jbuhler
Senior Member
I have until Jan. 27 to decide. Certainly won't make the decision to buy until after the new year. But, yeah, I'll most likely cave...
Orchestral Tools Metropolis Ark 4 - Elite Orchestral Forces
- Thread starter Fry777
- Start date
That was for The walkthroughs.....my download crashed during the night.....just restarting....12Mbs ....still 6 hours. to wait.......ahhhhhhhhhh
Emmanuel Rousseau
Senior Member
Ruffian Price
Active Member
Is there detailed information about the relative mic positions anywhere? The walkthrough videos mentioned some, but there's nothing in the manual. This looks like a good library to experiment with object-based/ambisonic mixing (I'm thinking tree+srnd for the 4.0 bed, AB with additional reverb and predelay for heights, spot mics for direct signals), but at this point there's too much guesswork involved. The Close I/Close II mic difference seems to change between sections (like in BHCT, actually) but I have no idea what exactly does.
(Goddamn that full orchestra marcato patch is fantastic for sketching)
(Goddamn that full orchestra marcato patch is fantastic for sketching)
SO.......
Been playing for an hour.....
What can i say.... :
The sound is clear, soft and agressive. I mean very agressive.
The strings.....chamber strings. With the 2 close mics you can get that chamber sound.
The strings power legato is fantastic. Really. Violins, violas ( vibrato!!!) and my favorite : 2cellos and 1 bass ...Ahhhhhh. This sound !!! Ohhhhhh ! Soft ...to ....aggggressssive .
The power legato has a mix of legato and portamento that makes things living ..
The choir : women.....you can see them in front of you...i mean, like the other sections, the sound is detailed. You hear there are 3 women. Not 10 or 20... They go from intimate to powerful...
The men : Operatic! That's it.
Love the shouts..add percussions and you go barbarian !
The horn mixes and trumpet mixes have the best legatos of the ark series. You can play those horn lines with upfront legatos.
The percussions :
Love the tuned toms and timpani. This is a great sound addition to the many percs of MA3 and the sound is unique and powerful.
The marimba xylo and piano mix has The sound. Unique. Rich. Clear.
Now, for the woodwinds mixes, it is what was missing in the other arks : high end winds. The high range of the winds.
Love the mixes, it creates unique sounds...you can tweak with the different mics and make some tunes more prominent than others.....
The articulations have many upbeats as it was in MA3,but more detailed by sections.
The martele and overpressure are so so for my taste.....
The trill orchestrator is new to me : you can trill from HT WT to 5th....And there are ....10 sections of it....and you can play more than 2 notes.....Interesting...
And there are great multis as it was the case in MA3.
All in all it is a great addition to three ARK series.
The Chamber strings, the brass / winds mixes, the high range of the winds was missing.
I think that with the 4 arks, we have the complete Orchestra that ranges from soft, clear, chamber size to powerful, epic ,action, power.
Happy to have the four arks. Thanks to Orchestral Tools.
With this series , OT rules !!!
Been playing for an hour.....
What can i say.... :
The sound is clear, soft and agressive. I mean very agressive.
The strings.....chamber strings. With the 2 close mics you can get that chamber sound.
The strings power legato is fantastic. Really. Violins, violas ( vibrato!!!) and my favorite : 2cellos and 1 bass ...Ahhhhhh. This sound !!! Ohhhhhh ! Soft ...to ....aggggressssive .
The power legato has a mix of legato and portamento that makes things living ..
The choir : women.....you can see them in front of you...i mean, like the other sections, the sound is detailed. You hear there are 3 women. Not 10 or 20... They go from intimate to powerful...
The men : Operatic! That's it.
Love the shouts..add percussions and you go barbarian !
The horn mixes and trumpet mixes have the best legatos of the ark series. You can play those horn lines with upfront legatos.
The percussions :
Love the tuned toms and timpani. This is a great sound addition to the many percs of MA3 and the sound is unique and powerful.
The marimba xylo and piano mix has The sound. Unique. Rich. Clear.
