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Don´t want to get too off-topic but how dry they are? If there's any link or music with that kind of example would be great for me to decide about leaving or not SsS.

Here are the strings in a 'song' context. This was very quickly put together, something of a try-out for the strings. Now editing afterwards, just playing.

[AUDIOPLUS=https://vi-control.net/community/attachments/our-man-other-men-v1-mp3.19756/][/AUDIOPLUS]
 

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Here are the strings in a 'song' context. This was very quickly put together, something of a try-out for the strings. Now editing afterwards, just playing.

[AUDIOPLUS=https://vi-control.net/community/attachments/our-man-other-men-v1-mp3.19756/][/AUDIOPLUS]
And here's the same tune, with just the strings. I think they are pretty dry...

[AUDIOPLUS=https://vi-control.net/community/attachments/our-man-other-men-v1-just-strings-mp3.19757/][/AUDIOPLUS]
 

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  • Our man other men v1 just strings.mp3
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I am very happy with SSoS. Bought it in the last wishlist sale and it suits my needs perfectly. My needs are: small, warm, intimate strings in a pop/indie setting. I will not be writing any symphony soon, I just want lovely sounding strings. Some comments on this site mention the difficulty with vibrato, but I followed CH's advice and use the progresive articulations for my main lines. Bought SCS this winter when it was 50% off and with the pair I have all I need for strings. Though both SCS and SSoS are not dry, they are dry enough for me when using the close mics, especially SSoS.

That's the kind of versatility I'm talking about. Could you post some example of your work here? Even some seconds? That would be great.

I do lots of orchestral for licensing, but i work with artists too. I know that nothing substitutes a very good player in a very good room with a very good performance, but something that can do quite well on both words (orchestral and pop) is something that i really need in my line(s) of work.

To be fair, i have 8dio´s Intimate Studio Strings to fit this "quartet" need. They are great for chords and everything, but on solos, honestly, i only liked their bass.
 
Don´t want to get too off-topic but how dry they are? If there's any link or music with that kind of example would be great for me to decide about leaving or not SsS.

I would characterize them, vis-a-vis dryness as “not dry”, at least compared to something like CH. So if you need dry, Chris Hein is a much better bet.

But one of the things I love about them is not just the reverb you get from the wetness - although I personally love the AIR Lyndhurst sound (together with whatever else it is in the recording and engineering and musicianship whatever else it take to get this sound). It’s assist also the presence, or dimension, or spacializations or something, especially when you mix the tree and close mics.

While i’m Sure nearly everyone’s is well tired of me sharing these silly little noodles, they give a sense of this space (tree + ~ 50% close) as well as the dynamics:






And a fun mock-up with with the virtuosic vl:

 
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And here's the same tune, with just the strings. I think they are pretty dry...

[AUDIOPLUS=https://vi-control.net/community/attachments/our-man-other-men-v1-just-strings-mp3.19757/][/AUDIOPLUS]

Wow...thanks!

I liked.

And congratulations for your piece! Very interesting!!
 
Pondering over LCOS and/or AltSS -- have a hunch either/both could be really fun/useful or rather disappointing. Hmm.
 
I would characterize them, vis-a-vis dryness as “not dry”, at least compared to something like CH. So if you need dry, Chris Hein is a much better bet.

But one of the things I love about them is not just the reverb you get from the wetness - although I personally love the AIR Lyndhurst sound (together with whatever else it is in the recording and engineering and musicianship whatever else it take to get this sound). It’s assist also the presence, or dimension, or spacializations or something, especially when you mix the tree and close mics.

While i’m Sure nearly everyone’s is well tired of me sharing these silly little noodles, they give a sense of this space (tree + ~ 50% close) as well as the dynamics:






And a fun with with the virtuosic vl:



Thank you for that!!

If i understood correctly, this is not even the 100% close mic, right? Its already dry enough for me.

I don't expect bone dry when it comes to strings. Dry enough, with high definition, detail on passages, expressiveness, already fit my needs.

These "performance vibratos" is the ones you control or this is another name for their "progressive vibrato"?
 
Thank you for that!!

If i understood correctly, this is not even the 100% close mic, right? Its already dry enough for me.

I don't expect bone dry when it comes to strings. Dry enough, with high definition, detail on passages, expressiveness, already fit my needs.

