# Kontakt is the protools of the composing industry



## Truthtrader (May 18, 2022)

Thought it would be a bit tongue in cheek. 

But prove me wrong. 

Industry standard 
Somewhat clunky and outdated 
User friendly is a no 
Native instruments "too big to fail"
Starting to loose touch with users 
Not growing with users 

I'm really interested to read some of your opinions especially with HISE, Falcon, Spitfire etc


----------



## thesteelydane (May 18, 2022)

I think you’re wrong on most counts, but then again as a Kontakt developer I am probably biased. All I know is it’s extremely efficient and stable, you can learn your way around the backend in a couple of hours, and I can extend its functionality to pretty much anything I can imagine with its scripting language.

What you see as not user friendly I see as exactly the opposite: endless opportunity. You can’t go under the hood on the big propriety samplers, but you can on Kontakt (unless the dev locked it). There’s a massive variety of Kontakt instrument from smaller independent devs, all wildly different and creative, thanks to this flexibility. You don’t get any of that imagination from the proprietary samplers from the big companies.

Could something like Hise replace this some day? Maybe, probably…but I know Kontakt, and right now I’m more interested in pushing its limits rather than learn a new scripting language from scratch. Of course that’s just me, I hope Kontakt will get some healthy competition, but it won’t be from the big boys locked samplers.


----------



## d.healey (May 18, 2022)

thesteelydane said:


> Could something like Hise replace this some day?


No. HISE is not a program for end users it's essentially an IDE for plugin creation.


----------



## davidnaroth (May 18, 2022)

I'm looking to explore into HISE and learn a thing or two with JUCE, but with all its flaws, Kontakt is invaluable to our industry. As far as I know, its one of the only "developer friendly" tools for allowing a large market of Sample Companies to create tools for us to do our jobs as composers and producers while keeping things organized and simplified into one plugin.


----------



## d.healey (May 18, 2022)

davidnaroth said:


> I'm looking to explore into HISE and learn a thing or two with JUCE, but with all its flaws, Kontakt is invaluable to our industry. As far as I know, its one of the only "open source" tools for allowing a large market of Sample Companies to create tools for us to do our jobs as composers and producers while keeping things organized and simplified into one plugin.


Did you just refer to Kontakt as https://opensource.org/osd (Open Source)?


----------



## davidnaroth (May 18, 2022)

d.healey said:


> Did you just refer to Kontakt as https://opensource.org/osd (Open Source)?


In quotations lol Maybe thats the wrong word, I just meant they allow you to develop your own things within their vst

Edit: definitely the wrong word after a term lookup


----------



## robgb (May 18, 2022)

Truthtrader said:


> Thought it would be a bit tongue in cheek.
> 
> But prove me wrong.
> 
> ...


I don't think the comparison is apt simply because there is no other sampler on the market that comes close to it. Pro Tools, on the other hand, has a lot of competition that is arguably better (Reaper, of course, comes to mind). Until someone comes up with a sampler that actually competes with Kontakt, it will remain to be king.

If all you do is use Kontakt as a player, however, I think that VSL's Synchron Player gives it a run for its money. But then you can only use VSL products, so even that isn't an apt comparison.


----------



## Truthtrader (May 18, 2022)

thesteelydane said:


> I think you’re wrong on most counts, but then again as a Kontakt developer I am probably biased. All I know is it’s extremely efficient and stable, you can learn your way around the backend in a couple of hours, and I can extend its functionality to pretty much anything I can imagine with its scripting language.
> 
> What you see as not user friendly I see as exactly the opposite: endless opportunity. You can’t go under the hood on the big propriety samplers, but you can on Kontakt (unless the dev locked it). There’s a massive variety of Kontakt instrument from smaller independent devs, all wildly different and creative, thanks to this flexibility. You don’t get any of that imagination from the proprietary samplers from the big companies.
> 
> Could something like Hise replace this some day? Maybe, probably…but I know Kontakt, and right now I’m more interested in pushing its limits rather than learn a new scripting language from scratch. Of course that’s just me, I hope Kontakt will get some healthy competition, but it won’t be from the big boys locked samplers.