Now, for the woodwinds mixes, it is what was missing in the other arks : high end winds. The high range of the winds.
Love the mixes, it creates unique sounds...you can tweak with the different mics and make some tunes more prominent than others.....
The articulations have many upbeats as it was in MA3,but more detailed by sections.
The martele and overpressure are so so for my taste.....
The trill orchestrator is new to me : you can trill from HT WT to 5th....And there are ....10 sections of it....and you can play more than 2 notes.....Interesting...
And there are great multis as it was the case in MA3.
All in all it is a great addition to three ARK series.
The Chamber strings, the brass / winds mixes, the high range of the winds was missing.
I think that with the 4 arks, we have the complete Orchestra that ranges from soft, clear, chamber size to powerful, epic ,action, power.
Happy to have the four arks. Thanks to Orchestral Tools.
With this series , OT rules !!!
Go there :https://www.helpdesk.orchestraltools.com/index.html
Or there :
(broken link removed)
jbuhler
Senior Member
Good to know! Keep filling us in as you compose with it. I'm especially interested to hear how working with the peculiar woodwind combinations is in context. Clearly from the demos you can get them to sound good. It's just not clear to me if you get there by feeling like you are fighting the library and doing what it wants to do.
Ruffian Price
Active Member
Oh snap! I always ignored that link, assuming it's just contact information - this is a fantastic resource!
e: the Mixer View page doesn't seem to be updated for Ark 4 though - the instrument-specific perspectives are only mentioned once:
There's quite a lot more info about older OT libraries though, so I assume this will be updated in time.
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TRKStudios
TK
As a fan of OT and owner of many of their libraries, I've spent quite a bit of time with it since last evening's release and some thoughts to help others in their decision:
-Strings are definitely the highlight of this library. The staccato's & power legatos will be great to layer with the other Arks to add that much sought after level of detail.
-The lower strings seem to get very bass heavy/muddy in parts but nothing a bit of post EQ won't fix.
-Choir is very useful, although if you own Ark 1 & Ark 2, you aren't really gaining much here. The male "operatic" power legato is very well done, but a bit overpowering when combined in the full patch with the women. On it's own though, it will be useful when that style is needed.
-The legatos of the woodwind & brass sections are nice, but there seems to be many many places in several of the patches where the transitions sound like grace notes :-/ and this happens in between many intervals. The regular legatos as well don't seem as smooth as they do say in Ark 2. The power legatos are nice, but for fast passages they may not be the best choice.
-The other articulations like over pressures and marteles sound good in concept, but I feel they won't find a way into any of my compositions here. If you own the previous three Arks, you won't find much excitement in what's provided articulation wise. A few "oh, that might be cool if I ever have to write something like that" moments, but that's about it.
-The tuned timpani and toms is great and will definitely be heavily used! Same with the Marimba, Xylo and Piano combo... such a great sound!! Not much other percussion standouts here that you don't have in the other Arks.
Overall, as an owner of all the other Arks, this one is a bit underwhelming I must say. The strings as others have stated are definitely the standout here, but for the price, just have to ask yourself if that level of detail layering is worth it. I really hope OT decides to go back through this one and address the several bugs with the transitions of notes in the legatos (not to mention the entire low end shorts missing from the brass multi) and release a fix. Don't know if they rushed this one compared to the other Arks, but just doesn't feel the same. Some standouts in this library, but a bit over shadowed by other things that are tough to ignore.
Hope this all helps!
-Strings are definitely the highlight of this library. The staccato's & power legatos will be great to layer with the other Arks to add that much sought after level of detail.
-The lower strings seem to get very bass heavy/muddy in parts but nothing a bit of post EQ won't fix.
-Choir is very useful, although if you own Ark 1 & Ark 2, you aren't really gaining much here. The male "operatic" power legato is very well done, but a bit overpowering when combined in the full patch with the women. On it's own though, it will be useful when that style is needed.
