Meteo Xavier Posted August 25, 2013 Share Posted August 25, 2013 Hi there. An upcoming project I have will be doing a highly melodic, slightly retro-sounding ambient synth album for a label within the next few months, and while I have more than 10,000 synth presets across my VSTs already, I'm still trying to compile them together and get a structure going. I wanted to know if you, the reader, knew of any preset soundsets that catered specifically towards the quasi-Berlin School sound that the following examples take after. These are not, to my understanding, actually Berlin School, they just seem to be highly melodic, structured ambient pieces similar to them. I'm trying to do tracks similar to: I have the following synths: * Synth 1 * z3ta 2 * Zebra 2 * Arturia Minimoog * Absynth 5 * FM8 * Massive I will likely come back with other questions as to its production as well. And for the record, no, I'm not a synthesist and I have very little skill programming my own synths. If I was going to do that, I wouldn't post here in the first place. Sorry to be blunt on that, but I still get responses that seem to think I'm a programming wizard who just never thought to build it myself any time I ask these questions. Thank you, I appreciate your help in advance. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
avaris Posted August 25, 2013 Share Posted August 25, 2013 I have zebra soundset but it more geared towards Dance. Arksun: http://www.arksun-sound.com/products.html The Dark Zebra: (sounds used in Batman movies) http://www.u-he.com/cms/zebra2-patch-banks Most of the soundsets on the link above. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rozovian Posted August 25, 2013 Share Posted August 25, 2013 I'm gonna be an ass and suggest you fiddle with the synths yourself. It's actually not that hard. A lot of these examples are just old synths. Old synths tend to be simple synths, not a lot of morphing or a dozen oscillators and affects. You could probably make most of the sounds in just FM8 and only customize them on the Easy/Morph tab. Just dig in the Classic Poly Lead subtype of that and your other Native Instruments synths. Their preset sorting isn't the best, but you can find those appropriately retro synth sounding stuff under that category and a few others. Also, fiddling with Fm8 can produce some spectacular sounds. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timaeus222 Posted August 25, 2013 Share Posted August 25, 2013 (edited) If you ever get stuck trying to find a particular patch sound that you need, PM me and I could give a shot at making it for you on Zebra2. Many of the sounds I hear are just emulations of old synths, like the Minimoog you have, the Juno, the CS-80, etc. Some others are mods of pretty common sounds. Ectoplasm's arp is a mod of a 303. Colours of Rain has some soft saw pads, vintage filter basses, ambient hits, and bells. Zircon's Zebra Tetralogy, which you have, would do the trick with the pads on Flow and Scottish Highlands Walk. I also recommend Arksun since some of the leads match the one on Ectoplasm, but past that there's still loads more great stuff to try out in that bank. Scottish Highlands Walk starts off with something you can get from OP-X Pro II, I'm 90% sure of that. I really can't remember what the patch is called, but it sounds like a soft E. Piano to me. There's loads of magical stuff though that you might be able to find since some demos on youtube name the patches off. Edited August 26, 2013 by timaeus222 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meteo Xavier Posted August 26, 2013 Author Share Posted August 26, 2013 You're the man, Timmy! Now that's some helpful stuff. I almost want to take you up on your offer of making some synth patches for me, but I don't feel right asking you to do that for free, and I need money to be GOOD for me for the next few months before I can even think about a budget for this just yet. I lost $4,000 in the last 5 months for just out of the blue stuff. I know I have a bunch of those presets SOMEWHERE, but with 10,000+ patches to go through, I haven't found them all yet. What I would need help with most is getting the right arps, choirs and SFX, so I will consider your offer and maybe put some $ on it when I get closer to starting production for real, but we'll see. Thank you either way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
poblequadrat Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 Berlin School is basically a sequencer playing a bass patch two octaves higher than what you'd consider "bass", pads under it and sometimes a lead over it all. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meteo Xavier Posted August 31, 2013 Author Share Posted August 31, 2013 ^ Hmm... I've never heard it explained quite like that before. It intrigues me. Might you go into more detail? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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