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  4. "Problems I have with Solo Strings"
  • W
    W

    This thread is a bunch of crap.  I wish people here would not give it constant replies, and keep this bullshit in view. But I know you will since it is negative.   

    This guy is a "professional"?  If he is, then he would realize that doing a performance such as the Bacal-Ravel quartet is BEYOND "professional" - far beyond.  And yet, this library is not good enough?  I think the real story is - he is not good enough for it.  What are his qualifications to make a sweeping statement like this thread?  Who is he to place himself above it all and judge it?  What arrogance!

    I swore I would not get irritated by this kind of attitude any more, but can't help it.  This is the whole problem with the internet - everybody's opinion is equal.  Even those who don't have a clue what they are talking about.

  • L
    L
    DM33, I'm trying to learn from those tutorials associated with the demos.

    So far, I've looked at the Beethoven, Bloch, Borodin and Bridge. They all consist of one MID file and one or more fxp files. In none of them do I see a tutorial in the sense of a verbal or visual explanation. Am I looking in the wrong place?

    In the Bridge there's a viola C# that starts 1:17 into the piece, and is meant to last 6.3 seconds. However, it sounds only for 4.3 seconds. So the thing I want most to learn, I can't seem to learn from this example. I await any further pointers.

    ddunn, you are obviously on the warpath. Calm down and read where I said that "My computer can handle 11 MIDI tracks with 17 Kontakt articulations at once, but it can't handle one MIDI track with 2 VSL articulations without frequent interruptions." These are facts. If V is less efficient than K, then V cannot be the most efficient thing.

    William, you too are on the warpath, and it's because I chose a bad title for my thread. I already apologized for that before your post. I'll apologize again if it makes you happy. I do not place myself above anyone, and anyone who knows me will tell you I'm not arrogant. I have been very frustrated by a piece of software that takes a heck of a lot of figuring out just to make a note sound its notated length. I'm still hoping one of you will tell me how to do that.
  • T
    T
    Just wanted to chime in with regards to your fifth point, about legato and double stops.

    I own several libraries from other vendors utilizing legato scripts, and I've demoed a bunch of others. None of them can handle polyphonic legato lines on one midi channel. The reason for this is actually pretty obvious, if you think about it. How could the legato script select the proper samples if several notes are being played simultaneously? Sure, it would be possible to approximate what transitions the player had in mind, but it would produce unpredictable results, at the cost of extra strain to the CPU.

    Furthermore, with most other (reasonably detailed) libraries you need several different midi-channels for each instrument. Take the solo violin in gypsy as an example. You need 3 separate midi-channels to utilize all articulations (the master patch, plus the legato and fast legato patches).

    I'd love to learn how the bow change works, though, so if anyone would care to explain, I'd be thrilled. :)
  • W
    W

     So, change the title.
  • M
    M
    I don't know how you guys can take Londoner's post so seriously as to even spend time writing replies to it. Isn't it obvious we have a troll here? Or no, wait -- I can't even believe that a troll paid by the competition can be *that* dumb to post such obvious nonsense and hope people will take it seriously. Come on, I have used VSL for even shorter time than Londoner claims to have, and even I can see the obvious fallacies. Maybe we have the opposite... a VSL-paid troll whose aim was to seed this discussion? In either case, I am actually grateful, because as a newcomer to VSL, I do find some of the posts in this thread enlightening and useful.
  • M
    M

    Yes, that's exactly it. We are all on the warpath, out to get you. Considering your accusatory thread title, did you not expect a few of us to shove back?  Regardless of your insistence that your computer can handle Kontakt but not VSL, until you post some specifics as to your set-up, your argument is useless.

    VSL runs a bit differently than  your standard audio plug in, sort of running in a "shell" outside your actuall sequencer. Thusly, it should actually run SMOOTHER than something inside your application, using up RAM within your sequencer. There are other things too, such as the 1X and 2X buffer along with your audio driver's latency which also need to be addressed. Check into all these things before saying VSL cant even run two instances.