-The legatos of the woodwind & brass sections are nice, but there seems to be many many places in several of the patches where the transitions sound like grace notes :-/ and this happens in between many intervals. The regular legatos as well don't seem as smooth as they do say in Ark 2. The power legatos are nice, but for fast passages they may not be the best choice.
-The other articulations like over pressures and marteles sound good in concept, but I feel they won't find a way into any of my compositions here. If you own the previous three Arks, you won't find much excitement in what's provided articulation wise. A few "oh, that might be cool if I ever have to write something like that" moments, but that's about it.
-The tuned timpani and toms is great and will definitely be heavily used! Same with the Marimba, Xylo and Piano combo... such a great sound!! Not much other percussion standouts here that you don't have in the other Arks.
Overall, as an owner of all the other Arks, this one is a bit underwhelming I must say. The strings as others have stated are definitely the standout here, but for the price, just have to ask yourself if that level of detail layering is worth it. I really hope OT decides to go back through this one and address the several bugs with the transitions of notes in the legatos (not to mention the entire low end shorts missing from the brass multi) and release a fix. Don't know if they rushed this one compared to the other Arks, but just doesn't feel the same. Some standouts in this library, but a bit over shadowed by other things that are tough to ignore.
Hope this all helps!
Parsifal666
I don't even own a DAW, I'm just a troll.
It does. I think I mentioned, I happen to very much like the strings in Ark 2, and have a ton of string libraries besides (not least of which the EWH, which has plenty of great and useful articulations...don't let the price tag fool you, people). I'm good this time.
Zoot_Rollo
Throbbing Member
at first pass, i'll agree with this.
committed, though, i will find use - still high quality sound, with its imperfections.
jbuhler
Senior Member
Agree. User demos would be most welcome!
Thank @TRKStudios - this confirms some of my suspicions after watching the walkthroughs. Feeling relieved - was struggling to justify cost vs usage and it sounds like this was the right decision (for me)
dodecabilly
New Member
I've just installed it, and my first impression is very positive. But, this is my first OT library, majority of my orchestral stuff is from Spitfire, and I was not used to this HUUUGE sound, nor I could compare it to other OT libraries. I am very happy with mic positions, close mic is actually useful on it's own. There are patches that I cannot imagine using much (like the operatic male voices) but overall sound is really impressive... Even my wife was "Whoa, what was that? Sounds like Star Wars!" Only complaint so far - I wish it had more round robins for short articulations... Hopefully I will have some time to make a demo. To conclude - I am quite happy with my first OT purchase.
AlexanderSchiborr
Senior Member
The legatos who produces some swingy extra notes here and there is (I guess done on purpose) because imo it is more musical. The very strong and fast dialing in vibrato is exactly what I love for my writing but I can understand that some people who use strings are pads won´t dig it that much. However from my first impression and what I used today, some specials in there.
1. Flute / Piccolo Power legato (yikes the name is hilarous) but the sound and musicality and expression you get is really something I dont´hear in any other libraries I have. Though this is a rough take I already love that sound, short snippet and excerpt on a production track:
2. The high power legato strings (lol...captain power..and the violins of the future) and tuba / Trombone / CB combination ( I think that was it?) is pretty descent and a ballkicker and can be used in contexts like that as well:
However, as I am busy I will explore MA4 while workin on my commercial projects and let you know more..
1. Flute / Piccolo Power legato (yikes the name is hilarous) but the sound and musicality and expression you get is really something I dont´hear in any other libraries I have. Though this is a rough take I already love that sound, short snippet and excerpt on a production track:
2. The high power legato strings (lol...captain power..and the violins of the future) and tuba / Trombone / CB combination ( I think that was it?) is pretty descent and a ballkicker and can be used in contexts like that as well:
However, as I am busy I will explore MA4 while workin on my commercial projects and let you know more..
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jbuhler
Senior Member
Thanks for the examples. They are most welcome! The flute/piccs sounded pretty restrained there. They sound good for the passage, I just mean that I was expecting something a bit rougher and forced for POWER LEGATO. In fact, the woodwinds in the second example accompanying the illustration of the big low end struck me as more interesting.
