COSMOS

Sample Finder

User Guide
 COSMOS is designed to find your sample files, even in the messiest of folders. COSMOS analyzes each sample file
and extracts useful information (such as instrument, BPM, key, length, one-shot or a loop, and more) and then
organizes it using tags. Since you can search and filter by any number of categories, you will quickly find the sample
you want, along with others that share its characteristics. Then you can create collections of samples, so that your
samples are organized just the way you want. COSMOS supports these formats: WAV, AIFF, OGG, and FLAC.
COSMOS works hand in hand with the Waves CR8 sampler. One click on a sample in COSMOS, and it’s loaded in
CR8, along with the relevant metadata.

Getting Started
SIGN IN
When you launch COSMOS, you’ll be taken to a login
page. Enter your Waves credentials (the same you use for
Waves Central), and COSMOS will open. Click the small
user icon in the top-right corner to log out.
SELECT USER FOLDERS
Click the Folder icon to open the Local
Folders panel. This is where your samples
folders are listed and managed. To help you
get started, the Waves Audio Factory Pack
folder is supplied with COSMOS. It contains
2,512 diverse, multi-genre samples.

ADD USER FOLDERS

Click the “+” button to add an audio samples folder. COSMOS will scan the content of the folder, extract data, and create
search tags for each sample. Scanning can use a lot of computer resources, so we suggest that you don’t scan during a
CPU-heavy session.

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 You can stop and resume the scan from the Local Folders
panel, or right-click on the COSMOS icon in the Windows
Tray Bar (left) or the Apple Menu Bar.
COSMOS runs in the background; click the icon in the Tray
Bar/Menu Bar to bring app to the front. Until you close the
app, the icon will remain visible, and the scan will continue
until it is complete.

The COSMOS icon has a small, color-coded dot that lets you monitor the scanning status, even when COSMOS is
in the background.

Icon Dot Color Status

Steady Red COSMOS is not working properly.
Yellow COSMOS is scanning files.
Green COSMOS is working properly.

MAXIMUM FILE LENGTH

COSMOS is designed to work best with music samples. For this reason, the maximum duration of the audio files it
scans is one minute. Audio files longer than that will be ignored by the app.

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 SEARCH AND REFINE
You can start your search with a name and then filter the results. Here, a
search for “clap” yields 41 results. When filtered with the tag, “Snare,” the
results are reduced to three samples.

TAG MENUS
Three drop-down menus offer different ways to use tags. Filtered samples are displayed in the Search Results list,
along with their names, waveforms, and assigned tags.
FILTER BY INSTRUMENT
Machine learning enables COSMOS to determine the
type of instrument, or family of instrument, played in a
sample. This provides very focused search results that
would otherwise be difficult to attain.
FILTER BY TAGS
This is a list of all tags that are available, based on
previous search and filtering choices.
FILTER BY KEY AND BPM
Enter the BPM in the text box. Use the bidirectional slider to
set the search range around it. Click the “X2” or “/2” buttons
to include double- and half-time samples in the results.
When COSMOS is used with CR8, there is no need to
enter BPM, as CR8 sends this information to the DAW.
To filter by the musical key of your session, use the
small keyboard. The selected key is shown to the right of
the keyboard. Select “Major” or “Minor” to filter for a
specific scale. Use the “Relative Key” switch to include
samples that share the same key signature and may
work with your session.

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 TAGGING AND MODIFYING SAMPLES
When a folder is added, COSMOS automatically classifies
and tags each sample file. Usually, analysis is done with
impressive accuracy. There can, however, be mistakes in
certain tag attributes.

To modify tag classification, click the three dots on the right side of a sample (circled above),
or right-click on a sample’s name or waveform. From the drop-down menu, choose “Edit
Tags” or “Edit Attributes.”

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 WORKING WITH SAMPLES
To audition a sample, click on the play/stop button or the sample name. In the Waveform view, you can also click on
the waveform itself. When using COSMOS with CR8, click on the sample name or double click on the waveform to
load the sample into the sampler.

Use the up and down arrow keys to browse audio or load samples into CR8. Your last action determines the
behavior of the up/down arrows. If the last action you performed was auditioning a sample, pressing the down arrow
key will play the next or previous sample in the list.

FAVORITES
Click the star at the top of the plugin to display only your favorite samples. To assign a sample to your
favorites list, click the star next to the sample name.

COLLECTIONS
A Collection is a virtual folder that helps you organize samples that you have located. Create Collections using
the “+” button in the “My Collections” sidebar.

Click the “Add to Collections” icon next to the sample name to assign it to your virtual collections. You
can also drag the sample to the desired collection folder.

Once a sample is assigned to one or more collections, the “Add to Collections” icon next to it is turned
on as an indication.

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 COSMOS VIEWS
COSMOS has three views: WAVEFORM, LIST, and COSMOS.
The Waveform and List views display search results as lists. Waveform view displays the sample waveforms, with
fewer search results visible, while List view shows more results, without waveforms.

COSMOS VIEW
In COSMOS view, your one-shot
samples are analyzed and scattered
throughout the COSMOS. Similar
sounds will appear close to each
other.

You can change the way that

samples are arranged using the Map
selections. This alters the weight on
the horizontal axis given to certain
characteristics of the sound when
spread across the COSMOS.

In this example, the “Space” map, dry samples appear on the left, wet on the right. The “Brightness” map arranges
the darkest sounds on the left and the brightest sounds on the right of the screen, and so forth.

The Instrument map is slightly different, as samples of the same instruments are grouped into the same “galaxies.”

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 The Gradient On/Off control changes the color scheme of the samples to suit the selected map.
When Gradient is Off, the samples are shown in their default colors (which are determined by the
instrument families). Gradient On/Off is disabled in the Instrument map.

The selected sample appears at the top right of the screen. Press the arrow symbol to
expand it and view adjacent samples. Use the up and down arrows (or the arrows on
your computer keyboard) to browse through the neighboring samples. The selected
sample can be dragged, loaded to CR8 (double click), or added to collections and
favorites.

Use the left and right keys of the History Bar to browse back and forth between samples
you previously auditioned. You can also use your computer keyboard arrow keys.

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