Re: kontakt 3 and mobius

["Per Boysen" <perboysen@gmail.com>]

On Sat, Jan 10, 2009 at 10:19 AM, L.Angulo <labaloops@yahoo.com> wrote:
> i am debating if i should get a small external sampler to sync to mobius 
>or
> if it would be better to get something like this one:
>
> http://www.native-instruments.com/index.php?id=kontakt_us
>
> provided of course it works flawlessly with mobius,i want to sync drum 
>loops and tweak them on the fly,anybody using both?



Hi,

I'm posting up on this one since I have owned Kontakt for many years
and use it almost every day in my live looping setup. You are putting
the question "does Kontakt work with Mobius" and I presume this
implies you are thinking about running them both as standalone
applications on the same laptop? The answer is YES, it works! Kontakt
as a standalone sampler can sync to MIDI Clock and MIDI Clock is what
Mobius is sending out when looping ("Sync Mode=Out"). On a Mac the
MIDI Clock can be piped through the system (IAC Bus) but on a PC you
may have to install MIDI Yoke. This also means you may put Kontakt on
a second laptop and it will sync from there and send the sync through
a MIDI cable. I've tried this and it worked well for me.

Another way to combine Mobius and Kontakt is to run them as plug-ins
inside the same host application. This is how I do it in two different
hosts I'm using for two different looping setups: Plogue Bidule and
Apple MainStage.

I don't use Kontakt for drum loops though, but for melody playing from
an EWI. The reason I bought Kontakt long ago was that I was producing
video music in 5.1 surround and Kontakt was the only virtual
instrument that supported that (moving sounds with doppler effect,
rotating textures etc). Since those days a lot more surround
instruments have become available and I wouldn't buy Kontakt for that
reason today. Today's great benefit of Kontakt is in my opinion its
excellent effect toolbox! If running a host as MainStage you already
have all that, but for a setup hosted in Bidule I'm finding it worth a
lot to have all kind of effects as well as effect routing inside
Kontakt.

Finally a personal reflection on "tweaking drum loops on the fly": it
will make you look as you check your email ;-))  Have you thought
about the option to include a step sequencer drum machine instead of a
sampler? For example iDrum
http://www.izotope.com/products/audio/idrum/. iDrum sequences can now
be recorded live over MIDI and this means you can start out with an
empty drum sequence syncing to your live looping on the laptop. Then
you hit MIDI pads to record different drum parts. That would be more
fun for the audience to watch and to understand that it is actually
you that are playing those drums. If using MainStage as the host you
already have UltraBeat that will let you edit drum patterns on-the-fly
but not record from scratch by MIDI drumpads (as iDrum).

Greetings from Sweden

Per Boysen
www.boysen.se
www.perboysen.com