I pretty much agree with everything that you have said. As I am dabbling in making a few instruments myself. 

Kontakt is invaluable, if you look at it from a macro view point it has probably powered 95% of music composition over the last 10 years. 

I can bet that every single composer owns kontakt. 

To me that makes it the protools. Guys like you with mega experience have invested so much time into it that it's the most efficient way for you to achieve your goals. 

Maybe that is a double edged sword. Protools guy will swear by it mainly because it's been the industry standard for 15 years. 

Could that completely shit them off from any new technology, maybe I don't know. 


Something that really interested me is how serum pretty much blew everything away and became one of the most used synths in electronic music production.

What were people using? 

Massive, sylenth, diva 

Serum came in and really shook the industry and made alot of plugin developers realise that they can't sit on plugins built 10 years ago and keep expecting the support. 

So maybe my question to you use a super user, is what could be implemented in kontakt that would make it the ultimate vst for your use?


----------



## Truthtrader (May 18, 2022)

I


d.healey said:


> No. HISE is not a program for end users it's essentially an IDE for plugin creation.


 Also agree with you. I briefly looked into hise today and have watched some of your videos. 

It's deep, really deep. Deep enough to make me think of it's worth jumping into it.


----------



## Truthtrader (May 18, 2022)

davidnaroth said:


> I'm looking to explore into HISE and learn a thing or two with JUCE, but with all its flaws, Kontakt is invaluable to our industry. As far as I know, its one of the only "developer friendly" tools for allowing a large market of Sample Companies to create tools for us to do our jobs as composers and producers while keeping things organized and simplified into one plugin.


This is true. But today I was messing around with it and off the top of my head I would really love the following. 

Vector graphics, so you can scale the plugin to any size. 

More of a usable interface for working with groups and mapping of instruments. 

The possibility of a group hierarchy, like a folder in folder idea. So you can have a master group with smaller groups dedicated to velocity, round robin and keyswitching. 

I think the browser could get an update, maybe with a sorting function similar to the automap system. Such as show me x velocity layers or x round robins. 

I also think that they could do a big overhaul of the effects. I don't know why they took away the browser for effects I thought it was awesome. 

But some new effects would be awesome.

Have to admit that the routing is pretty much bang on, doesn't need any changes.


----------



## davidnaroth (May 18, 2022)

@Truthtrader I would absolutely love all of those features added. I hope Kontakt 7 will be a big update. They just need an overall big update of Kontakt.


----------



## thesteelydane (May 18, 2022)

d.healey said:


> No. HISE is not a program for end users it's essentially an IDE for plugin creation.


Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but… that’s the problem. If every library created with HISE is it’s own plugin, you will eventually end up with hundreds, if not thousands of plugins to scroll through to find what you want. That leaves the organizing to the user’s DAW of choice, which is great for some and bad for others. With Kontakt you load a single plugin and then have the libraries tab or quick load for non-player libraries that you can organize any way you want. 

I’m already finding the Spitfire sampler annoying in this regard. Each library is it’s own plugin, and that’s f%\€]€!! messy. 

Not a deal breaker, sure, but definitely a nuisance.


----------



## Uiroo (May 18, 2022)

thesteelydane said:


> Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but… that’s the problem. If every library created with HISE is it’s own plugin, you will eventually end up with hundreds, if not thousands of plugins to scroll through to find what you want. That leaves the organizing to the user’s DAW of choice, which is great for some and bad for others. With Kontakt you load a single plugin and then have the libraries tab or quick load for non-player libraries that you can organize any way you want.
> 
> I’m already finding the Spitfire sampler annoying in this regard. Each library is it’s own plugin, and that’s f%\€]€!! messy.
> 
> Not a deal breaker, sure, but definitely a nuisance.


I wonder if one could recreate something like Kontakt in HISE, so one HISE plug-in which is basically a framework for making sample libraries and then developers making instrument for that. So that every developer could have the ability to port his/her new library that is made in HISE to that specific HISE plug-in.
But I don't really know what I'm talking about.


