is it like CNN Symphony Orchestra =?

 

BBC?!? - Girl you nasty

 

i join..

 

To add to what vaiman already said, I highly doubt that Spitfire would ever go the route of IRs, especially for such big release in collaboration with BBC. Part of their marketing strategy is that pretty much all of their libraries were recorded at Air Studios in London and they're very proud of that. For Spitfire to record only close mics and use IRs to emulate the room mics would be like an insult. For Air Studios to allow anyone to take IRs of their recording spaces would be a big hit to their income as they would potentially lose customers by doing that, especially big customers like Spitfire.

 

While I dont disagree that they likely are not going with the IR model, who would this be an insult to?

Also, AIR studio would be allowing Spitfire to take IR's, which is fine because, well, AIR studio is owned by Spitfire. They would not be releasing IRs to another studio, so I am a bit perplexed by this notion.

As to the comment about bleed, this is not an issue. The entire orchestra isnt recorded all at once, horns wouldnt bleed into the strings because the horns and strings are recorded separately. In a way actually, bleed would create more realism, and its something we dont have as an option currently, but something that could easily be generated / created with IR's.

I am a big fan of the IR model, but they have their tradeoffs. I will tell you, you will not find a better reverb engine than MIR Pro, end of story. Its problem is, its processor intensive and it has limited venues to pick from. It doesnt mean there are not enough venues to cover 97% of all music currently out there, but it is certainly a valid criticism. MIR Pro and MIRacles (the convolution reverb that accompanies MIR Pro's algorithmic reverb) allows for the end all be all of reverb in my opinion, but it is not cheap, coming in at about $1700 for the full engine with every venue. Probably my only other issue with MIR Pro is, it is limited to 2 microphone placement locales and this really should be 4. For my orchestration, I generally have to export two wave files, one with a microphone placement in the left and right balcony, and another with the microphone placement at the 7th row and the rear of the room. Then, I have to mix the balcony wave as the rear channels, and manually separate the center channel from the left and rights for the 7th row placement. Its a second step that really shouldnt be necessary, except that Dietz refuses to see the value in more mic placements, claiming it would impact processor usage too much. I digress, back to the point... If I were Spitfire, I would move to the IR model, it allows for more flexibility.

 

With all those different microphones. & the size of the library. I dont expect much other than the typical Spitfire super quiet libraries.

 

Performance to the masses is another consideration. I have VSL Dimension Strings, and I can tell you my system is on it's knees way before any kontakt heavy session. It's amazing but the performance hit is crazy due to IR's per player and room IR.
I agree with @Ikagura that using rooms is Spitfires thing, can't see that changing soon. Just like VSL and MIR Pro/ VEP... it's their thing.

Spitfire probably wish they owned it, but they don't. Although many people keep thinking Christian/Paul have done so.

 

Last edited: Aug 30, 2019

@littlewierdo, thank you for the insight, especially the different library recommendations. I'm surprised you would still recommend EWQL, thier Hollywood Orchestra is on sale right now for 60% off which is pretty cheap. Still worth it nowadays? I don't like iLok though (which is also the reason why VSL is off the table for me with their eLicenser). Do you have an opinion on the lastest Audio Imperia library, Orchestral Core? It is only 20 gigs or something but the demos sound pretty decent. A newer library with more modern engine I would assume. I agree that the price of this BBC library is great for what you get, but I just don't like their native plugin. I agree that it is for copy protection. Do you think it will be circumvented any time soon? I would think probably not.
I find it baffling how hard it is to find a good orchestral sound. Great to read your insight on it, thanks to everyone who's posting this kind of information.

 

@waverider
EastWest Hollywood Orchestra is still one of the best out there. I'd highly advise going Diamond though, even though the Gold version seems more attractive they rarely ever do discounts on upgrades. So you'll be stuck with the default Mid mic. Trust me... I done this
As @littlewierdo said, try the composercloud thing for a month, see what you like for a fraction of the cost. There's some great stuff in there!
As he/she also mentions, VSL Starter Editions are also excellent. Don't let the "starter" wording put you off, they are top notch and just come with less articulations and sampling intervals. Other than that they A class products. The Woowinds is still regarded as one of the best for price/sound.

