SPITFIRE AUDIO Contemporary Drama Toolkit User Manual
- June 6, 2024
- SPITFIRE AUDIO
Table of Contents
USER MANUAL
CONTEMPORARY DRAMA TOOLKIT
**CONGRATULATIONS
**
Thank you for purchasing Spitfire Contemporary Drama Toolkit. Contemporary
Drama Toolkit is a broadcast-ready sound set, expertly curated and produced by
award-winning composer Samuel Sim and our team of composers, to help you score
to picture without the theory — without compromising on emotion. Across 72
individual instrument patches and 44 combinations, expression is baked into
each sound, leaving you to focus on your music instead of software menus.
CDT’s diverse sound palette originates in a masterful blending of its source
material — mellow, chorus tones of a Juno 6, iconic MS20 textures, sung
vocalizations, and inspiring lead lines performed on guitar, electric cello,
and electric violin — all processed via an enviable collection of analog
effects, vintage stompboxes, and Eurorack modules. Everything from whispered
textures to bold melodies blossoms from the simplest variance in playing,
unlocking a world of sound in every patch.
Quick Specs
- 27.8 GB disk space required
- 28 GB disk space required during install
- NKS Ready
- Compatible with Native Instruments hardware
- Free Kontakt Player Included
- Intuitive GUI with inline help
- Two signals (Mx, Fx)
- Multiple Articulations
- Multiple Dynamic Layers
- Multiple Instruments
WELCOME
A World in Every Patch
Building on the success of the British Drama Toolkit, Contemporary Drama
Toolkit is a sequel of sounds created utilizing the same intuitive user
interface. This curated palette effortlessly unfolds across the keyboard —
seamlessly blending supporting textures with lead lines — while still leaving
space for you to develop a personal connection to your composition.
For anyone looking to embrace an alternative approach to scoring, this NKS
library toolkit gives you full creative freedom without the barrier of
technology — allowing ou to simply respond to the scene in front of you.
Whether set in a bygone era or dizzying future, uncover a world in every patch
and unlock the potential of every story.
Less Theory – More Feeling
Contemporary Drama Toolkit provides the most instinctive, immediate connection
to the heart of your composition, giving you the freedom to create a score in
an instant. Similar to British Drama Toolkit’s unique scoring approach, CDT’s
ensembles make use of the entire keyboard and rely on velocity to unlock each
patch’s huge range of expression, empowering you to forget about the computer
and respond instinctively to the drama at hand. This is a collection of
thoughtfully curated sounds, ready for wherever your imagination may take you.
DOWNLOADING & INSTALLING
Thank you for buying Spitfire Contemporary Drama Toolkit. If you are a total
newbie to this kind of thing you can get up to speed here:
http://www.spitfireaudio.com/info/basics/
First, though, grab the ‘Spitfire Audio App’ from this link: this app will
enable you to download the library http://www.spitfireaudio.com/info
/library-manager/
When you launch the app you will be prompted to log in using the same details
you use at our site. Then you’ll see your available downloads:
You can click on “not installed” to see the libraries you
haven’t downloaded yet, or use the search function on the top right. Click
“install” to start.
A default location will be generated but you’ll most likely want to change
this. Click on the folder icon and choose the location that you want the
library to download to.
Once you’ve selected the location, click “install” or “download” to start.
TOP TIP: You will need approx TWICE the amount of hard drive space the library
uses (see the product page on our site for this info) to download: this is
because the zip files are all downloaded, and then unzipped. This process
takes a while so don’t panic if it looks like it’s frozen!
TOP TIP 2: If you need to download again for any reason you can reset the
download of either the whole library or just the latest update from the cog
menu of the library in question. This is limited to a couple of downloads as
bandwidth is expensive! Please only do this if you actually need to.
TOP TIP 3: If you wish, you can choose a default location for your downloads
in the Preferences tab of the Spitfire Audio App.
**NATIVE INSTRUMENTS KONTAKT
**
If you’ve never used one of our libraries before and you don’t own a copy of
Native Instruments Kontakt, you’ll need to download the free “Kontakt Player”
here:
https://www.native-
instruments.com/en/products/komplete/samplers/kontakt-5/downloads/
If you’d like to find out more about the differences between Kontakt and
Kontakt Player (we know, very confusing!) go to Appendix B.
If you’d also like to know what we recommend as an optimal set up please go to
Appendix A.
-
Install Kontakt Player and Native Access (skip this step if you already have them)
-
Open the player (or Kontakt 5 full version if you have that) and click ‘manage libraries’ in the library browser window:
-
Native Access will open and you will need to log in or
create an account if you do not have one already. -
Click on “Add a serial” and you will be prompted to enter the serial number in this format: XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX-XXXX
…This can be found in your ‘ready to download’ email.
-
Once you have added this you will be asked to browse to the folder containing the library. Click on “BROWSE” to direct Kontakt to the correct location.
