where is Squids' Tron Collection Volume 2? SAMPLETRON!

[Squids]

Well, remember that we'll also make sure SampleTron can play everyone's Squids Tron sounds as well though if you have it. But, some of those Quirky ones will make it in anyway.

Oh yeah, I forgot you said that earlier. Technically then, that should include the JB Harmonium and the toy piano which were part of Squids Tron V1, right? (pretty please, with sugar on top!)

Correct.

[Squids]

I know Rami. I was rehearsing at the same hall the Wallflowers were and I remember seeing a cut down B3 in his set up. He loves Optigans too. I think he uses our software... I forget. I only met him a few times. Nice guy though. Vintage gear on ebay is always fun... even if I don't buy much of that these days. Too pricey. Samples and plug-ins are cheaper.

Rami's a good guy. I know him through a mutual friend. I almost had him playing keys on my last album, but we couldn't get the timing worked out. He was about to hit the road with the Wallflowers and I needed to have the record done before he was going to be back.

As for the Ebay stuff his friend is selling for him - there's a Maestro Universal Synthesizer System (he used it on a Macy Gray record), an Audion Consolette, a Univox Compac 2 electric piano that Ethan Johns gave him, a Whitehall organ, some oil-can delays, and other effects.
http://search.ebay.com/_W0QQsassZbobborockstar

Cool stuff. Funky.

[Squids]

This is Chris, the keyboardist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I met him just before their performance at the Grammys and gave him an early version of SampleTron. He couldn't say it at the time because it wasn't announced yet. But, that's what they used and here's what he had to say: http://www.ikstore.com/News/Uploads/Pre ... 1_2174.mov

Pretty cool huh? Rick Wakeman wants it too... there's a lot of interest in this plug-in. In a way, it's about time there was a quirky vintage keyboard/tron plug-in that could be programmed and produced with effects. We should have done it a long time ago. But, anyway, it will be here in a few months.

[Funkybot's Evil Twin]

Will this have the ability to do the sampler equivalent of "free running oscillators" when needed for Optigan rhythms? You know how on an Optigan the discs are constantly spinning once on, allowing you to change the rhythm chords without going out of sync in the loop? That'd be really cool for a Tron specific product like this.

[Squids]

Will this have the ability to do the sampler equivalent of "free running oscillators" when needed for Optigan rhythms? You know how on an Optigan the discs are constantly spinning once on, allowing you to change the rhythm chords without going out of sync in the loop? That'd be really cool for a Tron specific product like this.

That would be cool but I don't think it is possible with the SampleTank 2.5 engine. Maybe in the future though. While the Sonik Instruments are some of the more powerful virtual instruments of its kind, this feature is esoteric for a sample engine. I am experimenting with a way to trick the engine to do it but it's very hard and I may have to wait for a future update that would support such a thing... even if it is esoteric for a sampler I agree it would be cool for this. Anyway, SampleTron is not meant to be the equivalent of an Optigan. It is more for the playable instrument tron sounds. It DOES have a lot of grooves though in it and you can use PS/TS and Loop Sync with them which is already fantastic. But, the drop in drop out accompaniment stuff that is fun on the Optigan cheesefest may not be possible at least in this version.

[Beardedone]

It DOES have a lot of grooves though in it and you can use PS/TS and Loop Sync with them which is already fantastic.

Hey Squids! What is PS/TS? I am not familiar with these features.

Gordon

[Squids]

It DOES have a lot of grooves though in it and you can use PS/TS and Loop Sync with them which is already fantastic.

Hey Squids! What is PS/TS? I am not familiar with these features.

Gordon

Stands for Pitch Shift Time Stretch. It is one of the engines you find in the "SYNTH" section. The default is "Resamp" which is traditional sample playback. But, there's also PS/TS (which is like LIVE or ACID - so mostly for beats and changing their pitch independently of their tempo and visa versa) and then there's STRETCH which is close to something like Melodyne or Variphrase where you have independent control of the pitch, tempo and harmonics as well (and it preserves the formant - timbre- of the sound even when you bend the notes, transpose etc.). You should check out the videos I did on the www.sampletank.com site. I will be doing some new ones for SampleTank 2.5 and Sonik Instruments as well.

[Beardedone]

Thanks Squids. I have used these but it has been a while since I ventured beyond the stock sounds.

