Is machine worth it?

[Greg Savage]

Cool, what patches did you make?

I'd have to check, back when I made them they didn't have a patch name. Typically when I send sounds in I put them in a folder name “company name and date”. The company will generally give it a name if you haven't chose one yourself.


NI did a bunch of retitling because people were using generic names for example
k01
k02

etc

I know a good % of the sounds I made for Urban Arsenal were retitled and used for Maschine

 

[thedreampolice]

How did you get in to that line of work?

 

[Greg Savage]

I started off by biting people's sound. If I heard a tracks I liked then I'd analyze them and remake them. I don't just mean pattern and arrangement I actually got the sounds to sound just a like as well as the mix. I've always hated when people said... “This piece of software or gear can't get that gears sound” or “you need to spend x amount of $$ to get that sound” so I just sat and spent time tweaking stock sounds in my triton (when I used it) Eq and layering goes a long way.

When I switched over to software I did the same thing. Once I got good at it I'd take a companies applications and remake hit songs and send it to them (Only the tracked out wavs) some companies simply thought I had access to Pt sessions others asked to see a few sounds as patch in their software. Regardless of which they thought I always got in touch with the decision makers (producers/product dev team).I'd also go to Namm and network with companies. 1st company I ever did work for was modern beats

One thing that really got me in the door was when Reason brought in the combinator. I was able to mimic a lot of workstation sounds just with that because they made it easy to layer eqs and reverbs.. gates etc.. I spent 1 month with my boys motif just to see how their sounds were with the settings on and with the settings off.. then I just started testing application vs app and hardware vs app.

I remade some patches from the triton and Roland Fantom with Sampletank and Reason and sent them off to Ik and they gave me a few projects

No matter how good a program is people will always want what the pros are using so being able to mimic sounds was a good thing because that's something companies don't really have time to do and some don't want to but the market is there.

 

[dacalion]

My question is... why do you deem it "not worth it"?

 

[MORFEEUS]

not just a bargain...but it cuts sooo deep into the MPC series that you cant help but notice it and give it a chance...but chance is not really the word...MASCHINE IS A BEAST!!!!!! HANDS DOWN....it is REASON, FL STUDIO, MPC, LOGIC, ETC....alll in one!!!!!

 

[Greg Savage]

.MASCHINE IS A BEAST!!!!!! HANDS DOWN....it is REASON, FL STUDIO, MPC, LOGIC, ETC....alll in one!!!!!

I'll disagree last time I check you can't cant sound design with maschine.There are a lot of things you can do with Reason that can't do with maschine. Logic is a daw maschine is not

Maschine is a host if that's what you meant with your Fl and Logic comparision

My question is... why do you deem it "not worth it"?

Great question!

When I look at new tools that come out on the market I'm looking for 2 things. 1. What is it offering me that I can't or i'm not already doing? 2. Is it something that is going to improve my work flow/speed thigs up and if so is It really worth it. I'm not talking about price because if your making atleast 2k a year in your business your going to get to write a % of this thing off. I'm more so talking about is it worth getting just to save a couple of minutes?

I look a maschine and I go nice... its a good thought it I get the idea I love what they have done but at the same time. Its no different than having a Korg pad controller Reason and Reaper

But Maschine has thousands of quality sounds... this is true.. true in deed ad there are a lot of FREE plugins (legally) that are quality even better than what these companies that are charging $100-600 are charging for their plugins. Not to mention a lot are running standalone There are plenty of good drum sounds out there most of us like our own drums anyway.

I hate looking at a computer screen... I know how you feel I use Reason a midi controller (pad and keyboard controller). I don't look at my screen much but to launch Reason and export. I'm able to copy and paste tracks,turn knobs/adjust sliders,browse sounds, sample sounds etc with mapped commands

Drag and Drop?.... True that is a nice feature I like but not worth $600 bones. Especially for me because I like printing my sound off my preamps before they hit the daw so I'm going to be spending a few minutes tracking out anyway even when using machine.

Sampling.... Depending on how you have your setup routed. I'm able to record anything that hits my card. So I can sample everything in Reason and In Maschine

Swing Indi Pads.... Yea that's a good feature I generally have to look at the screen when doing this because I love messing around with settings. I tried having a preset for this with the Mpd was lil complicated because I was use to the options I could mess with in Reason.


Chopping Samples..... that's nice that you can do this on the maschine unit itself. I can do it with my knobs if the sample is in Nnxt but that's about it. So yes that's nice..


But we don't have presets mapped like that for our app... doesn't take long to do or find yes some apps allow more mapping than others


Maschine was made assuming the person had a computer... studio monitors etc … So when I look at this $600.00 and what it does there is very little it's doing that can't be done in my setup worth 600.00

Support is something that concerns me about new units for example my mpc 3000 breaks ok I can fix that and there are specialized companies that fix that..and I don't mean akai.. Same with any other brand out there except NI... So your Maschine breaks yes you have a warranty but anything after that you're looking at spending money on a new unit. I know this is a ways away but I'm the type of person that looks at stuff like that. I mean I'm sure there will be a company that can do this

if I've left anything out that Maschine does key features and what drop em. I've only had a chance to touch 1.6 for 24hrs I was disgusted with machine when it released and never bothered upgrading the thing.


