Looking for contributors to create the most license unencumbered sample pack ever

[stargate]

I want to be able to distribute DAW projects with the samples needed to play them, but almost all sample packs either do not allow redistribution, or do not specify if they allow redistribution. Then there is royalties, attribution, copyright, various other issues depending on the license, and some do not even specify a license.

So some friends and I plan to create our own sample pack of samples that we synthesized, recorded, processed ourselves, and make it public domain, completely unrestricted for any kind of use. If any of you might be interested in joining us (with new samples or samples you already created, as long as they follow the guidelines), you can read more about the project here:

https://github.com/stargateaudio/stargate-sample-pack

Your samples will go in your own subfolder of the sample pack, you will be able to attribute the samples to yourself and promote yourself and your website or pages, but you must distribute the samples and release the copyright under the public domain license without additional clauses for royalties, attribution or anything else. You may also provide a mini "teaser" sample pack to promote your commercial sample packs or music, once again, as long as the samples you provide to this sample pack meet the guidelines and licensing.

[reusenoise]

Freesound.org,there are thousand cc0 (public domain ) samples

[stargate]

Freesound.org,there are thousand cc0 (public domain ) samples

Thanks for the tip. Do you know of a way to filter by only the ones with a public domain license? The only way I found was to click on each one, and none of the ones i looked at were public domain. (not doubting they are there, just not sure how to find them). Seems like Creative Commons license is more common on the ones that specify a license.

EDIT: Actually, I think I figured it out. Thanks

[BertKoor]

Here's a big list of soundfonts which you might find interesting:
https://sites.google.com/site/strixsoun ... soundfonts

[JeffLearman]

https://vis.versilstudios.com/vcsl.html

https://github.com/sfzinstruments/Discord-SFZ-GM-Bank
https://github.com/jlearman/jSteelDrum2 (not yet added to sfzinstruments but will be)

Other instruments at https://github.com/sfzinstruments are unencumbered. Some only require attribution, which you can handle with a simple text file included in your distribution listing all the attributions. But some are noncommercial.

A collection of all free libraries is going to be pretty big, though.

Also, please make clear whether you're collecting samples or sampled instruments. This subforum is for both. I often wish they'd separated the two because there's an awful lot that's not in common. And a bit that is, but not much. (The legal issues are the same.)

While you're at it, consider submitting your own sampled instruments (assuming that's what they are) to VCSL or sfzinstruments. How many of these things do we need? (Admittedly, sfzinstruments is for free but not necessarily unencumbered sets. Some are not for commercial distribution.)

[stargate]

Great stuff, thanks guys! I've already begun collecting some of these and curating a sample pack.

Also, please make clear whether you're collecting samples or sampled instruments. This subforum is for both. I often wish they'd separated the two because there's an awful lot that's not in common. And a bit that is, but not much. (The legal issues are the same.)

Great question. I am definitely interested in SFZ instruments and willing to link to ones that are unencumbered, but I probably will not distribute them myself unless they are pretty small (but linking to them still has value). Github has a 2GB limit for release artifacts, so I want the entire sample pack to fit within 2GB at most.

For the actual sample pack I intend to distribute, I definitely want to cover one-shot drums thoroughly, and a nice selection of other sample types, and maybe a few SFZ instruments of modest size.

This sample pack is meant to be comprehensive, but not exhaustive, and of a reasonable size to be downloaded by people in less developed countries. Not the ultimate sample pack or ultimate collection of public domain samples, but really just something where I can tell people: "Want to create DAW projects you can share freely on the internet without getting sued? Use this sample pack for all of your sampling needs!"

While you're at it, consider submitting your own sampled instruments (assuming that's what they are) to VCSL or sfzinstruments. How many of these things do we need? (Admittedly, sfzinstruments is for free but not necessarily unencumbered sets. Some are not for commercial distribution.)

Absolutely. The initial priority is drums, but happy to share back any instruments that come out of this.

[vurt]

bump to get this rolling!

[JeffLearman]

Github has a 2GB limit for release artifacts, so I want the entire sample pack to fit within 2GB at most.

This per-file limit is not an issue, so as long as you keep samples in separate files (which is typical but not necessary) GitHub poses no issues. GitHub will gladly serve a .zip file well over 2GB using the Code->Download Zip feature. Just use a separate repo for each sample set.

[vurt]

Github has a 2GB limit for release artifacts, so I want the entire sample pack to fit within 2GB at most.

This per-file limit is not an issue, so as long as you keep samples in separate files (which is typical but not necessary) GitHub poses no issues. GitHub will gladly serve a .zip file well over 2GB using the Code->Download Zip feature. Just use a separate repo for each sample set.

i think this bit ...

This sample pack is meant to be comprehensive, but not exhaustive, and of a reasonable size to be downloaded by people in less developed countries. Not the ultimate sample pack or ultimate collection of public domain samples, but really just something where I can tell people: "Want to create DAW projects you can share freely on the internet without getting sued? Use this sample pack for all of your sampling needs!"

means its as much for those users, some people have dl limits or maybe only have internet at the library?
so a single, "does a good job of covering most bases (pads, leads, bass, drums, few acoustic instruments) for someone with nothing!"

maybe then, he could link to other, more rounded samples, say a single instrument youve sampled that you are willing to give away, that is quite big in comparison to the 2g limit, and so would take up lots of the "everything you need to get started" space.
then when those folk need and can access them, theyre there, but for now at least they are up and running

obviously, the more the merrier, and some variety for those who want something different, its all good

[stargate]

Right, what vurt said. However, if a larger movement was to coalesce around this idea, then I would certainly be open to growing the scope of this project, especially if there were other people interested in doing the creation of samples, curating of sample packs. But still, the singular small, well rounded for the average use-case sample pack is still a must, but there could be more sample packs (although I would still prefer to stay within the max 2GB-per-pack size for people without access to broadband).