I am really looking forward to Sampletron!

[HongKongTain]

DAVE/SQUIDS:
I own the original SSynth, OmniSynth, SS2, the Guitar Collection (and Drums Collection, too?), SampleTank 2XL (not yours, but you know), and the Squids Tron v1 (from original group buy). I've been a big fan of the work you guys do, and I use your stuff often.

I appreciate your excitement about all the tools you guys are producing -- it's catching, it really is. I think ALL of us love hearing about what's going on with you personally, as you get involved in new projects and have new ideas for tools that will help us all -- how can we deny that? We LOVE hearing your stories and we easily get excited about the things you come up with. Most of us have never met you and yet we feel like you're "one of us" and someone who is really out there for the MUSIC, and for MUSICIANS -- not just to "sell" stuff. It's OBVIOUS, really.

The "difficulty" for me (if I may use that word) is that you guys change your plans and products and what's coming so many times over the years, and it really confuses me. I might mention Studiophonik specifically in this regard -- I had given up on that one YEARS ago, and even in January you said, "I think it's dead"... Now here it is again, everybody!

But forget that one for now. More specifically to my questions, right here we have a 14 or 15-page forum thread on Squids v2, and "it's coming SOON!" -- and suddenly, out of nowhere (for me, anyway), I come on here to see an even MORE confusing situation. It sounds like, "Okay, Tron v2 (of a sort) is coming eventually, but for NOW, we have a combination of v1 and v2 together in a cool GUI called Sampletron!! But we've still got some more quirky non-tron things that were going to be in v2 that will now be in something else, and then still more v2 tron-type sounds we've talked about might be in something even later for Reason/Kontakt...."

Holy cow...
I just spent 15 minutes reading through the last 4 or 5 pages of this thread, and I'm STILL not sure what the deal is.

Now, listen -- please don't take that as too negative or anything -- I know you mention things in passing here, ideas and inspirations you have, and then time flies and soon enough other things come along, and new opportunities, and the market changes, and the technology changes SO fast these days -- I know how that goes, and I'm not COMPLAINING about any of that, per se. Do you hear me? I'm not complaining, per se.

But my POINT is just that even if you think you're spelling this out clearly, I for one am still unsure what's what. I only drop in here (to your forum) from time to time, and it confuses the HECK out of me to suddenly see the entire development arc of products that I've anticipated so long to be completely changed.


So PLEASE indulge me, and help me make sure I understand your plans as of today:
----------------------------------
What I *LOVE* is your Tron and quirky keyboard tools.

What I WANT is ALL of them.

Does that mean, as of today, that I am probably looking at buying a product called "Sampletron", *PLUS* a product which will come later called something like "Squids Tron v2" for Reason/Kontakt (to get the sounds not in Sampltron), *PLUS* a third "quirky non-tron" product that is not yet in development?
----------------------------------

It's like, I'm sitting here, for YEARS now, waiting to give you money for more Tron sounds. You got 'em, and they're great. You said yourself it's one of your most popular things. I want to buy it if you produce it. But geez, already owning v1, I can't for the LIFE of me figure out if I need to buy Sampletron (are there really sounds that will ONLY be there?), or if I should reasonably wait for a more "complete" v2-type set coming later (for Kontakt), or what.

You spend SO much time on here -- and it makes us all appreciate you so much -- not just your products, but dude, YOU. We appreciate YOU and your contributions to the community, you know?

But man I get confused by all the stuff you guys put out. Am I the ONLY one who thinks that?

Anyway -- THANKS for all your stuff -- I love it and use it, and will definitely buy more. DEFINITELY. Just hoping to get all you make WITHOUT spending my hard-earned money on duplication and GUI's that don't honestly add anything to my toolset.

(this post is WAAAAAAY too long -- sorry)

[Squids]

Well, reading this thread which skips through time CAN be confusing because you see the evolution of "a sequel to Squids Tron" and then what it ends up being. Plans can change depending on a lot of factors and you have to understand that MOST people (ie. those that aren't reading KVR to hear the inside scoop) have no idea what is being discussed as future development and just see what we actually announce in press releases. Even THEN I admit with products like Studiophonik you have to scratch your head as a customer and wonder if the darn thing is ever going to see the light of day. I understand that. Some things are internal and cannot be explained without revealing other factors that are still a secret. That makes it more difficult to clear up but I do my best. So here it goes.