Great tool but is it really worth it... not to me if unless you were starting over

 

[dacalion]

great post, I touched on a few of these same issues in another thread....thats my thing with Maschine...Is it really worth redo'ing my setup thats working perfectly fine? Workflow isn't an issue with me, doing things on the fly isn't an issue with me. That only leaves "the fun factor", having fun with it does make a difference but moreso on the fly than anything else imo. Plus I already have fun without it...lol, my fun comes in making the beat, not twisting knobs and hearing what cool effects it makes. I'm gonna give it a shot one day but right now, it's gonna stay in the box .

Once again, I'm not knocking Maschine at all, I really do like what I'm seeing from NI.

 

[Sucio]

Great tool but is it really worth it... not to me if unless you were starting over

Which I did...

I felt that by using FL studio (i really wanted to like Reason, and couldn't) I was just stuck with it..and I didn't like the way midi worked with it...

I basically got Maschine for free and didn't come out of pocket for it.....

I think because of what I've been able to do and being actually more involved in the process rather than just plugging steps into a piano roll, it is worth it to me.

It has given me the opportunity to expand my versatility.. And that alone is worth every penny....

 

[thedreampolice]

Chopping Samples..... that's nice that you can do this on the maschine unit itself. I can do it with my knobs if the sample is in Nnxt but that's about it. So yes that's nice..

This is a big one, it is so much faster than anything else. I think this alone is worth it honestly. And as you know I am a hard core Reason guy, so I always move the project there in the end. But coming up with ideas really fast in Maschine is awesome!

 

[MORFEEUS]

all that being UNDERSTOOD...that is cool for what is good and or bad bout the MASCHINE...but remember before reason u used something else and before fl u used something else...MASCHINE is not the end all to everything but it will be the NEW MPC SP12 OR WHATEVER OF PRODUCTION...i dont care what u say the flaws are..go back and look at all the forums...there is SOMETHING missing from ALL pieces to make music...whatever works for u is what matters...but like i said just like PROTOOLS is industry standard...MASCHINE will be the same thing...every person may not use but it will be looked at as the STANDARD!!!!!!

 

[Sucio]

Each has it's flaws....but it's SO easy to create on the fly with Maschine....

I eventually put everything in Pro tools to finish it up... I don't do a single thing in terms of mix in Maschine, because that's where it lacks in my opinion.

 

[Greg Savage]

great post, I touched on a few of these same issues in another thread....thats my thing with Maschine...Is it really worth redo'ing my setup thats working perfectly fine? Workflow isn't an issue with me, doing things on the fly isn't an issue with me. That only leaves "the fun factor", having fun with it does make a difference but moreso on the fly than anything else imo. Plus I already have fun without it...lol, my fun comes in making the beat, not twisting knobs and hearing what cool effects it makes. I'm gonna give it a shot one day but right now, it's gonna stay in the box .

Once again, I'm not knocking Maschine at all, I really do like what I'm seeing from NI.

Right and that's where I stand. For those of us that have been doing it for a minute that's what we question

Which I did...

I felt that by using FL studio (i really wanted to like Reason, and couldn't) I was just stuck with it..and I didn't like the way midi worked with it...

I basically got Maschine for free and didn't come out of pocket for it.....

I think because of what I've been able to do and being actually more involved in the process rather than just plugging steps into a piano roll, it is worth it to me.

It has given me the opportunity to expand my versatility.. And that alone is worth every penny....

Totally understood

This is a big one, it is so much faster than anything else. I think this alone is worth it honestly. And as you know I am a hard core Reason guy, so I always move the project there in the end. But coming up with ideas really fast in Maschine is awesome!

I feel where you're coming from I guess it depends on how you sample. I'm a phrase sampler so me sampling something in maschine or reason and truncating it takes the same amount of time maybe a little faster for me in reason. I'm in a record taking 3-4 chops and composing around so its not much for me I guess. But I do see what you mean with speed. That's huge when it comes to sampling or atleast the ability to go at the pace you need to go. I hated editing samples on the mpc 3000 so I'd do it on performer and re sample them back to the 3k

all that being UNDERSTOOD...that is cool for what is good and or bad bout the MASCHINE...but remember before reason u used something else and before fl u used something else...MASCHINE is not the end all to everything but it will be the NEW MPC SP12 OR WHATEVER OF PRODUCTION...i dont care what u say the flaws are..go back and look at all the forums...there is SOMETHING missing from ALL pieces to make music...whatever works for u is what matters...but like i said just like PROTOOLS is industry standard...MASCHINE will be the same thing...every person may not use but it will be looked at as the STANDARD!!!!!!

I didn't point out any of Maschines flaw as my aim was not to insult the unit. I was just comparing its features to setups most people are using these days. I think you're getting a little bit off topic. I'm not saying what the maschine is or will be become or what it will be considered nor am I saying its inferior to what is already out. I was just answering the main threads question. If this is your go to piece... great I have nothing against that if it works it works

at the end of the day this is just my opinion....breath