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Old 06-27-2010, 01:51 PM   #1
Walt_43
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Default Orchestral sample library

Hi all,

I only bought Reaper recently, so I'm new to this forum. I just thought I'd see if anyone can help me make a decision on a sample library.

I'm looking to buy a new orchestral library and have seen a thread or two on this site discussing Garritan GPO 4 vs EWQLSO. I want to buy one of these (having used the sounds of a Korg N5-EX for years), but my problem is: in most of the demos of GPO4, the strings sound like General MIDI. Yet I've heard demos of EWQLSO exhibit the same problem. Also, I've heard that the latter is very system-hungry. I'm running a 32 bit OS so the best I'm gonna manage is 3.25 GB RAM (that's all XP pro will see).

Would much appreciate if anyone has any pointers. Can the ensemble strings in GPO4 sound decent? Can EWQLSO Gold Complete work reasonably well on a PC with a 3.32 gHz processor and 3.25 GB RAM?

I was told I might need to freeze or bounce tracks, but I believe Reaper can't freeze tracks - is this correct?

Apart from that, I presume both will work in Reaper?

Thanks,
Walt
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Old 06-27-2010, 02:02 PM   #2
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Both will work with Reaper.

EWQLSO sounds much better than GPO, and both most certainly don't sound like GM (btw, GM doesn't have its own sound at all! )

You gotta know stuff about orchestration and how to mix such things in order to make them sound realistic and true to life.

PLAY software version 2 got much less system hungry. However, it will still need a good CPU and as much RAM as you can give to it.

Reaper can render tracks as stems, which is sort of like freezing. You can render a track and then bypass FX processing, so that instance of VSTs won't consume CPU.
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Old 06-27-2010, 03:18 PM   #3
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Hi EvilDragon,

Thanks for the reply. Very interesting to hear that EWQLSO is better than GPO. This is what I had imagined, but it wasn't always obvious from listening to the demos.

EWQLSO sounds like the one to go for, but I can't afford to upgrade my system, so I may have to get used to rendering my tracks (thanks for that info about Reaper, by the way).

As for GM: yeah I know it varies from soundcard to soundcard and keyboard to keyboard, but my experience is that the designated sounds were generally lacklustre. :-)

Thanks for the info. You've answered what a search on Google couldn't. ;-)

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 06-27-2010, 03:26 PM   #4
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If you go for EWQLSO Silver Complete, you can't go wrong. It's VERY cheap currently since there's 50% sale going on at EastWest ($137.50 with iLok included!)

You get the most essential articulations with Silver. If you need more, you can always bump it up a notch and get Gold Complete after you upgrade your machine.

I can testify that Silver really isn't that big of a system hog. It has the basic stuff you need to do some nice orchestrations. I would highly recommend it considering your situation.
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Old 06-27-2010, 03:34 PM   #5
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That's a very good point about upgrading later on if I get a better system. Maybe you're right and Silver is the best one to go with. Is Silver as good as GPO4 or would you say all the EWQLSO editions are better?

I see Thomann are selling it for €77 (without the i-Lok, which is another €38):
http://www.thomann.de/ie/east_west_s...er_edition.htm

At least I wouldn't be too worried about it grinding my system to a halt. Does Silver come with Play as well?

Thanks, EvilDragon!
Walt
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Old 06-27-2010, 03:51 PM   #6
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Yup, Silver cannot run without PLAY. Make sure you update to PLAY 2, the most recent version.

Now GPO... I dunno, I didn't "gel" with it well, it has its uses probably, but not for me, so I can't recommend it.

On the other hand, EastWest will give you that cinematic sound out of the box. Which is slightly limiting if you wanna use it in pop productions, for example.

The only library that's the most flexible to mold into anything would probably be Vienna Symphonic Library. Those are dry samples without any room or panning built into them. You hold the key to how those will sound. However, I've mostly heard Vienna do classical and cinematic stuff as well.

Miroslav Philharmonik seems to be used a lot in pop/rock productions.
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Old 06-27-2010, 04:01 PM   #7
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Thank you very much for all this advice, EvilDragon. I think I've made my decision and will go for EWQLSO Silver. I don't think I'm ready for dealing with banks of different articulations so it might be a good starting point for me. I have heard of the Viennas and they're excellent, but they're also expensive and, I believe, system-hungry.

