Do you program all of your sounds from scratch?

[vurt]

im innocent guv!!!

[AsPeeXXXVIII]

Always.

Okay, sometimes.

[harryupbabble]

no. not yet. it's time consuming.

got my hands full programming melodies and lyrics.
and bass part and drum part and guitar and synth parts.
trying to, at least.

[kvotchin]

Almost entirely, yes.

[Scrubbing Monkeys]

I did a full album where I made every sound from scratch including all electronic drums. I will never do that again. It was fun and I learned a great deal. It is definitely a workflow killer.

Here is my approach now. When in inspirational mode, I dial up a preset. I usually start from banks I have done myself. Then move to a synth with a good browser.

When I am not particularly inspired to lay down tracks. I do sound design to build the previously mentioned banks. Some times this leads to inspiration. It never happens the other way around where being inspired to lay down a track leads to great sound design....usually results in stalll.

[Constructed Identity]

Do ya?

I used to try to never use a preset back in the days I was using a Yamaha workstation, although they had a pretty good Japanese drum preset I used once. Now, I realize very few will ever make anything like what I do anyway so I am not so strict. But I do love making new preset sounds in my Prologue.

[BONES]

I discovered something quite interesting last night, after installing Dead Duck's Deducktion synth. It doesn't come with any presets so instead of spending half the evening wading through other people's sounds, I was forced to make some of my own. I surprised myself because it didn't feel like a chore at all. I had quite a good time doing it, something I would never say about going through a bank of presets. It felt so liberating to make some patches because it didn't have any and I reckon I learned a lot more about this synth in that couple of hours than I would have with some other synth full of presets.

[UncleAge]

I'm about 70/30 on this. 70% of the time I find/tweak a preset. But there a couple of times I start from scratch. One, if I have an idea in my head and I think I can dial it in quickly without losing the idea, iykwim. The second is very long ambient/soundscape presets. I usually take direction from a preset then clear it all out and start over trying to get the nuanced difference into my song. With that said, it's no big deal really to me whether its a preset or not in the song.

And I do have sessions that I sit aside just for sound design. I just don't let using a preset slow me down if what's in my head is a song. I grab my guitar or bass or synth w/preset and get to it.

[Azbest]

Hardware synths - yes, always. Software - rarely.

[hoxclab]

Depends what I am working on.

[BONES]

Hardware synths - yes, always. Software - rarely.

I'm the opposite - hardware is usually a real chore to patch, whereas softysnths are generally much easier. In fact, I do most of my hardware patching using a software editor for the instrument and instruments without a hardware editor usually don't last long in my set-up.

[AnX]

if you're patching hardware with a software editor, you may as well just use software

fact

[Rastkovic]

Do ya?

No, I use the Init preset....

Of course, I love doing sounds.

nobody’s ever done that, an entire Track of INIT

Well, as a starting point of course.

Sometimes I listen to presets, to see, what other people can do with this synth. But I almost never use them to make music. Not because my sounds are super outstanding, it's just not my way of working.

[TribeOfHǫfuð]

if you're patching hardware with a software editor, you may as well just use software

fact

Why? What if I like the particular hardware sound better than any software alternative?

[AnX]

if you're patching hardware with a software editor, you may as well just use software

fact

Why? What if I like the particular hardware sound better than any software alternative?

such as?