Please can we get a new forum for

[Sendy]

Yep, it's actually getting worse, visibly, over time. And I still say it's basically SPAM, a few notches up from "hello I'm a GIRL and want to do a sex onto you, please send me money".

Preset spotting doesn't belong in a sound design/synthesis forum! Let them post in the Soundware forum. But then, they have no interest in buying anyone's soundsets, you can almost guarantee someone with this attitude is gonna be torrenting the presets when they find out which one contains their precious "awesome pluck" sound.

These people are making me actually hate preset users - they're giving them a bad name. Sometimes I just think - if you're going to make a type of music where the sound and timbre is as important as the notes you play - you should just learn synthesis! If that slows you down a bit, so be it. I've always seen the "I don't have time" excuse as a copout for everybody, except those working for someone else on a tight deadline.

[Bronto Scorpio]

I'm still waiting for the "Patchbender" forum U-He announced something like 3 or 4 years ago
I have a feeling that it will be a lot more nerdy than the sound design forum here.

In fact, the U-He sub forum often has much "better" discussions about sound stuff than the actual sund design forum.

Cheers
Dennis

[Sendy]

Yes, I also find I get a lot more responses if I post my music in the u-he forum, as well. Given the amount of time I've spent on this site, often trying to help people, it amazes me how I can post a tune at the music cafe and nobody will say a word (despite the listens going through the roof), and yet someone can make their first post to KVR "Hey listen to my music" and get a load of feedback. Maybe people think I don't need feedback (which in a way, is kinda true, and in a way isn't. I don't follow feedback blindly but appreciate construtcive criticism and encouragement).

I think u-he products act as a sort of filter, blocking out those who see sound as a stepping-stone to getting money and teh babes. They all require a sort of independence and sound design vision to get the best out of them, and those that mainly surf presets are more likely to get involved in tweaking them and learning synthesis in those type of synths, in my honest opinion, because the layouts are so intuitive and beg to be tweaked.

[ntom]

I'm trying to get caught up in this thread, but Hidden Goose, your post stood out particularly I feel compelled to reply now, so sorry if this takes the thread back a few steps.

It's always possible that they're young and interests haven't been broadened yet. They may get put off the whole thing if everyone who they turn to for guidance tells them to politely f-off.

While maybe a valid point, I just want to say when I was growing up my musical interest lye well outside of the popular artists on the radio, from Coldplay to Jami Seiber, the Cinematic Orchestra to System of a Down, so I don't know if it's a good excuse to let the kids get away with this narrow field of interest.
Then again, I was a band geek while I was in junior high and high school, so maybe that helped in broadening my musical tastes.

The first things I made were awful. Diabolically so.

I want to hear it, imo.

It annoys me more that their focus of learning is so narrow

+1
And this is the poison of the subforum. In all honesty, I no longer check the Sound Design subforum - unless something really catches my eye that might have good forum drama in it, but I'll come rushing in to any subforum if that's the case (with a bucket of popcorn too)
So in a more polite manner than "The N00b Forums" or whatever, there should be a forum to catch all of the narrow minded Aviccii lovers.

****Side note, someone mentioned all the people trying to sound like X producer and listed Avicci among a few others including Benassi and I'd like to say I have never seen a sound design thread on Benassi. We are talking about the Benassi from the early 2000 who did this song, right?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r838pJCS2o0

[The_Hidden_Goose]

Maybe they need everyone to tell them to f-off so they do go and learn the hard (proper!) way.

Well, perhaps I'm too soft on 'em but I remember trying to get exact sounds - they weren't modern or current "it" tunes that I was trying to copy (and I say copy rather emulate as that's what it was at the start), whereas anything else grew from confidence gained from learning after the easy bit. It was a good kicking-off point though. I'm happy using sounds that are similar to other stuff now that I can make them myself if necessary - I still use presets at kicking-off points sometimes but I never buy them, I just use whatever presets come with it. That's usually enough to save a bit of time messing around with basics.

I can definitely see how it annoys people who like to get deep into sound design discussions, with it being close to their hearts. It'd be like asking a at chef's conference how to make cheese on toast - with red leicester cheese and nothing else. Some of them might have special tips and tricks that would be beneficial (even with those limited caveats) but they'd be reticent to offer them as it's nothing they couldn't get anywhere else, and they've got better things to talk about - and learning of their own to do, most likely.

You're not hearing my very old stuff though! Haven't got it anymore - that was like 4-5 computers with deaded hard-drives ago! I don't even public show my earlyish stuff that I like as there are not-so-cleared samples (some obvious - some Nick Drake guitary loops as I recall), and I used not-so-legal methods to make them. Kinda drew a line under that period a few years ago.

[ntom]

You're not hearing my very old stuff though! Haven't got it anymore - that was like 4-5 computers with deaded hard-drives ago! I don't even public show my earlyish stuff that I like as there are not-so-cleared samples (some obvious - some Nick Drake guitary loops as I recall), and I used not-so-legal methods to make them. Kinda drew a line under that period a few years ago.

I got caught up in this thread!
I kind of would like to hear where a lot of the KVR artists got started, obviously some of the first tracks are going to be completely f**king shit. My first track once I still leave it posted to my Soundcloud for giggles - albeit it had a revision since the very first version, but the revision to it was just some better production (using the term loosely) a few months after I originally posted it to soundcloud.