-
Navigate to and select the “Spitfire Audio – Contemporary Drama Toolkit” folder.
-
Click on “Install” and your library is authorized. If the library does not add to the libraries pane or disappears when you re-open Kontakt, see Appendix F – Troubleshooting and common problems
If you have never used Kontakt before we wholeheartedly recommend that you familiarise yourself with the basics of the patch (or instrument) loading, multi-management, outputting, and midi routing detailed in the Kontakt user manual and native instruments website:
https://www.native- instruments.com/en/products/komplete/samplers/kontakt-5/downloads/
If you are an established Kontakt user please make sure you absolutely have
the latest version of it downloaded via NATIVE ACCESS. Our libraries are
frequently updated and often simply won’t work on any previous versions. We
cannot describe the multitude of painful symptoms you will experience if you
don’t do this!
For more information about NKS and integration with Native Instruments
hardware controllers and keyboards please check out their online instructions:
https://www.native-instruments.com/en/specials/komplete/nks/
FOLDER STRUCTURE
If you click the Instruments bar to expand it you will see that you have a
‘basic’ startup palette for each instrument, plus the Ensemble, these are
your basic patches that contain a selection of curated ‘workhorse
articulations.
If you click the Advanced
folder to expand it you will see subfolders for each of the main instrument
patches, these contain the individual articulations. You can double-click the
folder name to open that folder. Double click it again to go back up a level
in the folder structure.
OPENING YOUR FIRST INSTRUMENT.
Simply double click a ‘nki’ file (this is Native Instruments’
file extension for a Kontakt instrument) to load, or indeed drag the
instrument (it’ll have the little keyboard icon and the suffix .nki) from the
left pane into the right pane.
If you can’t hear anything double-check first that the midi channel you are
transmitting on with your keyboard is the same as the one in the Kontakt
Instrument!
A QUICK LOOK
**SWITCHING VIEWS** When you first load up a Spitfire Contemporary Drama Toolkit
preset you’ll be greeted with this GUI. This is one of 3 pages that you can
switch between using the panel switcher shown below:
ASSIGNING CONTROLS IN KONTAKT
All GUI controls can be assigned a unique controller number so you can
automate or adjust via an external controller (vital when playing in virtual
Orchestral parts). To un-assign, assign, or just to see what CC number is
assigned to any control RIGHT or CTRL CLICK.
You can then alter the controller parameters in the “Automation pane” if you
want your mod wheel to go all the way from top to bottom but the control to
have restricted bandwidth, change the default of 0-127 to 20-100 say. Or if
you want the controller to make the GUI control in the reverse direction
change from default 0- 127 to 127-0.
THE VELOCITY LAYER VIEW
-
ARTICULATION SWITCHER
These icons denote key articulations, display the current articulation playing and act as switches between them If what you’re playing stutters, or feels delayed or cut out make sure everything is loaded, as some of these articulations are very deep-sampled.
LOAD STATUS: Make sure Kontakt displays the instrument load status as pictured. If the left-hand bar is illuminated and red it’s in a queue and hasn’t started loading yet, if the middle bar is lit and yellow the instrument is still loading up. If you try to play before it’s loaded it may not be nice!
ARTICULATIONS – Click on these notes to select the different articulations, whatever articulation is live is displayed in the yellow sidebar on the left. POWER TIP: SHIFT > CLICK to select and play multiple articulations! -
SIDEBAR
Tells you what articulation you’re playing. -
VELOCITY LAYER DISPLAY
This view is unique to the British Drama Toolkit and Contemporary Drama Toolkit, showing the velocity split for the currently selected articulation. Each one played will appear as a black bar starting at the bottom of the texture split and finishing in the split which corresponds to the velocity of the note. Playing at a high velocity will trigger samples from LOUD in the screenshot above, playing softer will trigger samples from SOFT, and playing even softer still will trigger TEXTURE samples. Some articulations will have only two splits and a handful of individual articulations will have just one.
THE GENERAL OVERVIEW PANEL
-
ARTICULATION SWITCHER
This behaves just like the articulation switcher in the velocity-ty layer view on the previous page. -
SIDEBAR
Again, just like the velocity layer view, this tells you what articulation you’re playing. -
SIGNALS
This is the simplified Signal mixer, giving control over the two signals, Mix (Mx) and Effects (Fx). The power buttons under each fader will enable and disable the signals. Clicking on the Mx or Fx under each fader will allow you to route the signal to the available outputs in Kontakt. -
EXPRESSIVE CONTROLLERS
LP Filter – A low pass filter (CC1), moving the fader to the left will close the filter, reducing high frequencies.
Expression – This is instrument trim (CC11), so this adjusts the volume within the instrument volume.
Reverb – Controls the amount of simulated reverb applied to the sound, with the slider fully left there is no reverb added, and fully to the right the maximum amount of reverb is added.