    To say it is uprofessional is unacceptable. Yes there is quite a learning curve, and to this day  (3+ years using VSL) i STILL learn new things about how to use VSL. It is very deep. But that is a good thing. It will seem frustrating as a new user to figure out how to use many options, but it necessitate getting previous programs' architectures out of your head and learning the VSL way. Once you get it down, it is really quite simple. Ten years ago i was programming Hexadecimal code and sending as MIDI data for parameter changes to my JD-800. I eventually figured out how to do that. VSL is ten times simpler!

    Hang in there, open your mind, be patient. The VSL demos are not fake; they really are possible. But itll take a while to get there. Best of luck.
  • N
    N
    FWIW, regarding point 1: It is true that I wish the sustains were a bit longer - as a classical bassist, myself, it is certainly possible to play slightly longer sustains than were recorded for this library. But, VSL did it the right way - one cannot endlessly loop a solo sustain note - the bow direction has to be changed. What some have asked for on the forum - looped solo strings - runs counter to the physics of solo playing. Regarding some of your other points: I have been working on an original double-bass concerto. All I could afford to purchase were the SE libraries, and the solo double-bass even in SE sounds amazingly good. It is far closer to the tone I produce than one should have any reason to expect from a budget sample library. Yes they are samples, and yes they don't capture all the sutble nuances, but the sounds of the different bowing techniques are actually very close. Overall, if one does not know what one is doing, and choose to use articulations in wrong ways and in wrong places it can indeed sound really bad (as it actually should under those conditions). But, if one has a basic understanding of string playing technique, it is possible to achieve very good results, even with the solo strings in SE, let alone what one could do using the full solo strings package.
  • L
    L
    DEAR MODERATOR, please rename this thread to "Problems I have with Solo Strings".

    I hope in the future the people trying to be helpful will outnumber the people expressing spite. I do appreciate the former.

    I still have not figured out why my attempt to connect two notes using controller 68 to control Master Release was unsuccessful, as described above. But I have switched to using controller 64 (sustain) without mapping it to any VI control, and this works better. The documentation led me to believe that mapping a controller to Master Release should work, whereas I found nothing in the documentation about the Sustain controller. So this behavior is puzzling.

    But it is a step forward. As long as I'm willing to restrike a note every 2.7 seconds, and put the sustain controller on during the transition, I can get a good-enough long note from 10 VI_sus_Vib at velocities over 50. It also works for 03 VI_pon_sus at all velocities, and for 02 VI_harm_art_sus up to velocity 80. Harmonics with velocities over 90 must be restruck every 2.5 seconds because of the shorter sample length. In fact maybe I should make 2.5 seconds the general rule.

    This is a workaround. Not what I'd expected from an expensive product that claims to offer "highly sophisticated and elegant virtual instruments ... to provide our users with tools that guarantee maximum efficiency and an intuitive workflow".

    I have also learned a lot about this forum and the kind of answers one can expect. I wonder whether Jurgen (zentrumsounds) ever got reasonable answers to his (very polite) posts and his very valid questions about sustained notes, viola range, downward harp glissandos, and multi-instrument percussionists. There's no evidence in this forum that he ever did.

    To answer those curious about my system: it exceeds the official VSL requirements for the product. The official requirements are: Apple G4 processor of 1GHz, OS X version 10.4, and 1GB memory. My system has a G4 processor of 1.33GHz, OS X 10.4.10, and 1.5GB memory. All audio to/from Pro Tools is on a 7200 RPM external FireWire disk, and all VSL instruments are on another. But even though I've exceeded the requirements stated by VSL, it looks certain that I'll have to buy a new computer if I really want to use this product, as I am constantly being told "you are running out of CPU power" even though I've muted all other tracks and allowed 95% of the processor to be used by a single VSL instrument with a single matrix in which only 2 articulations are in use.
  • D
    D

    Londoner,

    If you open the MIDI file and import the FXP into the VI you'll have all the same articulations as the demo used.

    Now you can study how the piece was crafted and achieved. I guess its more like a self tutorial.

    If the Beethoven does not include the example you are looking for try some of the others,

    maybe the Borodin, Tchaikovsky, or Sarasate?