EW stuff has a steep learning curve as their patches are named... well weird. Like "1st violin NV NV NV VN RR Ni" Once you get around that and the Play interface the sound is truly amazing. You wouldn't need much more than this for most productions.

Nucleus looks very good. Jaeger has been received very well so this shouldn't disappoint.
You get solo instruments, not in Jaeger, as well as woodwinds and a choir. Tuned percussion. Similar to Albion One but with individual sections (violins, viola, cellos, double bass) opposed to just ensemble patches.
It was mentioned by them - Jaeger is focused on modern hybrid orchestral music, Nucleus is a bit more classic orchestral focused.

Then we have Orchestral Tools dropping their new interface later this year... just to make your decisions even more difficult :D

Edit: don't buy anything unless it has at least 40% sale, it's Black Friday, or you are buffoon like me and need BBCSO like I need another asshole. Still getting it though!

 

Last edited: Aug 30, 2019

Oh wow, that is great information, thank you for this again! I didn't realize that the Hollywood Orchestra on sale right now is a "mini" version with only one mic. I guess it's still OK for the price, but that does put it into perspective and makes other libraries as interesting even if they're a bit more expensive. But as I said, I would probably not buy it anyway because of iLok, and that's also the reason I'm not even looking at VSL's libraries.

You're making me want to buy Jaeger as well now... I was hesitant because it's quite pricey and it feels like something is lacking because there's no woodwinds, and it's more geared towards louder productions. Nucleus looks more versatile, but will probably not have the same bombastic sound.

Do you think Orchestral Tools will remove their Kontakt libraries and and move everything to their new proprietary sampler? I wanted to buy some of their libraries and I would definitely prefer Kontakt versions.

 

I dont have Nucleus, so I cant comment on it, and there is little to no video content I can find on it. The ui looks interesting, I like that it looks clean, basic, easy to get to what matters. My concern with Audio Imperia is, their libraries have been traditionally good for layering, that is, adding to an already existing library, so I am not sure Nucleus will be a good starting choice. I remember putting a request up for it on the other site, just because I wanted to take a look at it, but they removed the request because I didnt put a web link for it.

East West is really quite good. For some reason, people poopoo it because its older, but it is a very good library. I dont think it is necessary to do the diamond edition if you are just starting out. The reason I recommend it is because of the price. Most people dont even know just how technically challenging it is to get realism, and I think it important that you get a library that wont kill your pocketbook before starting to delve into the other libraries. East West provides a very good opportunity for that, $20 a month. Add to that Reaper for your DAW, and for $80, starting, and $20 a month, you can start learning. I by the way, still continue to pay for composer cloud, even tho I have most every library out there, that gives you an idea of how good I think it is, and by the way, if you contact their support, you can do the other bigger packages with more microphone positions to their monthly plan. However, if you are just starting out, dont worry about this!! Just work with what they give you.

If you find that the technical side of manually manipulating, sometimes note by note, individual notes, great, you havent gone out and spent $1000+ on a library, plus, you still have Reaper as a DAW you can use for other projects in the music arena that is not as tedious.

As to ilok and elicenser, Im just going to tell you, its not a big deal. Yes, it sucks you have to spent $30 up front (dont buy it from the manufacturer, look on Amazon or places like guitarcenter, much better pricing). However, you plug it in, and provided you never go anywhere, it just sits there with its glowing pulsating red light to tell you its there. It makes purchasing libraries a bit more tedious, but this is the direction companies are going and I dont blame them. To be fair, I have quite a few libraries I didnt purchase and never ended up getting rid of them, but I also dont use those libraries other than reviewing them for myself. When you purchase a library, you get a key, you run close all your sound software, open the licensing software, paste the key in, wait 15 seconds, then reopen your sound software. Really no big deal other than having to close all your sound software. When you work with large templates like I do (usually around 50 gb), having to wait 20 minutes for everything to reload is obnoxious, but hey, it isnt every weekend I buy another library, only every other weekend, even on my minimum wage income as a full time physics student.

