral question, I think that you should use already existing patches from others as long as you don't perform any morally wrong action. Regarding music, it's possible to use such already existing patches made by others musically wrongly. Even possible to use them in such ways that aren't even that interesting or musically complex. (It doesn't always have to be, though.)
While at it, you may as well ask if morality is absolute and where morality originates :P
One thing I do like presets for is learning tricks. Take a preset that surprises you, and take it apart to find out what makes it tick. You can learn some really good tricks that way
Very true!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Brenz
While at it, you may as well ask if morality is absolute and where morality originates :P
To me the thing about this is it's a slippery slope and where does it stop.
One person can criticize someone for using a preset, the next person will say you should have built your own reaktor ensemble, the next guy will say you should have coded it directly in C-sound, the next guy says no you need to breadboard that shit in analog.
Usually the people who code their own stuff in C-sound etc, seem to be picking the lamest 4 on the floor preset to put their synth over (my observation).
Personally I have no issue with presets, but I do try to avoid situations where the defining characteristic of the preset becomes the defining characteristic of the song.
For me, musicians are not bound by any rules and they come in all shapes, sizes and colours.
Imitation is just part of muisc imo, we are always influenced by someone, copying them is just the next step and it can be really helpful to get to a place where you can really be more original.
About presets, I never used them in the past. One I started selling mine however my attitude towards presets really changed. I have a lot more interested in what others are doing now, if for no other reason than it fascinates me what people come up with.
Often it is imitation of commercial music but sometimes it is less common sounds. My favourate is to find really good presets and break them down, I've learned a lot about sounds that way, it's surprising what really makes a difference in sounds, a bit of EQ, or slight modification of an envelope etc.
As for others, they are more focused on banging out the music, and it can be really tedious and a mood killer trying to come up with some interesting yet suitable sounds.
Remember people think differently and approach music differently. It's far more about work-flow than principle imo and I don't see any meaningful difference between producers who make their own sounds and those who use presets.
I've heard people use my presets in songs that I just would not have imagined, and the processing they use totally transforms them. That is where a lot of skill is at, even if someone doesn't take time to tweak their synths, they are definitely taking the time to tweak their mixes.
My advice to anyone wondering about the issue: do what you want!
Good point, but that said, what if the music your making is almost entirely based on synths? (For example Ambient music)
I can certainly see it as being genre-dependent. If you are opening a high-class Espresso Bar, you really should be roasting your own beans. If you are opening a Continental restaurant, you could shop around for a good local source of coffee and nobody will think any less of you.
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Is it still okay if your music is a massive collage of presets?
I guess that would totally depend on what you did with those presets! I don't see why it would HAVE to suck. The proof is in the pudding. It would be the height of snobbery to reject music you actually enjoy just because you learned presets were involved.
Heck, a lot of people's music is a massive collage of samples.
Quote:
I'd personally think theres fun and importance within ambient music to make your own pads and drones but i guess thats my opinion.
If someone's music is centered mainly on the sounds that go into it, then I agree, a certain degree of creativity in whipping up those sounds is valuable, if only for self-respect.
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