ROLI acquires fxpansion -- unexpected industry move

[mhschmieder]

http://www.kvraudio.com/news/roli-acqui ... ucts-34459

Saw this earlier today, but haven't had a chance to see if there's been much talk or buzz at GS or elsewhere.

It doesn't take much reading between the lines in that detailed report to get the gist of things, and though I'm surprised by this particular partnership I did expect something big to happen soon because Platinum Samples recently rolled out their own drum sample playback product.

BFD3 tries to be more like Superior Drummer 2. I knew they were in trouble when they felt the need to start copying vs. leading. But it's understandable that most people who use Drum VI's are looking for easy-and-quick; whereas I am looking for quality, realism, detail, and flexibility.

Content-wise, BFD continues to fall behind as well -- though I continue to find most of their libraries to still be more realistic and flexible if one puts the work into it. Superior is way ahead though in addressing genre-specific needs and doing almost-as-detailed high quality libraries.

My biggest personal gripe with BFD3 though, is that it becomes an almost unusable product once you own most of the available content, due to how difficult it is to browse. It was MUCH easier in BFD2 and faster as well, not to mention more flexible as there were more ways in which you could do so.

To be more specific, the scrolling of the lists per kit piece is jumpy -- either too slow or too fast. It is nigh impossible to get an overview of your choices, and if you want to try an alternate for the slot, often it would be nearby in the list but you have to re-find the one you previously selected as the list always starts at the top.

That's not even getting into how poorly the filters work -- probably a result of several generations of changing how things are categorized and labeled, and many libraries being behind on the tag system so that they get orphaned, seen as user libraries, or the wrong drum type (e.g. a tom labeled as a hi-hat and thus not found when searching).

I never really got around to writing any of this up on their forum as I kind of lost interest in contributing feedback based on the muzzle that got put on anyone who didn't toe the party line that BFD3 was exclusively a magnificent leap forward and had no flaws whatsoever. That was another hint that all was not well business-wise.

The other clue was the apparent move towards emphasizing the electro-oriented products over the core drum product. And this apparently is where ROLI saw synergy with their own direction and product line.

So it's nice that BFD 3.2 is promised in that article, but you'll note the wording is quite precise and careful and seems to intentionally list a few updates as obligatory but possible end-of-life at the same time.

Well, we shall see how this plays out. I expected worse though: something similar to the Camel Audio buyout, with fxpansion products getting locked into a specific DAW. Clearly that isn't going to happen, at least!

[waxman]

That is pure speculation. Angus SKoT and the rest of the guys cashed out. FXpansion was not in trouble. The guys from ROLI have big bucks and are building a brand. Look for those guys to buy out more companies that fit their vision. They will be the M-Audio of the next decade. ROLI bought FXpansion because it's the best sounding and professionally operating drum VI available.

I have all the content and no issues with the browser. For me BFD3 was a big step up from BFD2. Not only did it sound better but it worked better. It became a stronger more professional program. Watch companies like ROLI buy up talent like Angus and the crew to reach their vision.

There is a revolution at hand. Pro's like Andrew Scheps are on the front edge. 100% ITB, small rigs that can go anywhere and have instant recall of ALL parameters. Mixing 30 songs at all times. At home or in a hotel room. Putting out state of the art radio hits at a cost the music business can support.

ROLI Seaboards and FXpansion products are supplying the tools that make the revolution possible. Slate touch consoles and great sounding plugs and mics. It's a go anywhere and make great records anywhere at a cost that the producer still makes big bucks without the overhead of a traditional studio. It's about time...

[mhschmieder]

I should have clarified what I meant by "all the libraries". I am including third-party content in that list. So my browser lists are likely 4x what yours are.

I miss being able to save tweaked kit pieces, but have gotten around it by templating subsets of kits as building blocks. For example, I ALWAYS tune my congas up, and theirs are untuned/flabby. It's just an extra step to get to a working starting point, that I'd rather not have to do over and over again. Not sure why they took away kit piece presets.