----------



## timbit2006 (May 18, 2022)

robgb said:


> I don't think the comparison is apt simply because there is no other sampler on the market that comes close to it. Pro Tools, on the other hand, has a lot of competition that is arguably better (Reaper, of course, comes to mind). Until someone comes up with a sampler that actually competes with Kontakt, it will remain to be king.
> 
> If all you do is use Kontakt as a player, however, I think that VSL's Synchron Player gives it a run for its money. But then you can only use VSL products, so even that isn't an apt comparison.


Yep. This explains it exactly. Pro tools could vanish from existence and I would probably not even notice, in fact my life and many others that are forced to work with pro tools elitists/amateurs that only know protools and refuse to expand into other DAWs would be better and easier.
If Kontakt dissapeared, well now I have thousands upon thousands of dollars worth of products that I can no longer load and that's an absolute nightmare situation.


----------



## Land of Missing Parts (May 18, 2022)

I prefer Kontakt.

If a company releases on Kontakt, there's a higher chance I'll buy it, and a higher chance I'll use it.


----------



## timbit2006 (May 18, 2022)

Land of Missing Parts said:


> I prefer Kontakt.
> 
> If a company releases on Kontakt, there's a higher chance I'll buy it, and a higher chance I'll use it.


This is important too.
I personally thought the new generation of third party players would strive to be better than Kontakt but in fact... They are all 100% worse and many were seemingly made solely so they don't have to pay Kontakt licensing fees.


----------



## thesteelydane (May 18, 2022)

Well, at the end of the day I believe Kontakt is great because 1) it works, and 2) it has a massive eco system.


----------



## Scottyb (May 18, 2022)

Whew! You got me on this one! lol Kontakt and even more so, NKS I adore and is such an integral part of my music-making process. You can have Pro Tools but please never take my Kontakt away. : )


----------



## d.healey (May 18, 2022)

thesteelydane said:


> Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but… that’s the problem. If every library created with HISE is it’s own plugin, you will eventually end up with hundreds, if not thousands of plugins to scroll through to find what you want


There are tools for organizing your plugins and some DAWs (FL Studio for example) have really good plugin browsers already - much better than the limited system Kontakt provides for searching through 1000s of NKIs.
Pick your poison, 1000s of plugins and a choice of search/organizational tools or 1000s of NKIs and whatever NI gives you.



Uiroo said:


> I wonder if one could recreate something like Kontakt in HISE, so one HISE plug-in which is basically a framework for making sample libraries and then developers making instrument for that. So that every developer could have the ability to port his/her new library that is made in HISE to that specific HISE plug-in



Kind of. You could make a plugin that loads expansions - you may be familiar with PercX or Cube, they use the expansion system of HISE. If you wanted a Kontakt like editing interface for the end user you would have to roll your own and it would be a mammoth amount of work.


----------



## AlphaCen (May 18, 2022)

I love Kontakt. I mostly use commercial libraries, both from NI and from other vendors. NI just need to do something with that window size and font size. I'm not even on HiDPI display (49" 5120x1440) and everything is far too small and pixelated.


----------



## p_script (May 18, 2022)

Pro Tools is much-much more limited, than Reaper, Cubase, etc. Kontakt is not limited: this is the best sampler. Pro Tools => ultraprocessed overpriced junk food


----------



## davidnaroth (May 18, 2022)

On every instrument I've released I get at least one comment on an ad saying "you had me until Kontakt" lol


----------



## timbit2006 (May 18, 2022)

davidnaroth said:


> On every instrument I've released I get at least one comment on an ad saying "you had me until Kontakt" lol


For every one person that comments that there's at least 100 laughing at how ignorant the person is for not buying the obvious industry standard sampler, especially when it goes on sale on regular predicted intervals.
Trust me on that, I used to be one of them then I realized I was being an absolute moron.


----------



## pinki (May 18, 2022)

Kontakt 2 was my favourite. I connected with it as a musical instrument. 
Nowadays Kontakt is a very good commercial library playback machine for me. 

