FXpansion BFD Drum Instrument VST/RTAS/AU (Mac and Windows)

No longer available at zZounds
FXpansion BFD includes over 50GBs of vintage, rare, boutique, and classic drum sounds with the ability to setup your own.

The new FXpansion BFD 2.0 virtual drum library gives you a staggering 55GB of rare, vintage, boutique, and classic drum sounds that will punch up the quality of any recording. The BFD 2.0 sound library, which was recorded at London's legendary Air Lyndhurst studios, features each instrument captured in immaculate detail with multiple mic setups. Within the user interface, you have complete control over the mics like you would in a mixing situation. If you want to assemble your virtual dream kit, look no further than BFD 2.0!

BFD 2's easy to use interface is redesigned from the ground up to give you more power and control for shaping your drums than ever before. It's fast and easy to set up and integrate into your digital audio workstation of choice.

Create expressive, complex drum parts using 55GB of rare, vintage, boutique and classic drumkits. Recorded at AIR Studios in London, BFD2's sound library combines extreme realism with stunning sound quality.

Mix your drums with flexible routing, submixing and built-in EQ, compressors and other effects.

Meanwhile, BFD2's Groove engine offers advanced editing, performance and humanization functions for creating realistic drum parts. You can even lay out a full song's drum track entirely within BFD2!

Now you can purchase the BFD2 upgrade. All BFD1.5 users are eligible to purchase BFD2 upgrade. All BFD1.5 and expansion pack sound content is compatible with BFD2 and BFD2 upgrade.

Features

- 10 full kits, extra snares, cymbals, read more and more
- Incredible detail: Multiple mic positions, expressive articulations, up to 96 velocity layers
- User stereo multi-velocity layer sample import
- EQ and FX suite containing everything from flanger, bitcrusher and delay effects to circuit-modeled dynamics, filtering and distortion
- Great-sounding presets let you concentrate on writing and playing instead of engineering
- 5000+ Grooves ready to use in your projects
- Built-in multi-channel audio export
- Better management of kits, instruments, Grooves and other files
- Easy mapping for keyboard/pad controllers and automation
- Electronic drum triggering support including expressive hihats and snare positional sensing
- A huge range of powerful new features and workflow enhancements

Set Up Your Ultimate Drumkit

Customized 10, 18 or 32 piece kits are at your fingertips, with full control over tuning, damping, ambience levels, velocity response and more. Layer parts of the kit for powerful hybrid sounds perfect for modern productions and flick through preset kit-piece profiles for quick access to dry, damped and other useful settings. BFD2 lets you configure your sounds like a real drum kit instead of pushing buttons on a sampler.

You can even import your own stereo sample-sets with multiple velocity layers so you can mix and layer your own sounds with BFD2's for experimental kits and 'drum-replacement' production tricks.

A Universe of Detail and Sonic Power

The hyper-detailed 55GB library features sounds with multiple articulations recorded with up to 96 velocity layers to open up new worlds of rhythmic expression. BFD2 makes it possible to program or play convincing nuances and ghost notes, intricately varied and dynamic hihat parts, elaborate cymbal workouts and visceral kick and snare lines.

The refined tone and definition of the space at London's legendary AIR Lyndhurst studios is captured with two pairs of room mics, including a mid/side set. Meanwhile, the kit is mic'd with stereo overheads and mono close directs. All audio is routed through the magic of a custom Neve desk with Air Montserrat preamps into Prism A/D converters, sealing the foundations of a killer drum sound.

BFD2 is compatible with the entire BFD library, so if you've already bought FXpansion or third-party expansion packs you'll be able to use them in BFD2 and take advantage of all the new sound shaping features to get even more out of your investment.

Mix, Route and Process

BFD2's flexible, comprehensive mixing console lets you blend, route, submix and process the mic channels just like a real-world drum recording. Tweak bleed levels, play with ambient mic width, create aux sends and patch sidechain effects to shape your drums into infinite variations that sound convincing and powerful. The built-in processors include circuit-modeled dynamics, filters and distortion to deliver fat and floor-shaking sounds, while the flanger, bitcrusher, ring mod, delay and other effects allow subtle to extreme timbral variety.

In fact, the depth and scope of BFD2's mixer rivals that of many fully-fledged sequencing hosts, meaning that you don't have to worry about setting up multiple outputs in your host for mixing your drums. If you want to take advantage of external reverbs and other plugins or outboard you can route channels freely to any of the 32 available outputs. However, if you're more of a musician than an engineer, you may prefer to browse through the supplied presets from experienced studio veterans, suitable for a variety of musical styles.

A Versatile and Full-Featured Groove Engine

BFD2's Groove engine provides the perfect environment for editing patterns, setting up performance modes and applying humanization effects for added realism. Although you can create and record your own Grooves, over 5000 stylistically diverse patterns are ready for you to slot straight into your productions or edit and combine with elements of each other to make new, customized parts. You can even lay out a sequence of Grooves to form a full drum track entirely within BFD2.

If you're a previous user of BFD, you'll love the new time-saving and powerful functional enhancements in the Groove engine like the advanced editor, synced audition previews, individual start and end actions for each Groove and improved sorting, searching and management of your Groove library.
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System Requirements
- Windows XP SP1 or higher, Vista 32, P4 or better CPU (Windows)
- OSX 10.4, G5 or Intel CPU (Mac)
- 1 GB of RAM
- 60 gig HD, 7200 rpm
- DVD drive
- Internet connection for product authorization

Recommended for best results
- 2 GB of RAM or more
- Fast, multi-core modern Intel or AMD CPU
- Dedicated hard drive
- VST, RTAS or AU compatible plugin host
- Low latency audio interface

For support or warranty questions, please contact the manufacturer:
Phone: 805-258-1465

Reviewers gave this product an overall rating of 4 out of 5 stars. (40 ratings)
Submitted September 19, 2007 by a customer from comcast.net

"Great tool for the money... but..."

Overall: 4 out of 5 stars
(see rating details)
Conceptually, it's an awesome product. In the real world it needs some work. I'm a producer. I don't produce part-time- it's my full-time gig. I use it every day on my client's songs. I wish it were a bit more memory-friendly (seems to use lots of RAM). Other than the comments above, I believe it's a great tool for the money.
Sound
Franky, I expected more. After reading the marketing hype and then finally buying it, I think the marketing is too hyped (but kudos to the sales guys... I was one in a former life!). Some of the cymbals sound obtrusive. Snares are good as well as the kicks. HOWEVER, I use it almost always over the sounds on the Korg Triton, Roland JV-2080, and some of the other soft synths in my toolbox.
Features
Lots of cool features like adding room ambience, level and pan adjustments, pitch, changing kit pieces, etc.
Ease of Use
Like too much software it seems to be designed by nerds and not by musicians. I use it as a DXi plugin. ONLY.
Quality
As I said, some of the cymbals are 'rough' sounding (although you CAN find kit pieces that sound better than others). Aside from working with cymbals, I like the sounds.
Value
For the price I paid at Zzounds ($199), it's way worth the headaches.
Manufacturer Support
The web site is efficient. Otherwise, I don't know.
The Wow Factor
BFD has awesome marketing. I bought based on the hype. I believe the product will improve with the next version. I'm not unhappy with the purchase.

Musical Background:

Professional

Musical Style:

Adult
19 of 21 people (90%) people found this review helpful. Did you?
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No longer available at zZounds

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