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Bunker Strings Vol. 2 - what would you like to see?

thesteelydane

Bunker Samples
If all goes well, I will be recording the next installment of Bunker Strings soon, and thought I’d ask if there is anything specific the community would be interested in? I have a bunch of ideas of course, and the principle will be the same - varying the texture by changing the ensemble size, which is not necessarily über realistic, but does use sampling to its fullest and most interesting potential, in my opinion.

So, with that in mind, here’s your chance to influence the creation of a new string library. Throw me your ideas, and it may become a reality! Think unusual string textures that haven’t already been sampled!

To the mods: feel free to move this to the commercial section if you feel it would be more appropriate!
 
Guitar style vibrato (by bending the string itself) you need some very strong fingers tho to do it on violin or viola but might be easier on a cello
 
I might speak nonsense, but what about using gut strings on those modern instruments, and try turning them into highly playable early instruments (using modern articulations)?... My favorite percussions are from Modwheel's Humdrum, and Dark ERA, which have calf skin drums that make them sounding extremely warm and deep. To my taste, a nice viella with gut strings will always sound more emotional than a screachy Stradivarius. The other side of "Epic".

https://www.johnsonstring.com/resources/choosing-strings/strings-types-gut-core.htm
 
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What about clusters where you can add each note? Seems like people have asking for that since all the string fx and symphobia came out. The ability to choose what notes and what attack the the notes have; not just a one shot string fx sample. That might be a bigger project...or maybe something you can start and add to over time.
 
Identifying gaps in CSS for me:

1.Donno what it has to do with a bunker, but I believe there's a market for realistic, playable string runs.

2. Sustains with multiple dynamic layers and varying (recorded) vibrato levels.
 
When sampling, you can also do things that would not be practically playable in real life. Bowing with weedwhacker line and super-sticky bass rosin, for example.

Also, this might take some advance practice, and you're probably not gonna have a bass with a high C string, but here's an "arco that almost sounds like pizz" technique.
 
Thank you for asking! Something I miss, both solo and for chamber ensemble, is, for example, what follows:

- Bowing over the bridge.
- Bowing very much sul tasto (or even crossing the left hand).
- Slow, marked bowing, like a quarter-note pulsation. The same, accelerando to trem, and the opposite.
- Fast, irregular bow changes.
- Bow scratches.

Of some of these articulations, there is something in some older libraries, but only for solo instruments. By recollection, there isn't other in more modern libraries.

Paolo
 
When sampling, you can also do things that would not be practically playable in real life.

That’s pretty much the entire ethos of Bunker Strings. I leave realism to other developers, I’m more interested in creating virtual instruments from real sources that are instruments in their own right. All the sounds in Bunker Strings are real - the way you can perform with them however, would be almost impossible to pull off in real life - that’s where I find sampling to be the most interesting and a creative art form in itself. I try to be an instrument maker in the virtual domain. A digital luthier of sorts...
 
Thanks all, some great suggestions here! Can't do measured anything really, it's outside the scope of this session and budget, and it's already been done by Spitfire in their EVO 3. Same goes for playable runs, I'm not particularly interested in "realistic" sampling, but rather in creating instruments that are built from real sources, but can do things you can't do in real life. The playable cluster is something that has been on my mind for awhile, and it fits nicely in with the vibe of Bunker Strings. Fast irregular bow changes is definitely also something that I'm interested in.
 
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