These "performance vibratos" is the ones you control or this is another name for their "progressive vibrato"?

The above are quite wet - lots of tree some close (I find to really get the sound I love out of it I really need at leas some of both). And also a bit of additional Valhalla room reverb (I might have used the ambient mics to give it that tail, but I just don’t have the system resources). CORRECTION - I think it’s actually closer to 50% tree 100% close (+ external reverb)

“Performance vibrato” is actually a reference to a little script I wrote to automate the vibrato - the script changes vibrato, I think it’s something like 400 times across the 4 instruments even within the first 2 of those little pieces, so within the idiom that the “performance vibrato” script infers based on cc1, it saves you a lot of messing around with cc21 (a lot of the initial negative reaction to the lib focused on the vibrato - including some of my own early demos, before i’d got my head around the vibrato and cc21). There are progressive vibrato longs, which have much smoother progressive vibrato, though obviously you have no control over when you switch from vib to non vib, and the virtuosic Vl integrates this into the legatos (though it’s not used in the above demos).

As mentioned, this library does have a terrible plonkability. The downside of being able to craft the arcs it’s that it also lets you plonk in some truly horrendously unidiomatic lines, especially if you don’t vary the vibrato. It a very different approach form, say CSSS or the Embertone Joshua Bell (which I also consider as best in class libraries) which have superb plonkability - but at the expense of much less ability to craft the arcs. That said, once you get the hang of it (especially the vibrato) the playability is excellent - the above (except the Part mock up) are just my hamfisted piano playing in real time, with only a few tweaks after the fact.


So I completely understand how someone who passingly messes around with it for a bit would come away with a negative impression. But it is in fact, absolutely unbeatable within its own sweet spots. I I find it really painful in fact to go from working within SSoS on lines suited to its sweet spots, to even something as amazing as the Joshua Bell which feels lumbering and inexpressive in comparison - although the converse is of course also true. It’s all about the sweet spots.

The question of course, is what sweet spots, of all the possible sweet spots of solo strings libraries, do you most care about.
 
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As for string quartets. Well, mocking up Beethoven string quartets ... is only going to end it tears. Sacconi, or something like CH is probably your best bet there (but it’s still only ever going to end it tears).

My own aspirations however are closer to something along the lines of Jane Antonia Cornish’s “In silence” or Caroline Shaw’s “Orangery”. And while I’m not saying that any sample lib is ever going to approach the nuances of the performances on these quartets, I think that between SsS and AltSS ... well I’ll let you know once I start writing anything approaching this level of brilliance...
 
I think I have my list done.

Scandi
Studio orchestra
Bohemian
Maverick
Orchestral Swarm
Sound of Dust 1
Sound of Dust 2

Can't afford all of these and what I do get will depend on how rich I feel on the 6th. Kind of thinking, depending on discount, I may go for Bohemian, Orchestral Swarm, and Sound of Dust 2.

Any of these stand out as great or terrible?
 
Here's my takeaway from what i could see (hear) from videos, demos and this thread.

These are among the best solo strings on the market imho. I´m pretty sure that, with knowledge and good programming you can make both work well.

I've heard that SsS is more orchestral / cinematic oriented, to be used on top of Spitfire libraries, but i can´t deny that this tone is awesome for pop and intimate stuff too. Don't judge me! I just like it for everything from what i´ve heard.

On the other hand, i feel that Hein is a lot more flexible and tweakable (and has more instruments), but the "default" tone, at least from what i´ve heard, seems pretty classic-oriented to me, but the fact that its so flexible and made to work with anything, makes it not a problem at all. I like the attention to the smallest detail this library has and its vibrato page is awesome.

Both are Kontakt and NKS, which is a nice bonus for me (Komplete Kontrol 49 here).

The fact that i already have SCS, its cheaper (going even cheaper in a few days) then Hein and i liked the "default" tone more, makes me want to choose SsS.

And the fact that Hein seems more flexible, with more instrument options and its very dry to work well with any library and any project, makes me want to choose Hein.

At the end of the day, is kind of Brazil x Argentina (football / soccer - for some - analogy! Sorry, brazilian here, so...). Both are great teams with big stars and championships. There's simply not a definitive answer about who is better...