But I used to love using Kontakt 2, dragging all my own sounds in and creating key-groups, getting my hands dirty, felt special, creative...I never do that with Kontakt 5/6.


----------



## Uiroo (May 18, 2022)

d.healey said:


> and it would be a mammoth amount of work.


Hold my beer.


----------



## robgb (May 18, 2022)

pinki said:


> Kontakt 2 was my favourite. I connected with it as a musical instrument.
> Nowadays Kontakt is a very good commercial library playback machine for me.
> 
> But I used to love using Kontakt 2, dragging all my own sounds in and creating key-groups, getting my hands dirty, felt special, creative...I never do that with Kontakt 5/6.


Why not? I do it all the time. I even take instruments I'm not happy with, offload the samples and create new and better instruments for my own use. And I'm not even close to being a Mario or a David. I've been using Kontakt for well over a decade now. Hell, I started with Kompakt. And I've yet to see a better sampler.


----------



## pinki (May 18, 2022)

robgb said:


> Why not? I do it all the time. I even take instruments I'm not happy with, offload the samples and create new and better instruments for my own use. And I'm not even close to being a Mario or a David. I've been using Kontakt for well over a decade now. Hell, I started with Kompakt. And I've yet to see a better sampler.


No particular reason apart from maybe it just became so bloated…early Kontakt was minimal. Anyhow enough of the “better in the old days” from me. I use New Sonic Arts sampler now, really good..and minimal!


----------



## EvilDragon (May 18, 2022)

Truthtrader said:


> What were people using?
> 
> Massive, sylenth, diva
> 
> Serum came in and really shook the industry and made alot of plugin developers realise that they can't sit on plugins built 10 years ago and keep expecting the support.


People still use Massive and Diva. Serum can't touch Diva's analog emulation quality.


----------



## gsilbers (May 18, 2022)

Oh no... Kontakt is no where near PRO TOOLS level.


of HATE that is.


Pro tools is the industries most HATED DAW thanks to AVIDs business practices.

And industry standard only in like 4 area codes in LA and one copy in the one or ttwo major studios in every city.
Ableton live on the other hand? Now those are indutry standard numbers.

So far Kontakt is a PITA for developers trying get their libraries on the Kontakt player tab and snapshots.
Copy protection? meh.. gets pirated the 2nd its released anyway.

Just to be on the tabs w snapshots w/o much hassle. Thats all we want. Instead its not only the cost (which i dont mind that much) but the tech crap to make it nks is absurd all thanks to trying to push their midi controllers and Machine daw. A thousand image formats/sizes, odd audio formats. extra coding and maybe months to get it done/right. Hope developers here start pushing for an EZ pass for kontakt only libraries or something and now that others samplers are coming around.. who knows. maybe itll chnage.

Still, as a user i much prefer kontakt than all these crappy sampler everyone keeps pushing. The odd copy protection, the download manager. The updates. The crashes. No customization. The overselling it. etc. I have very amusing memes of this btw. Same for the kontakt nks crap.


----------



## EvilDragon (May 19, 2022)

OGG is not an "odd audio format", it's been there for years and years, and is well known and often used in other industries (games etc). Provides way better sound quality than MP3 at lower bitrates.

NKS requirement for Kontakt Player is not going to change.



gsilbers said:


> thousand image formats/sizes



Really? 12 images are a problem (and their PSD sources)? And packshot images you'd have on your website anyways. Come on.

You make a template for all of them and you can spit them all at once. This is really a non-issue.



Oh and by the way, NKS is heavily appreciated by blind users. This is a really important point.


----------



## Uiroo (May 19, 2022)

EvilDragon said:


> OGG is not an "odd audio format", it's been there for years and years, and is well known and often used in other industries (games etc). Provides way better sound quality than MP3 at lower bitrates.
> 
> NKS requirement for Kontakt Player is not going to change.
> 
> ...


Is there good documentation for that?