But I absolutely agree these narrow minded sheep need to learn the hard way if they aren't going to accept real help or even be appreciative of it. I am usually always happy to help people, I'm certain a few here on KVR may remember I use make personal tutorial videos whenever someone needed help or a very in depth guide sharing what knowledge I have (not that I am an expert by any means). I still do on occasions, but for the shear fact of my help being unappreciated by these people I would write like 10 pages worth of text for and spend several hours collecting screen shots, making short demos showing examples, ect was too much effort for no appreciation, not to mention, I turn around and there are like 20 more asking the very same question; 9/10 times I post these things IN THE TOPIC so it's publicly available for others to read (not just for others to learn, but also for others who know more to correct me on anything I might be wrong on) so it's especially irksome when someone else doesn't even bother to check the recent topics in the forum they are posting in to see if their question is answered!
Isn't that a typical things forums ask before members post dumb questions, "Please check our forums for your question before posting?" I don't expect someone to scroll through hundreds of pages and put a lot of work into their search, but god, even a half ass search will turn up a bunch of results that will probably answer their question.

My latest foray into helping a producer out (this is kind of unrelated, fyi) was more on the production side of things, and while he was fairly appreciative of my advice I kind of dropped the ball on aiding him as first of all:
He wanted to make cookie cutter EDM music, and while I was being tolerant of his choice, my knowledge of the exact specifications of the rules of how to produce that way aren't very vast - not that I think it takes much in the first place, but since my music generally seems to follow whatever rules I want it to, having rules to make a specific genre is....foreign to me.
Secondly, his english was not fluent at ALL and I often had to repeat myself, reword things, then reword them again and it was just all too difficult.
Sadly this was all done through PMs, though I think our conversation started publicly on one of his tracks.

AS FOR SENDY,
Yes, these preset seekers make even myself feel dirty when I use one. I do use them at times, but it feels like I am cheating on a wife (which we know I don't have one because I'm being shafted out of my money to find one - different thread, sorry)
But I have pretty much said my fair amount on this topic in this post already. As per the Cafe when compared to U-He....well....actually that's awhole different thing entirely which I ALSO would like fixed along side the Sound Design subforum...but one thing at a time. Baby steps, you know?
I would love to critique people's music, but almost for the same reasons as sound design; you offer advice to someone and unless they are a frequenter of KVR, you typically don't get any appreciation. When I actually DO go to the Cafe to listen, I always try to leave feedback on the posts that have less than 2 responses and are sinking to the bottom, but sometimes either the tracks just aren't my cup of tea and I don't have any feedback to give, or it's more unoriginal rubbish crap, or I do leave feedback and, as said above; no appreciation.
If any frequenter of KVR wants some critique I'll be happy to if you just tell me or at the very least, I'll try, not every track will be my cup of tea so I may not have a response to it, but if that's the case, I'll let you know.
Not like I'm doing anything better....Just womanhunting while some fat cat in a suit bleeds my already-dry wallet into a barren, bony husk.

[The_Hidden_Goose]

My first tracks just had far too much bass. Every sound had bass. I didn't know how to properly eq and I didn't have any visual tools which I now rely on and absolutely couldn't live without. I also didn't have a sub and had weedy computer speakers, so I couldn't really hear how bad the bass was getting.

But still...I was making dumb techno too dumb for people who like dumb techno (by dumb, I mean quite hard and very repetitive - and I still like me some o'dat!). That's what really got me going when partying. I had a mate who started at the same time (there was some friendly rivalry there at the time) who was mega into Orbital, and so his stuff tended to sound very much like Orbital at first.

But then I got into more chilled out stuff like The Orb, FSOL, Aphex Twin's Selected Ambient Works stuff, Ozric Tentacles and some of the stuff on Delerium Records which put me back on the path to where my tastes started (krautrock/kosmische and psychedelic music generally) before I got a taste for dance music and music-making in general. I still love dance music, but I don't really make it anymore because my heart's not in it.

But, oh, those nights I'd be up til the wee hours, high as a kite, making stuff that I thought was gonna be huge in the clubs....only to listen to it with sober ears in the morning and realise it was utter crap. Not just badly mixed, but badly everything!

On the Cafe, my experience from commenting hasn't been too bad - on the few occasions I've actually offered any technical critique or advice, it's been mostly well received or at least not railed against - and often I've only been reiterating what others have said. That said, I don't say anything if I can't listen to the tune - even if I could have something to say about the mixing or something, I just flick by on to the next one. The main reason I don't go there so much lately is because (as I've mentioned in a post, possibly this one - can't be arsed to check) I find it hard to talk about music without referencing other music, and I think the feedback most people are after is possibly a bit more than a boomkat-style reference-bite (yeah, they do that a lot on their reviews...can't blame them - they probably have to do a lot of them, and there's only so much flowery art-talk that you can do before you're repeating yourself every other week!).

It's tough to get your stuff criticised, even constructive criticism, but that's a part of the learning process. Taking it is something like a skill in itself, and some people will be better at it than others. I remember an acquaintance of mine giving me perfectly good criticism of a generally oversaturated thing I did once, and even though I specifically wanted THAT sound, it still niggled at me until I redid it - I ended up preferring the original with the original slightly knackered sound, but it bothered me enough to go back and have another look at it before I told myself it was finished. Now I often do that without the criticism to jolt me into it - undo a specific thing I had in mind just to check if, on comparison, I really did want that. It turns out I'm wrong sometimes in the original plan and it works better another way. So I'm thankful to that person who told me stuff I didn't want to hear, as it has taught me a process-checking process that has come in handy.