Support and discussion for all of Akai’s modern standalone MPCs including the MPC X / X SE, MPC Live 1, 2 & 3, MPC One / One+, MPC Key 37/61.
By redfresnel Sun Aug 04, 2024 5:14 pm
Hello!

My setup is as follows:
MPC One sequences (via CV) Deckard's Voice synth module which goes through Chroma Console (for FX) which then connects to MPC One's audio input.

My workflow:
I make a sound and then make a sequence via CV in the MPC. Then let's say i want to create sampled instrument of that sound. So far i've been using auto sampler but it seems the results are very very different. The samples seem to not only sound very dull and plain they seem also to lose environmental effect such as reverb. Also volume seems to fluctuate. I test my sampled instrument usually by just changing the CV track to keygroup of the sampled instrument. I am aware that sequencing involves the sequenced instrument's envelope and samples use MPC's envelope and while this has helped a bit the samples are still very different. Am i missing something or did i understand something fundamentally wrong with sampling?

Thank you in advance!
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By MPC-Tutor Sun Aug 04, 2024 5:49 pm
Yes, add the hardware effect after the output of the MPC, or if your mixer supports it, connect the hardware FX the FX inserts or send/returns and add them to the MPC output signal that way. You can sample some FX, e.g. distortions, lofi, dynamics etc, modulation sometimes (but makes looping very tricky, so you might need to just use long samples)) but ambience and delay is normally best added afterwards.
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By MPC-Tutor Sun Aug 04, 2024 6:20 pm
redfresnel wrote:Just to make sure we are on the same page: my MPC doesn't exactly output to anywhere. I'm using headphones connected to MPC and because it's the last link in the signal chain i'd prefer working on MPC with already effected samples.


Okay, IMO if you are using the MPC as the last link in the chain then you really have to be using the MPC FX for these things otherwise you likely get exactly what you are experiencing. Normally in a hardware setup the MPC is going to output somewhere else, like a mixer and you record/track to something via that.

In the first instance I would suggest you at least try it with the MPC FX to clarify if it is the act of sampling reverbs that is causing the issue.

You could get away with sampling reverbs on short one shot samples, i.e. notes that are always going to play to full decay, but if it's 'note on' samples then it's always going to sound awful as the reverb tail isn't going to sound on the release.
By redfresnel Thu Aug 08, 2024 2:34 pm
Following up on this. Do you have any workarounds i could look into to achieve a dawless setup and integrate my fx into the patches/sounds/samples i create without paperwork etc. I searched youtube for examples of controlling external effects with MPC via midi but found mostly either examples of external controllers controlling MPC or MPC controlling external synths. Any comments/drawbacks on this kind of setup?

Audio: Synth -> MPC -> FX
MIDI: MPC -> FX
MPC -> Synth