I will mostly be using it for soundtrack type stuff, as opposed to pop/rock tracks, so from what you've said, Silver will suit me perfectly.

Much appreciate your advice.

Thanks,
Walt
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Old 06-27-2010, 04:11 PM   #8
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Glad I could help.

I'm still partial to old Kontakt versions of EastWest libraries, since Kontakt proved to be a more stable, less resource hungry and reliable sample engine than PLAY. However, it seems that EastWest picked up the pace a bit and straightened themselves out a bit. Some people still have problems with their sample engine, so take all this with a healthy dose of awareness. If anything bad happens, try registering on their forums.

Cheers, and enjoy!
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Old 06-27-2010, 04:14 PM   #9
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I hear ya, EvilDragon.

Once again: thanks! :-) And I'll let you know how I get on (doubtless I'll have tons of questions).

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 06-28-2010, 11:19 AM   #10
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Ordered Silver, an i-Lok, and some extra RAM today. Thanks again, EvilDragon!

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 06-28-2010, 11:56 AM   #11
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Good luck and enjoy! I sincerely hope you won't have any hard bumps down the road
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Old 06-28-2010, 01:41 PM   #12
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Heh heh, thanks. I've come to expect bumps with PCs over the years, so I'll just keep the head down and battle through them.

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 07-01-2010, 12:45 PM   #13
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Hi ED and Walt,
I'm interested in EWQLSO silver too.
can you tell me please - I've loooked at the EW site (soundsonline.com?) and cannot understand which instruments are included in silver - there is a HUGE difference in silver/gold?

Is it right that you only have the instruments noted with a † on the articulations page? http://www.soundsonline.com/EastWest...pr-EW-177.html

e.g. in '18 violins' you only have 'Pizzicato Round-Robin x3 †'
in 'Solo violin' you have 'QLegato †' and 'Sustained Vibrato Hard †'

etc.

also, is 'Steinway B † ‡' a full set of steinway piano samples?

Thanks for your help.
keys.

Last edited by keys; 07-01-2010 at 12:52 PM. Reason: add piano question
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Old 07-01-2010, 04:09 PM   #14
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Hi Keys,

I was just as confused as you and I wrote to East West about a month ago telling them I was considering either Silver or Garritan GPO4. They never replied. The site needs a lot of work, but given how many products they have, I imagine that won't be happening soon. But it's very hard to be certain what version of EWQLSO contains which sounds.

From what I can see, I think the cross the denotes the 'articulations' Silver has, as opposed to the instruments. That said, Silver is stripped down and doubtless has only a fraction of the instruments. Apart from getting advice on this forum, what swung it for me was hearing demos on YouTube. This one demonstrates that there are some decent sounds in there and a good variety, even if some still sound synthetic (oh, and ignore the 'video'):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wZ0KEwmu7c8

I'm still waiting on my delivery to arrive from Thomann, but I shall report back when it arrives.

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 07-01-2010, 04:34 PM   #15
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Silver has a decent amount of articulations, for starters you won't feel robbed down. Yes, it has a piano as well, but I'm not particularly fond of that sound, YMMV.
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Old 07-01-2010, 04:45 PM   #16
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Thanks for the replies. I'll wait to hear what you find too Walt.
i dloaded the free demo and it does sound really good
Keys
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Old 07-01-2010, 04:50 PM   #17
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That's good to hear EvilDragon.

You're welcome, keys. And do you mind me asking where you found the free demo? I heard someone else mention this but I don't recall it jumping out at me on any of the websites.

Thanks a mill.
Walt
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Old 07-01-2010, 04:52 PM   #18
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That promotion is ended now...
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Old 07-01-2010, 04:58 PM   #19
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Ah I see. Fair enough. How much did EW give you in the free demo?
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Old 07-01-2010, 05:01 PM   #20
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3 GB of samples, can't recall on top of my head, but there were around 20-25 instrument files.
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Old 07-01-2010, 05:07 PM   #21
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Cool, thanks, EvilDragon.

Well, if they sound good, keys, it bodes well for the full library! :-)

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 08-01-2010, 09:30 AM   #22
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Hi all,

I recently received EWQLSO Silver (thanks, EvilDragon!) from Thomann and am using it with Reaper. I just have one question (for now). When I create a virtual instrument track in Reaper, it gives me a list of effects and instruments, from which I select East West Symphonic Orchestra. This is fine for the first track, but do I have to load an instance of Silver for every Virtual instrument track I create? Can't I have just one instance of Silver loaded, in which I assign several orchestral instruments to different MIDI channels?

