VG-99 - Patch Creation / Programming Examples

Started by surdaas, March 26, 2008, 12:32:05 AM

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surdaas

We're all impressed with Bill's application of VG-99 technology and I think his friendly advice is challenging us to use our minds+ears and make patches ourselves.

I believe in collaboration.

In this thread we will recreate Bill's patches.  Sound clips can be heard here:
http://www.soundclick.com/bands/default.cfm?bandID=781088&content=music

Since the "VG-99 Mellotron Flutes" patches seems to have gotten the most attention, I nominate that we tackle this one first.

And let's not just post patch files.  Post what you did specifically to find the sound.

And I have no idea how to start...  :'(

ajvdn

#1
Hi,

I've already posted an alpha version of the melotron flutes under patches -> others.
It's not even near completion. I'm even wondering if I started with the right instrument.

First thing I have tweaked is the instrument (synth) itself. But there are several synth that might have the sound we are looking for. The other thing I have listened to and try to reproduce is the tremor in the end of the sound.

It's all just a question of tweaking and hitting the sweet spot.

Please download my file, and/or start you own. If I see/hear a better on I will remove my post.

Regards,
AJ

feloniouspunk

#2
I'm down with the challange and I believe in collaboration too.  This is what Bill had to say about the flute patch.

"Re Mellotron Flute: Fun sound. I added some noise by goofy gain staging to sound more real:-)"

Maybe we could get Bill to help us get started and pointed in the right direction.  After that I would love to tackle his "Fusion" patch as a group.  That patch sounds so freakin' cool.

Man, I am sitting here listening to all of his patches (for the millionth time) and I am still completely floored by what I am hearing.


Chris
Lots of Gear. :)

philflood

First off, I want to let you know, I think the general idea behind this thread is great. Count me in as a willing participant. Give me a patch to tweak, and I'll try my best. I think we need to be reasonably sure we are using similar setups or just know what setups we will be using in order to get the best results. Example: GK-3 on Les Paul, monitored via Twin Reverb line in. (Not that I think that's great choice, mind you, but that's the kind of info we would need in order to get close to the same page.)

sixeight

Well here is my version. You have to play the exact part, otherwise it does not sound OK. I built this patch from scratch, starting with the bowed synth, getting it as close as possible by altering its parameters and eq. The defret effect does most of the job in getting the right sound after that. The uni-v adds the tremolo. That's it. Setting eq is a matter of practise. Sometimes using a spectral analyser helps to visualise what you are doing. Feel free to edit , change and repost this patch until you are completely happy. My guitar setup is a Charvel guitar with a GK-2A pickup.


feloniouspunk

Is anybody working on any other BPs (Bills Patches)?  I am working on something like his fusion patch and I will post it soon.

Chris
Lots of Gear. :)

truth57

Well, once I get my own VG-99 I intend working on Bill's Crystal Rain patch, which is what blew me away initially, because it gets well into the territory of the Fractal Axe-FX demos on Youtube and takes them beyond into other sonic realms. For me the ability to combine such ambient sounds with guitar simulations would be really inspiring......

I also really love his Overdrive and ES-335 overdrive sounds, as well as his organ and orchestral and string ensembles. But of course as has already been said elsewhere, a great deal of this tone is in his fingers and in his musicality. We know that Bill uses light strings (I use 10-46 guage and tend to want to go to 011), and like Allan Holdsworth he sounds to me to have a very light touch, and I feel that a lot of his phrasing and especially legato expression reflects this. So in a nutshell, this needs to for a part of the equation when trying to emulate such sounds.

I can hear AH's influence in the Fusion demo Bill did, it reminds me of his Synthaxe solos, which I always thought were amazing! Perhaps there is even a way to imitate the voice tube that helped obtain the Synthax's unique sound shapes via the VG-99's continuous controllers, or maybe even connect a similar controller to the one used to control the Yamaha VL-1M for example. That might actually be one way of further expanding the VG-99's potential via cc messages whilst leaving the hands free to play......anyone tried this? If it worked, I would see that as a far better option than the new Steinberger device.
Sorry if I went off topic ;)

Regards,

David

Steve Mac

Not to sound too naive  ;D, but has Bill formally stated he won't share the patches?  Or help us in getting started, at least?

