DKFH Superior or Artist drums?

[monkeymike]

hey there,

Anybody out there have both the DKFH Superior and the Artist drums collections? I realize that the DKFH is a much bigger library and only $100 more, but the demos for the Artist drums are killer and buying the DKFH means buying a new hard drive or cleaning out my present one..........any thoughts?

[Brian2112]

hey there,

Anybody out there have both the DKFH Superior and the Artist drums collections? I realize that the DKFH is a much bigger library and only $100 more, but the demos for the Artist drums are killer and buying the DKFH means buying a new hard drive or cleaning out my present one..........any thoughts?
OOO I was hoping no one would ask that!..LOL

I have both. Love both!

If you want just good sounds out of the box, grab Artist Drums…Great for fusion and most rock stuff.

If you want to do a lot of work, but have the ultimate control over your drum sounds, get DFHS.( I’m a drummer and very picky). So in most cases, I’ll use DFHS (great for jazz because of brushes and of course fusion, metal…whatever.)

Keep in mind that you need a lot of hard drive and serious memory to use DFHS. On top of that, you’re gunna have to work to get the sound you want. But it’s worth it if you are really serious about your drum parts.

For composing, I usually fire up Artist Drums – great sounds, less performance hit. Sometimes I then render with DFHS when I finish the piece, sometimes I think “what the heck? Artist Drums is perfect as is”
Good Luck Mike!

Brian:)

[FV]

Hi monkeymike,

I own DFH Superior and a friend I know has Artist Drums (AD). I have compared both. I whole-heartedly agree with Brian. DFHS is great if you really want to tweak your sound and want to have ultimate control. Artist Drums sounds great right out of the box. DFHS has more sounds and you have the choice of brushes as well (which AD does not have), plus DFHS gives you some percussion as well.

If you don't have that much computer power (and lots of RAM) and aren't inclined to fine-tuning your drum processing, AD might be more suited to you. Both are excellent sets IMHO and at some point I may pick up AD for times when I need something quick.

HTH,
FV

[monkeymike]

hmmmmmmmmmm

okay- .............I'll get both!!!! (maybe artist drums for starters- I don't feel like buying another hard drive!!!)

thanx guys

[Atombo]

Hi,

I've got DFHS and a friend of mine has Artist Drums. I decided to go with DFHS because it has so much different drums and cymbals and it has lots of mixing options. But I think Artist Drums are great as well. Especially the Simon Philips kit. Very articulate toms and nice hihat too. All the sounds have the reverb built in, so you can't get it out. But it is so much fun to play around with. Here's a piece I made at my friend's place:

Demo of Simon Philips kit (http://www.bzzt.net/~tom/SimonPhilipsDemo.mp3)

Bye,
Tom

[Mandarin Man]

Hey,

I'm also looking into buying een good acoustic drums-plugin, mainly for working on mainstream pop/rock songs and ballads as well. How about BFD from Fxpansion, anyone?

[Deep White]

All the sounds have the reverb built in, so you can't get it out.

It's not a "built-in reverb". They simply recorded the ambience of the studio (which is a good one) with the dry sounds.

You can modify the effect of the ambience by enabling the velocity envolop (which is disabled by default) and then adjust the release time to get the sound you want it to be. If you get this part right, you don't really need to much extra tunnings.

I got both too, and I too suggest that you got both. They are great in different ways.

[fizbin]

DFH Superior aside, I would pick StormDrum over Artist drums for rock. Artist drums for fusion maybe, but I prefer the samples in StormDrum.

[Brian2112]

DFH Superior aside, I would pick StormDrum over Artist drums for rock. Artist drums for fusion maybe, but I prefer the samples in StormDrum.
LOL!! Got that too! Awesome library! It sure does cover all the bases quite well.
2112:D

[midphase]

Have you considered Drumkit from Hell 2? It's essentially DFH Superior LITE, it has about 2.5 gigs of samples, comes in a Kompakt plug-in, and it's $100 cheaper.