Any help you can give would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Walt

P.S. Keys, I'm still not sure which instruments from East West's website are included in Silver. All I can say is that there are quite a few and they sound amazing to my ear.
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Old 08-01-2010, 10:10 AM   #23
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You should be able to use multiple instrument outputs from one PLAY interface. You can load different EWI files, and assign them to various outputs (you have 18 mono outputs in PLAY, so, 9 stereo channels), it's described in the manual.

Then you need to activate those inputs in Reaper, which I hope you know how to do if you worked with multichannel VSTi before. If not, I'll fill you in on that if necessary.

You can then create individual tracks for each plugin (stereo) output, which would then receive that particular sound, for example solo violin on ch1-2, pizzicato section on ch3-4, timpani on 5-6, etc.
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Old 08-02-2010, 05:04 AM   #24
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Hi EvilDragon,

Thanks for the info. I haven't worked with multichannel VSTis before, but I'll see if I can work it out from what you said. I've downloaded the Reaper User Guide and will get the EWQLSO manual off the Silver DVDs. If I have any questions after that, I'll drop you a line.

I presume that if you use up your 9 stereo channels and want more, you then simply insert another virtual instrument track to get 9 more?

Once again, thanks a million for your prompt and invaluable advice.

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 08-02-2010, 05:19 AM   #25
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Walt_43 View Post
I presume that if you use up your 9 stereo channels and want more, you then simply insert another virtual instrument track to get 9 more?
Indeed.
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Old 08-02-2010, 08:13 AM   #26
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Excellent, thanks again.

Walt
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Old 08-02-2010, 02:18 PM   #27
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Hi EvilDragon,

Went to the studio today but forgot my iLok, so I'm trying this out at home using just the virtual keyboard. Such a pain.

Anyway, I'm trying to figure out the i/o and MIDI channels situation without the EWQLSO manuals (are on DVDS in studio) and I'm a little confused. First off I realised that when I insert a virtual instrument track, it sets up a main MIDI track plus the 9 stereo audio tracks. So I figured out how to stop those recording the audio (I just want MIDI recorded for now). One I'd done that, the only way I could get multiple MIDI tracks to record was to record takes and then explode them. Is this how it's done?

Sorry, but I'm a complete novice with this and don't want to wait til I get to the studio again where the East West manuals are.

Thanks,
Walt
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Old 08-03-2010, 05:15 PM   #28
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Have the EWQLSO manuals now, so I'll see if I can make sense of it all. I think part of my confusion is that when channels are mentioned, I'm not sure whether MIDI channels or audio channels are being referred to. :-/

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 08-03-2010, 10:42 PM   #29
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Late to the party.... but www.audiobro.com. LASS is easily the most advanced and best sounding library out there IMO.
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Old 08-04-2010, 12:31 AM   #30
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Default Another method offered...

Quote:
Originally Posted by EvilDragon View Post
You should be able to use multiple instrument outputs from one PLAY interface. You can load different EWI files, and assign them to various outputs (you have 18 mono outputs in PLAY, so, 9 stereo channels), it's described in the manual.

Then you need to activate those inputs in Reaper, which I hope you know how to do if you worked with multichannel VSTi before. If not, I'll fill you in on that if necessary.

You can then create individual tracks for each plugin (stereo) output, which would then receive that particular sound, for example solo violin on ch1-2, pizzicato section on ch3-4, timpani on 5-6, etc.
EvilDragon and Walt...

Firstly, EvilDragon, I've got to commend you, and it's been long over due; I've been using Reaper for some time, but don't post all that often, and time and time again I see you post great information that is really helpful, and consistently stick with problems until they are seen through. I'm an EWQLSO Gold Complete user myself, and your info here has been spot on, especially the comparisons with GPO. Thanks for what you do!

Here's a slightly different twist on a way to work that works for me, and I'd at least like to offer it up as another method perhaps worth a try. This method has taken a lot of "my" MIDI and routing confusion out of the equation and it also simplifies my work flow and especial simplifies the visualization of complicated parts in the MIDI Editors as your orchestration grows.