As to native plugins and so forth, here is the thing, musicians dont like change. Many have been working with Kontakt for years as it has been the defacto standard since Giga went away. Here is the thing to be careful of, do not let the opinion of others become your opinion, simply because it is the popular opinion. I see it far too often, Simply because it is different, musicians especially will poopoo it. Well, Vienna has its own engine. East West has its own engine. Personally, I cant stand Kontakt. In fact, I will tell you the thing that annoys the shit out of me, if your UI doesnt scale to screen resolution, all I have to say is, wtf? I run everything on a 50 inch monitor simply because, I cant read anything on a 22 inch monitor if its 8 feet away. Every person has their own opinion on the things they want out of a UI. I love Vienna's Synchron interface because it rescales, but I cant stand it because it looks like a fisher price UI. I love Vienna's VI interface, but it doesnt rescale.

My point is, you have to learn to deal with things if you are going to get into orchestral work. Not every library is perfect, and not every library is ideal for every situation. They each have their weaknesses and you have to learn how to navigate around them. You have to learn how to deal with change. You have to learn how to deal with aspects of a library you dont like. If you've ever done any programming, you should be familiar with this notion, every programming language has something it does in the most retarded of ways. You as the programmer will have to learn how to get around this most retarded way this programming language does things if you want to get your program written. In alot of ways, MIDI is no different, other than, if you have multiple other libraries, you can simply use another library to get around specific weaknesses. However, I typically recommend to people, especially when starting out, spend the time to get the library you are working with to sound as realistic as possible before giving up and moving to another library.

There are four things as a beginner that I see frequently, and I went through these even myself.

1. Getting a library to sound realistic. This requires work and experimenting. Its tedious as fuck. Its not for everyone. I spend weeks on a piece getting it to sound right. I am not that experienced with this, Im still learning new things constantly. MIDI is very powerful, very flexible, and offers crazy amounts of choice for how to approach a problem. Its hard to imagine that it is a technology from the late 60s.

2. Getting the latest and greatest to stay on the cutting edge. As soon as you can break this habit, the better off you will be.

3. Falling into the realm of number 1, dynamics! Every phrase should have a nuanced change in volume. Every note accented or de-accented to provide emphasis on specific notes. Brass and Strings should swell (get louder and softer) with long chorded legato notes and notes even for Ostinato strings should have accents. Woodwinds should add twinkle to your music. I strongly disagree with Daniel James, woodwinds are still relevant in orchestral music, but they require carving special places for them to briefly shine. I will post a link at the bottom to my soundcloud, some of the music here, Im not proud of looking back on it, but I like to keep it there as it is sort of a history of how I have improved. In my Soundcloud link is the highly controversial arrangement of Amazing Grace that I posted here a few weeks ago. Listen to the third verse, listen to how the woodwinds occasionally chirp in the third verse. Listen to the trills used throughout the piece. These are things I have been learning how to do. I am not bragging about my work, believe me, its nothing to brag about, I am pointing out things that I have been learning.

4. Creating music that moves. Anyone can write big chords if they have a bit of music theory under their belt. What takes real skill is, how do you create music that takes the listener on a journey? This is where phrase based libraries are great. My two favourites are Sonusscore The Orchestra Complete, and Sonokinetic, although others exist such as redroom. Not only can these libraries provide inspiration, they also can give you ideas and are highly instructional on how to effectively use instruments in a way that you may never have thought about. However, here is the key, when you find a phrase that works, recreate the phrase with a non-phrase based library. Dont use phrase based libraries in your final music. This is how you will learn, both music theory, and how to effectively play with MIDI cc data to create. Then, you can take these ideas from one of the phrase based libraries and build on it, change it, manipulate it, make it your own. The key is, inspiration, not copying. I will tell you what is really fun, take a traditional Christian hymn and use at least three, if not four verses. Figure out how to make each verse sound unique. Figure out how to incorporate the lyrics into the music.

