|
you are confusing alot of stuff. theres a difference between a midi controller and a midi keyboard. a midi controller is a work surface with rotaries and sliders on it. a midi keyboard is, well, a keyboard (usually has some sort of control surface on it too). you do not need either of these to operate a hardware synth. the only thing you need is an audio interface (or soundcard) that has 2 analogue ins/outs and a MIDI in/out. that and a pair of MIDI cables and 4 TRS jack to jack cables.
you get your synth (lets say, an access virus b). you use 2 TRS cables to connect the 2 analogue outs on the virus to the 2 analogue ins on your audio interface. you have the MIDI out of the virus connected to the MIDI in on your audio interface and the MIDI out on your audio interface into the MIDI in. obviously, your soundcard outputs go to your monitors or speakers or whatever.
in floops, you cannot use hardware like a conventional VSTi. you add a MIDI out channel. you define what channel to send MIDI clock through the options then MIDI settings menu. you assign a unique MIDI out port to your soundcard (for the sake of argument lets just set it port 1).
on the MIDI out plugin you set the port to 1 and the channel to 1 (since most synths play back by default through their first MIDI channel. you can change this on the synth though).
sound now plays back from the hardware through the MIDI out plugin. you may use your typing keyboard to play notes in floops (which is what i do. i have no controller and no keyboard). note that your soundcard latency also affects your hardware synths. so if you have 30 ms latency, there is a 30 ms delay between pressing a key and the sound being triggered by the synth. which brings me neatly onto...
recording stuff from your synth. you cannot render a track with MIDI data in it. MIDI is not audio. so if you were to just render your song, all the parts played through the MIDI out will not sound. in order to record and add VST effects on your synth you have to go to the mixer. at the bottom there is an 'in' and and 'out.' set 'out' to master. if you want to add effects to your synth, give it a unique mixer channel and select the 'in' button on the bottom of the mixer. select the analogue ins on your soundcard. your hardware synth will now play through fruity's mixer. you can press the record button on the bottom, choose to save the recorded file wherever you want. hit record. wait for the notes to finish playing. you now have a 32 bit wav of your hardware synth playing. remember the audio latency? you will have to chop that dead time off the start of the wave. clean it up in wavelab or soundforge and there you go.
incidentally, most of this is in the floops manual/help file. i suggest you read it.
lastly, dropping a couple of grand on a hardware synth wont make your music suddenly get better.
however, if you absolutely must have a hardware synth popular choices in dance music are normally virtual analogue synths. popular ones are access virus b/c/ti, clavia nord lead 1/2/2x/3, korg ms2000b, roland jp8000/8080, roland v-synth, novation supernova 2, novation k station, waldorf q etc.
dont just go out and buy one because someone said it was good. they all have very subtle differences which you only begin to notice when you work with them for a long time.
of the above mentioned synths i have had experience with the following...
access virus always has a slightly dark tone to its patches. even though it can do lush pads, plinks, sweeps, everything really, it just has this darkness to it. or it can easily be turned dark using its nasty FM capabilities or using the sub osc to put a massive bass end on it. it can scream too (FM and twist the semi tone rotary) which is one thing i liked about it that few synths i heard could do quite so expressively. generally has a clean, thick, dark and bassy kind of tone and can be very aggressive and forward sounding. the keyboard is very nice.
nord leads are typically brighter. very clean sounding. again, like the virus has quite an aggressive and forward sound. not as dark and bassy as the virus but the FM stuff on this synth is amazing. good for squelchy kinds of rhythmic sound (ala psytrance) and shredding lead sounds. the keyboard is not so good but the mod wheel is brilliant and the pitch stick is the best thing ive ever used for duplicating vibrato.
novation supernova 2 has a more subtle kind of tone than the above two synths. less forward sounding, much softer (although it has a certain kind of grittiness to it). the effects on it are very good and overall it makes good bass and soft lead/pluck kinds of sounds as well as certain types of pads. the keyboard is very good but dont go gigging with this without a light cuz you wont be able to see shit in the dark - too many rotaries too close together, not enough LEDs - writing is blue on purple.
obviously if you dont like dark bassy kinds of sounds, then no matter how many people tell you that a virus b is the way to go, you simply wont like a virus b. because its dark. and very very bassy. if you just want to make supersaws till the cows come home just buy a jp8000 because you wont be able to make very authentic ones without one. make sure you try all of these out before you buy one or else sods law will land you with an expensive peice of metal that you dont like the characteristic sound of and thus will probably never use.
hope this helps.
|