The Squids Tron phenomenon became so big that certain dealers and stores wanted to carry it and IK wanted to put the product into the mainstream distribution network around the world. But, at the same time there were plans to cancel SampleTank 2 LE and the Expansion Tank range*. So, Squids Tron Vol. 2 could not be sold the same way as Squids Tron Vol. 1 (combination library/module via the LE). So it made sense to combine the best of both volumes into one MEGA plug-in... called SAMPLETRON! It adds more features if you only owned ST2 LE and if you own ST2 full you get a free upgrade to ST2.5 which can read it and even do more. "What you are paying for" is always relative and depends on how you look at it. But we design it so that you can justify the price no matter how you look at it (for the sounds, for the software... still a good crossgrade price that's worth it even if you don't care about the other part so much).

So, for SampleTank format Tron sounds, including additional Mellotron, Chamberlin, Optigan, Orchestron, Rhythmate, Powerhouse (and the rest of the list which you can find on line) that were NOT in Squids Tron 2 the answer is: SAMPLETRON. It IS Squids Tron 2! For owners of Squids Tron 1 the crossgrade price to SampleTron (only on esoundz) will be such that you are ONLY paying for the value of the NEW sounds.

Now, there have been requests for other format versions of Squids Tron Vol. 1 for a while. This is more of an esoundz-only product and takes second seat to a world-wide distributed product like SampleTron. But we're still up for doing it. In that case it will still be called Squids Tron Vol. 1 So, we'll do that first. Then if it is successful we may follow up with Vol. 2 with the rest of the TRON sounds that were put into SampleTron. This is in Reason, maybe other formats too as mentioned. It all depends on the DEMAND. If people want it we'll make it... if they buy it when we do. If they don't then it doesn't matter how much I talk about how I'd like to make it. If we make say an SFZ version of something and people don't ACTUALLY buy it (despite asking us to do it) then it's understandable that we can't afford to make it just to make it. (but we might give it a try and see).

So, what about the OTHER unusual instruments mentioned in THIS thread? Those aren't TRONS anyway and while I squeezed a few into SampleTron because they are at least CLOSE (like a Stylophone... only because of Space Oddity really as a bonus) you will be able to get MORE Stylophone, Marxophone, Squidsophone and other phones on a product that has since grown into it's own cool thing which is a RARE INSTRUMENT COLLECTION. Actually, when I had originally mentioned it this was always supposed to be a separate thing, it was just going to be a bonus disc in a group buy for Squids Tron Vol. 2. Since the TRON sequel thing has gone beyond being a group buy product on esoundz, now this "rare instrument collection" is left on its own (maybe we'll do a group buy on that!). So, I am still going to put it out. I don't know why that would be confusing really if you think about it but... re-read this post until it's clear and by all means ask me if anything in particular isn't.

Studiophonik being canceled and brought back is confusing but we brought it back for the people that wanted it. Simple answer there is we went WAY WAY WAY over budget. This is because we're dedicated to bringing amazing things into our products but this time we went overboard. There were also other reasons under the hood (do we wait for this and that or do we release it and update later etc.). As a developer you can't have everything you want or it can take forever. So instead it took NEARLY forever. We narrowed it down to just Guitar, Bass and Drums, leaving out keys and horns. The horns I've said were not up to par so that was also holding it back. That wasn't supposed to be the focus of the product anyway. In order to recoup costs the product should actually be in the $700 range but ironically we decided to put the price at half that ($349.) and are going to take the risk that this is going to be one of our biggest sellers (at the more affordabe price point... crossgrade at $299 and that's before your esoundz or other store's discount)... after all it is like three plug-ins in one and you can get better/more diverse character drum sounds than most of the popular drum products on the market right now. It's the boldest move we've ever made (next to Miroslav Philharmonik... which was a success though... you know that unlike other drum products that have drum kits recorded all in the same studio this one has around 7 different studio sounds from around the world... MUCH more expensive to do!). I don't mind taking chances like that if I am making a product I believe in. I've always loved the concept of Studiophonik and to be honest, now hearing an almost completed version I think it is one of the coolest plug-ins ever. It's like Coldplay production in a box or Pink Floyd or The Beatles. It's the most ROCK ever put into a plug-in.

