Posted
Hi. I have been using the demo for Harmony Navigator and am
planning on buying Synfire. I have been very impressed with this forum and what
I have learned about Synfire.
Before I get started, I have some questions about sampler plug-ins.
I plan on working on a Mac and a PC and currently use Cubase 6.5 and own
HALion 4, Garritan Personal Orchestra 4 (using the Aria engine) and Kontakt 4 (I dread
upgrading to 5). I am looking for a nice-sounding set of orchestral sounds that
does not take excessive time to load or a huge amount of RAM or cost more than
Synfire!
- What samplers do you like to use?
- Is it easier to use a sampler where velocity
controls note volume or one like Garritan where a separate controller regulates
the volume of each note (I am most curious about this question)? - Any opinions on VST vs. AU versions of the same
plugins?
Thank you for your answers.
Ken
Tue, 2012-09-25 - 22:30 Permalink
Kontakt is a great general purpose sampler that works fine with Synfire.
GPO is very lean and loads fast, but EWQL sounds multiple times better. You would need 16 GB RAM though, if you are doing orchestral works."Nice sound" is always = "loads for ages" ;-)
EWQL uses velocity and other CCs and feels very natural.
On the Mac use AudioUnits where possible.
Wed, 2012-09-26 - 01:02 Permalink
Nothing compares to the Vienna Symphonic Library. It produces mind-blowing realistic sound and the Vienna Instruments VST runs very stable at the Synfire Engines and Drones. But you need a huge amount of RAM (at least 16 GB, better 32 GB) and you have to dig very deep in your wallet :-( So, that's probably not what you are looking for.
I would say the next best solution is the EWQL Orchestra www.soundsonline.com. There are platinum, gold and silver editions. Before I changed to VSL I used mainly EWQL silver (currently the price is 155 € but sometimes they have a 50% offer ;-) ).
These orchestral pieces I produced with Synfire and EWQL Orchestra silver:
(https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/track…)
(https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/track…)
Also not bad is Steinberg's Halion Orchestra (which you can get for 99 € when you have Cubase 6). At least it is better than Garritan. Unfortunatly the Halion Sonic SE VST, which is used for the Halion Orchestra, does not seem to work with the Synfire Engines and Drones. You would need to upgrade to Halion Sonic full version, this works.
This piece I made with Synfire and Halion Orchestra:
(https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/track…)
And finally a piece that I made with Harmony Navigator and Garritan Personal Orchestra:
(https://w.soundcloud.com/player/?url=https%3A//api.soundcloud.com/track…)
If you are looking for cinematic orchestral sounds you can also take into account: EWQL Hollywood Strings and Hollywood Brass, Symphobia, Cinesamples and some others.
Wed, 2012-09-26 - 17:24 Permalink
Juergen, Thank you for your advice. I think I will try GPO and Steinberg Halion orch first since I already have them.
I have read about VSL and someday I would like to use them but first I want to learn Synfire.
I also like your compositions very much and am very impressed!