BFD is still the ONLY drum program that has resonance tuning features and damping across the drum set as well as extensive mic bleed control. For me, that continues to make it my number one choice, and I am definitely glad that they moved away from effects with BFD3 so that it is easier to get started creating new kits (I never use the presets, but sometimes audition likely combinations using them).

There were feature improvements in terms of articulations, so theoretically BFD3 is more professional and advanced, but the content hasn't kept up and I think that's why Superior continues to be the de facto standard. Maybe more money can be pumped into the project so that work can be done to bring the full set of libraries up to date.

It's difficult to swap slots because of this incompatibility between old and new, the terminology changes, and the complete sea change in the mappings. I only recently switched to BFD3 mappings and they are certainly more comprehensive but what a lot of work it took to redo my sixteen or so core kits (almost half of which are percussion of some sort).

Given the unassigned ranges in BFD3, some of it seems like change for change's sake, in terms of incompatibility with BFD2 and also the switch in philosophy regarding cymbal and snare articulations as opposed to simply adding some but not changing the ones that were already present.

The strong message I have gotten for several years is one of lack of discipline, which is a common problem in the software industry. Tweaking things due to boredom or whatever, and a disconnect from those making music. Given the electro focus of the other products, and the tenor of the forum since BFD3 came out, I really didn't hold out much hope for the future.

ROLI is a good company, so hopefully this will work out well, just as has the Novation/Focusrite partnership.

[waxman]

I should have clarified what I meant by "all the libraries". I am including third-party content in that list. So my browser lists are likely 4x what yours are.

I miss being able to save tweaked kit pieces, but have gotten around it by templating subsets of kits as building blocks. For example, I ALWAYS tune my congas up, and theirs are untuned/flabby. It's just an extra step to get to a working starting point, that I'd rather not have to do over and over again. Not sure why they took away kit piece presets.

BFD is still the ONLY drum program that has resonance tuning features and damping across the drum set as well as extensive mic bleed control. For me, that continues to make it my number one choice, and I am definitely glad that they moved away from effects with BFD3 so that it is easier to get started creating new kits (I never use the presets, but sometimes audition likely combinations using them).

There were feature improvements in terms of articulations, so theoretically BFD3 is more professional and advanced, but the content hasn't kept up and I think that's why Superior continues to be the de facto standard. Maybe more money can be pumped into the project so that work can be done to bring the full set of libraries up to date.

It's difficult to swap slots because of this incompatibility between old and new, the terminology changes, and the complete sea change in the mappings. I only recently switched to BFD3 mappings and they are certainly more comprehensive but what a lot of work it took to redo my sixteen or so core kits (almost half of which are percussion of some sort).

Given the unassigned ranges in BFD3, some of it seems like change for change's sake, in terms of incompatibility with BFD2 and also the switch in philosophy regarding cymbal and snare articulations as opposed to simply adding some but not changing the ones that were already present.

The strong message I have gotten for several years is one of lack of discipline, which is a common problem in the software industry. Tweaking things due to boredom or whatever, and a disconnect from those making music. Given the electro focus of the other products, and the tenor of the forum since BFD3 came out, I really didn't hold out much hope for the future.

ROLI is a good company, so hopefully this will work out well, just as has the Novation/Focusrite partnership.

What specific 3rd party content? I have every expansion offered by FXpansion plus some of my own with no browser issues. I LOVE IT... Always record BFD3 with live hi hat even though set up of the edrum hat is simple. It's so fast to build the kit from scratch which is why I think the browser is brilliant negating the usefulness of templates.

Though a mixed message thanks for clarifying the negative tone of the first post. As for "industry standards" please... I have a lot of industry standard both software and hardware. I tossed Superior in the same box with stuff like PT, Logic and Apogee.

When it comes to BFD3 with DP 9.12 no rival exists.

[mhschmieder]

Maybe the Magic Mouse is not the best mouse to interact with small list views that show hundreds of kit pieces. Maybe I should try another mouse and see if it is less jumpy (going from too-slow instantly to too-fast) and thus easier to not miss something while scrolling through so many items to try to find other ones to audition, when putting together a kit.

