# ProjectSAM Orchestral Essentials 2 - Now Available!



## ProjectSAM (Nov 11, 2014)

*The follow-up to the much loved original is now available... Orchestral Essentials 2!
*

The Orchestral Essentials series captures the essence of the ProjectSAM experience: an inspiring collection of sounds taken from our extensive, cinematic product catalog. This volume expands your Orchestral Essentials template with brand-new selections from the ProjectSAM catalog, including the Symphobia series, the True Strike series and our other libraries, all re-designed and streamlined to fit the Orchestral Essentials concept.

We are releasing Orchestral Essentials 2 at the unbeatable price of *€299/$399*... for everyone! Better still, starting today, Orchestral Essentials 1 is also available at this price.

If you don't own Orchestral Essentials 1 yet, go for the *€575/$759* Orchestral Essentials Pack and get up to scoring speed with _the_ killer cinematic orchestral package.

[Orchestral Essentials 2 product page]
[Orchestral Essentials Pack page]

Full information, demos and videos at www.projectsam.com

Enjoy!

The SAM Team


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## ysnyvz (Nov 11, 2014)

Hey Projectsam. It's great. I like it 
There are a few little problems. "Tuba Long" patch doesn't make any sound. Also there are some empty keys in "Big Drums and Cymbals" and "Box Organ" patches.
Congrats and good luck with release.
Yasin


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## gsilbers (Nov 11, 2014)

I dunno how i feel about only one mic position. is there an upgrade option to add another mic?


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## Guy Rowland (Nov 11, 2014)

gsilbers @ Tue Nov 11 said:


> I dunno how i feel about only one mic position. is there an upgrade option to add another mic?



I'm pretty sure that the only upgrade option is to the full libraries. That's one of the main trade offs with the OE series, imo its a good one.


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## ProjectSAM (Nov 12, 2014)

ysnyvz @ Tue Nov 11 said:


> Hey Projectsam. It's great. I like it
> There are a few little problems. "Tuba Long" patch doesn't make any sound. Also there are some empty keys in "Big Drums and Cymbals" and "Box Organ" patches.
> Congrats and good luck with release.
> Yasin



Thanks Yasin!

- We have a fix for the Tuba Long patch available. Please e-mail us and we'll send it over. This fix is now included in new downloads.

- We'll take a look at the Drums & Cymbals and Box Organ patches!

Cheers,
The SAM Team


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## ProjectSAM (Nov 12, 2014)

gsilbers @ Tue Nov 11 said:


> I dunno how i feel about only one mic position. is there an upgrade option to add another mic?



Hi there,

Guy is correct. Full mic options is one of the benefits of the full libraries. There is no option to upgrade to more mics within the Orchestral Essentials series. Same as with the instruments and articulations, you get the mic set that we think is the _essential_ one to have. In the Program List PDF file on the Specs page you can see exactly which mic this is for each instrument.

Let us know if you have any other questions!

Cheers,
The SAM Team


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## ysnyvz (Nov 12, 2014)

ProjectSAM @ Wed Nov 12 said:


> Thanks Yasin!
> 
> - We have a fix for the Tuba Long patch available. Please e-mail us and we'll send it over. This fix is now included in new downloads.
> 
> ...


Ok sent it to technical support. Thanks.

edit: Thanks for quick response. It's working now


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## muziksculp (Nov 15, 2014)

Hi,

Any benefits of buying OE1 and/or OE2, if I already own Symphobia 1, Symphobia 2, TS1, TS2, Classic Brass, and the Orchestral Harp. ? 

Or would *Lumina* be a better choice given what I already have ? 

Thanks,
Muziksculp


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## Zhao Shen (Nov 15, 2014)

Looks like a great library, I'm giving it some serious thought! Guy's video walkthroughs were fantastic, so kudos to him!


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## dpasdernick (Nov 15, 2014)

ProjectSAM @ Wed Nov 12 said:


> gsilbers @ Tue Nov 11 said:
> 
> 
> > I dunno how i feel about only one mic position. is there an upgrade option to add another mic?
> ...



I do not own any Project Sam libraries but I have VSL, East West and Albion. Should I buy the original Symphobia or for the same price the Orch Elements Bundle? Any insight?


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## ryanstrong (Nov 15, 2014)

dpasdernick @ Sat Nov 15 said:


> ProjectSAM @ Wed Nov 12 said:
> 
> 
> > gsilbers @ Tue Nov 11 said:
> ...



I have the same question!


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## Guy Rowland (Nov 16, 2014)

Well my $0.02 fwiw:

Muziksculp - since you're practically got the whole set, I'd say Lumina is the best one for you. There will be a few things in OE2 you won't have quite the same, but I think you'd appreciate more depth to consistently cover all that ground.

dpasdernick and ryanstrong - tougher call. Very tough call actually. What I'd recommend is book a trysound session with Symphobia 1 - it does have some more content from that in the current version and the UI is now much slicker, but it's a very good hands on overview. (wish trysound would update to modern versions of Kontakt so they can keep up to date). You can also try OE1 there in its original version. I guess PS's own videos and my walkthrough will have do for OE2 for the time being.

