Mr. Anderton, your EB5 DimPro freebies are phenomenal for metal. Thank you...

...I think I may have to get the full patch bank when the cash is flowing.
 
Seriously I just treated these as if they were a live recorded bass (I did some fancy tricks on them) and they are a total punch in the face... just like I'd expect from a sweet ass bass track. This is full on metal.
 
They thin out a bit/get kind of hairy in the upper range (like for up the fretboard solos... but most basses do anyway) but the bottom range is exactly what I needed. Still gonna try the Hardgroove Rapture stuff but these are fitting my trying unbelievably well.
 
For everyone else... I am referring to the freebies in the Cake blog but the full banks are in the Cake store for sale. I am doing a full tilt metal mix which ultra thick crunchy guits. I set Dpro to output two mono channels (instead of one stereo channel). Did a wicked low pass on the first channel and left it clean with some compression (big, fat and round) and on the second did a high pass (to focus in on the pick sound/high end then ran it through GR5 through a Marshall emu set to add drive and bite (like Lemmy would... and TH2 can totally acheive this as well). Both sent to a bus with a bit more compression and EQ....
 
Bingo Bango my kick and guits sound like someone kicking f*ck out of my face. Brilliant.
 
Again... many thanks. I'm posting this simply because it is that good and I'm sooper pumped. Gonna try this using ARA to extract the MIDI of parts I've actually played to double up (was previously using Zeta+ on Picked Alembic patch).
 
Cheeeeeers!!!!
 
 
Edit: It has recently come to my attention the EB5 Patches are actually on sale (I think) until Sept 23....
 
https://shop.cakewalk.com/1244/catalog/product.151213/language.en/currency.CAD/?id=S8ih7RkR8y
 
I do not work for Cakewalk or anybody. I do consider myself sponsored by the Cake Forum user base so ya... I'm an idgit but I try to provide useful info when I can. The freebies are really good live bass sounds (for metal anyway and I'm sure much more) so the full bank is likely even more awesome. I know Craig did some extra fancy awesomeness to the full version.
 
 

I bought the full set.  I don't do metal (although I like it) but find the library excellent when I want the bass to come through melodically.  Of course, it is good for any application, but I find it has enough mids and highs to provide needed clarity when the bass is playing an interesting part.

Beepster
The freebies are really good live bass sounds (for metal anyway and I'm sure much more) so the full bank is likely even more awesome. I know Craig did some extra fancy awesomeness to the full version.

IIRC the freebie isn't multisampled to the same degree. The freebie has only one multisampled sound, the tuned coil tap neck and bridge pickups. The full-blown version has all eight possible timbres and multisamples for all of them.
 
Don't forget a little treble boost never hurts either when you want to bring out the pick sounds and get more articulation. Also, the EB5 patches work well with the four CA-X bass amps when you want more of an "amp sound." 
 
And don't forget the bottom octave with the slides! They add realism when you throw them in from time to time.
 
Rock on!!

Anderton
IIRC the freebie isn't multisampled to the same degree.

Ya... I think this is likely the most important thing for me and I know it's been pointed out to me before (but I wasn't sure exactly what the extra complexity was).
 
I think it might stand up better to the crazy solo/noodly stuff I'm feeding it... especially after I humanize it.
 
and I will check it out with the CA amps maybe for some of my blues rock adventures. I wanted a Lemmy sound for this so when straight for a Marshall emu (but maybe the CA chains would do the same thing... I'm just used to working inside sims and getting the ultra control).
 
For a lot of direct bass stuff I usually just toss some stauration on in the PC instead of a sim but I could definitely see the CA chains giving me a much better/more tweakable version of that setup.
 
Cheers!

I sure like that " speed of inspiration " tag you have come up with 
 
Kenny

Graham at Recording Revolution commented on his fast style vs Pesaro's very slow style of mixing recently. 
Personally I find the faster I go the behind-er I get....
Looking forward 'One of ther days...' for your seminar!

Vern C
Is there a clean DI patch with the commercial version?

 
All the samples are 24-bit, recorded direct, one sample per note. There are eight programs for the eight pickup combinations. There are an additional eight "growl" programs that use the same samples, but take advantage of some of the processing in Dim Pro to rough up the sound a bit.
 
FWIW I always try to go for the most neutral, "honest" sound possible. That way you can process them any way you want - it's harder to add coloring to something that's already colored. There's always the temptation to include processing to make sounds more impressive, but I think SONAR users are probably a cut above average, so they probably want more control over the sound. 
 
I would recommend playing around with EQ for the EB5 patches to tailor it for the music in which they reside. I typically give it a bit of a "smile" curve.
 

Vern C
One other question/query:
 
Seeing as the OP said the EB5 programs are good for metal, I can only assume that there's round robins, or at least multiple velocity layers?

Actually, no. Again, I tend to do things a little differently. IMO a physical bass string is only one "sample." If you hit it harder, it gets brighter and the pitch might shift a bit if you hit it really hard. You can create these changes with a synthesis engine by tying velocity to brightness and judicious use of pitch envelopes. To my ears, that sounds more natural and "linear" than velocity-switching. You can't get away with that with all instruments, but you can to a great degree with bass.
 
I'm working on a sampled bass instrument now (Gibson Midtown bass) where I'm using Melodyne Editor to remove the pitch shift at the beginning of the note so it can be controlled entirely by the synth engine. So far the results are really promising in terms of creating a realistic plucked string sound that responds convincingly to velocity.
 
It also helps that when recording, engineers tend to even out the bass with compression. That removes a lot of the dynamics anyway. I've done multisampled basses, but never turned them into commercial products because I liked the sample+synthesis end result better.
 
With bass, I also program the mod wheel to to basically anything other than vibrato . That can give some real control over the sound.
 
FWIW this song uses the EB5 expansion pack. Several bass players have thought it was a physical bass, not a virtual one. (Also FWIW the "Rickenbacker 12-string" sound is from the Gibson Gold Top expansion pack, and all the amps are CA-X series amps.)