ARTICULATIONS
Unlike many other Spitfire Libraries, in Contemporary Drama Toolkit a single
‘Articulation’ will often contain two or three different techniques divided by
velocity (as described on page 7). Below are descriptions of these velocity
layers.
TEXTURE
The most ubiquitous layer in Contemporary Drama Toolkit, the player plays very
softly and texturally so that a single note or chord can be held and you will
hear subtle movement or fluctuations in timbre. Perfect to accompany the other
layers mentioned below.
The actual techniques used in this layer will vary by instrument so in the
Electric Cello this might involve some semi-improvised bowing techniques such
as ricochets whereas the Vocals might adjust their technique for a more “airy”
or “breathy” sound.
SOFT
The Soft articulation is most like a traditional long or “normale”
articulation, it will stand out when played over the texture layer above but
would equally work well accompanying the Loud or Accented layers below.
LOUD
In this layer the note is performed with some virtuoso flair, this might
involve re- owing the note in the strings, for example, this layer is perfect
for playing out melodic lines, dramatic bass lines, or holding inverted pedal
notes. These notes will stand out when played alongside the soft or texture
layers and is less suited to accompaniment.
THE EXPERT VIEW
-
SIDEBAR
On the ‘General Overview’ page this simply displays the articulation being played. In the ‘Expert View,’ there are some additional functions:
a. “KEYBOARD SHIMMER” – This shifts your bank of key switches
left or right to suit your needs, preference, or performance. Simply click on
the icon and drag your cursor left or right and you’ll see the pink bank of
key switches follow! Wherever you stop, those will be the new key switches.
b. “KEYSWITCH TO CC SELECTOR” – Use this to assign a CC controller to act s articulation/key switches. Click on “CC” and you’ll be prompted to move the controller you wish to use in order for the instrument to “learn” how you’d like to select articulations.
c. “ARTICULATION LOCKER” – We all like to elect articulations and use our templates in different ways. Many composers like to have a single articulation loaded to each instance of an instrument for example. So it’s worth locking off the articulation switching once you’ve elected one so you don’t have sounds disappearing from slaves way off in your machine rooms!
Unlocked Artic’ – select articulations via the front panel or associated key switch. (disabled by default in CDT as the key switch range may overlap with the playable range in some cases).
Locked Artic’ – This locks your articulation so it doesn’t change either via the front panel or key switch.
Locked Keyswitch – This is the default setting, this option locks your articulation via key switch but you’re free to switch via the front panel.
Locked to UACC – This is a standard developed by Spitfire and detailed in appendix E. The default controller channel is #32 but this can be changed by right/CTRL clicking on the padlock.
Locked to UACC KS – The functionality of UACC with the flexibility of a key switch. When activated, a single key switch is available. Pressing this key at varying velocities (according to UACC standards) changes articulation.
-
ARTICULATION SWITCHER
This works the same as it does in the ‘General Overview’ panel, with the addition of ‘load chips’ beneath each articulation. These load them in and out of memory as you wish. Remember before playing an articulation you’ve loaded in make sure it’s fully loaded!
LOAD STATUS LAYERING ARTICULATIONS – To layer sounds within the articulation set simply ‘SHIFT’ click on your next articulation. Rather than introducing a multitude of more confusing ‘layered articulation’ options, the front panel shows (and edits) only the most recently layered articulation.
TRIGGERING – For triggering options CTRL or COMMAND click on the articulation icon:
“By CC Range” – This will allow you
to use a single control channel to switch between artics. This allows you to
fine-tune on your MIDI event list, or to use an idea controller fader or
indeed button with a single range assigned to select your desired artic’. Our
default setting is guided by our UACC protocol.
“By KS” – The default setting. CDT is scripted so it won’t switch mid-note but wait until the next note-on event before switching. This means you’re able to play the key switch say whilst playing a long note and have it switch to a Long (Alt) n our next note.
“By Velocity Range” – Due to the way in which velocity is handled in this library, this setting is probably of limited use.
“By MIDI channel” – Ingeniously turns your single instance of CDT into a multi-timbral instrument. MIDI channel lets the instrument change articulation based on the incoming MIDI channel. To use, pop the instrument Midi Ch. to ‘Omni’ mode in Kontakt. The single instance can now be configured to play based on the incoming MIDI channel. For example. Set “Fireflies” to channel 1, “Haywire” o channel 2, “Highlands” to channel 3.
“By Speed Of Playing” – A function that allows you to switch articulations based on the playing speed of your performance. When selected, it provides options to specify a triggering time range in milliseconds. (See right-hand menu above). For example, you could specify that ‘Fireflies’ should be activated if the time between playing each interval is between 0 and 250ms pictured above). Fully configurable to suit the user’s playing style and needs and can be deactivated by unchecking ‘Enabled’ (or if not in the artic switching screen, simply holding ALT/MENU and clicking the articulation icon on the stanza).
