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Orchestral Tools Metropolis Ark 4 - Elite Orchestral Forces

The trailer music sounds like.....ark1......BUT the surprise will come....this is a front row library....so chamber size ....meaning details.....making quiet to power sounds.....I'm waiting to hear the 3 violin and also the 3 violas. How detailed the sound will be.
And i'm confident the power legato will be something....special......hoping...
And choir shouts.....Yeah...and the martelee and ALL the other legato combinations for melody lines.......AND the designed multis.......
Yeah, it's about 90% speculation at this point. They'd have done better to just tease it this week and then make the official announcement next week when they were ready with demos and walkthroughs. I think the same is true of SF and their brass library. OT and SF both seem very rushed at this point, and very rushed will likely mean mistakes in the libraries. And how quickly will they fix those mistakes?
 
And how quickly will they fix those mistakes?
The NI SSC has some bugs that apparently never got fixed. I've encountered and reported bugs in other libraries and those won't get fixed either because the libraries are going to be re-released soon anyway. I would be more concerned about whether something will receive bug fixes at all, if it's released in a buggy state. Longterm support for libraries doesn't seem to provide good financial ROI, going by the behaviour of some devs. I'm not judging, it's just the conclusion from my observations.


wrong thread but SF Brass walkthrough is out. I'm not the expert but sounds great....
Personally not a fan of the room's sound, but thanks for reminding people that there are other brass libraries as well. I was actually considering Project Sam Orchestral Brass classic for a moment last week. But I'll probably try my luck with Ark 1 instead.
 
Even in my current butthurt state over OT's big sales it has me a bit tempted. I'm not a fan of forced heterogeneous instrument combinations, however. It makes things considerably less flexible in many ways.

Is it "really" the front line of an Ark orchestra if I have forced heterogeneous combinations in almost every woodwind or brass setting?

Why not go for it and do a true Ark-style interpretation of more similar instruments, letting users make more of their own orchestration decisions? High winds, mid winds, and low winds with all the "power" stuff would have been pretty killer.

I have other solo instruments and small groups of brass that I can blend with the Arks reasonably well. So unless the demos or walkthrough truly sell how unique this library is, I'm probably not sold. I'm certainly never going to pay 549 Euros for it...
 
wrong thread but SF Brass walkthrough is out. I'm not the expert but sounds great....

I'm confused. No offense, but why do you post here a Spitfire library walkthrough when you're clearly aware of the fact that this thread is called "Orchestral Tools Metropolis Ark 4 - Elite Orchestral Forces"? Linking OT library walkthrough in the Spitfire thread wouldn't even cross my mind really. No big deal, just asking.
 
I'm confused. No offense, but why do you post here a Spitfire library walkthrough when you're clearly aware of the fact that this thread is called "Orchestral Tools Metropolis Ark 4 - Elite Orchestral Forces"? Linking OT library walkthrough in the Spitfire thread wouldn't even cross my mind really. No big deal, just asking.
Are you from Orchestral Tools? o_O
 

Veeery funny:) no I'm not and since you're asking I like and use products from both developers and I'm a big fan of both. And I wouldn't probably mind that much a link to any Albion walkthrough, but SF Brass is an entirely different beast with a different approach and purpose. But as I said it's not a big of a deal. I could've also ask if Britpack50 works for Spitfire but I just didn't feel like it.
 
I pretty much agree with what @jbuhler is saying on this page.

OT basically started a pre-order period with just a teaser.
So at this point we can only make assumptions. And I would be surprised if they increased the pre-order price before releasing an in-depth walkthrough.
And I also prefer a "walkthrough only" rather than a "demo only" pre-order period.

Its best to have both, but if I had to make a choice, it would be a walkthrough.
You get a more in-depth look at the sound of the individual patches/articulations.
And with a walkthrough video, we might also been able to get some info on their "Power Legato". (TBH, they should be more clear about what Power Legato is on their product page)
You can also sometimes even spot the cons of the library with walkthroughs, where with a single demo, you can only get a glimpse.
I'm not sure how many people could make a decision of paying $400 from a glimpse...

Don't get me wrong. I'm not hating on OT. I love some of their libraries.
I just don't like how they are doing it with the Ark4 pre-order period.
Just my personal humble opinion.
 
My only major concern is that OT had so many large libraries release in a very short period of time (Time Macro, Iconica Ensembles, Glory Days, now Ark 4) which is very unlike them that they would cut corners on Ark because it's already got a very dedicated userbase. I do hope I'm very wrong and the walkthrough absolutely wows me but the whole idea of this particular Ark seems to have gone in a very odd direction. I guess we'll see in a few days.
 
Speculation is fun, but there is really no urgency to purchase anything before a walk-through during the intro period.

yeah, I'm not spending a penny till I can see a walkthrough.

But (to quote my post), my main concern is this.
And I would be surprised if they increased the pre-order price before releasing an in-depth walkthrough.
I hope they keep the pre-order price at 349euros until we're able to see a walkthrough.
I'm really interested in how the individual patches sound on their own and what power legato is.
 