Here's what I do;
I never load the Play engine with more than one instrument, or one instrument "section". Take my entire symphony string section for example; I have a Reaper template that has; First Violins, Second Violins, Viola, Celli, Bass, etc... each one of these instruments gets it's own PLAY engine on a separate Reaper track (with a top level folder track named [Strings], and each instrument track uses only ONE loaded instance of the Play engine. This seems like a lot of instances of PLAY and needlessly used CPU resources right? Wait 'til the end. This REALLY simplifies your MIDI problems as I never worry about channels anymore as each instrument is simply on MIDI channel 1 in it's own instance of Play and on it's own Reaper track.

The benefits of working this way are two fold (maybe four!). As you become more experienced with the different articulations available with each instrument, you will undoubtedly get into writing these articulations using "key switching" notes in your MIDI editor. In the previous method, if you have multiple instruments loaded in only ONE Play instance things start to quickly get very very cluttered looking on your video monitor with the instrument notes, AND the key switching notes all over the place in one window. Personally, it doesn't take me long to get visually impaired and overwhelmed with all the mess.

A better method?...don't know, but worth mentioning;
However, using a separate instance of Play on each track with ONE instrument offers some very cool methods for arranging in Reapers MIDI Editor (not to mention the extra control in mixdown). When you have say 1st Violins, 2nd Violins, Celli each on separate tracks with separate Play engines. To edit, OR write parts, you can [Select] ALL the string tracks in Reaper, and then open them ALL by selecting "Open Selected Items in ONE MIDI Editor Window". At first you might think this will look as cluttered as all the instruments in ONE Play instance but it doesn't. Here's why; The beauty of this (at least for me) is that now ALL the parts are there to see like note stacks in a written score. BUT... the cool thing is the part you are working on is active and the notes are bright looking, and the parts you are not working on are still visible, but grayed out as if they are lurking in the background. But...(ah the beauty!)when you want to work on an instrument that is grayed out in the background, you just click that note once and IT becomes the active instrument MIDI window and that instrument is immediately brought to the top level, you are switched to that Reaper track in the mixer, AND the notes are bright in the MIDI Editor's window. This is VERY powerful stuff. You can now say, loop ALL your string parts, slide notes around, instantly jumping between violins, viola, celli, bringing those to the front, moving their notes around, and you can build chord stacks, arpeggios, etc., VERY quickly, and all the while you are not working in one cluttered window but instead working in each instruments separate window with the other instruments still visible but without the clutter, and yet instantly available with the click of your mouse.

Regarding Memory Usage:
Lastly, and this really surprised me. (BTW, I have 8 gigs of RAM now so I have NOT tested this with the Play engine, but long ago I did this test with the Kompakt player when I only had 4 gigs) Here's what I found.

Example; Loading three French Horns into one instance of the Kompakt player on ONE Reaper track takes up more memory and is more CPU intensive than Three instances of Kompakt player on three separate Reaper tracks each loaded with a single French Horn!! I was amazed! I am not sure why this is, but it must have something to do with the single instance with three instruments needing more CPU power to manage all that. I simply don't know. So this test, (and it was confirmed on the EWQLSO forums), is what got me started using a single instance of the Kompakt player (either Kontakt or EWQLSO Play now) with one instrument on ONE track. BTW, if you want to use this method, when you open the VSTi window to select EWQLSO as your VSTi plugin, and Reaper pops open a dialog box asking to build multiple tracks; select NO. This will leave you with ONE instance of an empty PLAY engine on one Reaper track. Then just go into the Play interface and load whatever instrument you want. For that track select record input; ALL MIDI Channels.

Using only 4 Gigs of RAM:
As for memory issues now... When I start to get close to my limit I usually by then have finalized some of the active MIDI parts that I've already written, so in Reaper I just "Render to Audio and Mute Originals" (Some call it Freeze) thus releasing CPU MIDI resources and also reducing the RAM usage. Then I just load new instances of Play with whatever instrument I want to work with and keep right on working. This is a beautiful and very powerful way to work, and work quickly, and I could not be more happy with my work flow.