When an articulation has a ‘trigger’ assigned to it, it shows a little short- cut icon above to let you know that it has been customized. Holding down LT/MENU (PC/MAC) and clicking an articulation with this short-cut above it will toggle the trigger between enabled and disabled. It’s a handy way to quickly urn off legato speed/velocity switching if the user doesn’t want it. TRIGGER ANEL – Reset will clear the trigger for this articulation, allowing you to set it to a different type or disable it permanently. Legato intervals will only activate this trigger if the notes played are legato intervals. Ignoring if purged means that his trigger will only occur if the articulation is not purged. The group allows you to group together triggers. When set, the trigger only occurs when an articulation in the same group is currently active. For example, use this if you wanted to set up speed triggers on legato articulations, but don’t want them to rigger if you have staccatos/marc/shorts selected.
OTHER WAYS TO WITCH ARTICULATION
S Alongside switching your articulations manually by hand, via a key switch, or via the advanced methods mentioned above you may also want to try a system we’ve named UACC universal articulation controller channel). Whereby each and every possible style of articulation has been given a unique CC data number. Simply use C#32 and the table found in Appendix E to see how this can work for you. -
MICROPHONE MIXER
Giving you greater control over the blends of microphone positions for your work.
Use the chips beneath the faders to load & unload different microphones and the faders above to tweak the balance. Turning an ader all the way down will also unload the mics, conversely turning the fader ack up will reload. Right- click on the faders to assign CC controllers so you can ix this life for fantastic shifts in the spatial nature of the samples. Left-click on the mic letters to change the Kontakt channel/output assignment.
On the top right of the mixer, the controller section is some deeper mixing options. 3a VELOCITY RESPONSE Pick from 4 different velocity curves to suit your controller.
3b PAN MIC COLLAPSER **The mics are a stereo mix and this collapse allows you to refine how the stereo image is handled. All our musicians are recorded in-situ, i.e. where they ould be seated on a standard scoring session, giving you a fantastic spectral spread when putting all the elements together, which helps define the detail. This panning tool helps you to manage and tweak this to your own tastes/ needs. STEREO WIDTH – This allows you to control how far the stereo image reaches. All the way to the right would be like having your two pan pots panned ard. All the way to the left would be like having both pots center,
STEREO PAN – Then allows you to control wherein the pan field in the center of this image is placed.
3c MIC MIX TO ARTICULATION LINKER
The small notation symbol locks the microphone mix or tweaks you’ve made to the articulation selected. This means if you want to boost any perceived inconsistencies in volume between say pizzicato and col legno you can. Or indeed if you want to roll off some of the hall ambiances for a short versus long articulations this is how to finetune.
3d MIXER PRESETS
**A way to transfer mixer settings between patches, or save and load presets to disk.
AUTOMATING MIXER FADERS – Each mixer fader has a dedicated #CC. To change this to suit your MIDI controller or surface, simply right-click (on PC) or command-click (on Mac) on the fader itself to “learn” the new controller.
ROUTING MIC MIXES – To route each mic mixer channel to unique Kontakt channels simply click on the mic acronym. Great for putting your ambient mics in the surrounds for example. Also good for tracklaying individual mics for your engineer to control in your final mix sessions. -
GENERAL CONTROL
OPTIONS
PRESETS – This allows you to load predetermined sets of articulations affectionately called articulation sets (see General Overview Panel) quickly and easily to optimize your system quickly for essential articulations or to start building templates using empty “shells”.
PURGE UNUSED – This control keeps unloading any samples you are not using to keep your memory usage as low as possible.
TRANSPOSE – Toggle this on and tweak the number to the right to transpose your instrument. Note this is not the same as tuning, the instrument will actually offset the samples to the selected pitch. A great way to “track up” CDT and make it sound bigger!
ROUND ROBINS
NO EXTRA FUNCTIONALITY(NEIGHBOURING ZONES)-
Next to this lies a pop-down menu with some amazing new functions:
• “No extra Functionality” – This is the standard default where round robins are used as they were intended.
• “Neighbouring Zones” – pulls from neighboring zones, so for an ‘8RR’ instrument, you effectively cycle through up to 24 different sounding notes when pressing a key. It’s still just playing the one RR at a time, though giving you more of them.
• “2x Round Robin With Skip” – plays two RR simultaneously, so you get a thicker sound, it’s the equivalent of plopping two notes on top of each other in your DAW (and it drops the overall volume ~6db so that the levels remain the same but it just sounds thicker). NB THIS IS NOT AVAILABLE TO LEGATO TRANSITIONS. This plays the pairs and moves ahead by 2 RR. In this mode, RR is effectively halved. e.g., if you press a note it would play RR1/RR2 then RR3/RR4, etc.
