2015/12/15 02:36:51
LJB
Hey guys, I am so tired of sifting through over complicated pads in soft synths that are useless in the mix (incl the ones we get bundled in SPlat). The best pads I've heard are in the new Roland Juno and similar synths. Good, wholesome, rich and simple stuff that works for gospel music etc. Anyone know who makes similar sounds in software?
2015/12/15 03:34:13
stickman393
I love Dimension Pro's strings. But this is probably hugely subjective. One persons over-complicated is another's bread-n-butter.
2015/12/15 07:23:48
bitflipper
The nature of pads is that they're fillers, audio spackle for making sure there are no holes in your music. Just as when applying putty to bathroom tiles, you have to scrape away the excess. That means brutal amounts of filtering and volume automation so that they fill the gaps without masking the percussive and melodic elements.
 
There are two ways to approach this: subtractive and additive. You can either start with a thick pad and carve it to suit the mix, or you can create your own custom pad to more precisely fit the cracks you need to fill.
 
Omnisphere is the king of pads, most of which are made from those Roland synths you admire, but they often require a lot of shaping and reduction. Dimension Pro has a few nice pads in that category, too, that aren't quite as opaque but sill need some filtering. Z3ta+ can do some decent pads, too, that aren't quite as gooey.
 
More and more, I lean toward option #2, building pads to order with Zebra. I look to the patches of Joseph Hollo and Howard Scarr for inspiration and as a starting point.
 
2015/12/15 08:41:54
Mesh
Check out https://hideawaystudio.wordpress.com/ 
 
Dan Wilson restores a LOT of vintage synths for the digital format (Kontakt etc..) and the sounds/pads are excellent.......inexpensive to boot.    
2015/12/15 09:25:10
Starise
I can certainly sympathize LJB. Sometimes the names of the patches help and sometimes they don't.
For gospel I'm thinking you maybe want something like cleaner old yamaha DX patches? Other than organs I can't think of much that can happen well in that genre concerning patches.
The old Oberheims and DX7 kinds  patches maybe with reverb removed from the patch. This is something I've noticed a lot...almost all pads seem to have some kind of reverb or the samples were made in a large space....and they take up a lot of low end.
2015/12/15 09:26:16
Crowned One
Mesh
Check out https://hideawaystudio.wordpress.com/ 
 
Dan Wilson restores a LOT of vintage synths for the digital format (Kontakt etc..) and the sounds/pads are excellent.......inexpensive to boot.    


+1
 
For the price there stuff is great and the pads options are very warm sounding but with lots of options to tweak.
 
Also agree with Bit that Zebra is great for pads and there are plenty of people making patches to prove this.
2015/12/15 10:10:49
Bajan Blue
Check out https://hideawaystudio.wordpress.com/ 
 
Dan Wilson restores a LOT of vintage synths for the digital format (Kontakt etc..) and the sounds/pads are excellent.......inexpensive to boot. 
 
+1 here as well for Dan's stuff
Nigel
 
2015/12/15 10:29:34
JonD
Mesh
Check out https://hideawaystudio.wordpress.com/ 
 
Dan Wilson restores a LOT of vintage synths for the digital format (Kontakt etc..) and the sounds/pads are excellent.......inexpensive to boot.    


+3
 
I was just listening to some of the demos.  Great stuff, the strings and choirs in particular (for my taste). 
2015/12/15 12:30:44
mixmkr
Korg has a sale on their Legacy synths.  $24.99 each or $99.99 for the bundle thru December 28.  The Wavestation and M1 are especially good for these software versions.  BTW, they include all the cards that were made for the synths too.  I just got both, and they have a lot of great pads in the vein you're looking for.
 
https://www.korguser.net/shop/software/index.asp
2015/12/15 14:47:02
MarioD
Starise
I can certainly sympathize LJB. Sometimes the names of the patches help and sometimes they don't.
For gospel I'm thinking you maybe want something like cleaner old yamaha DX patches? Other than organs I can't think of much that can happen well in that genre concerning patches.
The old Oberheims and DX7 kinds  patches maybe with reverb removed from the patch. This is something I've noticed a lot...almost all pads seem to have some kind of reverb or the samples were made in a large space....and they take up a lot of low end.




If you are looking for those old Yamaha sounds NI's FM8 is the way to go.  FM8 will read DX7 as well as other Yamaha synths patches. There are 1000s of free DX7 patches out there.
 
I hope this helps.
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