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Offset , overlap , is it normal that it's a hassle

darkneo57

Member
hi, I'm french 34 yo, piano teacher, it's been about six months since I started computer music, I wrote an orchestral epic music that I'm about to finish ( i hope ). I subscribed to the cloud of eastwest so I currently use hollywood strings, HW brass, piano, stormdrum 2 & 3.

I had a lot of problems with the strings I have encountered a lot of problems for strings regarding note offset. Also after a while I understood that I had to overlap the notes for the sustained patches. I spent almost a month calculating the negative offset of each instrument V1, V2, viola etc, and and I set my DAW with the values( Unfortunately I am a perfectionist) . Despite this, some notes are not on time and I had to replace a number myself with the mouse. Same for legato patches, I find that it is not really functional without manually adjusting the notes. I think it's really a hassle. Is this normal? Is it because Eastwest is pretty complex? I heard that spitfire symphonic strings, cinematic studio strings, and cinematic strings 2 are much more functional, are they?

Thank you very much, I'm beginner and i worked hard but I find it's really a hassle compared to writing a score for a real orchestra. (unfortunately, I'm not rich or famous enough to have a haha orchestra ^^) :)

thanks fr all
 
You will have to manually postdate the notes of almost all samplelibraries on some instruments. Especially with legato patches. So this is not an East West problem.
The Hollywood Strings are complex, but also very flexible. It just takes time to "understand" the sounds.

Maybe it's because of the way you play. If you come from a piano, working with orchestral instruments requires a different way of playing. moreover, legato and sustain strings often have a delay, a delay that has to be compensated in the daw. In the beginning it takes a little practice to play live and each patch has its own particularities that you have to find out first.

I find patches that have too few layers hard to play. especially if they are legato or portamento patches. but with time you know how to do it right (exceptions confirm the rule).
Overlapping of notes is also different with each manufacturer to act.

I think the hoolywood strings are very playable, but everyone has their own opinion and experience.

Performance Samples strings for example have a very long delay, but sound excellent when they fit.
Musical Samples Soaring Strings are more playable in timing.
 
thank you for your answer

If you come from a piano, working with orchestral instruments requires a different way of playing. moreover, legato and sustain strings often have a delay, a delay that has to be compensated in the daw

I put delays in my daw for each track. Indeed, I am a pianist but at the conservatory of music I have a few years of orchestration and music writing, I even talked about the articulations with a violin teacher I know, but the VST has really nothing to do with it, I suspected that it was an imitation of acoustic instruments and that it would have its limits, but I didn't think I would have to fight for the notes to be simply on the beat, or fight for a legato note to be slurred with a sustain note without the sound of the sustain note becoming mediocre after 1.6s... ( i used modwheel, like a beginner but i used ) I think I've improved a lot, but still I find it's a hassle to simply articulate the notes as they should be, and that the notes fall on time, like in a score. ( I like VST, it's a great opportunity for a stranger to write orchestral and other music, and maybe one day to become "famous", but it's hard).

Thank you very much.
 
Hollywood Strings is harder to work with because you have to piece together performances from separate tracks, where Kontakt libraries like Spitfire, Orch Tools, Cinesamples, use keyswitches to switch articulations, which can take some time to get use to, but it does become quicker than working with Play. There there is Performance Samples or Music Sampling where the shorts and longs can be simply played, but cannot do every articulation. So everything has a downside. HS can get a nice sound, it just takes a bit more time.
 
There there is Performance Samples or Music Sampling where the shorts and longs can be simply played, but cannot do every articulation. So everything has a downside. HS can get a nice sound, it just takes a bit more time.
What I really like about the Performance and Musical Samples is the way they are programmed. The most important ways of playing without having keyswitches is already a fine thing and I wish more manufacturers would put on this concept. Performance Samples ABP Legacy ist the best free Brass lib and makes many expensive shopping libs look pale.
I'm not a big fan of keyswitches and I prefer to play several tracks with different articulations. Maybe that's why I'm satisfied with the Hollywood Strings, especially since there are too many possibilities to display them with keyswitches.
 
Thank you for your answers.
as I mentioned above, even using two separate tracks, one with the legato articulation and one with the sustain articulation, I didn't succeed to slur a legato patch note with a note from the sustain patch in a realistic way. Also, the notes of the legato patches deform after a while because it seems to me that they are not intended for this purpose, so it is strange that we can't slur a legato note with a sustain note, not to mention the note offsets and overlaps that we have to do manually.
 
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