• “Layer 2x Round Robins With No Skip” – As above but this plays a pair but doesn’t move ahead by 2 so that RR isn’t halved. So if you press a note it would play RR1/RR2, then RR2/RR3, then RR3/RR4. -
CONTROLS + ENVELOPE
Dia and automating this parameter may introduce artifacts into the sound.
ENVELOPE- These are the traditional ADSR controls found on many synthesizers, which allow you to control the shape of the sound (by controlling its volume over time). The controls are:
Attack – The onset of the note, is the time taken for the note to reach its highest volume after the MIDI note starts.
Decay – The amount of time taken for the level to drop from the highest volume to the sustain volume.
Sustain – The level the note will sustain at when the MIDI note is held after decay. Release – The time taken for the level to reach zero once the MIDI note ends.
APPENDIX A – RECOMMENDED TECH SPECS
IF YOU PLAN TO USE THIS LIBRARY WITH THE FULL VERSION OF KONTAKT PLEASE
MAKE SURE YOU HAVE THE LATEST VERSION OF KONTAKT 5 INSTALLED.
RECOMMENDED SPEC:
The better your computer, the better the performance of any Spitfire module.
But not to worry if you’re not spec’d up to the hilt. All programs are
provided with a set of parameters that enable you to dial back the CPU demands
of any given patch. But moving forward, we’re confident this module will keep
your computer busy for many years to come! We recommend a combination of high
processor speeds, a good chunk of memory, and a devoted SSD eSata, USB3, or
Thunderbolt drive. The more memory you have, the less demand is placed on your
drive, and having a totally devoted drive gives you the chance to load less
into memory and reduce load times. The higher the speed of your CPU, the more
capable your computer will be to deal with some of the amazing, but
complicated scripts we’ve written.
PCs: We recommend Windows 7 or later (latest Service Pack, 32/64 Bit),
Intel Core i5 or MD Ryzen 5, 8 GB RAM (16 GB recommended).
MACs :
We recommend Mac OS X 10.10 or later (latest update), Intel Core i5, 8 GB RAM
(16 GB recommended).
DRIVES:
USB3, Thunderbolt, or SATA SSDs. Ask your dealer for drives that are suitable
for “AV use”. If you can afford an SSD drive, this will massively increase
the power of your system. Instead of 7-9ms seek time, the usual seek time is
<0.1ms. These are fast enough to run a patch ‘Purged’ of all its samples, and
they can load on the fly as you play the notes. You can also reduce your
sampler’s “pre-load” buffer tenfold meaning you’ll be able to load enormous
orchestral palettes into a single machine.
HOST:
The Kontakt platform should work comfortably on the most commonly found
platforms and DAWs. As always make sure you’re as up-to-date as you can
afford! If your main DAW is not a newish machine or has a limited spec, and
you’re planning on building or adding Spitfire to an already large orchestral
palette, you could consider running your library independently of your DAW,
either on your host computer or on a slave device, using VEP for example.
APPENDIX B – KONTAKT vs KONTAKT PLAYER
Kontakt Player is a free version of the Kontakt sample playback engine
available to download:
https://www.native-
instruments.com/en/products/komplete/samplers/kontakt-5/downloads/
It works with libraries that the developer has paid a license fee for.
Essentially, you’ve bought this playback engine along with your library.
The Kontakt player gives you full access to all the sounds and all the
editable parameters on the front panel. Also, unlike non-Player libraries,
these libraries will also have a banner that appears on the Kontakt Libraries
pane.
If you want to go deeper into editing you’ll need a full version. As you will
already own the free Kontakt player and have bought one of our ‘player’
libraries you will be eligible for a discount upgrade to Kontakt via the NI
website. See here for more
details:
https://www.native-instruments.com/en/products/komplete/sam-
plers/kontakt-5/pricing/crossgrade-offer/
If the library you want to use is NOT a ‘Player’ library (the majority of our
libraries) then you need to buy the full retail version of Kontakt.
Then you can also load ‘non-player libraries like some of our other range,
Harp, Steel Drums, Harpsichord, etc. Please note that non-Player library
instruments will not appear on the Kontakt libraries pane and so can’t be
added as a library as Player libraries need to be. Instead, these libraries
will simply need to be loaded via the Kontakt files browser or alternatively,
you can add the library as a favorite to the Kontakt Quick Load window.
APPENDIX C – INSTRUMENT LIST
Instruments:
a1 – Combi Textural
a2 – Combi Pads
a3 – Combi Leads
b1 – Synths Textural
b2 – Synths Pads
b3 – Synths Bass
c1 – Guitars
d1 – Electric Cello
d2- Electric Violin
e1 – Vocals
APPENDIX D – SIGNAL ACRONYMS
Mx (Mix)
The essence of the sound is presented as a stereo mix, including processing
and effect to allow all the elements to sit together in a curated balance.
