Sometimes I'm working on some cues or tracks and I like to have everything at my fingertips.. I want to be totally focused on the music... Looking for articulations doesn't help me in those circumstances.

Now we all know that in reality writing music is always also reinventing the procedure of writing as well, but to cut things short, I could generalise my way of using the library like this:
When the main stuff is done, I will gradually dig deeper through the 'production' & will usually prioritize on parts that require the most 'fixing'.

Fixing can be indefinate but there's a point where you simply have to stop and deliver the music to who ever has to pick up on the job or just switch to another job or cue..

Personnally my experience has made me realise that the better my 'all' patches are, the less fixing I have to do afterwards... Again I'm being schematic here, but just to illustrate my point, here's an excellent real life example that happened this afternoon.
Earlier today I loaded a "basic all" solo viola (or violin or cello) I can't remember exactly...I'll check when I get back to work tomorrow. I was composing a quick snippet for a portion of a commercial.
Well, the patch had 2 velocity layers per articulation.. I played for 20 secs, clearly understood that 2 layers wasn't enough for me at that time. And I'm afraid I then turned to another library.... And found an 'all-round' patch that performed really well. The line was done in 3 min. & I didn't have to load any other patch or fix anything at all.

Frankly I would've preferred samples recorded on the silent stage but there was no way I wasn't gonna go the quickest way on this job..

I agree there may indeed be sometimes when the the fact you're using an 'all' patch is going to influence your musical idea... And it's a good idea to keep an eye on this phenomena.. I know I try to..
There's a kind of natural balance to find..

A good counter example is that I will sometimes load a very specific patch with a precise instrumental technique or something of the like even though I don't know exactly what I'm gonna play on it.
It's just my instinct that's bringing me to it ... It pops to my mind that I should use it at that point of my work. It'll sometimes work very well, sometimes not that well at all. [:D]

Also, King's comment on 'practicing' is a good one. I think with VSL the more you use it the faster you work. (Using it is also practicing). Maybe there WAS a VSL patch I missed this afternoon. I just went where it seemed the fastest easiest way .... 1 patch for writing + 3 patches for 'fixing' was not an option..


King Idiot :

@Another User said:

not to mention you might see other options that they've been planning show up that will kill your need for "generic" patches.

As I was saying, that's exactly what I hope (& trust) they'll do.. So why are we actually waisting our time on the subject of velocity layers...[[;)]]

Untill then, even though I agree more velocities doesn't 'necessarily' equate to more playability (michi's point on sequencing is a good one), in many cases I feel it actually really does provide more playability (By this I mean more depth in the reactivity of the samples thus more expression for an equal effort in the execution)...

Obviously I don't care much about the quality I'm only looking for a great 'return' and a minimum of mouse clicks.... ...... [6]

where jsut at a point where technology isnt there yet. I mean all the control in the world and options from jsut one patch jsut means you have to have 8 controllers to do it all in realtime, or have a MIDI instrument that pretty much makes it so that you might has well learn the real thing and record it.

I'm with you on gettin high return with less mouse clicks, believe me. With all the editing I do....BE freaking LEAVE me! Its worse with the actual software makers [;)]

What d'you mean you use software? who needs software...

You know how I get the best results with VSL don't you?...
I like to do it the real way :T.A.S.P. ( TRUE ANALOG SAMPLE PLAYBACK)

When I need some staccato tuba, for instance, I spin the corresponding DVD on my left hand little finger. I then read the tuba samples file with my right hand thumb nail (grown to this effect). - Aiming 'does' takes a bit of practice + a good knowledge of the DVD content.

What about 'playback'?

Good question.

Insert all your left-over fingers in mouth, and bite vigorously to insure proper proliferation of the wave form, from the finger bones to the teeth, and then from there to the jaw bone, ensuring maximum resonance of the samples in the whole of the cephalic cavity (from chin to forehead right through to the cervical vertebrae)..

Remember what John Lee Wonder said about the collection :

"In the right hands, those samples will make wonders"

Now is this groudbreaking or what? [8-)]


PS. Did I forget to mention how enjoyable and highly addictive it is to perform the 'Peter Framton like (talk-box)" effect on your favourite VSL timpani crescendo rolls?

My long-standing struggle with "basic" instruments is the way they're thinned out. They cut out entire velocities. We must go from yellow to red. We lose the orange. So when I'm writing in a hurry, paradoxically, I can't use basic instruments because the dynamics are so "either-or," and I haven't got time to tweak.