Then again, it might make even more sense to really divide up the packs by use-case. Drum samples are a pretty universal need (unless you are making drum-less music), so maybe keep them in their own pack of no more than 500MB. Then group synthesizer sounds into another pack, pianos+related in another, plucked strings in another, bowed strings in another... Let the users pick and choose what they need, when/if they need it. Once again, trying to make it as accessible as possible to people all over the world

[stargate]

...and I guess, since the secret is out in "the other thread", I can give a little more context about why I am doing this

I developed and recently launched an open source, cross-platform DAW + plugin suite with many unique features, including that it is very easy to share your projects with other people (including the bundled samples you used in the project):

https://github.com/stargateaudio

But as my friend and I started creating the first bundle of demo projects, we hit the sample pack licensing issue. So we started with a project of his that is all synthesized 808 style drums with no samples, and shifted some of the focus to curating a redistributable sample pack instead, since our users will definitely need something like this to be able to share their projects publicly without risking legal trouble.

Of course, the sample pack will be usable in any DAW and plugins.

[unkow]

Great project, best of luck!

For some reason this search for the ultimate free sample pack reminded me of this General MIDI soundfont from back in the day, I think it was a whole MIDI orchestra in like 2MB or so. Not sure who was the author, there was this KVR-adjacent guy who made lots of soundfonts IIRC. I want to say Hollow Sun, but there's no trace of any soundfonts on his website.

I like the idea of a free, resource-efficient, self-contained DAW. Useful for those of limited resources of course, but even for the man who has everything, it could become a sketchpad for quickly playing around with ideas, creating weird noises, etc. Have you thought of making a (paid) IOS version? Make the rich Apple Ecosystem users subsidize the rest of us.

(I kid, I kid... mostly.)

[stargate]

Great project, best of luck!

Thanks

For some reason this search for the ultimate free sample pack reminded me of this General MIDI soundfont from back in the day, I think it was a whole MIDI orchestra in like 2MB or so. Not sure who was the author, there was this KVR-adjacent guy who made lots of soundfonts IIRC. I want to say Hollow Sun, but there's no trace of any soundfonts on his website.

I like the idea of a free, resource-efficient, self-contained DAW. Useful for those of limited resources of course, but even for the man who has everything, it could become a sketchpad for quickly playing around with ideas, creating weird noises, etc.

It's always gratifying when another human being understands your ideas

My market research team (who is also my cat) informed me that there are many millions of people on this planet who want to make music but cannot afford the latest PC hardware, or commercial music software. Commercial software vendors only serve people with thousands of dollars of disposable income (or rich parents, or big dreams and a willingness to go into debt), so why spend extra time optimizing when you can just raise system requirements. Of course, the free and open source ecosystems have the same optimization problem, but likely due to lack of funding and developer resources.

So, we are aiming to serve the under-served. People in developing nations, the young and poor of developed nations, newbies who are simply daunted by the complexity of the current ecosystem. We serve them, not by developing a toy they will soon outgrow, but something with truly compelling and unique with features that they will miss if they switch to our competitors. With potentially millions of users and an open source product, we attract more developers to join, at which point we can truly take on the world. We keep the "walled garden" but turn it into a 1000 acre farm in California's central valley. My role shifts from main developer to BDFL who enforces quality, principles and standards by accepting pull requests or rejecting them with snarky comments on a mailing list.

Or at least that is the plan

Have you thought of making a (paid) IOS version? Make the rich Apple Ecosystem users subsidize the rest of us.

(I kid, I kid... mostly.)

If Stargate DAW becomes a significant player in the market, I will try to monetize it, somehow, so that I can hire myself as a full time employee and maybe others too depending on how much money it brings in. But I think we will need to wait until that actually happens to come up with a strategy, and then base on the strategy on the actual user-base we managed to carve out. It could be donationware, nagware, the "unrestricted, time unlimited demo version that you are supposed to pay for", or maybe something else more creative.

But, the interface was designed to be exceptionally mobile friendly, even if we are not shipping mobile releases yet. So you can definitely expect "Stargate Mobile" (tm) if this idea takes off.

[DSmolken]

There's a start to a General MIDI soundset on sfzinstruments, and other things also... if you want some subset of samples from commercial Karoryfer releases, I could license some for this (bits are already in that General MIDI set, and also in Chipsynth SFC), or want something from the free Karoryfer stuff under a less restrictive license, though the drums I have are probably too weird and niche.

For some reason this search for the ultimate free sample pack reminded me of this General MIDI soundfont from back in the day, I think it was a whole MIDI orchestra in like 2MB or so. Not sure who was the author, there was this KVR-adjacent guy who made lots of soundfonts IIRC. I want to say Hollow Sun, but there's no trace of any soundfonts on his website.

Mysung Kite is 990 MB. Is that the one, or did that have a larger successor?

[Esgalachoir]

I'm interested in participating in this. I've got a decent field recorder that needs some love.