Great idea, this thread.  Should we have a central repository of patches with version ##?

Just $0.2

Steve

Elantric

#8
>has Bill formally stated he won't share the patches?


Yes he has formally stated this. - He's a full time union session guitar player, and he will share insight on how he created his VG-99 patches when asked politely, but he categorically does not want to post his patches.

I feel he is a super valuable resource.

Be sure to read this thread:
https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=483.0

To quote Bill:

"With these VG-99 clips I was hoping that some users would find them
exciting and start to dig into the programing aspect of the VG-99.
. . as far as posting patches I wanted to write and explain why I don't.
I personally do not use any factory patches or patches from any one else.
I start with a blank canvas as it leads me to many cool things I would never have found.
To me, the use of  posted patches leads to a plug and play musician.
It short cuts the creative process of this great new instrument.
That is what was SO bad for Synths in the 1980's.
Every DX-7 sounded the same and you could hear it on every record.
We use to pick them out on records and even know the patch name the guy used!

I posted short clips to give people an idea of some things the 99 can do.
It was my hope it would encourage people to dig into the instrument and find new things.
Be creative not just a user.
Anyway that in a nut shell why I do not post patches.
Hope you understand

Bill"

mos6507

I'm still waiting for him to do Bittersweet Symphony.
Michael Dolan Doubleneck
Les Paul Custom

VG-99
FTP

surdaas

^^ of course its Bill's choice if he wants to share or not, but I wouldn't care if I'm called a plug and play musician because I use a patch someone created.  I'm an amateur hobby guitarist, I wouldn't even call myself a musician - and I only have an hour or two a week to play with all of this stuff.  If it were not for Roland's presets that allow me to explore some of V-Guitar's capabilities, I wouldn't get very far at all.

But why does Bill have to tease us with audio samples of his patches!?  ;)

judb

#11
on the other hand, some times its useful to post an example as opposed to making some sounds and posting them and saying go figure it out yourself.  Not everyone gets "paid" to sit and tinker with their electronics all day long.  I don't mean to sound rude about it but I'm sure the number of hours Bill has had to learn the device and find out what works and what doesn't far exceeds most users.

By and large, most of what I've seen posted about how to do something similar is fairly non technical or extremely vague. 

If we are really going to try and take a page from Bill's examples and learn how to explore, recreating them (from scratch given the sharing stance) would be a sensible way for the group to figure out what he's doing and hopefully (the most important part) how he's progressing to creating the sounds so we can begin making our own.
PRS SE Soapbar II Maple with GK-3, Frankenstein MiM Fender with Graphtech Hexpander system, Breedlove Atlas AC250 with Synergy system, VG-99, FC-300, Cubase 4 Studio, Presonus Firepods, PodXT Pro and FBV controller, Shuttle XPC for DAW use, Mesa Boogie Express 5:50 combo with a 2x12 second cab

Canis Testicastor

I'll pay for patches if they existed, without the actual patch, how do you know it happened on a VG-99, its a necessary qualifying  stage as to credibility of patch maker and the VG-99.

Is there anybody out there who has a VG-99 and sell's patches?

Is there an are on this fourum where you can post an MP3 and then sell the matching patch?.

judb

i would prefer a donation model be adopted, strictly because there is such a thriving community of users of other modeling gear where tools are available to distribute patches and search them in a mostly easy fashion.  if you want something specific and someone is willing to make it for you, then donations would be cool I guess, but the pay for model would only further increase the likelyhood more people would refuse to share.  Also how would you keep someone from sharing the patch after you got paid for it once?
PRS SE Soapbar II Maple with GK-3, Frankenstein MiM Fender with Graphtech Hexpander system, Breedlove Atlas AC250 with Synergy system, VG-99, FC-300, Cubase 4 Studio, Presonus Firepods, PodXT Pro and FBV controller, Shuttle XPC for DAW use, Mesa Boogie Express 5:50 combo with a 2x12 second cab

Canis Testicastor

I think that if you want it badly enough, and another has spent time developing it, then you should have a sales contract and copyright protection, that way the full weight of the law is behind the enforcement and desist of say someone buying a patch, then peer to peer  dissemination to the masses. (this affords protection on both sides).