* Why cancel Expansion Tank/ST2 LE? Simple answer is that we're retail store driven and stores are less into carrying a million different individual products these days... esoundz.com however IS into carrying a million products but it is easier to do them as downloadable so that's the direction esoundz is going and all of the current and future SR sounds designated for Expansion Tanks will be made as less expensive downloadable sound packs. That's the plan as of now. It could change.

Anyway, perhaps reading through this thread is not the way to find "the answers"... as in WHAT CAN you get? Here's what you will be able to get plain and simple:


SAMPLETANK FORMAT:

Squids Tron Vol. 1 (as a library only - we'll keep it on for a while, exclusively on esoundz.com - this is so you can get some of the extra quirky and non-looped sounds)

SampleTron (this is the best of Squids Tron Vol. 1 looped sounds PLUS the sounds of Squids Tron Vol. 2 ... just not the bonus rare instrument disc mentioned earlier as that will be a separate product... as it should be) [note: the esoundz-only CROSSGRADE of SampleTron will come with only the sounds you DON'T have in Squids Tron Vol. 1 but it WILL read your Squids Tron Vol. 1 in its entirety including the extra bonus sounds... therefore it DOES make sense to get the Squids Tron Vol. 1 even STILL... but only if you are a tron fanatic and want MORE.]

Squids Rare Instrument Collection All of the unusual non-tron instruments mentioned in this thread and MORE. Think along the lines of the product "RA" meets some kind of experimental music library. That's what this is going to be... but affordable and possibly a group buy.

Studiophonik and SampleMoog... These can all be read by SampleTank but are sold as their own standalone/plug-ins with their own GUI (as a crossgrade you can justify that you are paying for the sounds only ok?).

--------
For Reason and possibly other formats LATER this year and only PLANNED but not guaranteed to come out (will be based on the success of Squids Tron Vol. 1 in those formats which will be first to come out):

Squids Tron Vol. 1
Squids Tron Vol. 2 (the extra sounds added to SampleTron that weren't in Vol. 1)
Squids Rare Instrument Collection

---------
What if you want MULTIPLE formats? If you buy it all on www.esoundz.com then it is easy enough for us to make a deal that you'll agree is worth it when/if we come out with other format versions. Low crossgrade prices for multiple formats happen all the time on esoundz. This would be no different.

---------
I know this too is a long post but I wanted to give you detailed explanations you can re-read (rather than trying to find the answers earlier in the thread).

[HongKongTain]

YES, that is EXACTLY what I wanted to know!!

THANKS so much, and I can't wait to check out the new stuff (especially Sampletron and the Rare Instruments Collection). If they are even CLOSE to as cool, vibey and inspirational as the Tron v1, they will be an invaluable addition to my harddrive.

[DarkStar]

That's a great explanation and summary, Squids

I can only dream of the day when other commercial companies are half as responsive (or even respond at all, in some cases).

[kjcoral]

see, now THIS was what i was trying to get to with my various queries before !

now, squids, i know it might not have seemed all that confusing to you but i gotta tell ya, some of us here were *quite* confused.

BUT you did a MASTERFUL job of expalining it all in this last post and your continued efforts to placate those of us a bit "slower" than the rest of the class is *most* appreciated!

[Squids]

Well, just the fact that it took that long a post to explain it does prove that it was in fact confusing. But, this is what happens when you try to do products that please different users. I could have made it simple by cancelling Squids Tron and alternate formats and just putting it all into SampleTron. One product, one format (trust me, it's also easier to do!). But, we have the Squids Tron Vol. 1 Refill almost ready and... well, this is something we want esoundz to be able to do. To provide the extra stuff that other stores won't carry (other stores won't carry multiple format versions of the same title and sometimes don't even carry all SR titles so at least there's always esoundz.com for that).

Anyway, glad it is clear now. I will tell you guys more info soon on what is included and what isn't from Squids Tron Vol. 1 in SampleTron.

[aquasloth]

Thanks for that clarification, Squids -- I, like some others, was a little confused here and there, but it all makes sense now.
Now I'm just on the edge of my seat to see when IK Multimedia announces the release date (not too worried about price, as it sounds like the price will be pretty reasonable, especially considering all the sounds you get with Sampletron!). I guess I'll just have to be patient
Will it be tough? Yes, but I think I'll make it.
Just expect me to plunk down my cash at 12:01 A.M. the day it comes out.