KVR Audio

basslinemaster · Post by **basslinemaster** » Tue May 19, 2015 2:56 pm

Is it just me, or are soundbanks really, really expensive nowadays? Somebody on one of the other forums announced their new soundbank for Hive, which has only 40 presets, and they said they are going to be asking £15 for it. Hive comes with 2,700 presets, and is only £64 odd before release on 2nd June, isn't £15 for 40 more presets asking too much? Especially for only 40 presets.
I'm sure I remember a time when nobody would attempt to bring out a soundbank without 128 presets in it, and they were generally well under £10, for 128 presets. Seeing as there is no way to copy protect soundbanks, aren't they setting their prices too high?
(I'm hoping nobody replies with "You're trying to undervalue the hard work that preset designers do", etc. as that clearly isn't what I'm saying at all... a lower selling price in no way equals smaller profits...)

Chandran · Post by **Chandran** » Tue May 19, 2015 3:44 pm

If the presets are amazing and inspire your work 15£ are peanuts! Try to sound design yourself interesting and useable presets and see the time you spend for that...If you have such a huge sound bank included with the synth why are you looking for more presets? 15£ for 40 artesan presets is very cheap in fact! " If you buy haute couture clothes it cost more than industial ones" and nobody complain about that.
Cheers!

Kriminal · Post by **Kriminal** » Tue May 19, 2015 4:03 pm

Roll your own. Its by far the best way. Anyone who doesnt is a mug.

fluffy_little_something · Tue May 19, 2015 4:06 pm

It is a bit odd when a sound bank is more than 1/2 of the synth price as in the case of Retrologue. (It's a bit like with ink for printers, but at least you can print without ink in this case

)
And frankly, if a synth ships with hundreds or even thousands of presets and few or none of them are great, the synth probably can't sound great to begin with

Or they deliberately include mostly crap, which is not exactly a good thing, either. And often those making sound banks are also the ones who make factory presets, which is not a good omen

It would really have to be at least two dozen amazing presets if I were to pay 10 euros for such a sound bank. Sounds I would love to use but not have a clue how to program.

blortblort · Post by **blortblort** » Tue May 19, 2015 4:12 pm

basslinemaster wrote:Is it just me, or are soundbanks really, really expensive nowadays? Somebody on one of the other forums announced their new soundbank for Hive, which has only 40 presets, and they said they are going to be asking £15 for it. Hive comes with 2,700 presets, and is only £64 odd before release on 2nd June, isn't £15 for 40 more presets asking too much? Especially for only 40 presets.
I'm sure I remember a time when nobody would attempt to bring out a soundbank without 128 presets in it, and they were generally well under £10, for 128 presets. Seeing as there is no way to copy protect soundbanks, aren't they setting their prices too high?
(I'm hoping nobody replies with "You're trying to undervalue the hard work that preset designers do", etc. as that clearly isn't what I'm saying at all... a lower selling price in no way equals smaller profits...)

(short version):
totally up to the buyer.

(laboriously expanded version):
from a sound designer perspective-
While I do not have a LOT of experience in the professional soundbank sales world I can share the experience I've had with the ONE soundbank for Virus TI that took me over a year to complete. Its LOADED with modulation routings and MW, AT and all 3 "performance knobs" are mapped per patch for 128
I initially released it for $49 two years ago when there were literally NO 3rd party Virus TI banks available...I sold 2 (two). I have since tried selling it for 20bucks both on well known sites and thru "sellfy"...zero sales.
I know MY experience may not be typical and admittedly, I have NOT put in the time and energy on promotion ...and it IS only ONE set after all... but the point is I will NEVER make back the money equivalent to the time i put into creating the bank.
Others are quite gifted in their ability to crank out serious volume AND QUALITY preset banks as much as one every couple weeks or so...I've seen the prices vary from 2 or £3 to as much as £30

from a customer perspective-
I have paid variously as well... never as much as £30, mind you, but- IF the quality of the demo was that good and the producer provided a small demo set for test driving...maybe yes-
I think it IS all up the the customer to dictate what they are willing to pay.
and I DO believe that sales can be affected by promotion, offering a small demo set of patches or loops if you're doing a sampleset, and quality of the demo song(s)

One more point to add that speaks to the cost issue here:
if you're buying a patchbank of a more popular synth, you're more likely to see a much wider range of prices... IE-if you are a designer and you KNOW you have a great set and a great demo for a popular synth you can legitimately ask for more and are likely to get it... so there will be more designers out there ...and as follows, more different pricing...
conversely- if you have a great set for a more obscure synth, it would be less reasonable to expect to see many sales for your bank if you price it very high regardless of how good it may be.