Remember, I don't do much pop/rock and am mostly using percussion vs. standard drum set pieces. But for drum set stuff, it is really hard with cymbals as the categorization isn't consistent or complete enough to easily narrow down to ride vs. crash vs. china vs. splash vs. effect cymbal etc.

I should take a look at ROLI's software products (didn't know they had any) to get a feel for whether they put a lot of emphasis into performance and ease of use or not.

As for extra kits, I own dozens of non-fxpansion ones, not even counting Platinum Samples. All of the Ken Scott kits, the Master Series, a bunch from Chocolate Audio -- and I haven't even added the Drum Drops libraries yet for ska, reggae, etc. As BFD doesn't get much press, I don't think many people are aware of just how many kits are available from other vendors.

No time for more detail right now; am about to head out on my first vacation in nearly four years, and also have been working 60-70 hour weeks at my day job. I hope my rushed response helps explain the issues I face better. If I could do a couple of quick screen captures it would probably do a better job.

[mhschmieder]

Oh, how did you get to be so fast with building up kits? It takes me one to two hours, with lots of listening, before I have my tunings, resonance control, and all other factors (remember, there are two pages worth of fine-editing now). I also spend a LOT of time choosing my mic blend ratios.

Not to mention cymbal selection, listening carefully for how they blend as well as whether I can stand them to begin with. This is BFD's biggest weakness in my view, even with the Zildjian and Sabian add-on packs, along with Bosphorous and a few others. It's rare that I find ones that work well for jazz.

I'm not a drummer and don't use e-drums to trigger. I bet that makes a big difference in perception regarding ease of use, as BFD is well known as being preferred by e-drummers.

For my next project though, I am going to start from scratch with Superior and see how things go. The last time I tried, I got frustrated by missing features that I felt were critical, but the sound is finally almost as good as BFD (it certainly wasn't back in the Drumkit from Hell days).

At any rate, it's probably a relief that ROLI has bought fxpansion, as it likely means a brighter future for them and no worries that BFD will just stop working someday and go away. I was quite concerned about that as it seems almost as much of a niche client base vs. other drum programs as DP is vs. other DAW's (I constantly have to add DP as "other" when filling out forms for other vendors).

[Robert Randolph]

Maybe the Magic Mouse is not the best mouse to interact with small list views that show hundreds of kit pieces. Maybe I should try another mouse and see if it is less jumpy (going from too-slow instantly to too-fast) and thus easier to not miss something while scrolling through so many items to try to find other ones to audition, when putting together a kit.

A interjection, this 'too slow to too fast' is called mouse acceleration. It is enforced by OS X by default on ALL mice.

Mouse acceleration is when cursor movement is determined by the direction and speed that the mouse moves.

No acceleration is when cursor movement is determined by direction and distance that the mouse moves.

Muscle memory of humans greatly favours distance based movements for recall and fine motor control. In most scenarios, no acceleration is the more ergonomic and efficient setup.

I wrote this software that fixes it http://www.mediafire.com/download/hiyxn ... eFixer.zip The issue is that this means you can no longer control the mouse speed via OS X preferences. You would have to use a mouse with variable DPI/CPI (of which I can make recommendations based on what you need).

There's another program (which I also worked on) http://smoothmouse.com/ which does allow you to change the speed and have linear cursor mapping. The issue here is that smoothmouse can introduce minor jumps in cursor movement at times. You may or may not notice it.

This topic is a bit of a pet-peeve of mine, and I don't want to hijack this thread any more than necessary. The solutions are there for you

[waxman]

Oh, how did you get to be so fast with building up kits? It takes me one to two hours, with lots of listening, before I have my tunings, resonance control, and all other factors (remember, there are two pages worth of fine-editing now). I also spend a LOT of time choosing my mic blend ratios.

Not to mention cymbal selection, listening carefully for how they blend as well as whether I can stand them to begin with. This is BFD's biggest weakness in my view, even with the Zildjian and Sabian add-on packs, along with Bosphorous and a few others. It's rare that I find ones that work well for jazz.