    Bottom line is that if you are not happy with the VSL Solo Strings you are out of luck because

    its well known that its the best solo strings library on the market.

    Whatever the workarounds are we all try to learn them because these are truly 

    beautiful and unique samples. 

    You may have to compose to the samples strengths in some areas but mostly,

    with these samples and all the rest of the the VSL libs you can let your imagination

    drive the samples and not the other way around like with other libs.

    DM33
  • N
    N

     Londoner, if I may make a hopefully helpful suggestion:  Although I post rarely to this forum, I have found people here to generally be most helpful and courteous.  Your initial post really did get things off on the wrong foot.  Civility, even when one is upset, helps to foster discussion and the search for possible solutions.  This forum really is a good place.
  • L
    L
    noldar12, you are right; my first post got off on the wrong foot. I regret that. But some of the contributors seem to feel that I was attacking them. It's the VSL product that I was up against, not the users.

    _TUTORIALS_

    DM33, thanks again for your advice about the tutorials. I would like to learn from them. It's proving more difficult than I expected, though:

    • The CPU issue is a big handicap. In order to play the first 9 notes of the Bridge, I had to get past 15 interruptions of either "running out of CPU power" or "the operating system held off interrupts for too long". And I had muted every track except for the solo viola.
    • Every tutorial I've looked at uses the Extended Edition. So far, I've been able to play them because of the 30-starts free license, but it won't be long before the tutorials become unplayable for me.
    • The things I really want to learn, aren't satisfactorily demonstrated. I've gone over the Bridge in more detail, and found several instances of notes that were intended to be sustained, but weren't. The following timings are what I get after importing the MID file into Pro Tools. The first piano note is at 25.2 seconds and the first viola note is at 40.5 seconds.
      • At 1:53, G#4 is notated as 4.52 seconds but dies after 2.68 seconds.
      • At 2:18, F#3 is notated as 4.66 seconds but dies after 4.2 seconds.
      • At 2:57, the last viola note in the piece, the harmonic on C#5 is notated as 8.66 seconds but dies after 4.76 seconds.

    And these are the officially published examples of what the product can do? Unsatisfactory.

    _SUSTAIN_

    I've found that using controller 64 (sustain) leads to more problems. If the sustain starts just before the end of part 1 of the note, and ends just after the start of part 2, I get the sound of two violins playing the same note slightly differently. When a subsequent note (on a different pitch) starts, it sounds like one of these two violins is dropping out. This problem is at its worst for a diminuendo -- when the first part has a higher velocity than the second part. So I've stopped using ANY controllers to paper over the bow changes. Of course this leaves audible bow changes. Many more of them, and more audible, than in a professional performance. Unsatisfactory.

    _HARMONICS_

    I've been trying to use Solo Strings to demo a piece I wrote two years ago. That piece includes violin harmonics sounding D#5 and F#5. These are produced by fingering bottom G# and touching the D# a fifth above it, and by fingering bottom B and touching the F# a fifth above it. This sounds the third partial. Apparently the guys in Vienna have never heard of such a thing. Their software cannot be coaxed into sounding violin harmonics in this range.

    No combination of "Oct" and "Transp" in the Edit Cell page will allow you to produce these harmonics from the violin patches.

    My demo will have to use viola harmonics for these two notes. The sound is noticeably different from the surrounding violin harmonics. Anyone listening to my demo will say "what an unprofessional job he did".

    I now realize that this oddity is why I came to the false conclusion that the harmonic patch was monophonic. In my tests, the lower notes were E5 and F#5, and they never sounded. Now I know that the VSL design correctly allows double-stopped harmonics, but incorrectly omits the valid pitches D#5 through F#5.

    Another bad design decision about harmonics is less serious, because the workaround is easy and the sound is not bad. That was the decision to map harmonic patches an octave lower than they sound. I don't recall any score where this practice was followed. In fact the OPPOSITE has sometimes been done, in double bass parts, where harmonics sound an octave lower than written. But I can work around this problem using "Oct".

