Can anyone recommend SampleRobot, or Samplit (or suggest another semi-automatic sampler) ... ?

[MasterTuner]

I am looking to do some semi-automatic sample recording (the program plays a tone or says a note in my headphones and I play that note on my guitar or keyboard and sample it back into the program basically.)

I am looking at SampleRobot but I know of others out there like Samplit. Something that can auto-trim, auto-xloop... export in Kontakt5 format...

Can anyone suggest another program that will do it for me. SampleRobot is a bit pricey at 249euros (do they have a Sale price sometimes?) but Samplit has not been developed for a while and some users report stability issues. I wonder if there are any other programs...

Any comments ?

[NTO]

Extreme Sample Converter
Better price, limited development, 32 bit only. Unsure if it does the Kontact variation you want (earlier versions).

[MasterTuner]

Extreme Sample Converter
Better price, limited development, 32 bit only. Unsure if it does the Kontact variation you want (earlier versions).

...I did come across that one a couple of weeks ago, but it looked ancient and I was concerned that as Windows updates this might stop functioning. Looks almost like an abandoned project, and that worries me...
I think it exports Kontakt3, which K5 will import so thats not a deal breaker.
There's a demo, I might look at downloading that...

[Bansaw]

There are three versions of SampleRobot, the Pro version can act as a VST plugin.
The Pro and Multi-X can export all formats.
In terms of sales, I think they have a 20% off sometimes. I don't know if I've seen a bigger discount than that.

[deastman]

Extreme Sample Converter
Better price, limited development, 32 bit only. Unsure if it does the Kontact variation you want (earlier versions).

I own a license of ESC. It hasn’t been developed in probably a decade. I’d forget about that one.

SampleRobot is probably the leading one still on the market. However, if you happen to be on a Mac, Mainstage includes an autosampler which is all that remains of the formerly great Redmatica tools.

My MPC Live also includes a built in autosampler, although it seems focused on sampling MIDI gear. I assume the software version of the MPC also has this, although I haven’t looked yet.

[pc2000]

Extreme Sample Converter
Better price, limited development, 32 bit only. Unsure if it does the Kontact variation you want (earlier versions).

I own a license of ESC. It hasn’t been developed in probably a decade. I’d forget about that one.

SampleRobot is probably the leading one still on the market. However, if you happen to be on a Mac, Mainstage includes an autosampler which is all that remains of the formerly great Redmatica tools.

My MPC Live also includes a built in autosampler, although it seems focused on sampling MIDI gear. I assume the software version of the MPC also has this, although I haven’t looked yet.

Yeah... the software has the auto-sampler. It records by means of midi as well as VSTi's. You should be able to load the saved Akai instrument into Kontakt and then save it as a Kontakt instrument.

[McLilith]

Many folks don't realize, Extreme Sample Converter was actually updated this year. It's not abandoned, but that was the first update in several years. I'm hoping the developer releases more updates in the near future. I like ESC, and I use it a lot. The loop editing features are very handy. I mainly use it to turn a collection of WAV files into a basic Kontakt or SFZ instrument. I've also made some Kontakt instruments from some of my hardware synths, letting ESC automatically handle the tedious sample recording and sample mapping stages of the process. Once I open the basic exported Kontakt instrument in Kontakt5, I then tweak it (adding FX, scripts, etc) and re-save it as a Kontakt5 instrument. It's much faster than building a Kontakt5 instrument totally from scratch, from inside Kontakt5 itself.

ESC can also make Kontakt instruments from VSTi plugins, but they need to be 32-bit plugins, and it doesn't support VST-3. Those aren't terrible limitations for me personally, but it would be nice to see the VST support fully modernized.

That said, there are definitely newer products from other companies, and they probably have more features. They also cost a lot more. ESC is a real bargain.

[DSmolken]

Interesting news about the ESC update. Is there a list of which SFZ opcodes it supports? We could use that info to update the sfzformat page.

[McLilith]

Is there a list of which SFZ opcodes it supports?

It both imports and exports SFZ, but I don't know which opcodes it supports during either import or export. I also took a quick look at the program's documentation, but file format details like that aren't mentioned in the help file. To answer the question, we'd either need to try contacting the author, or spend a few days testing all the possible SFZ opcodes for both import and export functionality.

[DSmolken]

Thanks. We'll just add it for now, and try to find out the degree of support later. Hopefully won't have to actually run tests... that would, like you say, take a few days.

[MasterTuner]

Many folks don't realize, Extreme Sample Converter was actually updated this year. It's not abandoned,

Whats the semi-automatic sampling like in ESC? Does it play a tone in your headphones, or is it speech, "play C#3.." ?

[chickeneps]

ESC was actually updated this year. It's not abandoned

I don't mean to sound cheeky here (since I represent a competitor), but the only thing was added was one looping mode. All that really tells you is that the author isn't dead. Otherwise, the previous real update was over 10 years ago. So much, so much has changed in that time that it has a lot to catch up to. maybe too much.

[chickeneps]

Chicken Systems Translator (and Constructor and all the Creator variants) has a highly capable AutoSampler in it, and it outputs to pretty much every format including Kontakt 4, EXS24, SFZ, Falcon/MachFive, Bitwig, everything). It has lots of features, a real bargain being that's it's already in something you'll use a lot for other things. www.chickensys.com

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vt8EM4zrSQY

[MasterTuner]

I found out that I can do automatic and semi-automatic recording in Reaper, actually better than most products out there.

What I would find helpful is a program that would convert those easily to a Kontakt format, auto-loop, auto create velocity layers.
I think auto-loop might require me to manually look at the decision the program is making because I think auto-looping is fallible.
Its automating the KOntakt side of things I would find interesting.

So basically a conversion program that will jump into the process after I do the recording in Reaper.

[chickeneps]

First, Auto-loooping is a "black art", meaning that getting acceptable results across just isn't possible by just checking a setting. You always have to go through all the samples and tweak them to taste. The CLOSEST you can get to this ideal is using a variable crossfade and variable LS/LE to set where a good loop should exist. I should mention that any Chicken Systems products that have the AutoSampler include this function.

Chicken Systems Constructor has a handy function called The Chizard (Chicken Wizard) which can take tokens out of your naming system and auto-create key ranges and velocity ranges (or even anything else like Round Robin, KeySwitch, Controller Switch, you name it) and create any format of Instrument such as Kontakt. www.chickensys.com/constructor

If Reaper enables it (probably doesn't) you can embed keyrange/velrange into the WAVE files, and Chicken Systems Translator www.chickensys.com/translator and Constructor will read those, then export out to Kontakt.