I'm not a drummer and don't use e-drums to trigger. I bet that makes a big difference in perception regarding ease of use, as BFD is well known as being preferred by e-drummers.

For my next project though, I am going to start from scratch with Superior and see how things go. The last time I tried, I got frustrated by missing features that I felt were critical, but the sound is finally almost as good as BFD (it certainly wasn't back in the Drumkit from Hell days).

At any rate, it's probably a relief that ROLI has bought fxpansion, as it likely means a brighter future for them and no worries that BFD will just stop working someday and go away. I was quite concerned about that as it seems almost as much of a niche client base vs. other drum programs as DP is vs. other DAW's (I constantly have to add DP as "other" when filling out forms for other vendors).

Haha I use the magic mouse & chocolate kits etc.

I bet I ultimately spend more time then you but our approach is different. I stretch out the process way into the project. I keep the drummer in the control room with me until the guitar, keys, and bass players are up and going. Then the drummer goes in and is playing on a Roland TD 30 in the other room while I am concentrating on getting the drum sounds. I have go to kicks and snares I start with getting them tuned quickly which takes only a minute. Tuning kick and snare asap makes the song sound better quickly. ASAP I ask the artists and players if they think the drums sound right for the song.

The live hat helps because the drummer is keeping time right away and playing something right off the bat. eDrum hats still can't go the live hat thing right for me and I've bought and tried all of them to death. So while playing the hat the drummers are hitting the pads and don't seem to mind the few minutes it takes to get the kits initial build. Once it's in the ball park getting the vel correct is important that is just a gradual thing that may take a few times through the song. Those are the magic knobs that make the drums real and the ghost notes sound correct. I've had drummers come in and track 2 songs and be in and out in an hour when the feel of the vel is right on. Once they have a signature kit they like I name it the drummers name and it's total instant recall for the future.

When things get stable and the sessions is going good I'll start trying different drums that go with the style. Then more small tweaks to dampening, FX are pretty easy with the BFD3 gui. I think the major difference in our approach is even after the song is completely tracked and the musicians are gone the kit is only 50% done.

After tracking the fine tuning of sounds and replacing goes on way into the production. I do that stuff alone. Fixing MIDI and making sure the groove between the bass and drums are insane. My goal is if it sounds like real players playing with great sounds I'm winning. If it sounds programmed or quantized I don't like it. It's possible to squeeze the life out of it making it too perfect.

Finally I usually strip most of the FX from BFD3 and start using the O'Way UAD plug and things like Slate crusher to take the sounds to a new level. The drumds get individual parallel compression. Snare & kick get individual parallel comps and rack toms at least get a stereo comp and cymbals get a stereo comp. Live hat gets a comp and goes through the OH parallel and O'Way. Finally I print the drums but sometimes don't even use the printed tracks in the final mix...

So really for me it's a journey. I doubt I could get the kit even 75% together before the downbeat. But I treat it like the the old days when we would spend the day getting great sounds but those sounds would then develop for the needs of the song as the song progressed. Compression, rooms, reverb, samples etc. I've also mixed a lot of concerts where the sound check would start and it would take until the final song until I felt the drums were working. Sometimes a few songs into the concert because all the bodies in the house change things. So maybe take the mind set to stretch it out into more of a process and don't seek perfection to soon.

If I was hitting a key controller or finger trigger pad while building a live sounding BFD3 kit it would be a drag. I have Maschine Studio for that kind of work because it's a different music using loops and drum machines. I use BFD3 to replace the process of a great kit in a live room with killer mics and world class drummers. It's what I do when it's a band thing or live drum o'dubs over a drum machine. The drummers I use are great but they are not A list first call guys. But when I'm done with them they sound like A list guys. It would be impossible without the power of BFD3.

If you are doing jazz you need a player... unless it's smooth jazz then the robot is better.

[mhschmieder]

Robert, I'll take a look at your mouse software when I get back from vacation and a tech conference.

Waxman, I probably should have mentioned that 75% of my time (minimum) is spent trying to find a usable hi-hat in the context of a kit or a specific project or song. I wish I knew how to play hi-hat. I intend to learn snare sometime soon so I can do some snare parts now and then.

