Apple AutoSampler -> Ableton Live one size fits all method?

A week or so ago I re-discovered/remembered the AutoSampler that is built into Logic Pro and Mainstage. I have a rompler synth where I keep using 4-5 favorite presets with minimal tweaking so it felt like a no-brainer that I should just auto-sample those sounds and get rid of a lot of I/O mess in my projects.

So I sampled a bass, some organs, some rhodes-wurlie sounds. The way the AutoSampler works is that you set some parameters and what notes you wish to sample etc etc (online video tutorials cover this part so I won't repeat much here) and then you hit "go" and come back in 5 minutes to a neatly organized sample folder and even Apple's own sampler instrument that works nicely in Logic (and I guess Mainstage).

However, since I use Live, I want to figure out a more or less one size fits all painless process to build Sampler instruments based on the AutoSampler output. Currently, what I do is that I just sample three velocity layers and then I drop the samples into Sampler one velocity at a time, so I can set the Key Zones spread equally around root keys and ensure that there are no dead notes at any velocity.

The 2nd step should be fixing the velocity zones, but it's here where I get confused I think. The issue I have in Live is that the perceived loudness of the sample changes a lot when it switches to a new velocity zone (this may be due to me using 100% Vel to Vol setting in Sampler, but what is a good default?).

So basically I think I am wondering what is a good default setting for the velocity zones, the crossfades and overlaps so that when I switch out the real synth for the sampler, the sound does not drastically change?

Thanks in advance for any tips or war stories you have with this thing.

I've got a bunch of info to share but need some time to put it together comprehensively. Re; the velocity zones, are you crossfading them or hard switching?

  On 6/7/2023 at 9:26 AM, user said:

I've got a bunch of info to share but need some time to put it together comprehensively. Re; the velocity zones, are you crossfading them or hard switching?

I started out by hard switching, but then I ran into the issue that moving from one zone to another caused a huge jump or in loudness, so I started messing around with crossfading and whether to use linear or constant power and then I got kind of lost.

Yesterday I spent a bunch of time AB testing a bass preset vs the same preset in the Sampler and I ended up having to boost the lower velocity samples by 3dB and bringing down the highest velocity samples by -12dB.

If I only had one preset to sample it would be fine like this, but I would rather have a process where I sample a bunch of presets and then just drop them into a Sampler and have it "just work". I.e. how the Apple builtin Sampler instrument is set up after the AutoSampler runs.

Anyway if all else fails I can just get Mainstage and run it as a rewire instrument too, but well even thinking about it it feels just like yet another kludge and I would rather have my workflow fully in Live and be done with it.

And thanks again in advance for your wisdoms tips and tricks.

After thinking on this for a while, I think what I need to do is sample some pure sinewave VST using AutoSampler, then compare how it plays in Apple's autogenerated thing and try to mimic it in Live's Sampler.

I just hope that the result ends up being straightforward enough that if I start sampling stuff in bulk, I would not need to spend loads of time lovingly tweaking the Sampler settings just to get things to sound sort of similar.

I goot Awave Studio earlier this year and it works well for most of the stuff I've done so far.  This is the list of supporte formats, I'd be ahppy to batch convert between them for you if that helps (it doesn't support any Ableton formats I can see, unfortunately)

https://www.fmjsoft.com/awavestudio.html#formats

i used to have and use the suite of apps from the dev who made autosampler, keymapper etc.. before apple bought them. i made a lot of sample instruments. depending on the patch i'd sample every note at 3 velocities. it sometimes took a long time but the results were always good or useable/satisfying. 

it would export in many sampler formats so it'd work in kontakt, reason, logic etc.. but also the note data was in the name of each sample taken so wherever i'd drop the samples they would automap to those notes because whatever sampler i'd use would use the note name to find the original pitch of the sample. it saved a lot of time. 

i don't know if ableton's sampler does this.. i've never jumped all in on the ableton sampler but i know it's very capable. 

i do think the velocity setting in sampler when you go to use it will effect the loudness of each sample layer so you have to tweak each instrument you make so it works how you want to work.. and sometimes it's easier to only do one velocity depending on the patch. 

Yeah, the AutoSampler from Logic also writes samples nicely with note and velocity information to a folder and then it'st just a matter of drag and drop into Live's Sampler.

I think what I am missing is how to set the velocity zones or rather how to layer the velocity zones that the sound retains the loudness curve that it had in the original instrument as the velocities increase.