I can't see anything other than a form of "Open Source" licensing with a donation model, they get abused all the time.

With copyright, you could state that if more than 0.01% of the patch is changed (name, a value tweak) that you have infringe your agreement and if you publish it out to the free world, you can be sued   is a better thing, as it keeps the original patch pure and stops slight cloning and redistribution of a secondry market patch.

surdaas

These are patches that are simply configuration files or machine commands with certain parameters, and it would be very difficult to claim copyright on files that are not human readable.

Re: patch database, I'm sure someone will make a fine VG-99 patch sharing community. 

LeeMorant

Without doubt Bill's patches are awesome, just remember that this is due just as much to his playing ability and the arrangement and layering of the tracks.  I personally feel that we would learn a lot more by looking at the patches than by messing around with setting ourselves, but that's up to Bill.  There are a lot of clever guys out there and it wont be long before these are all available, in a way I dont blame him he's even got people asking for tab for them, it is a bit mental!

John Waters

Quote from: sustainiac on April 01, 2008, 05:55:28 PM

...but he categorically does not want to post his patches.

To quote Bill:

To me, the use of  posted patches leads to a plug and play musician.
It short cuts the creative process of this great new instrument.
That is what was SO bad for Synths in the 1980's.
Every DX-7 sounded the same and you could hear it on every record.

Be creative not just a user.

Hope you understand

Nope, I don't understand at all.

What's wrong with being a "plug and play musician"?
The sound you use is only one aspect of your musicianship. It's what you do with that sound, it's what you play that counts.
If you buy a Bogner amp and a 10'000$ custom Gibson, but can't play, then it will sound crap.
And every old bluesman proves, that you can play the hell out of an old and dirty noname guitar.

The comparison with the SOOO bad thing that every DX-7 sounded the same is a very lame one.
The sounds of the Synths and especially the DX-7 were new and unheard! That was what attracted people.
Bill, if you would create new, exciting and unheard sounds with the Vg99... but hey, what are you creating?
Just soundalikes! Just fakes!


Anyone can buy or hire a mellotron or a Farfisa and will sound at least as good as your patches do.
Do you fear, that - if you would post your patches - there would be mellotron sounds on any new record in the next years?

Is it creative to buy a Fender guitar and a Fender amp? I would say no.
Is it creative to emulate a Fender guitar and amp with an advanced technical processor?
Is it creative to read "Guitar Rigs of the Stars" and then choose the appropriate guitar, amp and effects in a modeling device? I would say no.
The fact, that your samples sound closer to the originals because you tweeked it a bit, just shows that the preset emulations in the Vg99 are not good enough. And it shows that the unit is a complex one and quite hard to 'program' on your own.

And why the hell do you post your sounds here, but not your patches?
This group is meant to be a place to share information and help people!
It's not a place to show off and hide the information!


Sorry, if I sounded too harsh, but it's my two cents on "awesome Bill".

J.W.

Kenmac

Thank you for saying that John. I've been thinking this very thing since I first joined up back in March. First of all, a little history here, when Aure first put his VG-8 website online, http://www.vg-8.com, it was for informative purposes and later on he added a section where people could upload the patches they made with the VG-8. I was one of them and I contributed 3 patch sets under the names of "Acoustune", "JoAndHex" and "Mixedbag". Sharing was what it was about, not only tips and tricks but *patches*. He also started the VG newsgroup where people could talk about the VG and share information just like this website and it's still going today. Now, there's no question that Bill is an outstanding guitarist but for the life of me I can't understand why he won't share his patches either. He did give an explanation but it still would be nice if he did upload them. I'm just starting to get into the VG-99 myself and believe me, I'll definitely be sharing my patches just as I did with the VG-8. Sharing is what the VG community used to be about and I hope it still is and willl continue to be that way. BTW I don't think you sounded harsh at all. You were just being honest and I was going to mention the whole *sharing patches* issue but you said it first. Well said and I agree 100%.  :)

Quote from: John Waters on April 26, 2008, 01:45:44 PM
Nope, I don't understand at all.

