Native instruments - Studio Drummer

[chrisso]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

The thing about NI's drums is that they go for realism. Where other companies will use only close-mic samples in order to create custom sets without the differentials of overheads, snare bleed, rooms mics, etc... NI has snare bleed in the toms, kick bleed in more than just the overhead mics, no hi-hat bleed into the snare mic (good thing? I think so) and it just congeals together, which is especially noticeable in overhead and room mics into something very spacious and believable.

I think you just described the most frequently used drum libraries.
Which companies do you say only use close mics and don't employ bleed, room sounds and spill?

[DAWgEAR]

I thought the NI demos sounded good, but I am happy enough with Superior Drummer 2 that, for once, I don't feel tempted. (Not a very slutty thing to say.)

[s_sibs]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

There are other sample libraries doing this (or some of it) snare bleed through toms, kick in snare, etc and even the use of overheads for an entire kit... are you telling me all of those things are NOT a rarity in drum libraries?

The entire Superior Drummer 2 line of products have bleed from all kit pieces in all mic channels of the mixer (if turned on). So, it's not that rare

[chrisso]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

are you telling me all of those things are NOT a rarity in drum libraries?

Yes, it's more the norm, and not rare.

[mirrorboy]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

There are other sample libraries doing this (or some of it) snare bleed through toms, kick in snare, etc and even the use of overheads for an entire kit... are you telling me all of those things are NOT a rarity in drum libraries?

The two that I use, Addictive Drums and Superior Drums 2.0, both have bleeds. And in both cases this function is very intuitive to use, in my experience. I find this to be a very important feature. I also have BFD2 but haven't used it in ages so I can't remember if this one has it or not.

Scott

[mr pennine]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

Does Superior Drummer 2 put the kick, snare and hi-hat in the overheads by any chance? Because this is what I don't hear in the demos. How many voices is it usually tracking on average would you say? I'm curious

you can control the bleed for everything in superior, to quote the manual:

The SUPERIOR instrument not only gives you full-on leakage, but will also let you specify which drum leaks into
which microphone, a feature useful to keep memory usage low while programming or previewing sounds. For
those who need to keep memory usage at a minimum, a clever system of offline bouncing allows you to feature
all bleeds when rendering completed drum performances as audio files.

[chrisso]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

Does Superior Drummer 2 put the kick, snare and hi-hat in the overheads by any chance? Because this is what I don't hear in the demos. How many voices is it usually tracking on average would you say? I'm curious

Yes, every single sample in Superior is recorded with every mic open.
In the recording session the kit is mic'ed and recorded in exactly the same way it would be for a standard album.
Numerous room mics, overheads and snare under mics etc.....
Then in Superior's mixer you have a fader for each mic, plus bleed controls that change the influence of each drum on another.
It's set up like a real drum tracking session which is completely natural.
Even EZdrummer is recorded in the same way. The kit (including bass drum and snare) appears in the overheads as it would on a regular recording session. Being a cheaper, easier to use product, the options for bleeds are a bit less flexible although still present.
Like I said before, I'd ask you which drum programs you think don't use room mics and don't record drums in a normal recording session way, because as far as I can tell that's the norm, not unique.

[babel2]

Originally Posted by suicidebomber

nice! I would think bfd and ssd would not use them. It would seem that when you start swapping pieces of a kit, so would all the bleed samples for a snare. How can you possibly have both?

BFD was the original program to do this many years ago (not sure about DKFH - it might have to a lesser extent) and everything since does it too.

Hope we can get back to talking about Studio Drummer soon. Want to hear more about it.

[chrisso]

Originally Posted by babel2

Hope we can get back to talking about Studio Drummer soon.

Fair enough.

[relayer]

Originally Posted by babel2

...Hope we can get back to talking about Studio Drummer soon. Want to hear more about it.