[fizbin]

I heard that in DFH2 the hihats are not well programmed and do not cut each other off properly. Of course I suppose you could do this yourself but isn't this drum programming 101? I haven't laid ears on DFH Superior yet either - does it have this same "problem"? StormDrum has an excellent selection of well-programmed hihats from open through closed. There is enough overlap between the cuttoff of the hihats to lend adequate realism. If you don't have the slight overlap (basically a little release on the first sample) you'll many times get a very unrealistic click at the cuttoff point.

In case you're wondering, I don't work for them, but am a happy customer of this particular product. The Dunnett snare rocks.

[midphase]

DFH2 does have both HiHat cut offs and not. Reprogramming them is not a big deal if you have Kontakt, but generally this is not needed.

I think DFH2 is a good compromise for that raw type of sound without having to go out and buy a new hard drive just for the drums samples.

It definitely is rude, unrefined, in your face and raw, but if you're looking for that edge and if you're doing really rocking stuff, it's great.


Now, I'm going to let both of you guys in on a little secret.....shhhh....don't tell anyone allright?

Here it is:

http://www.natural-studio.co.uk/index2.htm


Merry xmas!

[fizbin]

Yes, everyone's heard of the NS kit. Unfortunately, not only is it not quite up to par with the samples in the kits discussed in this thread, it cannot be used to "make money". Now, I haven't made any money to speak of yet, but my goal is to do so. From the NSKit copyright statement:

All Rights Reserved. All samples and all text contained within or distributed from this website are the property of Douglas Whates. The banksets/samples are licensed to the original downloader/purchaser of the instrument for use in music production only. Copying, duplicating, selling, electronically transmitting, renting or other uses of these sounds not specifically for the purpose of personal, non-profit music production is prohibited by law.

Please do not distribute these samples from any other website unless given express permission.

It should be noted that these samples are NOT royalty free. If you wish to use them in such a way as you'll be making money from it (be that in any form) you must ask permission.

[midphase]

Firstly, being an owner of both, I have to say that NS Kit is quite up to par with DFH. Different sound, a little more processed perhaps, but still very good (superior in fact to Wizoo Drums and Pure Drums which I was using prior to going to DFH and NS Kit).

Secondly, while it's true that there is a disclaimer against using it for profit, have you considered contacting the guy that made NS Kit? He's quite cool about things and I'm sure that some contribution from your Paypal account would buy you the right to use it to make money with if and when that happens.

[monkeymike]

I did end up purchasing both during the sale- I am mightily impressed with both- and they both do what you guys said they would do.

The amount of realism in the DKFH Superior is pretty mind blowing I must say!
There is a bit of an installing/learning curve for the first day- but it is well worth the trip

[aplanchard]

"The amount of realism in the DKFH Superior is pretty mind blowing I must say!"

I know the drums sound great but how varied and realistic are the cymbals?

[fizbin]

Kays-
It's true I haven't tried NSKit for about 3 years, it's probably gotten a lot better. It's also great that he's doing this for free - I don't want to knock that effort at all.

All I really want to say is that I'm very happy with StormDrum and can recommend it to anyone, especially for rock.

fiz

[midphase]

StormDrum is on my shopping list. Curiously enough, a fellow composer who bought StormDrum told me that had he known what he was getting before buying it, he would have never plunked down his cash on StormDrum. I asked him why he felt that way and he responded that StormDrum sounds exactly like everything that you see in trailers and action movies. He prefers to have a more custom sound rather than sound like everyone else.

To this effect DFH is a good tool for composers that are looking for something that they can customize more.

[fizbin]

He was probably referring to the loop library in this regards - it does sound exactly as he describes (generic soundtrack stuff). Honestly, I don't even use that half of it. StormDrum is strange in that it comes with some excellent acoustic drum kit hits, a prepared piano, some other ethnic drum hits (can't remember exactly what right now), and there is a whole seperate DVD with Intakt and it has basically drum bed loops that are really only suitable for soundtrack work. I installed the loops to try them and then uninstalled. I guess I'm OK with it but I'm not going to use them. I do wish it would be possible to buy the hits only for less money. The loops will probably never be of use to me.

