Tag Archives: Sample Map

Get Awesome Reaktor Tools by Martin Wood-Mitrovski

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Some of you may already know Martin as the creator of this great Euclidean sequencer for Reaktor.  Recently he’s also uploaded a Blocks version that makes it easy to incorporate Euclidean sequences in your Blocks based ensembles:

552941_1716.EuclideanRotatorBlock

Just drop it into your Blocks ensemble and use the output to drive, for example, some drum sounds. User Daniel Wincott uploaded an ensemble to the user library demonstrating how to do this.

1699313_1069.DrumGrot

Now Martin has graciously shared with us a couple of other tools. One is an update of his sample map builder, which now comes bundled with a built in Java runtime in the OS X version so you don’t have to fiddle around with installing and configuring a JRE.

Another is a node.js based tool to generate Reaktor multitext macros from a text file. This is a command line tool but it’s extremely simple to use if you’ve ever run anything from a command line, ever:

Screen Shot 2015-11-27 at 7.25.01 AM

I think this highlights the need for a scripting language built into Reaktor just as one is in Kontakt – the ability to address text fields from a script would overcome hours of wrist strain from laboriously entering data in MultiText modules. And that’s just one usage example. In the meantime Martin’s tool is a great shortcut Reaktor builders can use right now.

The Tunnel Sample Pack

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I recorded a bunch of samples in a stone tunnel on Mt. Royal here in Montreal a while back – stomps, tin cans, bottles, plastic containers, sticks and stones and etc. clanking and knocking around. Here are some of them cut up into individual hits for your percussioneering pleasure.

And here’s a beat I made with them, loaded into a new version of ParamDrum.

The new version will be available this week as soon as I make a few more demo presets. Notable additions are: a sub bass control to add some extra oomph to your bass samples, and decay and sample-start controls.

UPDATE: daaaamn, I have to stop working in headphones. The bass ain’t what I thought. I have to redo this with a better kick that kicks.

Fast Sample Wrangling with Reaper, Edison and Reaktor

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How do you deal with samples and MP3s that you want to use as raw material in Reaktor? Reaktor has an audio browser, but it doesn’t read compressed formats so they have to be converted beforehand. Then you’ll probably want to break them down into chunks so you don’t have to import a three minute song to get a ten second drum break or koto sample – so you have to fire up a separate audio editor and cut things up ahead of time.

FL Studio is one of my go-to programs for this, especially for dealing with large numbers of samples. It has a great sample browser sidebar which previews-on-select your compressed or uncompressed audio, and the integrated FL version of the Edison wave editor makes it a snap to grab a selected area of a sample and drag it into a sampler channel or the playlist. This works for just about any audio file, including compressed formats like Ogg and MP3.

This is handy for prototyping things and trying out ideas, but the built in sampler channels are limited and I’d rather be dragging things into Reaktor. So can you drag a sample or a piece of a sample from Edison into Reaktor running as a plugin in FL Studio? Of course not – that would be too easy.

The next step for me was to try the standalone Edison sound editor and see if it can drag selections into standalone Reaktor’s sample map. Nope, that didn’t work either.

Finally, I loaded up Reaktor in Reaper, selected a sample from Reaper‘s media explorer (it’s very similar to a Windows file explorer window), and opened it in Edison. Magically, dragging a selected area from Edison into Reaktor worked now! Reaper is voodoo, kids. I don’t question it too much, I just use it and be thankful.

Sample Drag and Drop with Edison, Reaper and Reaktor from Peter Dines on Vimeo.

The media explorer tab, like the browser in FL, works with compressed or uncompressed audio and can preview on select. And of course Edison can deal with compressed or uncompressed audio, so these two plus Reaktor make a super sampling triumvirate powerhouse. Jeez, I should be writing ad copy. Anyways, go grab ’em, because the demo versions of both programs are non expiring and will allow you to do what I’ve demonstrated here.

Reaper

Edison

Pro tip: sample maps

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Often, I want to have a whole bunch of samples with the same root key but on different notes in the map; for example, in a drum machine, where you have separate sample select and pitch controls. I like to have my root key at zero so I can add or subtract semitones with a knob to pitch things up or down.

One way to prepare a map for this is to laboriously add one sample at a time and set the root key manually. Blech! That’s no fun.

A better way is to use Reaktor’s internal browser to navigate to your sample directory and select a bunch of samples, like so:

Then – and this is the important part – drag them onto your target root key so they all stack up together like so:

Then from the functions menu choose “remap to single keys”:

…after which you will have all your ducks in a row.

Go to the sample list view to verify that they all have the same root note.

Now, wasn’t that easy? Of course you can also drag them onto key C3 to have them pitched at middle C. It all depends how your sampler instrument likes to be fed and watered.