YOUR favorite Sonik Synth 2 patches!!!

[Squids]

I am putting together a special collection of Combis that are pulling out popular favorites amongst the factory combis and single presets. I want to do this so that someone who is checking Sonik Synth 2 out in a store gets an opportunity to find the most exciting sounds in each category first to get an impression rather than find themselves overwhelmed with 6,000 sounds and not knowing which ones make it particularly shine! You've got thousands of sounds that are just there when you need them or want to experiment around with making new sounds but then you've got certain sounds that you look to your friend and say "kewl dude" (if you're younger than me) or "that's sweet" (if you're Greg Phillenganes). Those are the ones I want to pull out into a combi set.

So, in each of these categories which are your favorite combis and which are your favorite individual sounds? I will make a more general list of categories than what we have in SS2 so you can lump them together into these:

Favorite:

Basses
Brass
Drums
Guitars
Layered Stacks
Leads
Long Evolving Sounds
Odd Sounds
Organs
Pads
Percussion
Pianos (both acoustic and electric + clav etc)
SFX
Strings
Voices
Winds
Other

Try to make a separate list of your favorite combis than your favorite individual patches (parent or chilod it doesn't matter).

To participate you don't have to name sounds in each category. Pick a few categories you like or as many as you want and give the same name the sound is in the factory sound set.

When I am done compiling this I will make it available to anyone who wants it for free. I am including a few extra custom combis that I made in there as well which are nice.

[Squids]

Actually, this is also a good tip for Sonik Synth 2 users. If you want to keep a favorites folder of your own it is easy to do with making combis. A combi doesn't even have to have more than one channel of a sound. All you do is load up your favorite sound into channel 1 and then save it back into a made up "favorites" folder in the Sonik Synth 2 Presets folder (where your combis are stored). Name it the same name as the patch if you want or add a suffix or prefix to it perhaps. Then load up another one of your favorite sounds and save that back as well!

Oh, here's another tip. You want a quick and easy way to zero out the settings after you've loaded up a multi-layered combi with lots of panning and stuff going on? Simple. When you first load up Sonik Synth 2 before a session, save back a BLANK combi before you've loaded anything. Call that combi "template" or "blank" (or whatever you like). Then, next time you have a big layered combi loaded just load up this "blank" or "template" patch and it brings it back to zero settings.

[Kim Lajoie]

I think the first sound (001) in each category is usually pretty representative (or at least really good). Then there's 002, then 003, then 004...

Forever,




Kim.

[Mr. Tunes]

this will be hard for me to figure out but i'll go through and search for my faves soon. a lot of special goodies got tucked away in the elementz so it's harder for me to find it all.

[chisel]

I'm anxiously awaiting your replies on this topic. I want to know which presets to check out first when my SS2 arrives! (I've been glued to the UPS site since I placed the order)

I checked out the article in Keyboard magazine May '04 issue where there are riffs to play with SS2 presets. After reading this article and listening to all the SS2 sound samples online, I thought it would be really cool if there was an insert in the manual that had riffs to play with some of the presets. Learning those famous riffs would really up the wow-factor when my friends come to visit.

Peace Out \/
Chisel

[Squids]

I am going to make a free combi set or two. But, one of them will simply be a "favorites" list that we'll at least do internally. I was hoping some users would participate in this thread and tell us theirs so we could incorporate them into the bank but... it's ok. I know which ones are really standout patches.

We're working on a BIG update for Sonik Synth 2 by the way. This is something that will make SS2 owners even more proud to have it! You know how we are. As far as I am concerned, we're not nearly done with that one! Wait until you see what's next! Oh and there are some popular feature requests that will be added in there as well... I don't want to say which just yet but you'll be happy especially if you do dance music or soundtracks.

[rollasoc]

To be honest, I haven't installed Sonic Synth 2 yet. I was in a hurry to hear the sounds and couldn't be arsed with all the copy protection stuff, so just threw all the sounds into my Sampletank 2 directory, where I have been happily using them.

What would be the benefit of actually using them under the Sonic Synth engine?