It doesn't appear people are lining-up in droves to buy it. The few reviews I've read of it have not been good. Just read another bad one over at V-drums.com, and it had nothing to do with its playability on V-drums. I think people had high hopes for it in the beginning, but a room alone doesn't make or break a drum library. I don't see shelling out $165 for something that has received such a tepid response.

You may have heard about as much as you're going to.

[lxm]

Does it have a 'learn' function'?

[Oli P]

Originally Posted by babel2

BFD was the original program to do this many years ago (not sure about DKFH - it might have to a lesser extent) and everything since does it too.

Hope we can get back to talking about Studio Drummer soon. Want to hear more about it.

That is just not true at all...Toontrack came with DKFH back in '99 ...whereas FXpansion didn't release their BFD drums until 2003.

DKFH had more bleed options back then too...so the standard is set by Toontrack.

I'm waiting for NI to get the Komplete 8 Ultimate to my doorstep...we are 8 days past the release date, and I preordered a month ago.
So I'll have something to say about Studio Drummer pretty soon.

[babel2]

Originally Posted by Oli P

That is just not true at all...Toontrack came with DKFH back in '99 ...whereas FXpansion didn't release their BFD drums until 2003.

DKFH had more bleed options back then too...so the standard is set by Toontrack.

I'm waiting for NI to get the Komplete 8 Ultimate to my doorstep...we are 8 days past the release date, and I preordered a month ago.
So I'll have something to say about Studio Drummer pretty soon.

Sorry about that, never used DKFH. Puts all the above conversation in perspective though

Just ordered ultimate too so will be able to check it out soon.

Personally gone off the programmed acoustic drums a lot lately but hearing Abbey road 60s in kontakt blew me away. More excited about getting the rest of the Abbey road range than studio drummer really.

[m@rk]

Shame…. I was looking for some opinions about Studio Drummer (as topic says)
In every drums sw thread people ends up talking about superior, superior, superior…
So, finally did someone try STUDIO DRUMMER? Any opinion/test about that?

[K-Slash]

Hi !

Yes sure. I tested Studio Drummer recently and I honestly think it's a great product.

Together with Addictive Drums, it fulfills my "real acoustic drums" needs.

The samples themselves sound great, and as a "ready to go" instrument, it's perfect to lay out nice sounding ideas quickly, or provide the beat for a track your working on. For example, if you were building a track upon some piano or guitar, or even bass riffs, it fits well to provide a convincing rythmic part.

The included grooves are good, not the best I head, but as you can tweak everything, it's not that important.

The mixer is one of the best part of it.

The included EQ and COMP are using the algos from the separate SSL emulations for NI (Solid Mix Series). And they do sound very very good ! Actually if you need some quick quality Drums mixes, you can end up using only the included effects and they will have nothing to envy to your others effects.

The transient designer included is surprisingly good IMHO, and the tape effect suprised me too. I thought like "well, another crappy addition to use it as a marketing argument", but in fact no. If you tweak it right, it sounds cool actually. Glues everything together and adds a nice vibe.

That just my views, as we all have different taste, but IMHO it's overall a great product. I would not have been again some "old school" drumkits, but maybe there will be expansions. I mean, it's modern sounding Drums, and it's good at that.

[Foxis]

I am considering Studio Drummer for my Logic setup, but the info on the NI website is a bit scarce regarding some features.

I would be very thankful if someone could enlighten me about whether it can do multi out easily? I have searched a bit and only found an unanswered post on the official forums where someone failed to get it working.

Multi-out is a must-have for me as I want to mix the different drum channels in the Logic mixer using my controller rather than in the Studio Drummer mixer.

So...is it possible and is it easy...?
Thanks in advance!

[soulata]

Originally Posted by K-Slash

Hi !

Yes sure. I tested Studio Drummer recently and I honestly think it's a great product.

I like it, too. Grooves are fantastic, sounds good, easy to use. A fine addition to EZDrummer.

k

[SWAN808]

how do the hi hats sound? lots of variation?

