[freepats] Freepats 2.0

[Roberto]

On Thu, Dec 08, 2016 at 01:10:30AM -0500, John Lewis wrote:
> It looks like Freepats 2.0 has rolled out and there is just enough
> things documented that  can actually do something to help.

Yes :) Sorry for not having made an announcement yet. There are a few
sound banks already published and about 20 instruments in the works.

Things are a bit slow at the moment because two of us are currently
finishing a videogame that will be released on December 17th. We will
continue with FreePats in a few days.

> https://github.com/freepats/documentation/wiki/How-to-contribute I can
> actually go about getting audio samples and creating a sound bank.

That would be great. Please keep the wav files too, so we could easily
build other formats from them. If you start an instrument that is
missing in the General MIDI set, please send an email here and
optionally edit the list of instruments in the Wiki...

 https://github.com/freepats/documentation/wiki/List-of-missing-instruments

add "In development" comment next to the instrument to know that you are
working on it. Other instruments outside the GM set are also welcome, of
course.

> There are two big things I don't understand. What exactly do you need to
> record from an instrument to make a complete sound bank? What is the
> difference between a wav file http://soundfile.sapp.org/doc/WaveFormat/
> and a pat file?
[...]

I've made a quick update to the Wiki, it is far from complete but I hope
it's useful:

 https://github.com/freepats/documentation/wiki/How-to-record-an-instrument

As soon as I have more time I will add information on how to edit the
samples and build a soundfont with them.

If you or someone else reading this list have experience with recording
equipment (placement of mics, what kind of mics are more suitable for
each type of instrument, hints for noise isolation...), it would be much
appreciated if you can add a page in the wiki as those things can have a
large impact on the quality.

About PAT format...

I've made a python utility that takes an extended SFZ text definition
plus a set of wav files and automatically builds SF2 sound banks from
them (possibly in different sizes/qualities). Most sound banks in the
new freepats web site are made this way, and it is a huge time saver. If
we manage to extend it with PAT knowledge, the same utility could be
used to automatically build all formats from the same wav files, which
would be fantastic. I will upload the sources as soon as I have a little
free time.

Anyways, if it's possible for you to move to the SF2 format, it would be
preferred. It's better supported nowadays than the old PAT format, and
it is still very lightweight.