----------



## EvilDragon (May 19, 2022)

Yes, there's plenty of documentation regarding NKS, you get that with the SDK once you sign the contract.


----------



## Lindon (May 19, 2022)

timbit2006 said:


> For every one person that comments that there's at least 100 laughing at how ignorant the person is for not buying the obvious industry standard sampler, especially when it goes on sale on regular predicted intervals.
> Trust me on that, I used to be one of them then I realized I was being an absolute moron.


I think this is a case of observer bias. The reality is that there is no industry standard for audio plugin playback. Whilst Kontakt is I think a good solution for end-user-build-your-own sample-based instrument, its not actually a great solution for commercial sample-based product developers, and thus there are a range of alternatives used by said commercial developers. There are whole masses of end-users out there who are writing music with DAW + plug-in instruments that are not using Kontakt.

I base this on the fact that VST/AU plugin versions of my instruments have outsold Kontakt based versions by 10-to-1, but your milage may vary.


----------



## StefanoM (May 19, 2022)

Truthtrader said:


> Thought it would be a bit tongue in cheek.
> 
> But prove me wrong.
> 
> ...


*Industry Standard *

Yes, it is, but that depends from point of view.

As developer yes It is.

As User, there is not not so correct say "Industry Standard", because today there are many tools to produce music, and there are the real musicians, as well.

ProTools is the Industry Standard because in at last 90% of big facilities you can found ProTools, in particular if we are talking of Audio Post Production Area.

So its a little bit difficult compared this two software becuase are different.

Kontakt is both A Develping Tool and a Sample Library Playback.

ProTools it is just only a DAW.






*Somewhat clunky and outdated*

No to me: Because for the main user it is the library the Output..

and Kontakt Libraries are Not outdated.

For Kontakt actually there are the BEST libraries.
The market is not only Spitifire and Orchestral Tools.
And the market is not only "Orchestral Libraries" but much more.
And this "Much More" it is at 70% for Kontakt and for 30% there is HISE , UVI and Best Service Engine.


*User friendly is a no*

Same before.. for the normal /typical user the worflow is:
Load the Library, load the patch, insert it in a typical Template Workflow, and use that..!
if it is user friendly or not.. is a developer task.


*Native instruments "too big to fail"*

Any company of this industry can fail.. maybe not a complete fail but any company can delete an entire "Area" or TEAM if it is perfoming bad.

Then, I think are two complete different company. So the comparison is not quite possibile.

AVID has 2 Main business areas and they are: ProTools ( Audio ) and MediaComposer ( Video )

So I Think Native Instruments has a different business and areas, Kontakt is just a part of the business.

Native Instruments coud be exist without Kontakt ( as we know It ) , Avid without ProTools , nope because ProTools for AVID is the CORE business.


*Starting to loose touch with users*
mmm why?


*Not growing with users*

Are you sure of this? You are Inside NI?


Just my 2 cents.

Cheers


----------



## AudioLoco (May 19, 2022)

I like the "one ring to rule them all" approach.
If it ain't broken don't fix it.

But this is from a user perspective. I have no clue how bad or not it is for developers.
(I guess paying and waiting for the coding process must be not very pleasant)

Any other player I tried I liked less.
Engine is the worst offender and I will never buy anything again the runs on Engine.
OT player is meh and the Spitfire one is Ok I guess, I don't mind it but still prefer Kontakt ....

The only reason in the world for even considering to abandon Kontakt I can think of, is if NI goes full subscription -
THEN it would certainly become the Pro Tools of samplers....


----------



## Scripter (May 19, 2022)

AudioLoco said:


> I like the "one ring to rule them all" approach.
> If it ain't broken don't fix it.
> 
> But this is from a user perspective. I have no clue how bad or not it is for developers.
> ...


I really like or better to say LOVE Kontakt from an composers/users perspective cause: Well it just works, everything in one place, every instrument available I ever could imagine (Price is another discussion )
But from a developers beginners perspective (doing this 6 months now) it's clunky. Especially ui design. Why do we have to reorder all ui elements by typing in numbers for every frickin knob... and code can get quite lengthy - yeah my two cents. But besides that I like coding too and partly im quite happy that not everything is drag 'n drop - i know many disagrees here probably but I like that kontakt programming is still a skill that needs real effort and patience.


