JK's Random Sampler

[ymerejsasnak]

JK's Random Sampler has been upgraded all the way to 2.0!

Each parameter has extra ways to control how random things are. (Because controlled random is best random!)

There's a bunch of new CV inputs and a few other goodies as well. You can see all changes on the store page https://store.cherryaudio.com/modules/j ... om-sampler.

I've also added new sound samples and recorded a new demo video available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0iqOMeSxVYQ.

It's on sale for $5 until the end of December.

7 day demo available as well.

[xuoham]

... is a great little module ! Thank you !

[ymerejsasnak]

Thank you as well! It's great to know it's being used and enjoyed.

[MLohmeyer]

Great module.

Noticed a bug, though. Any time I put 5V into the Sample input, it causes your plugin to output nothing, or output static, and in fact, it causes the entire Voltage Modular system to stutter and freeze momentarily sometimes.

I loaded up 2 .wav files and was triggering them with the Misfit Drum Trigger Sequencer and was playing with modulating the Sample input to choose the sample. I used a Cherry Audio DC Source output to drive Sample. It works as expected allowing me to select the sample with a voltage knob. But if I turn the DC Source output up to 5V (max value), Random sampler shows the problem.

I did this test with a number of different sources (LFOs, envelopes, etc.). At 5V, they all caused it. The LFO was telling. With the LFO set to sine, triangle or sawtooth, it was OK hitting 5V for a very short moment. But when set to square wave, when the wave was high (5V of course), the problem happened.

Thanks,
Michael

[xuoham]

It would be great to have the option to search for missing samples : i use VM on three different PCs and it's a bit inconvenient because i have to remember all the samples that were loaded. Eight samples to remember is OK, but multiplied by many instances is a bit harder.

Is is possible, or just plain unrealistic ?

At least it would be nice that the RS tells about all the missing samples, not just one.

(If only one could save the samples within the VM patch, a bit like the self contained set in Ableton Live. )

Thank you

[ymerejsasnak]

Thank you both for bringing these things up!

Michael: I have found the bug and I have squashed him without mercy.

Xuoham: I will address this in two ways. I will definitely at least add a dialog box stating the name of each file not found. But I also hope to add an option to save the sample data itself, rather than just filename, with the preset/patch.

Aside from the above, I have a few more things to do on the module, but I hope to finish these changes and submit a new version for approval some time this week.

JK

[gone soft]

Good news with the updates! Please consider adding optional storing of sample within the patch/preste to your faboulus Sample Scrubber as well if you figure it out.

[MLohmeyer]

JK,

Thanks for the speedy response and squashing that bug.

Re: saving the audio files -

I was also going to suggest this. Of course storing the samples with the Voltage Modular Patch is best because it guarantees they will always be available no matter where or what computer you load the VM patch on. This is how the Misfit Audio DigiSample module does it. But it can take a lot of disk space with 8 audio files and multiple JK Random Sampler modules. Disk space is cheap, so who cares.

But sometimes disk space matters. Hence, it would be nice to allow the user to select their "Samples" folder and have that be persistent across all instances of Random Sampler. Then give the option to tell Random Sampler to copy samples into the VM patch for when the user wants it that way. I mean 3 options - 1) copy samples to VM patch, or 2) let the user set the path to the Samples folder, and 3) let the user do a one time "copy samples into the patch" when they use option 2, but want to store samples in the patch, perhaps to send to someone else.

Most DAWs reference audio files by file name and only collect and save them as part of the saved file when the user asks it to. I'm suggesting it would be nice to have the choice to either save in the patch, or continue referencing by file name to my samples folder. I say this because I am often using multiple instances of a very similar patch from VM using several Random Sampler modules, or saving the Random Sampler as part of a cabinet which I use in different VM patches including the chosen audio samples, and I don't want it to re-save all those sample files over and over every time I create a minor variation of the patch.

More on option 2 above...

Allow setting the sample folder path in the module - and make sure that path is persistent among all instances of the module (set it once and all future instances of Random Sampler know those settings - I've seen some other VM modules do global settings like this). You would want to set this globally, locally only in the current patch, or just on a single module for total completeness. If the users or different computers are sharing a common sample folder (or one user sharing the same sample folder on a cloud drive like I do across multiple computers), it makes it possible to find the samples as long as the sample folder has a consistent folder structure. This can also work across different OS's - Mac. vs. PC easily.

For example, I store my samples on a cloud drive (OneDrive) and so my sample folders end up here:

C:\users\mike\OneDrive\Music\Samples Windows
/Users/mike/OneDrive/Music/Samples MacOS

.../Music/Samples is the same folder on both computers.

Both are almost exactly the same except for the C:\users vs. /Users. But both can be referenced commonly with %HOME% on Windows and ~/ on Mac giving:

%HOME%\OneDrive\Music\Samples
~/OneDrive/Music/Samples

My point is, if the user is consistent in how they store their files, you can ask the user to create a persistent path to the Samples folder and you can always find the sample on any system or even with different user names.

You can probably even guess this folder path from one computer to the next without the user even knowing you guessed. Someone that saves their music at C:\Users\(username)\Documents\Samples\... is likely to do the same on a different computer. A little intelligence in your module goes a long way toward user friendliness.

Sorry for the long description, but I hope you can see with a few simple options you can easily give us the option to handle samples the way we want to, or perhaps Random Sampler can easily guess where the missing samples are without intervention from the user if the user stores their samples in a common file structure. Or maybe you guess the location, but confirm with the user if you have found the correct files.

Of course, this won't solve it for everyone, so if all else fails, being able to save the samples in the VM patch is the most important method to implement (and probably the best default). But the above ideas are probably easier to implement right now whereas saving patches in VM might take more effort in the programming (maybe, maybe not - I haven't looked at how VM handles this in VM Designer).

Thanks,
Michael

[ymerejsasnak]

Hi again Michael.

I really appreciate the time you took to detail your request. I want everyone to be as happy as possible with my modules!

I will be implementing an option to save sample data instead of just paths (actually, this is just about done).

I'm thinking over your other idea, as it seems helpful as well, I'm just not sure exactly how I want to go about it yet. But basically, I will be adding some flexibility to how the module looks for samples when the exact stored path is not valid.

JK

[MLohmeyer]

JK,

Sounds good. Saving samples is most important because it always works and the user doesn't have to think about it. I'll leave the others up to you to decide what makes sense. A fine line between adding options and making it simple. Thanks for the speedy reply.

Michael