Hi everyone,

Well, do you feel like sharing your tricks about how to make your sampled drums (ezdrummer, addictive drums, superior drummer, etc..) sound more realistic?

I mean, I do everything I can, but I still can't get that pro result I hear on the demos.

I mix each kit piece individually, pan, compress, saturate and equalize as necessary, add some nice reverb and take great care when composing drum tracks to avoid repetition, to create my own fills and rhythmic variations...Still, there's something missing.

I'm completely aware that nothing is better than a real drummer, but I've seen some very impressive demos which get really close to the real thing.

So, I would really appreciate if you could share your knowledge about this subject; Specific plugins, mixing and composing techniques...Any tip is welcome.

Thanks in advance,

Raf.

 

I feel you. I often have the same problem. For me, reverb is usually the culprit. Velocities are also important. I can't really tell if you're asking about programming or production or a bit of both. Posting an example would help peeps (who are hopefully better than me at it, too) give you some directions/advice.

 

Thanks for your reply, brother.

Well, I think I'm ok regarding programming drums. I understand how real drums work, which is crucial since it's not desirable to create impossible drums when the goal is realism. I'm also very meticulous when configuring velocities and I program each beat by hand without using my DAW's snap feature to humanize things a bit.

So I guess the key is in production...I think I'm definitively missing something in this aspect...And yes; Reverb makes a huge difference to glue the pieces together.

Raf.

 

Mixing drums is real difficult for me also *yes* It like an 'artform' in itself that the best engineers dedicate their lives to so I guess it can take a lot of time and effort.

Am no expert in this area at all but like Gramafon has said Reverb for me also sometimes makes it a little too much. That might just be personal taste but I much prefer a more dry sound. You have to be real delicate with the FX you use & remember if u using them on individual channels on multi-out setup there will be an overall collective effect. Compression & EQ for scooping certain frequencies on individual channels like say kick Drum,
Using a limiter ect. Could check your spectrum also.

Also important is to make space & check say the frequencies on say your Kick not 'mushing' around with the Bass guitar ect.

Like Gramofon also pointed out changes in velocity will be especially important in making the sound more realistic as no drummer hits the drum at the same velocity all the time.

Also important is to check your overheads/ambience channels ect as for me sometimes the levels on these channels especially important as they can 'shape' the whole sound. Rember also that the levels on these channels will have an effect on frequencies ect in other areas & can wipe out or Boost other areas. For example u don't want a whole load of different instruments all using the same say 1K area etc & interfering with each other.

Also be careful what FX u using on your master channel & double check all your routings/Busses ect. Check what controls may be active on each channel by default like EQ ect.

You could always spend a few hours just setting yourself up a basic mapping/routing ect that u could modify on each use ect.

As I said am definitely no expert & pretty sure someone can explain in much more depth than myself about the 'better' ways of doing things.

Good Luck

 

I was having issues with programmed drums also.. after checking around.. i found a lot of articles that mention the problems
with sampled hi hats... and the one suggestion that came out that was popular..and seemed to make some sense...( even to a non-drummer as myself )
that just getting a real hi hat and recording it played as a live instrument would help with humanizing your drum sound as well as giving a more realistic hi hat sound than the samples..




I have such a lousy sense of time that I just went ahead and got a used drum kit so I could learn about drums a bit.. but if space is limited the hi hat alone should fit in
"most" home recording spaces... and of course can be disassembled...


just my 2¢