[babel2]

Finally had a chance to play with this a bit more and I am very impressed.
Very useable and integrates into protools soo much more easily than the other programs I have (Strike and BFD 1) - export midi works flawlessly and suits my workflow very well

It took me a few sessions to get my bearings with the mixer and work out the routing but sounds very good to me
Routing individual channels out is certainly doable though it takes a moment to work out how to do this via Kontakt. (I'm assuming this is doable without also owning the full version of Kontakt but not 100% sure)

I don't understand why this got such a panning by earlier posters - it's no slouch at all!

[The Beatsmith]

OT - When you route everything to separate channels in PT, doesn't it process all that on one core and send the CPU through the roof?

[lordnielson]

Don't get the negativity either. Seems like the basic sounds of well recorded kits are there.

[Johnkenn]

No disrespect meant, but if your previous experience has only been with BFD1 and Strike, I would imagine this does sound good to you. To me, something like The Classic is head and shoulders better...

Originally Posted by babel2

Finally had a chance to play with this a bit more and I am very impressed.
Very useable and integrates into protools soo much more easily than the other programs I have (Strike and BFD 1) - export midi works flawlessly and suits my workflow very well

It took me a few sessions to get my bearings with the mixer and work out the routing but sounds very good to me
Routing individual channels out is certainly doable though it takes a moment to work out how to do this via Kontakt. (I'm assuming this is doable without also owning the full version of Kontakt but not 100% sure)

I don't understand why this got such a panning by earlier posters - it's no slouch at all!

[ARIEL]

I have to say this looks amazing ! the control and sound is excellent . I really like the quantize control and swing function . The IR verbs are a great implementation . The price super cheap . Any one complaining about this would leave me scratching my head in wonder .

[Oli P]

I finally got my Komplete Ultimate...and have been playing around with Studio Drummer a bit now.

Some things are really nice about it, and some pretty annoying compared to S2.0

The best thing is the mixer and the toms...the worst thing is that you can't mix and match between the kits.
And it seems to be pretty hard on the cpu...so it's bad news for e drumming and latency (again compared to S2.0)

The reverb sounds great too.

I don't know why they left out the lp/hp filters on the EQ in the Kontakt version...that's a pity.

Overall a nice product...but nowhere near the realism of S2.0 with the good SDX packs.

But S2.0 could really benefit from a reverb like this, and a tape/saturator type plug-in.

[vo1k1]

I was not looking at these for purchase. However, they came with Komplete. I've found practical use for them, can fit well in a mix. Also surprised at the some of the initial negative reviews.

[babel2]

Originally Posted by Johnkenn

No disrespect meant, but if your previous experience has only been with BFD1 and Strike, I would imagine this does sound good to you. To me, something like The Classic is head and shoulders better...

You're making me think I've been missing out,
'The Classic' is?
Doesn't seem to refer to S2.0 or addictive?

[nst7]

He's referring to "The Classic" EZX expansion pack which works in Superior Drummer, or it's little brother EZ Drummer.

I don't have it, but from what I've heard of it, I'm not super impressed so far.

[chrisso]

Originally Posted by babel2

'The Classic' is?

An EZX expansion you can use with EZdrummer or inside Superior.
http://www.toontrack.com/products.asp?item=95

[markham]

Originally Posted by nst7

He's referring to "The Classic" EZX expansion pack which works in Superior Drummer, or it's little brother EZ Drummer.

I don't have it, but from what I've heard of it, I'm not super impressed so far.

FWIW, I do have it, and I am super impressed by it. I think it's among the best drum sounds I've ever heard from software, in fact. I think Chris and Peter really nailed it on this one.

But of course, that's my opinion. Other folks will no doubt have differing ones.

[Tui]

Originally Posted by feck

Let's hope these play better on a Vkit than the Abbey Road Drums do.

Could you explain why the Abbey Road Drums don't play well, as I'm considering buying a copy. I use Yamaha e-drums, frequently in conjunction with Drumcore.