Newmello II User’s Guide

Table of Contents 1.  Introduction  .......................................................................................................................  3  

2.  Installation  .........................................................................................................................  3  3.  Old  vs  New  ..........................................................................................................................  4  

4.  The  instruments/patches  ..............................................................................................  4  

5.  The  mapping  ......................................................................................................................  5  6.  The  Interface  .....................................................................................................................  6  6.1.  Main  .............................................................................................................................................  6  6.1  Advanced  Panel  ........................................................................................................................  7  6.3  Rack  Effects  ................................................................................................................................  8  

7.  Final  words  and  credits  .................................................................................................  9  

8.  License  Agreement  ........................................................................................................  10  1.  License  Grant:  ...........................................................................................................................  10  2.  Rights:  .........................................................................................................................................  10  3:  Refunds:  .....................................................................................................................................  10  4.  Terms:  .........................................................................................................................................  10  

 

1.  Introduction   ‘Newmello II' is a sample library for Native Instruments Kontakt 4 and above. Inspired by the Mellotron M400, Newmello brings back the sound that shaped the late 60s and early 70s adding new functionalities that makes it go further beyond the original. A little bit of background: The Mellotron is an electro-mechanical, polyphonic tape replay keyboard originally developed and built in Birmingham, England, in 1963. The instrument works by pulling a section of magnetic tape across a head. It's considered the first sampler. The Mellotron became more popular after The Beatles used it on several tracks, including the famous Strawberry Fields Forever intro. It has no velocity layers and no round robin, and sounds very imperfect and artificial, but that sound persuaded the ears of the best symphonic and psychodelic bands in the 60s and 70s. It's hard not to love it. Newmello recreates the sound of the original Mellotron M400 but taking various steps further. We recorded 25 instruments / patches into two different cassette tapes using 2 different tape recorders. The first recorder was a Tascam 414, and the second one was a very lo-fi Omega hand recorder. Only one velocity and no round robin (repetition). Only one sample per key, just like the original. After that, we printed back the tapes into the digital domain and got rid of the background noise using advanced tecniques that didn't do any damage the sound. 1.8GB of samples compressed to about 950MB using NI's NCW compression.

2.  Installation   This library is not "Powered by Kontakt", this means that: - You need the full version of Kontakt 4.2.4 or above (Kontakt 5) to load it without restriction. Kontakt Player will run in demo mode and you'll have to restart it every 15 minutes of use. - The "Add Library" function is not available. For installing you have to take care of not moving any of the files or folders inside or outside the main one. When you want to move the library to any location in your hard drive you have to move the main folder with everything in it, otherwise Kontakt won't find the samples or resources. You can load the library using one of these three methods: 1. Double click on the nki files. 2. Drag and drop the nki file right into the interface. 3. Use Kontakt's built in browser and either drag and drop or double click on it.

3.  Old  vs  New   These are the funcitonalities in relation to the original unit: - The M400 samples only played for about 8 seconds. With NM you can set the samples to be looped or to be played for 8 seconds. - The M400 had no round robin, NM gives you the option of having a random 3x round robin (repetitions). - The M400 had no velocity layers, NM also has 1 velocity layer but it gives you the option to add a volume ramp based on the velocity of each note event. - The M400 had noise in the samples, NM gives you the option of adding the amount of noise that you want in 2 different modes (explained later). - The M400 had only a few sound patches, NM has 25 different patches. - The M400 had no effects, NM offers the brand new Rack Effects script that lets you add up to 12 different effects to exponentially extend the sound possibilities of the library. - A lot more functionalities explained in chapters 5 and 6.

4.  The  instruments/patches   01. Clarinet 01. 02. Clarinet 02. 03. Bass Clarinet. 04. Bassoon. 05. Muted Trumpet. 06. String Ensemble. 07. Violin Pizzicato. 08. Viola Pizzicato. 09. Cello Pizzicato. 10. Upright Bass. 11. Upright Piano. 12. Spanish Guitar. 13. Distorted Guitar.

14. Guzheng. 15. Dulcimer. 16. Harpsichord. 17. Organ 01. 18. Organ 02. 19. Pipe Organ. 20. Female Ah. 21. Female Oo. 22. Music Box. 23. Crotales. 24. Xylophone. 25. Vibraphone Bow.

5.  The  mapping    

 *Click the keyboard icon on the top bar if you don't see Kontakt's keyboard. The black keys mean that there are no sounds or funcionalities mapped to them. The range of the Newmello is the same as the range of the original M400, from G1 to F4. We have been asked to extend the playable range but this is definetly something that won't be implemented to retain this original limitation. Limits are, usually, the best tool for creativity. That's why we encourage you to not use the new funcitonalities like round robin, velocity ramp and looped sounds, altough they are there for if you need them. The green keys are special keys with funcionalities here explained: - G0: if activated it turns red and adds a -1 octave to the sound. - A0: If activated it turns red and adds a +1 octave to the sound. Original M400 had no octave functionality but some of the sounds were actually recorded in octaves, which results in a much fuller sound. - C1: switches to the prior patch in the list. - D1: switches to the next patch in the list. This is done so you don't have to raise your hands from the keyboard for trying different sounds. * This function is not available if the "purge" switch on the advanced panel is activated.