Fx (Effects)
A signal with more effects curated to suit each sound’s purpose, process to
accompany the stereo mix. Use on its own for an alternative to the original
sound- world.
APPENDIX E – UACC
With the development of Spitfire’s BML Sable, it was proving quite difficult
to standardize how to access the ever-growing number of articulations
contained within instruments and libraries. While they worked adequately,
Keyswitches and CC32 were inconsistent between sections and instruments and
it could prove a pain to do something as simple as substituting a Viola for a
Violin section.
To address the problem, Spitfire developed UACC, a specification that hopes to
standardize articulation control between instruments and libraries. UACC is
turned on via the Keyswitch locking option ( ) and utilizes the same CC as
above (and can be customized identically). When UACC is activated you can
change articulation by setting CC32 to specific values that are correlative
with different articulations. Here’s the latest (v2) spec:
Long (sustain)
1 Generic
2 Alternative
3 Octave
4 Octave muted
5 Small (1/2)
6 Small muted
7 Muted
8 Soft (flaut/hollow)
9 Hard (cuivre/overb)
10 Harmonic
11 Temolo/flutter
12 Tremolo muted
13 Tremolo soft/low
14 Tremolo hard/high
15 Tremolo muted low
16 Vibrato (molto vib)
17 Higher (sultasto/bells up)
18 Lower (sul pont)
19 Lower muted
Legato
20 Generic
21 Alternative
22 Octave
23 Octave muted
24 Small
25 Small muted
26 Muted
27 Soft
28 Hard
29 Harmonic
30 Tremolo
31 Slow (port/gliss)
32 Fast
33 Run| 34 Detache
35 Higher
36 Lower
Short
40 Generic
41 Alternative
42 Very short (spicc)
43 Very short (soft)
44 Leisurely (stacc)
45 Octave
46 Octave muted
47 Muted
48 Soft (brush/feather)
49 Hard (dig)
50 Tenuto
51 Tenuto Soft
52 Marcato
53 Marcato Soft
54 Marcato Hard
55 Marcato Long
56 Plucked (pizz)
57 Plucked hard (bartok)
58 Struck (col leg)
59 Higher
60 Lower
61 Harmonic
Decorative
70 Trill (minor2nd)
71 Trill (major 2nd)
72 Trill (minor 3rd)
73 Trill (major 3rd)
74 Trill (perfect 4th)
75 Multitongue
76 Multitongue muted| 80 Synced – 120bpm (trem/trill)
81 Synced – 150bpm (trem/trill)
82 Synced – 180bpm (trem/trill)
Phrases & Dynamics
90 FX 1
91 FX 2
92 FX 3
93 FX 4
94 FX 5
95 FX 6
96 FX 7
97 FX 8
98 FX 9
99 FX 10
100 Up (rips/runs)
101 Downs (falls/runs)
102 Crescendo
103 Decrescendo
104 Arc
105 Slides
Various
110 Disco up (rips)
111 Disco down (falls)
112 Single string (Sul C/G/etc.)
---|---|---
For example, turning on UACC and changing CC32 to 26 will change the current
articulation to Legato-Muted. Setting it to 52 would change to Short –
Marcato. You can set these manually in your DAW but it’s much easier to
utilize DAW functionality such as VST Note Expression, or a dedicated tablet
app such as Lemur, TouchOSc, LiveControl, etc.
The advantages of UACC are that it’s consistent between all supported
libraries (ie. setting CC32 to 52 will change to Arcata regardless of the
library or patch) and easily configurable on tablet apps such as Lemur. It
remains consistent between updates (any product using v2 will have the
articulations mapped to the above spec). It also takes up no space on the
keyboard.
UACC KEYSWITCH
UACC keyswitching is a new feature set to debut in upcoming Spitfire products
and updates. It is a mixture of key switching and UACC to provide the
advantages of both methods. When UACC Keyswitch is activated via the lock
panel menu ( ) a single key switch is available. Using the UACC spec outlined
above, this key switches velocity is used to switch articulation.
For example, pressing the key switch at velocity 70 would switch to the Trill
(minor 2nd) articulation while pressing at velocity 56 would switch to Short
Pizzicato. As with UACC, you can manually input these velocity values but it’s
easier to use your DAW or tablet app’s functionality.
The main advantage of UACC KS over UACC is that you can layer articulations by
overlaying the key switches notes on the piano roll.
APPENDIX F – FAQS & TROUBLESHOOTING
Q: WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN KONTAKT AND KONTAKT PLAYERS?
See Appendix B
Q: HOW CAN I REDOWNLOAD A PRODUCT?
With the continuous improvements to our Spitfire App, we have incorporated the
ability to reset your own downloads, be it the entire library of the most
recent update! This can easily be done via your Spitfire App. To reset both
your entire library download or the latest update; Open up the Spitfire App
and log in with your account email and password.
