How do you organise your samples?

The Lounge
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Another “out of interest” question here. Sample discovery seems to be something a lot of producers like, and after you’ve amassed a big collection of samples, having some help to uncover them or to break out of a rut can be useful.

I believe this is kinda personal and can be somewhat complex if you have a lot of packs.

A couple of approaches I’ve heard of:

  • Organise by sample pack creator. Good for jumping into a specific maker and pulling out different sounds.
  • Organise by genre. Because some sample pack makers span many genres.
  • Don’t organise extensively, use a filtering tool (Sononym, ADSR Sample Manager etc) to filter samples and get ideas.
  • Don’t organise/use DAW native tools to pull out samples.

So, how do you do it?

2

So far, I kinda don’t. I went through early on and organised a handful of ‘kits’ of hits I thought might work together and loaded them up onto the DT, and now I mostly end up just making my own on the fly from whatever field recording I happen to grab.

I really should spend some time going through the samples I have though, especially now I have more of an idea of what I actually like.

I also need to get started on making my own samples from my Analog Keys. I’m sure with some effort and time I can make my own personalised sample kits for repeated use.

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3

This is my fav. Then within each folder separate loops from the rest (one shots and effects).

But lately I prefer just loops and chops, then synthesize the rest by any means (kicks, bass, etc)

I hate single shots auditioning with all my soul.

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4

I organize by creator or package name, so like if for some strange reason I get something like tacky_techno_loops_everyone_else_uses.zip (like if I had a head injury and I can’t think for myself anymore), then I just dump the content into a folder called tacky_techno_loops_everyone_else_uses and I’m done. I use Sononym to look shit up.

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5

I use a model samples which means I’ve got seven letters to tell me what something is, haha. Information has to be at the start of the filename, so it’s hard to organize by creator. I just sorta stumbled into a file system that works, something like

  • Ambient [/drone]
  • Bass
  • Chords
  • Drum Kits (six files per subfolder, hold the button to assign to all six tracks)
  • Drums
  • FX
  • Melody
  • Samples [stuff I’ve made]
  • Synths [Mellotron, Fairlight, etc]

It’s not perfect, but it’s easy enough to sort through. More information can go later on in folder/file names as appropriate.

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6

Did you try using search ? Variations on this subject/question are quite common and you might find something useful there.

https://www.elektronauts.com/search?q=organising%20samples%20in:title

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7

For sure. Just wondered if the new gizmos and AI categorisation had changed things.

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8

I use XO and it works well.

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9

Organize by sample pack creator.

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10

I have a folder called SAMPLES. Into that I dump everything with no particular organization and then spend the limited amount of time I get to make music searching through that mess. I find this workflow saps me of any creativity or energy very efficiently. I’ve been taking this approach for years and so I’m somewhat of an expert at it.

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11

I just sort them all by file size and enjoy the ride

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