Due the opportunity, i´ll go with SsS for now. If it doesn't solve all my problems, i´ll pray for a Black Friday deal with Hein to get it too.

My big thanks to all of you for the tips and patience to read all this. lol
 
I think I have my list done.

Scandi
Studio orchestra
Bohemian
Maverick
Orchestral Swarm
Sound of Dust 1
Sound of Dust 2

Can't afford all of these and what I do get will depend on how rich I feel on the 6th. Kind of thinking, depending on discount, I may go for Bohemian, Orchestral Swarm, and Sound of Dust 2.

Any of these stand out as great or terrible?
No bummers there. And I am a BIG fan of Sounddust! Good choice. Only thing I do not like with Sounddust is that it lacks NKS-compatibility. Good luck with your choices!
 
Here's my takeaway from what i could see (hear) from videos, demos and this thread.

These are among the best solo strings on the market imho. I´m pretty sure that, with knowledge and good programming you can make both work well.

I've heard that SsS is more orchestral / cinematic oriented, to be used on top of Spitfire libraries, but i can´t deny that this tone is awesome for pop and intimate stuff too. Don't judge me! I just like it for everything from what i´ve heard.

On the other hand, i feel that Hein is a lot more flexible and tweakable (and has more instruments), but the "default" tone, at least from what i´ve heard, seems pretty classic-oriented to me, but the fact that its so flexible and made to work with anything, makes it not a problem at all. I like the attention to the smallest detail this library has and its vibrato page is awesome.

Both are Kontakt and NKS, which is a nice bonus for me (Komplete Kontrol 49 here).

The fact that i already have SCS, its cheaper (going even cheaper in a few days) then Hein and i liked the "default" tone more, makes me want to choose SsS.

And the fact that Hein seems more flexible, with more instrument options and its very dry to work well with any library and any project, makes me want to choose Hein.

At the end of the day, is kind of Brazil x Argentina (football / soccer - for some - analogy! Sorry, brazilian here, so...). Both are great teams with big stars and championships. There's simply not a definitive answer about who is better...

Due the opportunity, i´ll go with SsS for now. If it doesn't solve all my problems, i´ll pray for a Black Friday deal with Hein to get it too.

My big thanks to all of you for the tips and patience to read all this. lol

Small correction - checking my original files, I thing those noodles above might have been closer to 50% tree and 100% close (plus external reverb) ... can’t be completely completely certain what it was when I rendered it ...though happy to render an example of tree vs close if you feel you need a further example.
 
At the end of the day, is kind of Brazil x Argentina (football / soccer - for some - analogy! Sorry, brazilian here, so...). Both are great teams with big stars and championships. There's simply not a definitive answer about who is better...


Good analogy. Which makes some of the arguments that it can only ever be Argentina have a certain “Hand of God” air about them - or is that too English an (abuse of) analogy?
 
Small correction - checking my original files, I thing those noodles above might have been closer to 50% tree and 100% close (plus external reverb) ... can’t be completely completely certain what it was when I rendered it ...though happy to render an example of tree vs close if you feel you need a further example.

Thank you for all the support! I saw a video where Paul shows the close mics. Of course, there's some room there, but nothing that really bothers me.
 
Meanwhile, my own wishlist now reads:

EDNA Earth + Kinematik
The Grange
Spitfire Studio Orchestra, though, with all the orchestral stuff I already have from Spitfire (mainly strings (SCS and Solo, but also WW and Brass in Albion V and BHCT) and NI (Kontakt factory library, Symphony series light) this will be a very luxury purchase. It's alluring because of its dry, everything in its right place attitude, though...
Martyn Ware
DC Noisemaker
Alternative Solo Strings (already have the Artisan Violin and Cello, so should be 'cheap')
Ambient Guitars (not wishlist, but upgrade from having Enigma 1).

Any advices as to NOT to buy any of the above? ;)
 
I am on the fence with the Studio series.

How many dynamic layers does the Spitfire Studio Woodwinds (longs and legatos) have? How about the Brass? I couldn’t fund this info anywhere so I am asking owners of these libs...

The symphonic Series, for example, otherwise a good sounding library package, has too few layers to be used in certain situations. But I wonder if Studio series library is just as limited.
 
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