I hope I've helped with another option for you to try, and I also hope I've explained this well enough. If not please get back to me as I really understand how confusing this all is in the beginning. But I think you will find this method not only creates a fast visually pleasing work flow, but it takes all the MIDI and track routing out of the equation, and you will not believe how much you are going to love orchestrating. BTW, Walt, investigate the usage of Folder Tracks for your sections. If you are not familiar with this method take a look at the Wiki or manual. It's simple and gives you great mixing of the orchestra as well as sub mixing within the section. Also, once you are happy with your setup, look into creating Reaper templates for your various orchestra requirements. Say, one template for chamber orchestra, one for string quartet, brass ensemble, and of course a little one for full symphony! This will save you a ton of time loading new projects. If you want to save memory, create these templates with empty PLAY engines, then load instruments as you work. I have the above templates and also ones for Rock Band with Orchestra...stuff like that.

Good luck and let me know how this works for you or if you have any problems.

Cheers!!
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Old 08-04-2010, 01:57 AM   #31
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Hi all,

Thanks for the replies.

TexasFury, never heard of Tracktion Ultimate so thanks for the info, but I'm not sure I'd need it or GPO. I looked into GPO and EWQLSO (including in this thread) and decided that the latter was the one to go for. I wouldn't mind getting the Garritan JABB3 later on, but I really need to walk before I can run, so I'll see how I get on with EWQLSO first. Thanks again for the info.

Bubbagump, thanks for the reply. To be honest, I had checked out LASS, but it was a non-runner from the moment I landed on the page and saw the price tag: $1,099. I was on a small budget and jumped at the chance to get EWQLSO for €77 from Thomann in Germany. Besides, my system is modest so even EWQLSO Silver will probably max it out. The dream is to one day have a decent system running Hollywood Strings or VSLs... or both.

Yfoiler, thanks a million for your insightful response into how you do things yourself. I would never have thought that multiple instances of Play would be less CPU/memory intensive than just one with multiple samples loaded. I wonder would this be the same with the Play 2 engine. Either way, I will definitely give it a go. As I've yet to set Reaper up to use EWQLSO properly, I can't yet appreciate all of the benefits that you mention. But the less clutter and confusion, the better, so your concept appeals to be straight away.

By the way, you say you only use MIDI channel 1. How does this work on playback? Obviously it does but I'm just wonder how Reaper doesn't try to play every instrument on channel 1 at the same time. Is it because the instance of a MIDI channel between Reaper and a virtual instrument is unique to that 'connection'? i.e. MIDI channel 1 on one virtual instrument won't interefere with MIDI channel 1 on another instrument? If this is the case (and I take it that is), I didn't know this at all. So it would seem that each VSTi gets 16 channels all to itself. Probably more of an indication of just how much of a novice I am. Anyway, I'll print out your response and take it to the studio with me.

Lastly, I just want to agree that EvilDragon has always been very responsive and I appreciate his words of wisdom. I probably wouldn't have bought EWQLSO Silver without his advice. So thanks a mill, EvilDragon.

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 08-04-2010, 02:28 AM   #32
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Yfoiler View Post
Firstly, EvilDragon, I've got to commend you, and it's been long over due; I've been using Reaper for some time, but don't post all that often, and time and time again I see you post great information that is really helpful, and consistently stick with problems until they are seen through. I'm an EWQLSO Gold Complete user myself, and your info here has been spot on, especially the comparisons with GPO. Thanks for what you do!
Thanks!

Quote:
Originally Posted by Yfoiler View Post
BUT... the cool thing is the part you are working on is active and the notes are bright looking, and the parts you are not working on are still visible, but grayed out as if they are lurking in the background. But...(ah the beauty!) when you want to work on an instrument that is grayed out in the background, you just click that note once and IT becomes the active instrument MIDI window
This is actually where we disagree. It's not really a good thing Reaper does this. What if you want to draw the same note that's on the transparent channel? You get switched to that channel! It would be MUCH better if Reaper had a modifier for that switching. For example, if you just click on a ghosted note, nothing happens, you continue to draw normally. But if you Shift+click, you switch to the other source and make the rest ghosted. This is a much better solution, and much less irritating when you're drawing the notes out.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Walt_43 View Post
I wonder would this be the same with the Play 2 engine.
It will, as nothing was really visually changed with PLAY 2 - just internal optimizations. And even those are not consistent across the board - that is, some people noticed mass improvements, some actually got it worse. :/ Eh, EastWest...

