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How do you organize your audio samples?
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| Jake Benson |
So I have thousands upon thousands of audio samples in various folders, most of which are labelled with words unrelated to the sounds, which themselves are labelled with words unrelated to the actual sound of the sample (i.e. a drum n bass loop would be called "New York Twilight Mixer II" while a snare would be labelled as "TANK IFMtr 04").
So my goal is to dedicated MANY hours to taking out each sample, throwing away the majority of which I think are pointless to keep, and allocating my favorites into new INTUITIVE folders which are easy for me to find. I am making a master folder, sub-divided into more folders.
As I am organizing, I keep sub-dividing into more folders. So I thought I'd type out my current folders list and see if anyone can point out where I should sub-divide more or reorganize certain folders with different/new concepts. Might help me to better organize, or maybe viewing this list will help someone better organize or start their personal audio library.
NOTE: these are just folders, no samples in them. Also, the instruments section is not specifically branched as much because I usually create my own melodies from MIDI instruments
Atmosphere – Consonant
Atmosphere - Dissonant
Atmosphere - Exotic
Atmosphere - Orchestra
Atmosphere - SFX
Beat – Acoustic Drums
Beat - Bongos
Beat – Breaks
Beat – Build up
Beat – Drum & Bass
Beat - Exotic
Beat – Filler
Beat – High hat - Crash
Beat – High hat - Ride
Beat – High hat
Beat - hip-hop
Beat – House / Dance
Beat – Kick
Beat - Loops – Disco / Funk
Beat - Loops Soul – hip-hop
Beat – Loops (no bass, just mids & trebs)
Beat – Processed
Beat – Shakers
Beat - Snare
Instruments - Exotic
Instruments - Guitar (have not subdivided yet but will soon)
Instruments – Jazz & Blues
Instruments - Piano
Instruments - Rhythmic
Instruments – Synth - Rhythmic
Instruments - Synthesizer
SFX - Animals
SFX - Bass
SFX - Booms
SFX – Break Down
SFX – Build Up
SFX - Dance
SFX - Nature
SFX – People, cars, things, etc.
SFX - Records
SFX - Rhythmic
SFX - Transition
SFX – Vocals - Rapping
SFX – Vocals – Singing
SFX – Vocals – Talking
SFX – Weird/tweeks |
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| cronodevir |
| I have 7 gb or so of samples from google and sampleswap. None of the samples have any logical names, you just have to click through them. My vsti folder in paticular is a mess also, as is my FL studio installation. Nothing is using the standard filepath. Ive got projects that don't use any plugins I have, I got plugins that aren't uised in any projects, its a big mess if you ask me. But I know my way around wonderland. |
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| owien |
its what ever suits your stile of production,often its best to have things in order for good workflow. but if you make only one area of music like house then this can work well ect.
but most people get to learn what does what and figure out various combos that work. |
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| Jake Benson |
| LOL maybe I am going insane. The drive and motivation to listen to each and every audio sample when I have over 10,000 is probably some form of compulsive behavior with attention to detail. In fact, with my psych degree handy I would have to say that I am slightly psychotic for doing this. But I hope there's a really good payoff afterwards when I can easily recall whatever kind of sample I wish in a VERY ORGANIZED folder system. |
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| Waza |
i just have folders like loops - kicks - hats - stabs - fx's as when you want a sound you want say some mad fx you have all your fx in 1 folder and you can flick through alot of sounds very fast. without having to go in folder in sub folder etc.
All my samples are on my audio drive and i keep it that way. |
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| hasbone |
lol, i think organising it like that would be a good idea, but at the moment i just have one folder for each sample-maker, and then subfolders per samplepack
so it would be
Goldbaby -> XRB Samplepack -> (subfolders)
Vengeance -> VEH2 -> (subfolders)
etc |
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| Stephen Wiley |
Obviously Folders but I use the software "Mixed In Key" which automatically scans audio files and tells you what key they are in. It then renames the audio file, for instance, "8A - DrumLoop.wav" (it uses camelot system)
It has its strengths and weaknesses as far as sorting samples. The obvious strength is automatically knowing what key a sample is in, however; sometimes it is a pain. Samples that build in succession that are related to one another get jumbled.
I'm pretty sure everybody uses folders? You're most likely doing what best suites you because you've set things up in a way you find efficient. You are very gung-ho about it, others are very sloppy and don't care.
Mine are grouped initially by categories. Atmosphere, Basslines, Kicks, Percloops, Oneshot Percs, Cymbals, FX, etc - then I have sub-folders as needed. I don't add folders until I feel there is a need to. (lots of samples that would fall into it's category) |
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| owien |
| quote: | Originally posted by Jake Benson
LOL maybe I am going insane. The drive and motivation to listen to each and every audio sample when I have over 10,000 is probably some form of compulsive behavior with attention to detail. In fact, with my psych degree handy I would have to say that I am slightly psychotic for doing this. But I hope there's a really good payoff afterwards when I can easily recall whatever kind of sample I wish in a VERY ORGANIZED folder system. |
lol then dont just work with a few in one go and see if you can make them work and sound good |
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| Jake Benson |
| quote: | Originally posted by Waza
have all your fx in 1 folder and you can flick through alot of sounds very fast. without having to go in folder in sub folder etc. |
I had it like that at first but then I thought there's often times when I want a specific kind of SFX (build-up, break down, something with a lot of bass in it) and I have so many SFX files (over 1,000) that I wouldn't want to scroll through hundreds to find what I'm looking for (keep in mind most of them are not named what they sound like and renaming them would take too long). So I figure I sacrifice an extra click of a sub-folder to space dozens of clicks browsing through SFX I'm not looking for. |
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| Jake Benson |
Wow, that's amazing! Good work. And you know which samples are in which folders right? |
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| mysticalninja |
| for the most part. it could be more organized. i need to make a single folder for my own bounced samples instead of having like 20. |
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