Anyway, those are some tips, here is my SoundCloud. Like I said, not bragging, some of this is rather embarrassing. My first piece was Relm, yes, from final fantasy 6. It is rather boring and bland in my opinion. My last piece that I made no money from is Amazing Grace, then there is stuff in between, including three or four piano pieces I wrote that eventually, I will orchestrate. If you feel so inclined or are curious, enjoy. I dont know, I think there is maybe about 1 hour of music here.

https://soundcloud.com/joshua-gardner-15

 

No, they also said they would stick with Kontakt. It would be crazy for any company to ditch Kontakt until they have numerous products under their new vst's. So no worries there! But they'll all slowly move in that direction though.
What they have hinted at, is the ability to buy instruments from the new player. So you could possibly buy sections, so making say Berlin Brass much easier to buy.

Drop Audio Imperia a message, they might offer future discounts on either product if you buy one. They 100% discount the Hangar 4 price from future purchases of Jaeger, so it wouldn't be out of the question.

 

I do agree w/ pretty much everything you say, so prolly misunderstood. But actually, professional Jeff Epstein impersonator Christian (or whoever) said that: "Paul Thompson forced us to record bleed mics from other sections just to bloat the lib to 1bn samples for marketing reasons". Or something.

(15:57 if YT borks up the timeskip)

I'm just worried that the Spitfire direction of travel is to record billions of mics recording lots of wolf tone and breathing and chair scrapes and only one round robin (shared between three notes) and as many as one velocity layer. I am also worried about what Spitfire is doing with all those millions of bucks, chasing after a "dead" technology (sampling) instead of investing in modelling. It does seem like they're saving the planet, tho, what with all that recycling! >_____>

 

Last edited: Aug 30, 2019

Well, I took a closer look at Nucleus, it doesnt have individual sections, they group instruments together (violins and violas, cellos and double basses, etc), so, this is not at all in the same ballpark as this library. Also, I guess the reason no video or demos are available is because it comes out the 8th of September. Ill never understand pre-ordering a sample library and I think it sucks that these companies hype their libraries up to try to get people to buy sight unseen by putting the library on sale before it is released, then as soon as it is released, put the price at full.

As to the comments regarding bleeding, what they did was kept the mics specifically used for specific sections and specific instruments open when recording other instruments. For example, when recording the flute, rather than keeping only the flute mics open, they kept every mic open, for example, the percussion mic or the brass mic. So, when the flute plays, the percussion mic and brass mics will also pick up the flute playing.

I wasnt aware they went to the trouble of using duplicate microphones for every section, normally, I would have thought, youd have your brass section come in and record, then, have your string section come in and record, etc using just one set of microphones for that section, rather than having all the section microphones setup, even if you arent using them (very expensive to do this and requires an insane mixing board that would have to support 64 or more channels). Apparently, what they did was literally setup microphones for every section and left them hot, so I guess you would get bleed. Dont know, maybe this will add something, its hard to tell since I dont have the library to play with, and I am not sure we will have that kind of control (suppose we had the flute playing and wanted to turn off the flute microphone and use the percussion microphone audio for the flute player, that sort of thing).

Anyway, who knows... It looks interesting and will be something I keep my eye on, but I dont really think I need anything like this.

 

Daniel James is streaming right now and he's going to talk about BBC Symphony Orchestra, in case anyone is interested.

 

My guessing:
They recorded once a shitload of samples
They have launched a shitload of libs with these samples.
Now they release a shitload-ish-ly big library with all them samples. Perhaps a HDD will not be enough, how about a NAS in Raid5?

A shitload of latency?

 

I agree with you. I think that's also why the Eric Whitacre Choir is only available using their app.

 

Dammit I forgot to respond to this thread. Thank you to everyone who posted their thoughts about this. I am very curious how the library will hold up as soon as it's released. And if we're gonna ever see it on the other place. I doubt it'll be too quick, and I suppose if it happens, whoever liberates it will most likely keep it from the public for a while. But whatever, it's not like we don't have other great orchestral libraries.

 

Perks of having a jurassic PC: I don't have to wait for this because it won't run at all on it