6.  The  Interface  

6.1.  Main    

   This is the main view. Here you can see a representation of the original M400 knobs but with new modern look represented by the digital display. 1. Noise mode. If set to "I" the noise is permanent like if the cassette tape was rolling all the time. If set to "II" the noise will only sound while there's at least one key pressed, and will stop as soon as you release all the keys. This second mode is the closest to the original behaviour. 2. Noise Volume. This is a simple noise volume control from -inf to -6dB. 3. Attack: controls the attack time. 4. Release: controls the release time. 5. Tone. This is a tilt style eq. When set to the mid point the effect is bypassed, when turned right the high frequencies are boosted while the low frequencies are lowered. When turned to the left the low frequencies are boosted and the high frequencies are lowered. 6. Tape mix. As you know, the samples were recorded into two different cassette tapes. With this knob you can select the tape you want or you can mix them together with an equal power crossfade. Have in mind that the tuning is not perfect and it will sound like there are 2 files playing, like a chorus effect.

7. Digital display. Here you can see the actual patch that is loaded. Clicking on the arrows switches the patch, clicking on the Menu lets you go directly to the patch you want. 8. Advanced Panel Switch. Clicking on the little circle on the bottom right of the display will take you to the advanced panel.

 

6.1  Advanced  Panel    

     This is the advanced panel where you find these controls: - Loop: switch that when it's on the samples play as long as the key is held. If set to off the samples will only play for 8 seconds max, like the original. - Velocity: this knob controls the dynamic range of the instruments. By default it's set to 0 which results in no volume ramp, like the original M400. If set to 100% or full right, the minimum velocity will result in total silence and the maximum velocity will result in the loudest volume. - RR: this is the round robin switch. If set to off there are no round robin repetitions, like the original unit. If set to on there will be 3x random round robin repetitions. - Offset: this knob controls the sample start offset in milliseconds, from 0 (no offset) to 100ms. This is done to get rid of the original attack in the samples, for example, a flute breath. It's recommended to be used in sustained patches like violins and flutes, but it's not recommended to be used in hard transient or percussive patches like glockenspiel or grand piano.

*Note: if you use the offset function make sure that the attack knob is set to something greater than 0 or you'll hear a click on the attack. - Purge: when set to off all samples will be loaded into RAM (132 MB) and you'll be able to change patches using the C1 and D1 keyswitches. If set to on the samples will be purged and only the current patch will be loaded into ram, but the keyswitches are not available and you'll have to wait a moment for the sample to be loaded everytime you change the patch.

6.3  Rack  Effects    

 

 Newmello II is one the first library to include this brand new script called Rack Effects. Find the full documentation inside the Documentation folder.    Every parameter value is displayed in the messages bar:  

Command+Click (Mac) or Control+Click (Windows) on any control resets the parameter to its original value.

7.  Final  words  and  credits   Thank you for purchasing "Newmello II". It has been a very exciting project that I think you're going to love as much as me. Special thanks to University of Iowa for letting me use some of their samples. You can find them here: http://theremin.music.uiowa.edu/MIS.html Recording: Jesús Ginard and University of Iowa. Editing, programming, script, design and GUI: Jesús Ginard. Produced by Wavesfactory. Mellotron and/or any logos that may appear on the design or in this user manual are trademarks of their respective owners. Feel free to get in contact with me for any bugs, new functionalities, ideas or simply to share some love. Thank you very much for your support, have fun!

8.  License  Agreement   By installing any Wavesfactory product you accept the following product license agreement:

1.  License  Grant:     The license for this product is granted only to a single user. All sounds and samples in this product are licensed, but not sold, to you by Wavesfactory for commercial and non-commercial use in music, sound-effect, audio/video post-production, performance, broadcast or similar finished content-creation and production use. Wavesfactory allows you to use any of the sounds and samples in the library(s) youÕve purchased for commercial recordings, mixing and film/TV/game audio production without paying any additional license fees or providing source attribution to Wavesfactory. This license expressly forbids any unauthorized inclusion of content contained within this library, or any any Wavesfactory library, into any other sample instrument or library of any kind, without our prior express written consent. This license also forbids any re-distribution method of this product, or its sounds, through any means, including but not limited to, re-sampling, mixing, processing, isolating, or embedding into software or hardware of any kind, for the purpose of re-recording or reproduction as part of any free or commercial library of musical and/or sound effect samples and/or articulations, or any form of musical sample or sound effect sample playback system or device. Licenses cannot be transferred to another entity, without written consent of Wavesfactory.

2.  Rights:     Wavesfactory retains full copyright privileges and complete ownership of all recorded sounds, instrument programming, documentation and musical performances included in this product.

3:  Refunds:     Downloaded libraries can't be returned, so we can't provide refunds.

4.  Terms:     This license agreement is effective from the moment the product is installed by any means.The license will remain in full effect until termination.