Quote:
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By the way, you say you only use MIDI channel 1. How does this work on playback? Obviously it does but I'm just wonder how Reaper doesn't try to play every instrument on channel 1 at the same time.
Each track has its own 16 MIDI channels. That's how there's no confusion - if you have one PLAY instance per track, and you use just one MIDI channel, that PLAY instance receives only MIDI coming from the MIDI items on THAT track, since you're not using any sends from other tracks, in this case.

Quote:
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So it would seem that each VSTi gets 16 channels all to itself.
Precisely. More correctly, each VST on THE SAME TRACK, gets the same 16 MIDI channels of that track.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Walt_43 View Post
Lastly, I just want to agree that EvilDragon has always been very responsive and I appreciate his words of wisdom. I probably wouldn't have bought EWQLSO Silver without his advice. So thanks a mill, EvilDragon.
No prob!
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Old 08-04-2010, 02:59 AM   #33
Walt_43
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Thanks for your reply, EvilDragon. Do you yourself load multiple instances of Play for each instrument, or do you just load one for every 9 stereo outputs?

Thanks again.
Walt
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Old 08-04-2010, 03:08 AM   #34
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I don't use PLAY, I use Kontakt.

I tend to use multiple instruments per instance, myself. This is because each additional instance of Kontakt uses between 40-60 MB of RAM additionally, and I could use those for more samples instead (when you have 2 GB of RAM you need to save up on it )
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Old 08-04-2010, 03:43 AM   #35
Walt_43
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Ah yes, I hear ya. Good to know that you're able to run everything on 2 GBs. I'd say you become very skilled at memory efficiency!

Cheers,
Walt
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Old 08-04-2010, 04:26 AM   #36
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Everything except LASS at 24-bit!
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Old 08-04-2010, 09:12 AM   #37
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Quote:
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Thanks!
This is actually where we disagree. It's not really a good thing Reaper does this. What if you want to draw the same note that's on the transparent channel? You get switched to that channel! It would be MUCH better if Reaper had a modifier for that switching. For example, if you just click on a ghosted note, nothing happens, you continue to draw normally. But if you Shift+click, you switch to the other source and make the rest ghosted. This is a much better solution, and much less irritating when you're drawing the notes out.
Yes, I have noticed this and you are correct, a simple shift click or whatever would be OK. My easy work around, since I slide notes around a lot, it to just stay on the active level and add a note nearby and then just drag it over the note that's grayed out. Not elegant, but certainly not time consuming. I wonder; have you posted this as a feature request? If so I'll give it a +1 over there. Thanks
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Old 08-04-2010, 09:45 AM   #38
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Hi all,
P.S. Keys, I'm still not sure which instruments from East West's website are included in Silver. All I can say is that there are quite a few and they sound amazing to my ear.
Thanks Walt, if you do get the time, maybe you could see if theres a list of the instruments & articulations you have in silver in your docs that you could maybe forward?
Thanks, keys.
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Old 08-04-2010, 09:52 AM   #39
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I wonder; have you posted this as a feature request? If so I'll give it a +1 over there. Thanks
I think it is mentioned in some of my MIDI FRs... try to do a forum and tracker search for them and read a bit... I'm currently in time crunch doing something so I can't ^^'
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Old 08-04-2010, 03:00 PM   #40
Walt_43
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Hi all, just thought I'd post that I managed to get everything working as per Yfoiler's suggestion. Worked a treat and CPU usage (having loaded 5 instances of play with one sound each) was only around 6%. Went up to about 19% when I added a reverb effect to one of the sounds.

I'm using an old Korg M1 as a MIDI keyboard and while it was fine, I did find the velocity sensitivity a little annoying. Sometimes it was so quiet that I could hear nothing; other times it was too loud. It seemed a little difficult to achieve a happy medium. Can I adjust this using Plays velocity parameters? I do want the expression, but just don't want occasional dead notes or ones that are unintentionally too loud.

One more thing: I read about the Stereo section in the EWQLSO manual, but I'm not really any the wiser. I understand that the dial emulates a stereo separation (the higher you turn the dial, the greater the apparent separation), but I'm not quite sure about the L and R buttons. I switched L off and just left the ON button illuminated, but when I returned to that instance of play, L was switched back on. Can anyone explain to me why this is happening and what this section is for? Aren't the sounds stereo without the stereo section switched on?

Thanks a mill for everyone's helpful advice, particularly EvilDragaon and Yfoiler.

Cheers,
Walt
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