----------



## TomislavEP (May 19, 2022)

So far I never really ventured into developing my own instruments, but I still prefer Kontakt as the main platform for using sample libraries. First of all, the vast ecosystem of commercial titles available just can't be ignored; this also includes many fine products found in Komplete that I use on a regular basis. Also, the full version of Kontakt opens a door to a whole world of boutique libraries made by smaller developers as well as freebies that can easily rival commercial titles these days. Finally, for me, it has proved to be very stable and reliable, especially since I've switched from Pro Tools to REAPER as my main DAW.

I would like to see some cosmetic changes in the future as well as those related to ease of use. More keyboard shortcuts, a font that is easier to read, perhaps a few improvements regarding Quick Launch and Browser sections, etc.


----------



## AudioLoco (May 19, 2022)

TomislavEP said:


> Also, the full version of Kontakt opens a door to a whole world of boutique libraries made by smaller developers as well as freebies that can easily rival commercial titles these days.


This!!


----------



## Truthtrader (May 19, 2022)

StefanoM said:


> *Industry Standard *
> 
> Yes, it is, but that depends from point of view.
> 
> ...


I can see your point of view.

Maybe I should clarify that I don't come from a composing background. So initially in my music production kontakt took a back seat to all of the synth that came with the complete bundle.

To me there is a pretty big divide between the Electronic music community and the composing community. Kontakt doesnt really feature in that world. Its driven by Synths. Im not saying that Kontakt isnt used, but you dont see many "how to make dance music with kontakt" videos.

I wasnt comparing literal kontakt with literal protools, but they have many commonalities. 

Pro Tools was the standard because no one could do da/ad conversion better then protools. I mean the main product was the hardware that drove all of that processing.

But be honest with yourself, has protools really done anything to try and get some market share, i read a few posts from people who are saying that the new subcription model is terrible.

I also remember reading a couple years ago that if you wanted x more audio tracks you had to pay for it. Really?

The comment with the too big to fail attitude i still stick with. I have used Native instruments stuff for the last 15 years and have loved it.

I havent upgraded to the latest Komplete for a few reasons.

1. Native Instruments has gone in the opposite direction to what i want, They are trying to appeal to a bigger market, which is the amatuer user. They are doing this with their controller nks crap. They are releasing sub par products in my opinion.

Be honest there latest release this Play series 40's something or other is basically a rompler. You could argue ease of use etc, but its nexus in a different suit.

2. They dropped the ball big time on Massive X, i mean big time. They had all the time in the world to improve on the formula. Massive was industry standard. Massive X, haveny heard of it since its release. On top of that serum was out, Diva, Roland and arturia were doing some cool stuff how hard would of it to be to literelly steal all the best ideas and put it in one synth. They had the money, the dev team. It was a flop.

3. Maschine controllers and software in my opinion was also a flop. With Maschine+ being a disaster. 
no body liked the software, most of the feature requests were ignored and small easy to change things could of been done to make that product an absolute power house. 

I mean 95% of users wanted an arrangment page that they could freely move patterns and elements around, so they introduce something called clips which who knows how it works?

My maschine mk3 sits in my home office for smaller projects when at home. All it does is act as an audio interface.
i dont even want to mention what Akai is doing with those MPC's because they are just lightyears ahead of maschine+ (looks like maschine+ cant even run prism without maxing out and crashing.

Ok enough of the bashing. Just making a point. Do you feel that Native instruments have earned your money.

Were you happy with the feature upgrades from 5 -6, were they enough?

Last thought for the day. 

What really draws you to kontakt. The actual software. Or the incredible Libraries?

I still love NI and im busy working on a project using absynth. what an incredible vst.


