BFD 3

great plugin! it basically comes down to two things:


1. detailed sampling of drums. its not like BFD invented that, but the sampling is *really* detailed and makes the drum sounds come alive in a way i havent heard in a while.

2. the much more important point: it splits the samples into direct signal and crosstalk on the other microphones. i have done this myself with a few drumkits and it is *the* key to realistic drum sampling, but its such a lot of work, oh my...

...fxpansion has done all that work for us, and it shows. pressing the solo button on the basedrum channel and hearing the crosstalk from the other instruments is not only a cool jawdropper (in the traditional "look what this thing does" way) but helps the sound enourmously. being able to process only the overheads, or using an overcompressed basedrum mic as sole sound source for some fun lofi stuff, thats the way its gotta be.


so far so good. i dont know any other sampleset that does this, so that leaves BFD without any competition (asides from my own samplesets as competition for me personally ;-)

things i would like to see in the future:

1. random changing of samples. sample a full velocity hit on the snare drum 8 times and make them randomly chance. that makes it even more realistic and would be a very logical addition for the whole BFD concept

2. even though its hard on RAM: include the crosstalk on tom mics in future samplesets. let the user choose to load them or not load them. it might seem unimportant at first, but i.e. the low tom mic usually is one of the coolest SFX or pseudo-drumloop sources of them all :-)

3. make the bell samples of the ride cymbal accessible also via the keyboard (just put them on some other key) and not just switching. allthough maybe i just havent found that or my version is outdated.

4. some onboard effects, especially compression. it would be nice to have some good compression settings load as part of the instrument

5. on a somewhat similar note, it would be great if one had a way to rise the level of the "soft" samples with a knob somewhere in the UI. that may go against the ultra-relalism approach of BFD, but in todays ultra-stylized low-dynamic pop world it would be very helpful. right now i find myself mostly using the high velocity samples or adding another instance of BFD for the softer samples (thus killing my RAM of course ;-)


that may seem like a lot of complaints for an instrument i recommend, but thats only because its so inspiring and goes new ways. its the best plugin ive bought in a long time and outside of the KVR rating system i would give it a 10 out of 10, with my remarks being understood as BFD having the potential to go to eleven :-)


all in all, its the best in its category. its the only one in its category. the quality and detail of sampling are awesome, the UI is very clever (and beatiful! love the pictures in the panel to load drum sounds...not only eye candy but also useful to remember which drum was which).

a true masterpiece. i look forward for many more drum libraries. theres no such thing as a too big library of realistic real drum sounds.Read Review