DW kit 0:10
DW kit with Remo Rototoms 1:53
Equipment:
DW maple kit: 10, 12, 14" toms, 20" kick, 6.5x14 nickel over brass snare
Zildjian cymbals (A and K)
AKG D112 kick mic
SM57 mics for snare, toms
Remo Rototoms (10, 12, 14")
Blue Dragonfly mics for kit overheads
Blue Hummingbird mics for Rototom overheads
Apogee Element 88 A/D converter
Logic Pro X with Sampler
Alternate Mode drumKAT with eKIC and eHAT
Notes:
Though I love acoustic drums, I've also been playing electronic drums since the '80s-to practice without making a ton of noise, to compose parts for new songs, and to record electronic drum tracks.
About 15 years ago, long before there were dozens of excellent drum sample libraries, I decided to sample my own drums. The goal: Hear my own drums when I practice instead of someone else's drums. I started at home with an SM57, an inexpensive A/D interface, an early DAW, and Native Instruments' BATTERY.
Over the years, I've continued to resample my kit at home in different rooms/houses; with different sticks, mallets, and heads; and with a growing assortment of mics. Every time I went into an actual studio, I would also ask for an extra half hour and then carefully record new samples with all that professional gear.
Recently, I thought I'd try to use the Logic Pro X Sampler instead of BATTERY, so I loaded up my samples, with multiple dynamic levels, and gave it whirl. My assessment? Sampler works really well. No, it's not really designed for drums (as BATTERY is), so you'll have to look at a keyboard interface to set everything up. And actually, I've encountered some frustrating bugs. BUT it seems to deal with sample playback even better than BATTERY-it's a very responsive experience that doesn't run out of memory or voices. The result is a pretty natural experience.
As you'll hear, there are still some issues with my samples and my setup. It definitely doesn't sound as good as a pro sample library. If I were to sample even more velocities and use "round-robin" playback even more (to help eliminate the machine-gun effect, which you can hear a bit in the toms especially), then I might get better results. But for practicing and fleshing out parts, this works for me.