This is obviously more prep work to do, but if samples of all velocites were cherry-picked and then stretched just one key down, the dynamic spectrum would remain. It's still a compromised sound, of course, and I'd be reluctant to use it in a final track. But I'll suggest that a C3 root key sample stretched down to B2 is less of an audible difference than a leaping, snake-bite forte jumping out because the note velocity is one integer too high. This way, our basic instruments would be more playable and the RAM savings and palette availability would remain.

A classic example of this is what Dave Govett did in the reduced RAM versions of the GOS. Those are more than "basic" patches. They aspire to deliver the whole dynamic spectrum and save resources at the same time.

Pretty neat...

@Plowman said:

My long-standing struggle with "basic" instruments is the way they're thinned out. They cut out entire velocities.

Plowman,

Does that mean there's a difference between the stacc 1 + 2 of a basic instrument patch (say BASIC Vln 14) and the Stacc 1 + Stacc 2 that are singular instruments?

If so I didn't know (and would certainly like too.)

Dave Connor

I totally agree Plowman. I don't even use the basic instruments at all because of the bad velocity switching. I don't get how we're supposed to use programs like that. I guess we're supposed to choose which velocity we like, and then add programming like filters in order to adjust the sound the way we REALLY want it? It's a mystery to me...

Even some of the normal programs, like the solo trumpet, have bad velocity switching. I'm considering another brass library because of this problem.

I sincerely hope the Symphonic Cube fixes some of these problems.

Yes, Dave, there is a significant difference. VI-14 Stac from the Basic Instrument set has only two velocities, mf and ff. (the crossover being at 88 to 89). Stac 1 and 2 from the Short-Notes folder have four velocities: p, mf, f, and ff. I assume that other instruments are thinned out in a similar manner, though I haven't checked.

I understand the crossfading argument (that you'll get phasing and other artifacts when one sample is superimposed over another). But my ears prefer that issue to the unplayability of the cross-switching of significantly different dynamic samples. So some basic instruments become more usable when crossfading is used.

I recently purchased the SAM brass bundle. SAM unapologetically assigns samples to maybe two to four keys at a time. And the sounds are perfectly usable.

Tony, I agree, especially with the trumpet. I think it's partly due to the significant timbral difference between a soft and loud trumpet.

Plowman,

Wow, learn something new every day.

Are you using Gigastudio? If so won't the ability to load a lot more instruments in GS 3 solve a lot of this? Wouldn't loading the stac 1 + 2 combination patch and using the alternation tool or even key switching give you all the velocities conviently in one instrument. Or are you saying you would like a Basic patch that had all the articulations (pizz, cresc., etc.) that contained all the velocities in each instrument. Even so, won't the added dimensions in GS 3 allow for that as well?

Thanks

Dave

Hi Dave. I use both Gigastudio and EXS. My library is the First Edition Giga, but most of it is converted and the general trend is moving toward EXS. (though Giga's editor remains light years ahead of EXS'.)

More dimensions are something of a mixed bag relative to this discussion. "Basic instruments" should be clarified. They serve two functions.

The first is to conserve RAM by thinning out the instruments. Most of my comments above relate to this.

The second purpose specific to VSL is the ability to mix articulations live using the alternation tool. We can't alternate to other MIDI channels (Logic environment aside). So in that sense, we must have our articulations within one combination program on one channel using keyswitches.

It is soon apparent that more dimensions won't do much for the first purpose. As long as we are bumping our heads against a RAM ceiling of any kind, we will still be looking at those greedy four (or more) velocity programs and asking ourselves if they can be thinned out. More dimensions won't help.

But regarding the second purpose, the answer to your question is yes. More dimensions will most definately allow us to compile even more articulations -- multi-velocity articulations at that -- within one program for the purposes of alternating live.

"Wouldn't loading the stac 1 + 2 combination patch and using the alternation tool or even key switching give you all the velocities conviently in one instrument."

Perhaps you already this, but just to clarify, I think Stac 1 and 2 are different recordings of a staccato. If you mixed them for the sake of alternation, you still wouldn't get more velocities. You would get upbows and downbows though (if I'm remembering the patch correctly), which can be a great aid to realism.

Plowman,

Thanks for detailed response.

I have 1st ed as well and never realized that BASIC was a ram saving group of instruments! I don't think I've noticed because I've tended to use PerFLeg instruments far more than articulations.

Glad to be out of the dark on this.

As far as memory limitations GS 3 will aid in ram availabilty as well and help us all out a little.

Dave