Rollasoc

[Kim Lajoie]

To be honest, I haven't installed Sonic Synth 2 yet. I was in a hurry to hear the sounds and couldn't be arsed with all the copy protection stuff, so just threw all the sounds into my Sampletank 2 directory, where I have been happily using them.

What would be the benefit of actually using them under the Sonic Synth engine?

Probably the biggest benefit is the cool interface. Aside from the cool look, the text for the part list and instrument list is larger, and the current combi name is much larger too. This is especially good if you're using SS2 on stage, because it's easier to read to patch name and see what sounds are loaded.

Personally, I use my SS2 library in ST2 as well - I really like having everything in one place.

Forever,




Kim.

[Squids]

To be honest, I haven't installed Sonic Synth 2 yet. I was in a hurry to hear the sounds and couldn't be arsed with all the copy protection stuff, so just threw all the sounds into my Sampletank 2 directory, where I have been happily using them.

What would be the benefit of actually using them under the Sonic Synth engine?

Rollasoc

Organization of knowing you're using JUST the SS2 sounds (and knowing those sounds are compatible with other SS2 users since they may not have all of the OTHER sounds you have). Aesthetics... but, there's nothing wrong with using it as a library for ST2 either. Oh, there's another benefit. You can browse to different places on hard drives at the same time. You can't do that with one ST2.

[Beardedone]

Oh, here's another tip. You want a quick and easy way to zero out the settings after you've loaded up a multi-layered combi with lots of panning and stuff going on? Simple. When you first load up Sonik Synth 2 before a session, save back a BLANK combi before you've loaded anything. Call that combi "template" or "blank" (or whatever you like). Then, next time you have a big layered combi loaded just load up this "blank" or "template" patch and it brings it back to zero settings.

Thanks Dave! That's very helpful. Obvious once I read it but hey, I'm slow.

[chisel]

So my SS2 package is scheduled for delivery tomorrow. Any standout patches I should fire up after I install?

Thanks,
Chisel

[harmony gardens]

You can just about go down the line in the Motion Synths, a few of my favs are:

Something Wonderful
EvoBubble
Space Case
Enlighten
Dawning
AtmosPad
SquidsPad
Blue Fairy
Icey Pad
Ambiana
Liquid Pad
Warm IcePad
MotionCity

Pianos

The One
7 Foot Sound
Shiney Steiny

EP
Warm Elec Grand

Organ
Us & Them

Drums
Big Beauty

Shufflaze Kit

I suppose the main reason I haven't contributed to this thread, is that it would take SO much typing to list all my favorites.

[PaintedBlue]

To be honest, I haven't installed Sonic Synth 2 yet. I was in a hurry to hear the sounds and couldn't be arsed with all the copy protection stuff, so just threw all the sounds into my Sampletank 2 directory, where I have been happily using them.

What would be the benefit of actually using them under the Sonic Synth engine?

Rollasoc

The other advantage is that, if you are like me and have gigabytes and gigabytes of ST2 sounds, then SS2 will load up much faster because it only looks at a specific directory. For me, ST2 always rescans everything when loaded, and this can take a while to patch the VST in.

[pheeleep]

Yes, indeed, the more sounds you have in your St2 folder, the longer it takes for St2 to load. I still prefer the method of having all my sounds in St2 even though it takes longer for St2 to load. because once it's loaded, I have instant access to all my sounds. I don't have to go to three different plugins to look up Basses, for example, but have them all listed in the same St2 folder..

I have to say that St2 is really fast at loading, even with several gigs.. I guess it's when you start really getting crazy with your sound collection that it gets slower..

My St2 instrument folder is 31.7 GB at this point

[PaintedBlue]

Same here, I am at roughly 32 GB, not including Akai discs that need to be converted to ST2 format.

Once the new SR products are released, though, it's going to be much larger. That is why I was hoping that IK would make the instrument database scanning/loading procedure more efficient in the future.

Like you said, it's really not so bad, but I still think that the scanning algorithm can be much better in future versions. Compared to other commercial software products, it is slow for what it does.