What's wrong with being a "plug and play musician"?
The sound you use is only one aspect of your musicianship. It's what you do with that sound, it's what you play that counts.
If you buy a Bogner amp and a 10'000$ custom Gibson, but can't play, then it will sound crap.
And every old bluesman proves, that you can play the hell out of an old and dirty noname guitar.

The comparison with the SOOO bad thing that every DX-7 sounded the same is a very lame one.
The sounds of the Synths and especially the DX-7 were new and unheard! That was what attracted people.
Bill, if you would create new, exciting and unheard sounds with the Vg99... but hey, what are you creating?
Just soundalikes! Just fakes!


Anyone can buy or hire a mellotron or a Farfisa and will sound at least as good as your patches do.
Do you fear, that - if you would post your patches - there would be mellotron sounds on any new record in the next years?

Is it creative to buy a Fender guitar and a Fender amp? I would say no.
Is it creative to emulate a Fender guitar and amp with an advanced technical processor?
Is it creative to read "Guitar Rigs of the Stars" and then choose the appropriate guitar, amp and effects in a modeling device? I would say no.
The fact, that your samples sound closer to the originals because you tweeked it a bit, just shows that the preset emulations in the Vg99 are not good enough. And it shows that the unit is a complex one and quite hard to 'program' on your own.

And why the hell do you post your sounds here, but not your patches?
This group is meant to be a place to share information and help people!
It's not a place to show off and hide the information!


Sorry, if I sounded too harsh, but it's my two cents on "awesome Bill".

J.W.
"Let them brush your rock and roll hair."

s0c9

Not that I have any axe to grind with Bill, and no offense is intended, but I have to agree with JW and KenMac

For some time since joining this forum, I've listened to Bill's new sounds. I've seen lots of people request that he post patches. I've even responded to some of those posts that Bill "doesn't post his work"... OK !  I've read the posts about why not and the reasoning behind it.  I'm now pretty frustrated with that approach.
We're all expected to take this on faith... ???? -- I'm not a real strong believer in that kind of faith [much] anymore.
We could all be getting our legs pulled here, big time !  ;D
The proofs in the puddin' guys.... This is the internet, and I've not seen a shred of 'cred' on those patches !!

While the song clips posted sound [really] good, who's to say they are really VG99 created. From where I sit, they could have come from a Yammy, Korg, Roland or some other synth engine. I'm not implying that they are, but other than what we've heard on soundclick or has been posted in print on this forum, I have not seen or heard one shred of PROOF [other than the posters say-so] that a single one of those sounds was [actually] created by the VG99 !!

If Bill were to post just one of his patches here for verification, then I'd be the first to get in line to congratulate him on his achievement(s) with the VG99. They sound great, and the playing is excellent, but were they really created on a VG99 ??
How am I supposed to know that ????   In the IT world, this is what is known as vapor ware !! Show me !!
PROVE IT TO ME !!

Not that I count for anything in the grand scheme of things. I'm not a pro-musician. I bought the VG99 'cus I liked what it can do. I have a non-music day job that takes 9+ hrs a day. I do not make my living from music and play in a band in my spare time. I don't have tons of time available to tweak patches, experiment or fiddle. I'm not a plug-and-play musicians either, and I have set up gig-able patches on my Line6 amp. For now, I don't have the desire to re-create every patch from scratch on the VG99 or to try to re-create Bill's. 

I'd like to see some of the meat between the bread !

My $0.02

Steve

ajvdn

Hi,

The sounds of Bill are real, if you listen carefully you can start to hear the "VG-99" sound.

I stumbled upon some amazing sounds. On a good day I can maybe sitdown for 1 hour and program and that I can do for 4 hours in a week if I'm lucky. Bill can sitdown and program for 24/7 because as I understand it, it is part of his job.

