Emax

Yes, Elk and I'm trying to understand this...But in every case it is  
different, a different situation.
With Emax, for example, it is the filters, the dithering, the ability  
to loop highly complex material
that would be impossible to do in Peak or other software programs, and  
the soft attacks and decays
I get from the envelope generators and other analog parts of the  
instrument.

It is very interesting talking with some FL Studio users, for example,  
who curse at me and call me
an "old timer" and ignorant because "everything that used to be done  
with hardware can now be
done with plugins and FL Studio".  Well, I didn't hang-out with these  
guys for very long I can tell
you, Elk.  Trying to discuss this with them was pointless.  And a  
friend of mine said simply: "They're
zealots and wont listen to a word anybody says!"

I've worked very hard to replicate "tape-saturation" in my work by  
using any number of tricks and
tools.  I'm really big on tape-saturation because I had a system where  
the EIII or Emax was connected
to an 8-Track mixer and then went stereo-out to a Nagra that was  
custom-built.  Quite often I'd flip
the chain around and takes recorded on the Nagra would be re-recorded  
back into the EIII and then
re-designed further.

My mixer and Nagra were super quiet!  No noise build-up.  So I could  
do this.

So my method would be, and still is, multiple 24-track mixes each  
mixed-down to stereo two-track
mixes and then in the end the multiple stereo two-track mixes are all  
loaded and a final mix-down
is done.

This process adds to the need to be able to keep track of source  
material because in the end it can
become very difficult years later to remember what and where that  
source sample came from....

As a rule I'm burning lots of discs and putting notes with them and  
storing them away.

With the Emax I found that I was taking the source recording many  
times and processing it
through multiple effects-boxes before it went into the Emax.  Then on  
the way out to the
mixer it went though another chain of boxes before being recorded.

Now things at every stage of the game right from the working with the  
raw and unprocessed
source material everything is going into Melodyne Studio and I'm  
working with it.

Melodyne Studio after all I'm realizing is a sampler!  I never thought  
about it that way, but in
general the limitations that I ran into years ago with Emax can now be  
solved with Melodyne
before it goes into Emax!  :-)  It is wonderful -- incredible!  I  
cannot recommend it enough as
a tool for work with Emax because of the limitations of 1 MG of RAM,  
etc.

I have the Emax HD SE so unlike some lucky folks who were able to snag  
an Emax II I am limited
to that 1 MG of RAM which makes one become very creative to get around  
problems I must say!  :-)

The Melodyne PlugIn solves a lot of problems from the outset.  People  
don't have to shell-out for
the Studio version, although I would strongly recommend it because you  
will use it -- believe me!
Unlimited tracks, "unlimited undos", the ability to produce all of  
those arrangements on the fly and
then just re-arrange things again.

And I can design the sound for that 1 MG RAM limitation from the  
outset!  :-)  This makes me very
happy!

[Also, I am not a "shill" for Celemony who make the Melodyne  
Software.  I just got involved with
them from the start of their company in hopes of solving a serious and  
horrible problem with a
piece of music I had worked on for two, almost three, years and had to  
throw-out. That's how
I discovered the software.  It didn't solve my problem, but in  
learning about the software it opened
all of these doors for me creatively that I am still exploring daily  
and discovering new applications
for the software and the tools in it -- more than I have the time and  
life to explore and work with!
It's like the Spectrum Synthesis and Transform Multiplication in SE:   
you sit for hours pursuing
a path while it processes in that 1 MG of RAM!  Now with Melodyne  
designing everything on the
front-end for Emax's limitations Emax is far far more powerful for me  
than it was before!  I love
creating a beat with the Spectrum engine and then working with the  
loop in ReCycle and exporting-out
and into Melodyne and changing everything around -- all of the  
pitches, layering the melodic
lines of it, and changing the percussive elements of the SE beat!   
It's just fantastic!  Also I can
really create rhythmic loops with beats at the loop-points without  
artifacts or distortion when
altering pitch, or length, etc.!]

Hardware is important for many reasons.

You know I was just looking at Dave Smith's Prophet 8 and how I want  
to snag one of those
before they disappear!  Those synths are like Porches of the synth  
world!  And the combination
with Emax is perfect, really!  Just like the Access Virus and Emax  
combination's results. Perfect!
Great beats, great strings, great loops!  [Don't like the TI's,  
though! Like "Polar"...]

What other hardware are you using, Elk?

Now that I cannot get tape any longer the Nagra is gone from the setup  
for good in my world.



On 14 Jul 2009, at 21:30, Elk Latham wrote:

>
> everything I do with software instruments some how end up in  
> hardware sampler as well.




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