[midphase]

I just picked up Artist Drums, so far they seem ok. I might end up upgrading DFH 2 to Superior (I wonder if there is an upgrade path) as soon as they tighten up their AU integration. I'm going to test the Artist Drums stuff on some mixes to see just how well they blend. First impression is that they are smoother and cleaner than DFH, but also seem a tad more bland. It's really too early to tell until I get more familiar with the kits.

[Angus_FX]

Mandarin Man - not sure why BFD isn't talked about more here... let me know if you have any questions about what it can & cannot do.

[midphase]

If I may offer some constructive criticism and feedback perhaps it would help you get the word out.

Firstly, your product is not very well known yet, time to have a chat with your promotions dept. and let them know that small mentions in print is not enough.

Secondly, does carry it? For many of us Sounds On Line is the first stop for finding out what's out there. Hence the popularity of DFH Superior over other products like yours or even the Scarbee drums.

Thirdly, all of your on line mp3 demos only feature the kit itself. I'd really like to hear it in context with other instruments. This will definitely affect someone's decision.

Fourthly, start talking about it here, consider taking out a banner ad, consider starting a forum here, I think if more people know about your products, they'll be talking and reccomending them.

[Angus_FX]

Hi midphase,

Thanks for the hints. We've been around quite a while (since 1999, in fact), and are well known in quite a few user communities, but not this one and not amongst soundware-users in general. That's probably down to our history as a developer of utility software, plug-in effects, and mid-market virtual instruments.

does not carry our products - as far as I can make out, they only carry products distributed by East West. We have our own distribution network - for the US, we use eBlitz Audio Labs - you'll find our products on major sites like Musicians Friend, Zzounds, AudioMIDI, American Musical Supply etc. Quite honestly, if virtual instruments is your thing, there's a whole *galaxy* outside of .

#3 we are working on... we're shortly going to be running a competition amongst our user base for the best tracks produced with BFD.

As to #4... that's an excellent idea. We already have a forum at KvR - I don't know if there's really the critical mass of interest to justify an entire forum here just yet, but I'm definitely going to get in touch with the Northernsounds.com admins about banner ads and the possibility of selling BFD, XFL and the rest of our line thru Northernsounds' own online store.

All the best,
Angus.

[Martin Hines]

There are many good Internet sample CD/virtual instrument retailers including .

Here are my favorites:

http://www.mtlc.net/main.php?a=scd&main=1

http://www.ilio.com/

http://www.audiomidi.com/

http://www..com/

[LHall]

Angus,

Glad to see you here. I'm looking at the BFD and so far I'm really impressed. I have a friend using it and he loves it.

How much has the interface been tested with Logic 5.5 on PC? I've had trouble lately with some NI products on this system so I've gotten a little gunshy about jumping into new products. Some of the NI stuff (Stormdrum, GPO) has a "hung note" bug that hasn't been fixed yet.

It would be nice if there were some sort of downloadable, bare-bones demo for BFD. Maybe just one kick, snare and a ride or something. Maybe a 15-second white noise burst. But that would allow us to make sure it works with our system before shelling out.

On other thing. At a glance, it looks like I'd need to buy both the BFD and the expansion pack to equal the kits I get with DFH Superior for quite a lot less money. Any comment on that?

L Hall

[Angus_FX]

Hi LHall,

Our chief QA engineer is a big Logic user and still runs it on a PC (partly because he's also a big fan of Creamware gear, and, incredibly, that still doesn't run on OS X). So, you'll have no problems with BFD in that regard.

As far as downloadable demos go - it's really quite a difficult one to solve, as even a single kit would still weigh in at over 1GB, and we feel that reducing the bit rate or velocity layer count might put people off. We are doing our damnedest to make sure BFD works with absolutely every system (well, every system with adequate horsepower, anyway).

I don't think you can make a direct comparison between DKFHS and BFD/BFD XFL - yes, if it's brushed kits in particular you want, DKFHS will give them to you for less cash outlay, but there are a number of other considerations to take in to account also (how the engine works, host compatibility, V-Drums compatibility, MIDI playback engine, user interface - not to mention the fact that the two libraries sound quite different)... all I can say is, we've never had a single complaint that BFD was over-priced.

Best regards,
Angus.

[LHall]

Angus,

Thanks for the quick answer. Sounds like the right direction to go!

LHall