OE2 has greatly extended the reach of the Orchestral Essentials series, but of course if you ultimately had S1-3, OB classic, True Strike etc then you'd have an awful lot more in the long run. With OE you're stuck with one mic position (usually stage but not always) which I think is a good trade off cost-wise. Both have great multis if you're into that. If I had limited funds in the coming months and years which I wanted to get various other things with, I'd go with the OE bundle knowing it's not just a starter / stetching library now and there's a hell of a lot you can do with it. But if the financial gods have been kind to you, starting off with S1 is a great choice.

How's that for sitting on the fence?


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## wst3 (Nov 16, 2014)

two cents from the peanut gallery...

I focused, initially, on libraries that offered complete control, the very concept of an ensemble based library just did not compute, even though I understood that it would sound more realistic. I just could not get my head around the required workflow.

And I have not mastered that workflow yet, but I'm getting better, and I now think that these tools offer a good option.

I picked up OE 1 as a bit of an experiment, but I'm convinced now, and I will be adding OE2 when funds allow.

As far as leaping in with Symphobia or Albion, well, if I had the resources (read funds) I'd probably just start there, but I need more work to pay for these tools, so for now it will be OE2 for me, it is going to add so many more capabilities.


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## Echoes in the Attic (Nov 16, 2014)

Are there any plans to add the mixed articulation type patches to the essentials libraries like was done for the recent symphobia 1.4, with keyswithces? That's one thing that's sort of too bad about essentials is that the shorts and longs are in separate patches. Would be great to have mixed ones with keyswtiches for the available patches.


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## dpasdernick (Nov 16, 2014)

Guy Rowland @ Sun Nov 16 said:


> Well my $0.02 fwiw:
> 
> Muziksculp - since you're practically got the whole set, I'd say Lumina is the best one for you. There will be a few things in OE2 you won't have quite the same, but I think you'd appreciate more depth to consistently cover all that ground.
> 
> ...



Guy,

Thanks for the insight. Very much appreciated and your video walk-throughs have been incredibly informative as well. Keep them coming!

As they say "the poor man pays twice" and I have found that to be the case. I would have thought by now that someone would have gone head to head with Project Sam. Spitfire and SonoKinetic have some similar products but it seems like Symphobia is still at the top of the heap for the "ensemble" type orchestra. It's ben too expensive for me but now that it's around $800 I may start my Project Sam love affair.

I do use Try-Sound and while the latency is horrible it still helps hear the library. Every time I finish a session I load up my VSL stuff and make multis (their player is excellent for this) of layered ensembles. I have a pretty huge patch with Epic Horns, appasionatta strings, woodwinds, timpani etc. But there's something pretty magic about the Project Sam stuff that keeps me sniffing around their camp. Christmas is coming. We'll see if Black Friday throws me for a loop. 

Thanks again Guy!

Darren


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## ProjectSAM (Nov 24, 2014)

Echoes in the Attic @ Sun Nov 16 said:


> Are there any plans to add the mixed articulation type patches to the essentials libraries like was done for the recent symphobia 1.4, with keyswithces? That's one thing that's sort of too bad about essentials is that the shorts and longs are in separate patches. Would be great to have mixed ones with keyswtiches for the available patches.



Hi Echoes,

To us, a keyswitch setup isn't really part of the Orchestral Essentials concept. There are instruments in both OE volumes that do combine multiple articulations, but they are switched using velocity or CC. For OE we have no plans to offer an on-screen list with keyswitches, as we do offer for, eg, the Symphobia series.

Cheers,
Maarten
The SAM Team


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## ProjectSAM (Nov 25, 2014)

Hi all!

We just posted a sequencer playback video of the Orchestral Essentials 2 music demo "The Ascendant" by composer Maciek Dobrowolski. It shows you which OE2 instruments Maciek used and gives you an impression of how the demo was created:

[Watch on YouTube]

Remember that the sounds in this demo are 100% OE2!

Enjoy!

The SAM Team


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## Echoes in the Attic (Nov 26, 2014)

What is the upgrade path to full Symphobia products from Orchestral essentials? I feel like I want to get some ProjectSam stuff but not sure what yet. Knowing that there is an upgrade path might help go with EO for a while.


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## dpasdernick (Nov 26, 2014)

Is Project Sam going to have any kind of a Black Friday sale?


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## rottoy (Nov 26, 2014)

I'm still lusting after the *clarinet* from Lumina.
Tight legato with a beautiful timbre, sad to not see it included
along the GORGEOUS *flute* & *oboe*.

Could you guys consider an update with the clarinet included? :mrgreen: 
In that case, you have got yourself a customer. 8)


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## G.R. Baumann (Nov 27, 2014)

Echoes in the Attic @ Wed Nov 26 said:


> What is the upgrade path to full Symphobia products from Orchestral essentials? I feel like I want to get some ProjectSam stuff but not sure what yet. Knowing that there is an upgrade path might help go with EO for a while.



Prices were lowered on all products this year afaik, from their site:



> Do you offer discounts for existing users?
> Sorry, we no longer have a loyalty discount program. The first reason is that it became an unmanageable matrix of discounts and combinations. The second reason is that we could not realistically extend the loyalty discount program to our distributors, creating unfair competition. This is why we decided to lower pricing of the Orchestral Essentials series for all users. Please note that we do offer educational discounts.


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