- Select the download you wish to re-download
- In the cog, menu choose Reset Download > Entire Download/Latest Update
- This will reset your whole download/your latest update You can repeat this process for any of the libraries you own. Note that there is a limit to how many times you can reset your downloads in a certain time frame. If you do exceed your reset limit please get in touch.
Q: DIFFICULTIES IN DOWNLOADING / INSTALLING
Customers may find that they have some difficulties in the downloading
process. If you find that you are having some trouble, please check the list
below for possible causes.
- The formatting of your drive, if it is FAT32 this will cause errors because there is a maximum file size with this format of 4GB and our download files will exceed this limit. To solve this problem, reformat your drive to a more modern format, or use a different drive. We recommend NTFS on PC and Mac OS Extended (journaled) on Mac.
- Free space on your hard drive, please allow at least double the space for the respective library. This is because your library is downloaded compressed, then uncompressed into a separate location, then the original is deleted. So briefly during install, there are two copies of the library on disk. To solve this problem use a drive with more space (the size you’ll need during install is listed on the website page of the product you bought).
Other issues;
- Spitfire App freezes in the “Extracting” stage for hours. This may be because our libraries are often very large files, and this is the stage where the compressed files are extracted and placed in their final locations on the hard drive. There could be hundreds of GB of content to unpack, so it really can take hours. If you’re unsure whether it has crashed or is simply extracting files, visit the installation folder you chose when you started the install. If everything is working normally you’ll see various files appearing in the folder (or one of its sub-folders).
- If you see a “Download interrupted” message, this may be caused by a change in IP, usually the case with people using a VPN, or people who for some reason started a download in one country and tried to resume it in another. In this case, please submit a support ticket and we can unblock you.
- If your download gets stuck and is continually cycling and not resuming, please get in touch with us, giving us as much detail as possible about your setup. It would be helpful if you can tell us: Your operating system, where you are downloading from (your country, and also whether you’re at home or work), your ISP, and whether there are any proxy servers or firewalls between your computer and the internet.
Q: I’VE LOST MY INSTRUMENT FILES
In some cases, instrument files may get lost when transferring libraries
from one place to another, or if an update has gone wrong. If this happens,
the best way forward is to re-download the library in question. It will ensure
you will get all of the content you are missing.
Q: WHAT IS YOUR REFUNDS / RETURNS POLICY?
If you have NOT completed the download/installation process, then we CAN
refund/return your product, please contact support with your account email
address and order number so we can handle this quickly. If you HAVE completed
the installation process (even if you’ve not yet registered your serial
number), please see our EULA in regards to why we do not accept refunds and
returns. We can refund hard drive orders up until the point when the drive is
dispatched from our office. This is usually 2-4 days after your order.
Q: I’VE FORGOTTEN MY PASSWORD?
If you have forgotten your password, please see this link, and click
‘Forgotten Password’. If at some point in the past you asked us to merge two
or more accounts but have since forgotten, you MAY find that the forgotten
password isn’t working for the email address you asked us to merge FROM. In
this case, please contact support with your name, and any email addresses you
think we might know about, and we’ll work out what has happened.
Q: VEP – CONTROLS / GUI HAS DISAPPEARED!?
You need to ‘connect’ the instance of VEP to your sequencer, and send it some
MIDI – then the controls will reappear. Unless the instance of VEP is ‘booted
up’ by actually connecting it, Kontakt will not complete the setup of the
instrument which includes drawing the GUI.
Q: I HAVE FAST INTERNET, WHY IS MY DOWNLOAD SLOW?
We have no direct influence on your actual download speeds, our libraries are
hosted on Cloudfront servers which are normally very quick but it may well be
that at certain times of the day when traffic is particularly busy, your ISP
may throttle your connection speeds. We would advise you to leave your
download running overnight as speeds should ramp up at less busy times. Our
Spitfire App downloader aims to use as much of the available bandwidth as
possible to give you the quickest possible speeds and may take several minutes
to reach its peak.
Q: CAN I INSTALL IT ON MORE THAN ONE COMPUTER?
With our products, you have two licenses. This means that you are allowed to
download and install on two computers you own, say your main rig and your
mobile rig. The best way to get your library on both of your machines is to
copy it from one to another via an external HDD. It saves you from having to
re-download the whole library again!
Q: CAN I TRY BEFORE I BUY?
No – it is not currently possible to demo our products. If you go to our
Youtube Channel you’ll see many many walkthroughs containing detailed info
about all our products — you can hear them being played in real-time with no
smoke and mirrors!
Q: MY LIBRARIES ARE NOT SHOWING UP IN MY SPITFIRE APP
A handful of customers may find that when they log into their Spitfire App,
some of their previously purchased products do not show up in the ‘Installed’
section or in the ‘Download Ready’ section either. It may be that you have
purchased these under another email address. Checking other possible email
addresses for your previous purchases may help to find these missing products.
