yes, you're right, bit.  color me embarrassed! 

Does anyone have an example project template which uses 8 or 16 Kontakt instruments, ideally with a single instance of Kontakt?  I'd like to see how the MIDI and AUDIO tracks are setup.

Also, for the drums, do you use multiple instances of a kit within Kontakt, or a single instance, but somehow route specific drum sounds to specific audio outputs?

Sorry, I don't have any screenshots or templates to share, but it's pretty straightforward. You have to first either load one of the multi-output (8 or 16 channel) versions of Kontakt or add some channels to the single-channel version, then specify which output to use in each voice's header. Normally you'd also assign a separate MIDI channel to each instrument.

As for drums, it depends on the sample library. Some have plain old GM mapping, and as such have limited routability unless you load multiple instances. The fancier ones have separate libraries for kick, snare, toms, cymbals, etc. so you actually load up the drums as separate instruments. They can then have their own outputs, their own MIDI channels, and their own effects, just like any other combination of instruments.

That said, I rarely route Kontakt instruments to separate outputs, because I just mix them in Kontakt and normally only need a single stereo output. Kontakt has pretty much everything you need in the way of effects, so there isn't a lot of benefit to routing to multiple audio tracks.

One scenario where you might want to do it, though, would be if you want to do a lot of automation for each instrument, in which case it's a little easier to do that at the track level rather than within Kontakt. Or if you have some special plugin you want to use on just some of the drums (e.g. a transient shaper, which IIRC Kontakt does not have). And I suppose if you were doing a surround mix then multiple outputs would makes sense.

That said, I rarely route Kontakt instruments to separate outputs, because I just mix them in Kontakt

How do you mix within Kontakt?  For example, if your hi-hat is too loud, but you don't want to change the velocity, how do you soften the hat relative to the other drums?  You would have to create another instance of the drum kit within Kontakt, right?  Or is there another way?

I don't use Kontakt for drums, so I can't offer any suggestions in that regard.

Mostly I use Kontakt multis for orchestral ensembles and percussion, in which case each voice is a separate instrument, so each one's volume can be adjusted independently, either coarsely via the volume knob or more creatively via MIDI automation.

I don't know how you'd adjust each drum in a GM set - maybe you can't. Or maybe Kontakt has more sophisticated mapping features than I know about.

And yes, I have done exactly what you're describing: I've split out the hi-hat notes into a separate track and driven a separate instance of the synth with it. That also gives you the option of substituting a hi-hat from a totally different synth. But I've not done that for a Kontakt library, which seems like kind of a brute-force solution and poor use of RAM when you're talking about huge sample sets. But then, I don't use Kontakt-based drums, either, so I don't know any special tricks there.

The one to pose this question to is Jim Roseberry, who has actually created a Kontakt-based drum library and is therefore pretty knowledgeable about Kontakt's capabilities and limitations as pertains to drums.

Out of curiosity, what do you use for drums?

Tripecac


Out of curiosity, what do you use for drums?

That is the question.
I use Stephen Slate drums in Kontakt and I can set the volume, tone etc of each drum within Kontakt. I can also swap individual drums with others as well as set each drum to it’s own channel.

I use Superior Drummer. I can do anything with it that a Kontakt-based kit can do such as routing each drum to a separate track with its own settings, effects and automation. I also have complete control over mic bleed and what the room mics pick up. It's amazingly versatile, so much so that I've never felt the need to buy any expansion packs for it.

It's not perfect, though. It doesn't have any percussion beyond the standard kit instruments, so if I want congas, shakers or handclaps I have to add another synth (most often Jamstix). With Kontakt, you can easily add anything you want to the multi, even your own home-made percussion effects.

Even for non-drum instruments, I am wondering how you handle multiple parts of the same instrument.

For example, if you have a piano sound, you might want to split right and left hand parts into separate tracks (or layers) for easier MIDI editing.  And ditto for a french horn section, or a violin section.  In each case, it's the same instrument, but different parts for it.

It seems you have a few options:

1) all parts on one track, separated via track layers
-- PRO: requires fewest tracks and least memory/cpu
-- CON: all parts share pan/volume controls
-- CON: editing individual layers isn't as easy as editing separate tracks

2) each part gets its own track, but all parts use same instrument (and MIDI channel) within the single kontakt instance
-- PRO: easier to edit than layers
-- CON: all parts share pan/volume controls

3) each part gets its own track and its own instrument/channel within the single kontakt instance
-- PRO: independent pan/volume controls
-- CON: increased memory/cpu usage
-- CON: need to coordinate patch or effect changes between parts
-- CON: need to coordinate midi channels between sonar and kontakt

4) each part gets its own track and its own kontakt instance
-- PRO: independent pan/volume controls
-- PRO: no need to scroll through instruments within kontakt instance
-- PRO: no need to coordinate midi channels between sonar and kontakt
-- CON: greatest memory/cpu usage
-- CON: need to coordinate patch or effect changes between parts

---------------

Are there other pros and cons that I am missing?

Which strategy do you end up using?

Beagle


yes, using more than one instance of kontatk will be very taxing on your system.  I can't give you details because they're going to be specific to your machine, but every instance of kontakt will tax your CPU, your RAM and your hard drive access.

Do you have specific details on the implementation of Kontakt that quantifies how multiple instances taxes your CPU, RAM and hard drive more than a single instance...or are you surmising that this must be the case?

My armchair theorizing would postulate that each instance of the Kontakt player would probably occupy more RAM, but it's likely to be (postulating again) much less than the data size of the actual instruments.  As for CPU and hard drive access, I'd be willing to postulate that there's almost no difference.

If the above were true...I'd opt for "per instrument" instances just to keep things simpler.  Also, for the sake of organizational simplicity, I'd consider a drum kit to be "an instrument", which would then be an ideal excuse to use a single sampler/ROMpler instance for multiple outputs.