Taking VSL to the professional studio?

[jhonny.eriksson]

Hello,

I am afraid this question might result in thousands of "in case of..." "it could..." "if..." - this and that. But I am looking for experience, or input from studio owners and engineers who might come in contact with these situations.

I am a writer, composer. I've been lucky enough to afford the full range of VSL instruments and software to use on my own workstation without any limits. However, when it comes to mixing and mastering I am a novice. I've tried to get myself involved in the process by reading and playing around with the traditional tools but I think time has come to admit that I will never learn to be a successful producer on my own. I simply end up writing music all the time what I love to do.

I am currently in the works of putting down some final addtions to a symphony that I've been working on for many years and I am dreaming of having it fully produced, mixed and all. I am guessing professional studios are working with midi all the time but what about something as complete as VSL?

If I were to define professional studio it would fall into the category of what I could afford, meaning; no big recording stages but well equiped studios with experienced staff working with anything from pop to metal.

My guess is that I would load the midi into their workstation/sequenser and then just let them have a go with it. I have completed the score, and most of the automation such as velocity-XF, expression and slot-XF. Is there anything else I would need to consider?

In my work flow I use MIR and VEP. Is that anything that a professional studio would use or even gain from?

So in short...

• Does anyone have experience taking VSL to a professional studio?
• Is there anything more I can do in preperation except bringing the midi-information incl. automation (VXF, Exp. and Slot-XF)?
• Would a studio ever consider using VSL software in their work flow?

[jmcecil]

Two options,

1) Studios want the audio.  And, they want the individual tracks as dry as possible.  So you will not need VSL at all.  You will export everything as audio, time stamped, so it can be properly imported into whatever system the studio has.  

2) Print the score and  have a real orchestra record it in the studio.

I can't imagine a studio having the time (or you the money) to deal with the project at the VSL/MIDI level.

[jasensmith]

I can just vouch for what jmcecil said but I'd like to point something out...

@jhonny.eriksson said:

Would a studio ever consider using VSL software in their work flow?

Working with VSL is a skill set in itself and a studio would have to have somebody skilled enough to use the library and all of it's supporting software effectivley.

I use it for clients in my studio but only in limited ways like some backing strings for a Pop song that somebody wnats me to polish.  I'm certain that I'm not at the skill level to take on a whole symphony.

It really irritates me when studios post angry threads on the forum about how they paid all this money for the Cube but they want it to sound like the wonderful demos they hear right out of the box.  They don't understand that VSL is like an instrument and it takes a lot of blood sweat and tears to master.  It's like buying a custom made Cello, watching a few "how to play the Cello" videos on youtube and then getting frustrated because you don't sound like Yo Yo Ma the first week.

When we tell the angry studios this then they get even angrier shouting back "WHO HAS THAT KIND OF TIME!!!"

A classic case of not doing your research.

[Del Gibbons]

Bounce out the individual tracks per instrument without fx as audio....and make sure you label them or the studio will get grumpy 😄

As I side note, if you're using MIR Pro I find a pretty decent mix can be achieved by yourself using just that for instrument positioning and EQ, and the Vienna Suite plugins for some multiband processing. A lot of the presets are excellent starting points.

I then get the output mastered at Abbey Road Studios here in London by film soundtrack engineer Andy Walter. Seems to work for me, and saves a big chunk of money!

[jhonny.eriksson]

@derek_gibbons_10742 said:

Bounce out the individual tracks per instrument without fx as audio....and make sure you label them or the studio will get grumpy 😄

As I side note, if you're using MIR Pro I find a pretty decent mix can be achieved by yourself using just that for instrument positioning and EQ, and the Vienna Suite plugins for some multiband processing. A lot of the presets are excellent starting points.

I then get the output mastered at Abbey Road Studios here in London by film soundtrack engineer Andy Walter. Seems to work for me, and saves a big chunk of money!

Great input. Thanks for the tip and... congratulations on a great score! Sounds fantastic! Did you use the Abbey Road Online Services? Seems like a great source to obtain both mixing and mastering.

[jhonny.eriksson]

@jmcecil said:

Two options,

1) Studios want the audio.  And, they want the individual tracks as dry as possible.  So you will not need VSL at all.  You will export everything as audio, time stamped, so it can be properly imported into whatever system the studio has.  

2) Print the score and  have a real orchestra record it in the studio.

I can't imagine a studio having the time (or you the money) to deal with the project at the VSL/MIDI level.

Great input! Thanks!

Good news... and a little bit scary. I was hoping that I might re-touch some areas in my automation; expression for example in case it didn't fit as well in the mix. But thats detail work so hopefully that wont matter as much as I might think 😊

[Del Gibbons]

Yeah online. I always use andy walter as I like his sound. He worked on Harry Potter, Cinderella, Everest etc...but they have some top people there working on film soundtracks so choose any of the film guys I'd say :-) https://www.abbeyroad.com/engineer/andy-walter