----------



## Scottyb (May 19, 2022)

Wait, NKS is amateurish? : / But I’ve used that on hundreds of projects I’ve been paid for. NKS helps keep me sane. 😂


----------



## Scripter (May 19, 2022)

Truthtrader said:


> I can see your point of view.
> 
> Maybe I should clarify that I don't come from a composing background. So initially in my music production kontakt took a back seat to all of the synth that came with the complete bundle.
> 
> ...


From my point as a composer and programmer it is kontakt aswell as the libraries that draws me to kontakt. Why?

1) Kontakts way of organising the content (libraries) is just BEAUTIFUL, compare that to OT's Player or not to mention the thousands of standalone plugins with Spitfire *ugh*🤮 --> Therefore as I don't use templates that often i find kontakt to boost my workflow A LOT.

2) Ya the libraries are nice, some of the best designed virtual instruments out there ui and workflow wise

3) Kontakt gives the opportunity to go under the hood. Yes it has not the golden "best sample player ever developed" design of spitfire but hell ya who really wants that??? I want to have the opportunity to go under the hood to finetune some settings even if its just the adsr or the samplestart.

4) Going even further under the hood and develop libraries that really can be next level if well made with some effort (Yes Hise looks cool to but several plugins to organise ... - really nothing against Hise tho)

5) Kontakt as an sampling tool. Many peeps forget that kontakt is quite capable of manipulating oneshots and co. great algorithms and on board fx

6) Ok enough for today ... XD


----------



## EvilDragon (May 19, 2022)

Truthtrader said:


> They had the money, the dev team. It was a flop.


Well, numbers say otherwise. 

MX sounds amazing, and that's what counts the most (to me at least). Serum has nothing on it, DSP-wise.


----------



## homie (May 25, 2022)

d.healey said:


> No. HISE is not a program for end users it's essentially an IDE for plugin creation.


I think that's an absolute terrible idea (integrated player libraries). We rather need something like an open source Kontakt with support by some professional devs.


----------



## EvilDragon (May 25, 2022)

LinuxSampler exists.


----------



## d.healey (May 25, 2022)

homie said:


> I think that's an abolute terrible idea (integrated player libraries).


HISE is more than just a tool for creating instrument plugins. But as an instrument developer you get a lot more choice and room to innovate with a tool like HISE than with something like Kontkat.

The distinguishing feature of Kontakt is it has a system for users to load in collections of sounds, scripts, and modulator configurations. There is no reason this can't be done with other plugins if the developers allow it.



EvilDragon said:


> LinuxSampler exists.


Not open source


----------



## robgb (May 25, 2022)

I tried playing around with HISE. It's well over my head. I appreciate that even a non-coder shlub like me can create (or repair/tweak) an instrument in Kontakt with very little knowledge.


----------



## d.healey (May 25, 2022)

robgb said:


> I tried playing around with HISE. It's well over my head. I appreciate that even a non-coder shlub like me can create (or repair/tweak) an instrument in Kontakt with very little knowledge.


Kontakt is a car, HISE is a car factory.


----------



## EvilDragon (May 25, 2022)

d.healey said:


> Not open source


Whoops, apologies for the mixup! Not sure why I thought it was open source ^^;


----------



## Dawman (May 31, 2022)

My only beef with Kontakt is the GUI. Scrolling is incredibly choppy and on a big screen it's about as readable as a synth for the Nintendo 3DS.







I hope they do something about it in the next version.

As a user, I very much appreciate the ecosystem aspect of it. I know the heap of stuff I buy is in one place, managed by one thing. I don't have to juggle yet another set of login credentials for another vendor (at some point I've resorted to using the same password for all of this junk, if you've found me once you've found them all). Software stability is another big one, because my sanity is tied to it. Everything from Native Access to Kontrol to Kontakt just works, while these competitors can't seem to code their own download manager/player worth a damn. As I'm typing this I'm redownloading a few GBs of my Spitfire libraries because they mysteriously disappeared from my downloaded list AGAIN. It's been acting up since I reorganized my drive and sample/library folders had to be moved around, except when those were Kontakt libraries everything relocated just fine.