I no longer build my own MIDI drum tracks from scratch -- although what I end up with is uniquely my vision. My primary source is as good as a live player and not well known due to it being primarily marketed towards Yamaha MOTIF hardware workstation users.

The TWIDDLY.BITS MIDI libraries were recorded using percussion controllers, high-end e-drums, players like Bill Bruford and the like, Korg WAVEDRUM with VC-to-MIDI triggers, etc. And similar approaches were taken to their keys, bass, guitars, saxes, etc. It's really amazing stuff, and covers all genres as well as being easy to navigate to find what one already has in one's head (in my case).

I pretty much use only live drummers vs. VI's for pop/rock projects though if only because they're willing and available. For jazz and ethnic, I don't want to bother with people's time if it's primarily composed. My stuff is about as far from New Age or Smooth Jazz as you could get; most live drummers I know would be more robotic than my VI parts, or haven't the ability to play in genres little-known to most people in the USA. I do a LOT of World Music (the real stuff; not the baloney you see at UC Berkeley's Sproul Plaza).

When I first bought the Jazz & Funk Expansion, I didn't like it, but that was because I was using its presets. Now, I find it the best for most of my jazz-oriented work. I have set up kits for each decade, for brush, sticks, and mallets. I spent untold hours on trying to find acceptable hi-hats and rides, but ended up sticking to ones within the Jazz & Funk library for the most part. Plus Orange County kits.

Now that I am used to BFD3, I mostly prefer it to BFD2, but still miss the quicker browsing of individual kit pieces and the way those were previewed in the slots (including as "temporary" choices). It slows me down A LOT. And that annoys me, but more annoying is just the inability to maintain an overview of what's available due to the inconsistent categorization -- especially with older and third-party libs.

I think they really did do a LOT of work under the hood though, as I notice much smoother transitions from hit to hit as well as between dynamic layers, and the damping, resonance, and mic bleed control also seem way improved. So I think they DID at one point put a huge investment in it. It does seem though that updates have been quite rare, and it's not like it doesn't have bugs.

Well, I seriously doubt Superior can take me where I need to go. I may try the mouse tools from Robert to see if it helps when I'm using the right-side panel to scroll replacements for a specific slot in the kit. I may also look into whether I can edit the associated XML files to essentially "edit" some of the kits and kit pieces to be more properly organized and categorized. Hard to find China cymbals, for instance!

[waxman]

MHS... have you watched these? there are 4 of them and the guys is a good communicator.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sX1ECZ_-ayI

[mhschmieder]

Thanks -- will watch it when I get back from vacation. browsed it quickly without sound just now (I've already shut down my staged audio setup in preparations for leaving). Looks like good stuff.

[mhschmieder]

Although the future of BFD isn't clear (and I mean long-term, not short-term), we are at the point now where we are seeing the benefits of the ROLI buyout on stability, improved GUI's, and faster development, for the synth-oriented offerings from fxpansion. Seems like it was a good fit.

This past month, I have moved all of my jazz work over to Superior 3. I'll detail this in another thread, but the bottom line is that the way those kits were recorded better suits my music, even than heavily tweaked third-party BFD kits (for the most part, with a few exceptions). I haven't vetted S3 on rock yet.

Superior 3 is pretty much at feature par with BFD3; Superior 2 was not. But the head resonance and tuning features don't sound good to me. I don't know whether fxpansion recorded enough that it involves sample switching in their product (to some degree) or whether they just did a better job of the modeling and the algorithmic extrapolation of recorded samples. But as it turns out, it's no big deal because I feel less need to make those tweaks with S3 kits due to how they were recorded.

I have done the synth upgrades for fxpansion products and they are quite impressive; some of the biggest leaps I've seen from v1 to v2 of a product, from any manufacturer. I'm not really much into synths these days, but I do expect to use some of that stuff because I still love FM synthesis and that's where one of the biggest improvements was made in the recent upgrades.

