I always make sure to Xfade the two if I do layer. And like herb said, for solo/sparse ensemble stuff its not so great. Still with a bit of giga editing and making sure to slightly Xfade, its quite good.

I NEVER just plain layer, too much phasing in brass especially. I'll do it with strings if its fast stuff tremolo and short bows work well, or tremolo and repetitions.

I find things like layering sffz over dynamic or sustain samples work really well for anthemic stuff.

If I've got the time and really need to make things perfect I'll record the track with both sustains/dynamics and whatever "attack" sample (sffz, stacc. etc) then use Vegas to splice them together. Its a bit more time consuming but I get the best results this way. In fact this is the best way to combine/layer patches with any library IMO.

It also teaches you what you might be able ot do in terms of programming or creating your own "combo" samples. Its usually what inspires my own edits atleast.

Will the pro edition feature more dynamics samples for the strings?

I too find them invaluable for the brass and would love it if the strings had at least close to as my dynamic lengths and variations to choose from.

Herb,

I was very interested and a little disturbed by some of the things you've suggested in this thread - the idea of using dynamic samples for ordinary
notes is something I haven't done, but I can see how it could be very valuable as it is true that the dead, unchanging, mechanical uniformity of tone is something you always hear with bad samples but never hear with live players (if they are good ones).

I wish you did regular tips like these - like a separate forum "Herb's Tips" or something like that. I'm particularly interested in how you actually use what is actually available when recording your own pieces, rather than sampling theory and computer equipment discussions.

Also, I'm impressed by your purist approach with the layering issue. But I have to admit I totally contradict it! I have been layering samples regularly on ensemble instruments, especially for attack, for this reason - if the attack is highly velocity sensitive, then it can add a great deal of additional expressiveness to a sostenuto sample. This applies to your string detaches as well, since they are so beautifully recorded and very short. The doubling of size of sound is not an issue with attacks, because you hear the attack before you have even mentally registered the sustain.

BTW I thought the Parachutes demo was AWESOME. Though I love J. Strauss I can see why you replaced the delicate string tremolos and piano legato horn of the intro to Blue Danube with the blatant ff brass power of Jerry Goldsmith.

Hi herb,

this demo is awesome, incredible.

How did you proceed for the percussions ? You only used a snare drum and a bass drum ?

bye [:)]

My favorite brass patch is marcato 4 seconds filter ... wonderful ! [:D]

Snare drum, field drum, bass drum, timpani

best
Herb

Can I perhaps offer a suggestion? After reading this thread, I went and listened to the demo in question. It nearly made me weep, both for the beauty and realism of the sound as well as the how much I still need to learn to achieve such a sound using this library.

I have no idea if this has been brought up before, but... I would be willing to actually pay for detailed tutorials on DVD-ROM with complete breakdowns and descriptions of some of these fantastic demos (or new ones). You could break the composition apart by instrument, and by section. Let us listen to how it sounds dry and fully mixed - let us listen at each stage of the creation process so we can hear exactly how its done. Talk about instrument selection and composition choices. You get the idea. This is such an amazing library... Who wouldn't want to pay a little extra for such valuable reference material when we've already all made a pretty serious investment in these libraries?

There's a lot of discussion on these boards about "How did you get this sound?" and "What did you use to mix that?" I'm not saying this is a bad thing, but how much can you really get from written text descriptions? It seems so much better if users could actually listen to "dry" and "wet" samples side by side while reading the descriptions and explanations. Or, if we could listen to a composition part by part and hear every nuance.

It's a win-win for everyone. You guys could likely make money by selling these tutorials, and everyone could learn from those who know the library best. Maybe even some of the more accomplished users would be interested in contributing to a project such as this.

James,

as much as I understand you question in the quest for "the" sound - there isn`t one "proper" way. The Parachutes-Theme is a perfect example: We had the demo mixed in Vienna, it sounded great, but somehow it was still "Classics". Enter Mal Luker: We asked him to mix it "Hollywood Style", and hey presto! Instant Cinemascope [:)]. What I want to say is: A solution that seems to be brilliant in one case may be the wrong solution in the next.

Bottom line: Listen, learn, expand the palette of your tools and "tricks", but don`t hope for a "one size fits all"-way of doing things.

All the best,

/Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library

Hi Dietz,

I think perhaps you misunderstood the gist of my post. I'm not after a "magic bullet" sort of technique that solves every problem. I'm just saying that I think there is a lot of different imaginative techniques that experienced users could teach others, and that I honestly think there could be a market for well presented demo tutorials showing some tricks and techniques of the VSL library.

Of course, I'm always experimenting on my own. As you said: "Listen, Learn". That's exactly what I'm doing. I've downloaded and analyzed a large number of demo pieces from this website. All I was saying is that if parts were broken down a bit more, I would have a much better time analyzing the piece, and hence learning from it. Perhaps others with more sophisticated ears can do this more easily than I?

Believe me, I'm not looking for some simple short-cut, and I understand that nothing is going to magically turn me into a virtuoso overnight. In looking back on my post, I can see how it might be taken that way, but in fact I was trying to make the exact opposite point - how analyzing demonstrations of a variety of different techniques could help to improve my own composition and programming skill.

Anyhow, thanks for your response!

Cheers!
-James

Oh , I see - I really misunderstood what you are after. Well, I don't know if time really allows for a serious video-documentation, but I certainly will try to tell you about my way of working in our Mixing-Forum. - I hope that many others chime in, too, as I don't consider the results I achieve as the Ultima Ratio, just one of several possible solutions.

/Dietz - Vienna Symphonic Library

That's exactly it! Such an endeavor (a demonstration CD / video) would be useless if it only presented one technique from one person. It would have to be a collaborative effort on the part of a number of composers and mixing technicians all sharing their experiences on a number of different style pieces.

Anyhow, I've taken up enough of your time. Thanks for listening.

James