    Another thing about harmonics: Vienna Symphonic Library GmbH is guilty of false advertising. Read their web page
    http://vsl.co.at/en/211/442/344/350/217.htm which clearly states that the Standard Edition (Solo Strings I) contains "numerous natural and artificial harmonics". In fact, the natural harmonics are not included in the product. Articulation 11 VI_harm-nat_sus is a Level 2 articulation. Therefore the very commonly used violin harmonics G4 and D5 will not be available to me. I have been cheated.

    Dear forum members: Convince me that I'm wrong about any of the above, please. I paid more for this product than the cost of some computers, and I would like to believe that I have paid for a great product. So far it appears to be a collection of beautiful samples that will require many headaches to work with.
  • M
    M
    last edited
    last edited

    @Another User said:

    Another thing about harmonics: Vienna Symphonic Library GmbH is guilty of false advertising. Read their web page
    http://vsl.co.at/en/211/442/344/350/217.htm which clearly states that the Standard Edition (Solo Strings I) contains "numerous natural and artificial harmonics". In fact, the natural harmonics are not included in the product. Articulation 11 VI_harm-nat_sus is a Level 2 articulation. Therefore the very commonly used violin harmonics G4 and D5 will not be available to me. I have been cheated.

    Dear forum members: Convince me that I'm wrong about any of the above, please. I paid more for this product than the cost of some computers, and I would like to believe that I have paid for a great product. So far it appears to be a collection of beautiful samples that will require many headaches to work with.

    As for feeling you are being "attacked" read these sentences and then think again. Come on dude, give me a break. After all these pages, and you STILL are going at it. "GUILTY OF FALSE ADVERTISING!!! I HAVE BEEN CHEATED!!! MANY HEADACHES TO WORK WITH!!! VSL CAUSED THE 9-11 ATTACKS!!!!"

    Really, man. Seriously. Would it have been that hard to come on here and say "Hey, whats up? I thought i was supposed to get Artificial Harmonics? Can someone please explain?" Or, "Hey why are my sustains not really sustaining... someone please tell me if i am overlooking something."

    But no, you are addressing some of these issues with a litigious approach in the way you are wording your concerns. Do  you expect everyone to jump along with you and join in the witch-hunt? Obviously VSL is doing SOMETHING right or they wouldnt be in business.

    Man i TOTALLY understand your frustration, as i have it sometimes with certain issues, but it wouldnt kill you to tone it down with the accusations and show a little bit of etiquette. Im not trying to attack you or anything, im just merely trying to help you see why you feel like you are being attacked. This has been one of the friendliest forums ive ever dealt with. Everyone on here is always helpful and excited to be involved... even PaulR  😊  So i says this with only sincerety, that if you dont want to feel you are being "pushed back," try coming here with a little less accusatory nature and less denunciating of the product. This forum is here to help you, okay?

    Group hug.

    -plaster
  • T
    T

    The key word for Londoner is patience.  You'll find ways to workaround the supposed shortcomings you mentioned.  Will VSL replace live players?  Not now.  But whose expecting that?  

    Two points Londoner makes that I agree with.  VSL does use a lot of memory, and the newcomer sometimes suffers because he paid a lot of money for his VSL instruments only to find his computer doesn't support them very well.  And, yes, the manuals are sometimes unclear and perhaps too abbreviated for newcomers.  Once again--patience.  One discovers a lot of great things about VSL over time.

    Perhaps a tutorial that discusses in detail the memory requirements of VSL would be useful.  Granted, optimization is well explained, but how about a video aimed at newcomers that discusses VSL memory issues?  It might be helpful for those, like me, who bulldozed along with CPU overloads, rather than get a new computer.  Looking back, I should have thrown in the towel long before I did.  A video might have helped me see the error of my ways.

    Good luck, Londoner.  Give VSL more time, and all best.                                   Tom M.
  • L
    L
    Thanks, mplaster and Tom23. I am sorry that I got the facts wrong. I had thought that Solo Strings I meant the Standard Edition, and Solo Strings II meant the Extended Edition. Thank you for correcting me.