the thing to bear in mind is that in the end, sound designers are providing a convenience- They have spent THEIR time to create something that would take you a long time to create yourself OR something that you may not have even been ABLE to create...and perhaps, if you're purchasing really nice stuff, you are receiving inspiration from those sounds themselves! What price do you put on that?

blortblort · Post by **blortblort** » Tue May 19, 2015 4:12 pm

err...thick thumbs dbl post ;P
sorry

fluffy_little_something · Tue May 19, 2015 4:32 pm

I guess it also depends if someone is doing it as a kind of (second) job or as a mere hobby.

aMUSEd · Post by **aMUSEd** » Tue May 19, 2015 4:54 pm

1) Rolling your own +
2) Giving them away
= Plenty of decent free banks available

fluffy_little_something · Tue May 19, 2015 5:02 pm

Would be cool to be able to order exclusive custom presets that won't be sold to anyone else, 5 bucks per patch

cryophonik · Post by **cryophonik** » Tue May 19, 2015 5:03 pm

I don't buy many soundbanks, but it seems to me that they've been getting cheaper over the past few years. I remember 8-10 years when the big names (e.g., Vengeance) were selling them for like $75-100 for 128 patches. I can't remember the last time I've seen 128 patches for more than $40 or $50, and I seem to see many for under $25, which seems perfectly reasonable to me. But, then again I don't really follow the costs very closely, so maybe I'm just out of touch.

BERFAB · Post by **BERFAB** » Tue May 19, 2015 5:50 pm

I agree with the OP. It used to be that a soundBANK was an actual bank of presets--multiples of 128.

And, yes, they do seem to be getting more expensive. Which is probably why I own so many synths--it is often cheaper to get a good synth on sale--with hundreds of presets--than to get a soundbank for just one synth.

-B

basslinemaster · Post by **basslinemaster** » Wed May 20, 2015 7:44 am

I agree, I look at synths that come with thousands of presets, and then look at the cost of just 100 odd presets in a soundbank, and think "I might as well buy another VST!". I got Hybrid 3 for £30 odd, with well over 1,000 presets (I can't remember how many it has, maybe it's 1,500), I got XPand!2 for £30 with around 2,000 presets, and so on. I can't justify spending £30 on 128 presets for any of the synths I own, when I can just buy another VST with thousands of fantastic presets.

And I see more and more soundbanks that have a ridiculously low number of presets (like 40) and are asking £12 or £15 - for just 40 presets! So that would be about £40 for 128 presets, at that rate.

Lotuzia · Post by **Lotuzia** » Wed May 20, 2015 9:10 am

Our soundbanks are right priced ( ie not like the prices you describe) and sell very well ( Might be related with their price, as seen as *right* by our users ).

A soundbank takes us a minimum of one month of work. ( And not 35 hours per week, but a lot more ) I might be very slow, but afaik, most sound designers are equally slow, and therefore it should take approx the same time for any average user.

If you think that paying the price of a couple of pizzas is too expensive to avoid you to work one month to get a similar number of patches, well it's very simple : People are totally free not to buy any soundbank.

And finally, even if you work one month to make your own patches, they won't be the same than the ones designed by another person : Maybe better -for you-, or maybe worse -for you-, but mainly, in the end, totally different. And well, that might answer your question.

Lotuzia · Post by **Lotuzia** » Wed May 20, 2015 9:11 am

dbl post

tehlord · Post by **tehlord** » Wed May 20, 2015 9:26 am

Lotuzia wrote:Our soundbanks are right priced ( ie not like the prices you describe) and sell very well ( Might be related with their price, as seen as *right* by our users ).

A soundbank takes us a minimum of one month of work. ( And not 35 hours per week, but a lot more ) I might be very slow, but afaik, most sound designers are equally slow, and therefore it should take approx the same time for any average user.

If you think that paying the price of a couple of pizzas is too expensive to avoid you to work one month to get a similar number of patches, well it's very simple : People are totally free not to buy any soundbank.

And finally, even if you work one month to make your own patches, they won't be the same than the ones designed by another person : Maybe better -for you-, or maybe worse -for you-, but mainly, in the end, totally different. And well, that might answer your question.

I agree with all of this.

I think the sweet spot for presets is probably around $30-40 for 128 depending on the synth. $15 for 40 presets is a little much.

For preset banks for Alchemy they were considerably more expensive for a reason, it's entirely possible to spend a day or more on one sound to get it right and comply with Camel's strict guidelines. For Sylenth/Hive etc, not so much.

It's also not just the time spent programming. The demo's can take almost as long if done properly, then there's artwork, website, hosting costs.

The idea that you're a 'mug' if you don't roll your own is simply ignorant. If you actually step outside of your own bubble there are vast swathes of people that don't want to roll their own as they're already doing quite well just making the music.

Cost of soundbanks - often expensive