[cuttime]

I've been trying out the Cypher2 demo of late and have been impressed. The modulation routing is very impressive, and it has a very organic sound. I don't have an MPE controller, but I do have enough controllers to fake it, and Cypher2 has a virtual Seaboard controller that is very cool. All that said, at $200, I need another subtractive synth like I need a hole in the head. If a deal is coming, I might reconsider.

[HCMarkus]

Haha I use the magic mouse & chocolate kits etc.

I bet I ultimately spend more time then you but our approach is different. I stretch out the process way into the project. I keep the drummer in the control room with me until the guitar, keys, and bass players are up and going. Then the drummer goes in and is playing on a Roland TD 30 in the other room while I am concentrating on getting the drum sounds. I have go to kicks and snares I start with getting them tuned quickly which takes only a minute. Tuning kick and snare asap makes the song sound better quickly. ASAP I ask the artists and players if they think the drums sound right for the song.

The live hat helps because the drummer is keeping time right away and playing something right off the bat. eDrum hats still can't go the live hat thing right for me and I've bought and tried all of them to death. So while playing the hat the drummers are hitting the pads and don't seem to mind the few minutes it takes to get the kits initial build. Once it's in the ball park getting the vel correct is important that is just a gradual thing that may take a few times through the song. Those are the magic knobs that make the drums real and the ghost notes sound correct. I've had drummers come in and track 2 songs and be in and out in an hour when the feel of the vel is right on. Once they have a signature kit they like I name it the drummers name and it's total instant recall for the future.

When things get stable and the sessions is going good I'll start trying different drums that go with the style. Then more small tweaks to dampening, FX are pretty easy with the BFD3 gui. I think the major difference in our approach is even after the song is completely tracked and the musicians are gone the kit is only 50% done.

After tracking the fine tuning of sounds and replacing goes on way into the production. I do that stuff alone. Fixing MIDI and making sure the groove between the bass and drums are insane. My goal is if it sounds like real players playing with great sounds I'm winning. If it sounds programmed or quantized I don't like it. It's possible to squeeze the life out of it making it too perfect.

Finally I usually strip most of the FX from BFD3 and start using the O'Way UAD plug and things like Slate crusher to take the sounds to a new level. The drumds get individual parallel compression. Snare & kick get individual parallel comps and rack toms at least get a stereo comp and cymbals get a stereo comp. Live hat gets a comp and goes through the OH parallel and O'Way. Finally I print the drums but sometimes don't even use the printed tracks in the final mix...

So really for me it's a journey. I doubt I could get the kit even 75% together before the downbeat. But I treat it like the the old days when we would spend the day getting great sounds but those sounds would then develop for the needs of the song as the song progressed. Compression, rooms, reverb, samples etc. I've also mixed a lot of concerts where the sound check would start and it would take until the final song until I felt the drums were working. Sometimes a few songs into the concert because all the bodies in the house change things. So maybe take the mind set to stretch it out into more of a process and don't seek perfection to soon.

If I was hitting a key controller or finger trigger pad while building a live sounding BFD3 kit it would be a drag. I have Maschine Studio for that kind of work because it's a different music using loops and drum machines. I use BFD3 to replace the process of a great kit in a live room with killer mics and world class drummers. It's what I do when it's a band thing or live drum o'dubs over a drum machine. The drummers I use are great but they are not A list first call guys. But when I'm done with them they sound like A list guys. It would be impossible without the power of BFD3.

If you are doing jazz you need a player... unless it's smooth jazz then the robot is better.

Nice description of your approach Waxman. Good stuff!

Definitely tweak as the mix develops. Add one element and another will change.

[mhschmieder]

Ah yes, I should point out that Cypher 2 may be the first soft synth to FULLY exploit MPE. I don't yet own a ROLI controller, but am becoming more curious (a lifelong friend from childbirth onwards, who specializes in Indian instruments, has one and loves it).

Even without MPE, Cypher 2 is a serious synth, as was pointed out, since it gets into semi-modular (if not full-on modular) territory. The upgrade price was minimal for loyal customers, but I feel it is reasonably priced at all levels of entry, considering the competition.