About sharing
The sharing ability was one of the sellingpoints for me. I like sharing my patches (you can find them in the "others" -> "all patches")

I like creating new patches, but I also like collecting patches from others. Other people creat sounds that I didn't even think of. Also some are like me and create sounds that were never heard befor, others like to sitdown and create sounds from their guitar/synth heroes. Together we can create a fantastic soundbase.

Bennefits of sharing
There are a lot of guitarist that want to creat their own sounds and there are lot of guitarplayers that want to have the sound of their guitar hero(es). And offcourse a lot of coverbands that need that sound of that specific song.

If we can create and share the right patches, people might consider buying the VG-99 instead of another product. This is good news for us VG-99 users. The more money the VG-99 makes for Roland the more Roland will be willing to listen to us users, the better the following up product will be.

Regards,
AJ

truth57

I had to do a double take on this.......Bill has said that he is thinking about creating a website based tutorial. At this point I think it would be rather stupid to risk offending him with these remarks, even though like so many others I too am frustrated at not having been able to emulate certain of his sounds that I found really inspiring.

However that said, what Bill does in terms of emulating specific sounds is excellent, and it is probable that this is where his talent lies. But that is only one end of the spectrum in terms of the potential palette of the VG-99....
But we need to remember that for Bill such sounds represent his 'bread and butter' in terms of studio work.

My personal talent, and doubtless that of many others lies in creating original sounds, but after all the time it has taken to create them, I tend to agree with Bill - I am starting to understand his reticence in sharing his patches. I also agree that aside from the few players who truly have the tone in their fingers, there is really a plethora of sound-alikes and wanna-be's out there. As Bill says this has been a growing tendency for many years.

Personally I am as guilty of anyone else of spending years trying to imitate players like Allan Holdsworth, Pat Metheny, Jeff Beck, Scott Henderson and all those guys who truly have tone and the ability to express themselves through the medium of the guitar. But at the end of the day what counts is to find one's own sound. That is what such an instrument as the VG-99 was tailored to do, and in my opinion it is the only processor I have come across thusfar that really offers that possibility.

I have had the VG-99 for around a month, and to begin with I really had no idea where to start. The stock sounds are pretty useless, or at any rate to me. Some served as a starting point. The few sounds I was able to download from contributors on these forums screwed up my system settings, so I was pretty much forced to adopt Bill's approach of starting from scratch.

That, as it turns out enabled me to work with what is in my head, and what I need to produce, and the truth is that it has been a very inspiring and rewarding experience.
Now despite the fact that I got nowhere near this goal with the VG-8EX, and that I was beginning to consider myself pretty much a dunce with regard to this technology, I now find that gradually the secrets are beginning to reveal themselves.

However, there will be a tendency for each user to adopt a different approach, and I would like to see this information shared, rather than just patches. I agree with Bill that it does not really help one to be creative in the sense of being original. I am going to cut this short here and continue in a further post so as not to force people to read too much....

David

truth57

Continuation:

I feel that it would be far more useful for us to each contribute our approach to creating patches. If Bill goes ahead with his tutorial webpage, why not send him our methods so that we could contribute to a pool of information, rather than just patches?
After all, if he is willing to undertake the process of doing an in-depth analysis and break down of the process involved in creating certain key patches, he will be providing us the means to get inside the guts of the VG-99. But as I already mentioned, he alone does not hold all the keys - each of us can contribute our own approaches. I might well be that templates could be designed for specific combinations of sounds, in order to take the tedium out of the task.

When I speak of approaches, I am talking about alternative ways of changing between two sounds in a single patch, or combining them, among other things of course, this is only a single example. But given the fact that I use the VG-99 live and without a midi foot controller, I needed to find a quick solution to obtain the necessary range of sounds beyond those immediately available via the 5 direct patch buttons. This again forced me to think laterally. I started to look at each patch as potentially three distinct sounds, including the output from the mag p/ups of my Strat. My initial approach consisted of using the expression pedal to change the mix level between A and B. However I found this limiting because I then lost the ability to control the individual volume of the instruments.