If this is not the case, and these missing products were purchased a few years
ago, please create a support ticket telling us your account email address, and
any serial numbers you may have to go with these missing products. Our support
team can also merge one or more accounts together if you’d like to consolidate
all your purchases in one place. The more information, the quicker we can get
you back up and running!
Q: HOW DO I UPDATE MY PRODUCTS?
The main premise of downloading our products is that our Spitfire App
downloads into the folder you choose, so it is always good to choose the
folder above where you want the download to go. The best file path for our
products is something very simple, a long file path will cause errors as there
is a character limit on how far the Spitfire App can read. We advise a file
path of something along the lines of: Samples Drive > Spitfire Audio – always
point the downloader to the folder ‘Spitfire Audio’ (the folder above the
library) for all downloads and updates. When it comes to downloading /
updating – if you have a folder called ‘Spitfire Audio’ always point the
Spitfire App to the folder Spitfire Audio – never go into this folder and
choose the actual library in question.
Q: HOW DO I REDOWNLOAD THE LATEST UPDATE?
With the continuous improvements to our LSpitfire App, we have incorporated
the ability to reset your own downloads. This can easily be done via your
Spitfire App. Open up the Spitfire App and log in with your account email and
password.
– Select the download you wish to re-download
– In the cog menu choose Reset Download > Latest Update
– This will reset your latest update
You can repeat this process for any other updates you wish. If you do not see
the option to reset your download in your Spitfire App, we would advise
downloading the latest version of the Spitfire App from
spitfireaudio.com/info/library-manager/.
Q: I’VE BEEN WAITING FOR AGES FOR MY DOWNLOAD LINKS?
We run all our orders through a fraud-checking process. The automatic fraud
check takes 20 minutes (but can take up to an hour during a very busy period,
eg. Black Friday), but if your order gets caught at this stage, we run a
manual order check, and this can delay the processing of your order for up to
24 hours (though this would be a rare and exceptional case).
You should however receive an order confirmation email IMMEDIATELY upon
placing your order. This confirms that your order has successfully been logged
in our system and that your payment was successfully taken. Please check your
junk folders before contacting our support. The message will come from
[email protected] if you’d like to add us to your whitelist.
Q: CAN I DOWNLOAD ON A PC, THEN TRANSFER TO A MAC OR VICE VERSA?
All of our libraries are compatible with both PC and Mac computers (as they
run inside Kontakt). You can download all of our libraries on either PC or Mac
and they will work if you need to transfer them across to the other operating
system. We advise doing this by copying the library you want to move across
to an external HDD and then copying it to and then copying it to your other
machine.
Q: ‘SAMPLES MISSING’ ERROR MESSAGES
In some cases, samples files may get lost when transferring libraries from one
place to another, or if an update has gone wrong. You may also get this error
in some cases if you installed your library on a drive with just under the
minimum necessary amount of space to install the library (remembering that you
need DOUBLE the size of the final library to install successfully – see
above). If this happens, the best way forward is to re-download the library in
question. It will ensure you will get all of the content you are missing. For
more information on how to re-download a product, please see the question
above.
HOW TO BATCH RESAVE A LIBRARY
There are two main reasons to batch resave: Firstly it greatly speeds up the
loading of patches once you have batch resaved them. Secondly, it can help you
find missing samples and relink them to the patches so that you don’t need to
search every time you load a patch. Bear in mind that it can sometimes take a
few attempts to batch resave, and if Kontakt crashes the first time you try,
you could go into the instruments folder and batch resave a bit at a time — go
by subfolders, for example, just to lessen the load on Kontakt.
Q: I WANT TO BUY A COLLECTION, BUT I ALREADY OWN 1 OR MORE OF THE PRODS IN
IT
Our cart will intelligently deduct the proportional cost of any products you
already own from the total price when you get to the checkout.
Q: I’VE LOST MY SERIAL NUMBER FOR PRODUCT ACTIVATION
Emails get misplaced and you might find that you are out of luck when you need
to find a past serial number. The best place to find all of your serial
numbers would be to log into your Native Instruments account HERE and traverse
to the My Products, Serials, And Downloads section. Under there you will find
all of your serial numbers, including your Spitfire Audio serial numbers. If
you find that the serial number you are looking for is not there, please
contact us with all of the relevant information.
Q: I HAVE FOUND A BUG
In some cases, we can’t squash them all and bugs shamefully make their way
through. If you think you have found a bug, please contact us with all the
relevant information;
- A description of the bug you have found
- A screencast (video) of the bug happening, or an audio example
- The exact patch name (or patches) in question and also the library giving us as much detail as possible will help us get to the bottom of the issue.
MANUAL© SPITFIRE AUDIO HOLDINGS LTD
MMXXI
Documents / Resources
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SPITFIRE AUDIO Contemporary Drama
Toolkit
[pdf] User Manual
Spitfire, Contemporary, Drama, Toolkit
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