So yeah, I really like Kontakt and wouldn't even mind if it monopolized things a bit.


----------



## rdomain (Jun 3, 2022)

I've been a Kontakt user for many years and the only thing I've been tempted to try would be UVI Falcon. I don't own it yet and seeing there's no demo's I can't honestly compare but from watching some videos and some reading, it seems to be mighty powerful as a sound design tool where the sampling and synthesis can truely merge. Powerful for designing instruments. I've only heard good things about it and appears to be more powerful than Kontakt. Any opinions on Falcon? I know of some who have made the switch but yes, Kontakt does feel like an industry standard to me.


----------



## doctoremmet (Jun 3, 2022)

rdomain said:


> I've been a Kontakt user for many years and the only thing I've been tempted to try would be UVI Falcon. I don't own it yet and seeing there's no demo's I can't honestly compare but from watching some videos and some reading, it seems to be mighty powerful as a sound design tool where the sampling and synthesis can truely merge. Powerful for designing instruments. I've only heard good things about it and appears to be more powerful than Kontakt. Any opinions on Falcon? I know of some who have made the switch but yes, Kontakt does feel like an industry standard to me.


These threads linked below have a lot of information that may be of value. I like both Kontakt and Falcon. The latter has a way nicer user interface to be honest, albeit one with a learning curve of its own. But Kontakt’s third party support is unparalleled. So I couldn’t live without it, despite its UI being in desparate need of an update.






About to buy UVI Falcon. Any advice / warnings?


Falcon is currently on a 30% sale. I've been looking for a plugin that lets me create sample based sounds. I work on a 2011 Mac Pro without much hiccups so far. I have a feeling Falcon is going to push me to upgrade my computer. If you are using Falcon, I would highly appreciate it if you can...




vi-control.net










Trying to decide between Uvi Falcon 2 or MSoundFactory as my next synth platform.


I like them both but to be honest I have so many synth and synth platforms that I'm only willing to learn one this year. Plus with HOOE and expanding my OT sample plus two new computers. This year is going to be expensive. Not to mention money allowing I'd like to finally get some Spitfire...




vi-control.net


----------



## rdomain (Jun 3, 2022)

doctoremmet said:


> These threads linked below have a lot of information that may be of value. I like both Kontakt and Falcon. The latter has a way nicer user interface to be honest, albeit one with a learning curve of its own. But Kontakt’s third party support is unparalleled. So I couldn’t live without it, despite its UI being in desparate need of an update.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Cheers! Will have a read. Could have quite possibly read some of them in the past even but revisit if so.


----------



## robgb (Jun 3, 2022)

I guess I'm just used to Kontakt's GUI. It doesn't bother me in the least.


----------



## doctoremmet (Jun 3, 2022)

Make it resizable and I’m good


----------



## blaggins (Jun 3, 2022)

Kontakt's UI looks and feels dated (I mean the whole browsing and config/MIDI automation parts) and their lack of ability to scale the instrument UIs (due to a very old fashioned way of doing UI design based on static bitmapping of a fixed-resolution background image) is certainly frustrating. I don't love having to squint to see what I am doing. You could argue their scripting language and internals could be a lot more streamlined and easier to work with, they are not beginner-friendly.

However, even as a beginner myself I would still take them over any and all developer-specific plugins. Kontakt has more features (purge, ahem), better interoperability across platforms, more community support, a more stable codebase, a more reliable (from a user-perspective, not from a developer perspective) licensing and authorization model. And in any case, who the hell wants to have to work with multiple different varieties of the same damn thing when they could have one decent one that does everything they need? It's just a software sampler, IMO one decent one is better than 8 half-assed/limited "takes" on the idea. I have several different plugins from different developers, and the only one that has never crashed Cubase at some point is Kontakt. It's also the most resource-friendly of the bunch from both a memory and CPU perspective. These are very important things, much more important than how it looks.

The thing I worry about is if NI wakes up and realizes they could start charging a subscription fee to users of Kontakt and go the direction of AVID. Then we'd be really screwed.


----------

