Free Music Software: This is a preview of three Ensembles for Native Instruments Reaktor from The Color Space:
- Reaktor Phadia – a 4-osc atmospheric pad synth
- Reaktor Bass One – a 3-osc bass synth
- Reaktor Piky – 2-osc ‘pluck’ synth
The three Reaktor Ensembles are free downloads at The Color Space site.
Its quite interesting material. The only downside to this is that if you're using the free players or paid money for the Komplete Elements (E 49,- for the current one or E 99,- for the previous (IMO also better) one) you'll notice that you won't be able to use these ensembles. Not without switching to a time-restricted demo mode that is.
I've always considered this an amusing issue; many people who complain about Max for Live not having a runtime often point at Native Instruments because well; at least they DO provide something usable free of charge.
But when it comes down to terms you might even find yourself even more limited with the material provided by NI in comparison to that which is offered by Ableton / C'74.
(even though the old Elements is in every way totally worth the E 99,- I've often wondered why people hardly complained that they paid money for a product which wasn't very expandable; common freely available products (ensembles for example) or presets most often will not run at all)
I think it might even be one of the reasons NI recently shrank their Elements product quite dramatically and then cut the price in half (a change I can understand but still mourn because the previous Elements really was so darned good!).
Alas… I demo'd these ensembles and I quite enjoyed working with them. Not enough to make me suddenly by Reaktor, but they do give you quite a nice sound.
I got the big box version when Komplete was on sale one summer. I think in total with some coupon codes, it cost me $230? May be less.
Over time I keep going back to it. Without the user made Ensembles I would have uninstalled Reaktor a while ago.
Some of the work people do is just so musical becuase they are aiming for something THEY want. Not what a bunch of people in a room want.
I think this is why its still so much fun to use Reaktor. It takes you down some very cool roads. Something Korg, Roland or any big company trying to please the masses would never do.
I love that.
Its a shame that Kontakt has taken over to such an extent. There are several patch sources I pass over because they demand the full, expensive version of Kontakt. Well, I already HAVE a sampler and NI's fonts are just too hard to see when I am working. Its even worse when the background blurs the letters, as happens with black-on-blue or white-on-red. VERY bad GUI decisions there. All the demand for more and more money does is turn me off. Why can NI simply not get a cut from those patch sales and let me use them in the Player, which is PLENTY for my needs? I buy Camel Audio sounds because they do not try to force you to buy a full version you do not need. If I decide to upgrade, I'll go for Alchemy and NOT Kontakt, in part because they accomodate the CUSTOMER more. Sorry, but I refuse to drop hundreds on yet another disk-filling synth just for those relatively few sounds. Hollow Sun does this, so I don't buy ANYthing from them, which I'd like to do. $80 for a great sound set? Sure. That plus $400 MORE for Kontakt? Get bent. Oh well, Business first, even if you lose money by alienating part of the potential buyer base. Its just my opinion, but this situation shapes my buying enormously.