    Obviously I have expressed too much frustration and disappointment in these pages. I invite everyone over when they're in London and we can drink a few beers and laugh about some of the silly things that have transpired. But my joy will be even greater if I can find solutions to some of the problems that have surfaced in my attempts to use Solo Strings.
  • N
    N

     Londoner, I believe you are right about the description in solo strings - the articulations description contains an error regarding harmonics in the standard edition that has unfortunately never been fixed (it is something I had asked about more than a little while ago, as no other library listed natural harmonics as part of the standard library).

    As for samples/articulation ranges, it is a tough call.  It is impossible for a company to include every articulation for every possible note, with every possible playing nuance.  At some point decisions must be made regarding what to include and what to exclude.  For example: as a bassist, I would wish that the highest major third of the solo range had been sampled, but there are very few players who can play those notes truly well.  While not unimportant, their use is also not common, so for general use, there is justification for excluding them.  Overall, I think the VSL team has made excellent choices in their decisions of what to include and what not to include.
  • D
    D

    Hi guys,

    first of all I want to say that I'm very sorry - there was indeed a mistake in the sample content descriptions (which I obviously wasn't aware of). The Solo Strings Standard Library only contains staccato and sustained notes of artifical harmonics, all other harmonics articulations are part of the Extended Library.

    I'd like to apologize for any inconvenience caused by that error. It's not always easy to keep track of all the samples ...

    Kind regards,
    David Ender / VSL manuals
  • OceanviewO
    OceanviewO

    Hello David,

    Any possibility that VSL might publish something that would facilitate working with the samples? Many work-arounds get listed on the forums. Could these be gathered up? Could VSL publish its own suggestions, etc?

    Thanks.
  • Z
    Z
    Hi everyone,

    I feel obliged to throw in my two cents since Londoner has cited my own previous posts in some of these discussions.

    First off, we all know that VSL is a great product. I bought the Solo Strings first and proceeded to purchase numerous other libraries and a dedicated computer to run these over the course of the following six months. (I am a private individual so VSL is very expensive for me... in fact the most expensive music technology product I've bought in 5 years). So no bones there.
    I'd also like to point out that some of the remarks made in this thread (but more especially in the more recently created accompanying thread here), I find some of the comments to be less then gracious (though as previously pointed out an angry title never helps). The accusation of trolling and working for the other side have been raised against myself also despite my attempts at constructive criticism. And Londoners comments (despite the underlying anger) really did point out issues which are important to people like myself who work in a certain way. I think the defensive attitude of many here shows a reluctance to accept that there might be issues with our beloved VSL systems into which we invest so much time and money. But there are some issues which are a nightmare for many of us VSL users... no matter how elegant the workarounds seem for some of you... they are not practicable in the context of those who work primarily on Sibelius or Finale composition systems. I think the point is that VSL is the best system if you want your VSL work to be used as the final output (say in a film or TV score) but less then ideal if you are composing for a real orchestra and VSL is being used as a mock up.

    My main concern with VSL with regard to the sustain issues which seem so central to the issues both I and Londoner appear to be having is that VSL does not seem to have the capacity to update these files. The decision to loop or not to loop appears to have been made at the editing stages of the samples when developing the solo strings. As someone who has in the past been commissioned to make sample libraries myself I can attest to the fact that at the recording process there is indeed no guarantee that things will work out as planned and that seems to be the case here. I would really welcome a version of these samples which was less then ideal in terms of sound quality but which at least looped. And it would be great if an update were made available which addressed these issues. From what I can gather Solo Strings I was one of the first libraries created and issues which encountered then have since been addressed in more recent libraries.

    Hope these comments are met with non knee-jerk reactions folks...

    jurgen from Ireland
  • D
    D

    Hi Oceanview,

    thanks, your suggestion is certainly worth thinking about - only it's a capacity problem. Gathering together the info is no mean task, and I confess that at least at the moment it seems too much to handle to me. But how about opening up a "Work-arounds" thread? If people contribute to that, it would be easier for me to edit, publish and regularly update a .pdf containing all those user tips & tricks - much easier than reading through thousands of pages [;)]. (I did that once and it was really hard work. Only the forum contained about a 5th of what it does now.)

    Kind regards,

    David Ender / VSL manuals
  • W
    W

    .