So I came up with the idea of using an external FS-5U to change between A and B, then having the expression pedal control either or both instrument's volume for volume swells etc. That in addition to assigning other functions to the front panel switches (1 and 2) allowed me a significant amount of control over the sounds within the patch (even more when my FS-6 arrives).

The inherent limitations of having access to only 5 patches got me thinking how to make the most of what I could immediately access. There are certain sounds that I need to be able to switch between in a single patch, such as a steel string acoustic and strings, or saxophone and Jazz guitar or nylon string, and this tends to minimize the available range of sounds. But really the fact that two sounds can be so combined means that there is sufficient range for expression in a short set. I dislike being tied to those sounds, so I also grouped patches making use of the 'Category' function. Despite not being the most elegant solution, it does work when really necessary.

Not only that, but I have discovered that certain of the synth models are so sensitive that they can be made to change entirely between being very subtle keyboard sounds to highly percussive sounds which can be used to produce a rhythm whilst playing chordal passages or even single note lines, because the note does not change. The dynamic range is truly amazing when compared to a standard electric guitar using effects processors.

This has opened up an entirely new range of sounds and expression, and it is just these sorts of discoveries I am talking about us sharing. There are many more where these came from, and this is information I am prepared to share within the context of such a tutorial. But not the patches themselves, sorry, they are as personal to me as Jeff Beck's approach to playing is to him. I realize that having a few patches designed by Allan Holdsworth are unlikely to get you anywhere near playing in his style, but that is not the point. As I mentioned before, it is about being capable of creating one's own sound or whatever sound one wishes or needs to create. And that is the goal of such a tutorial.

The actual process that goes into thinking through the creating of a given sound is what imparts knowledge and understanding as to how to go about creating that type of sound. There are certain key sounds that form the basis for all the sounds and timbres Bill has recreated using the VG-99, and once we have that information it will be a far easier process for each of us.

If the VG-99 came with only stock sounds, even if they were truly convincing I would never have bought it, because I want to be more than a clone of my guitar heroes, and any good teacher will attempt to instill into their student the importance of only studying other players' styles in order to produce their own individual musical personality, rather than wasting many years trying to sound like someone else.

David

Elantric

#23
Just imagine what the world would be like if all the energy spent on trying to beg Bill Ruppert to Upload his VG-99 patches were exerted in actual dialogs about learning raw VG-99 programming techniques, and learning about the physics of acoustics and musical instruments. Bill has the knowledge to be an educator - yet we treat him like crap. It's really offensive. My 8th grade social studies teacher was dead on, I had hoped as a collective group we would have a bit more class and show some respect among our peers. Instead we have too many arrogant alpha males who feel like cutting to the chase and bullying, or begging, or sending Bill private messages that read like a threat from God if he does not upload his patches.   

For those who Forgot, or perhaps do not read old posts - Bill Ruppert is here to teach us how to fish - so we can feed ourselves, and be self sufficient in our quest for tone with our VG-99.

Instead we display we have no discipline, and lack the attention span to build upon the foundation of learning from Bill - HE has made every attempt to get the ball rolling - We even have a thread "Bill Ruppert Programming Advice:
https://www.vguitarforums.com/smf/index.php?topic=483.0

But it's ignored, and instead our bandwidth here is clogged with noise - All the public begging for the patches is offensive.


Too bad we are missing out on this great opportunity. Too bad people do not read, or have respect for others views or feelings.   

Instead we have the disbelievers who are basically calling Bill a liar, by asserting that he is not using a VG-99 to create his tones.



It's a damn shame - and a huge missed opportunity. It will be a huge loss to our VG-99 community of we deeply offend Bill and he no longer wants to participate in our group.
Frankly, the way he has been treated here -  I would not blame him.

sixeight

I thought this post was about recreating Bill's patches as an exercize in patch making. So far it's only discussion. I haven't seen any improvements of the version I posted weeks ago. C'mon guys, let's get programming.