OT basically started a pre-order period with just a teaser.
So at this point we can only make assumptions. And I would be surprised if they increased the pre-order price before releasing an in-depth walkthrough.
And I also prefer a "walkthrough only" rather than a "demo only" pre-order period.
I'm sure they will release some walkthroughs and more demos before the pre-order period is over, but they cut it very close with the Glory Days walkthroughs and I suspect we'll see similar timing here. The big problem for me is that I'm just not yet seeing the concept holding this library together and it makes it hard for me to decide whether it will be a useful addition. I really need a lot more data.
 
OT’s marketing is definitely different compared to most companies. I’d love to have a walkthrough on the day of the trailer release, but I think the reason they don’t do it is because they want the word to spread and discussion to build around what the product could possibly be about. I do think they missed the mark on Glory Days where they uploaded the final part of the walkthrough on the day of release, but that’s quite atypical and I don’t expect that here.
 
I'm sure they will release some walkthroughs and more demos before the pre-order period is over, but they cut it very close with the Glory Days walkthroughs and I suspect we'll see similar timing here.
This is one thing that truly pisses me off about how some of these companies are doing things now and I hope OT sees this thread and takes the hint for future releases because it seems to be the same thing every time. Get your walkthrough done before you put it up for sale so we can see exactly what we're paying a substantial amount of money for rather than hoping we rely on the brand. In many cases when I see companies do the whole "walkthrough coming later" spiel, I end up asking myself what the company doesn't want us to see and hopes we spend the money before we see it. This is a practice that absolutely needs to stop. The minute a company asks a person to spend money, they need to show what we are spending money on rather than asking us to trust them. Especially when it comes down to the final day or so of special pricing.
 
The big problem for me is that I'm just not yet seeing the concept holding this library together and it makes it hard for me to decide whether it will be a useful addition. I really need a lot more data.
To me, the concept is:

-Instruments with full dynamic range, legato, staccs (previous Arks handicap each instrument, either with dynamics, no legato, or shorts but no longs). So more useful and self-contained, rather than having to go to Ark 1 for loud, Ark 2 for quiet, Ark 3 for shorts/repetitions.

-Chamber-ish strings - VLN1, VLA, VLC + CB, each with an emphasis on accents (martele, overpressure, upbeats, trills). Each with slurred stacc too!

-Blended winds/brass - I think the key to understanding this is that OT wants us to think of each of these as one new instrument, rather than a blend of x + y +z instruments. From their marketing: "All performed and mixed in such a way that the listener perceives them as a single sound." There are only so many wind and brass instruments they can sell us, which is why they might be trying to expand into selling these cocktails. The importance of the small section is so that it actually comes across as if it's from a single new instrument.

The choir sounds like Ark 2, but with shouts. Power staccato.

The minute a company asks a person to spend money, they need to show what we are spending money on rather than asking us to trust them.
Agreed. Also, please give Chris Siu a pre-release copy to do a video walkthrough while pre-release pricing is still available.
 
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To me, the concept is:

-Instruments with full dynamic range, legato, staccs (previous Arks handicap each instrument, either with dynamics, no legato, or shorts but no longs)

-Chamber-ish strings - VLN1, VLA, VLC + CB, each with an emphasis on accents (martele, overpressure, upbeats, trills). Each with slurred stacc too!
So is the idea supposed to be to use the front row players as the glue to hold Arks 1 and 2 together better? I mean the strings from Arks 1 and 2 have so many other issues that I don't see how this will accomplish that. That's not really a knock on the strings from Arks 1 and 2, it's just that they are limited (which is what you'd expect from a library that is not a dedicated string library). And I see something more like a very aggressive chamber sound, yielding the possibility, I suppose, of a kind of POWER DIVISI as a complement to Arks 1 and 2 and the POWER TUTTI you get from some of the Ark 3 multis. We'll see what they do with the softer dynamics.

Blended winds/brass - I think the key to understanding this is that OT wants us to think of these an new instruments, rather than a blend of x + y +z. From their marketing: "All performed and mixed in such a way that the listener perceives them as a single sound." There are only so many wind and brass instruments they can sell us, which is why they might be trying to expand into selling these cocktails. Of course, we'll need to hear them to see if they really do sound different. Currently, it's just a list.

Two big sounds lacking from the Arks so far were upper woodwinds and muted brass. So we kind of get that here in odd but intriguing combination, though I'm surprised they didn't follow the concept of the rest of the series and do large ensemble versions of flutes, clarinets, and oboes. They could have done some really interesting things with muted brass, which I think is generally neglected in sample libraries, but they were probably trying to avoid direct competition with their Berlin Brass muted brass. Still I would have welcomed a very aggressive muted ensemble brass.

The choir sounds like Ark 2, but with shouts.

Hopefully there is more coherence to the choir here than this and that it offers something usefully distinct from the choirs in Ark 1 and 2.
 
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