What's the Point?

[Stephen W. Beatty]

As a user of your samples and software from the first edition through  the most recent releases I find the software and samples without question excellent.

However, your practice of posting just an audio file as demostration pieces of your software and sample instruments is annoying and useless. It is like giving a composition student who is interested in Beethoven and would like to emulate some of his techniques a CD of the fifth symphony and saying you figure it out!

Using your software and samples is not a straight forward process to get the most from them in the final mix. Your more recent instructional videos produced by Paul S. have been excellent especially the ones illustrating Vienna Instruments Pro. I assume since you are a for profit company you would want to promote the mature body of software and samples that you have created. The path to that goal is educational support for the user. If you are going to post a demo promoting your products, it would be of a lot more interest to your customers to have ithe audio demo accompanied by detailed release notes outlining which of your softwares and samples were used with details of settings in Vienna Suite and MIR in short a detailed work flow chart which enabled the composer to acheive the particular sound. I find it hard to believe given the talented resource base you are working with you could not accomodate your loyal users even if you have to restrict access to registered users only.

Otherwise this section of the forum turns into a "Gee isn't this a great recording, clap clap etc. I wonder how they did this? You can well afford to be more generous with your knowledge base , you might even increase you profitablity , if you manage the access to your advantage.

Annnoyed!

Stephen W. Beatty  

[MassMover]

The point is, that the music which is posted in this forum, is mainly NOT written by VSL staff members, but by enthusiastic users who like to share their work - sometimes they don’t even want to discuss the use of VSL but just the composition itself.

[Paul]

Hello Stephen,

I understand you point, and I agree that we can improve the educational part.

I am also talking to many composers and am constantly surprised on how different the work-flow of each and every single one is. Not to mention the different tastes in music, sound, reverbs, sequencers, OS´s....

In the end it´s all about how the music sounds, but you are right, it is very interesting to watch someone explain his approach. We cannot force anyone to share the secrets of his "personal sound" and I believe that Christian Kardeis is actually very generous when he shares his knowledge with the Special Edition Demos he is composing.

I am open to hear your suggestions, and we´ll do our best to share more ideas and approaches, especially with MIR PRO around the corner!

Our main goal is to create the tools for virtual orchestrations and to continue recording new instruments, giving your more options and possibilities. Of course our manuals and video tutorials should give you a good idea on how to use our products best to reach your musical goals, and we´re happy to answer questions, both in our forum and via

Best,

Paul

[Guy Bacos]

Maybe there should be a special thread with a thumbtack: "Tips donated for your improvement" So anyone could donate a tip that works well for him.

But I agree with Paul, not 2 composers work the same way.

[Stephen W. Beatty]

I put together a web site to illustrate some of the information that might be helpful when listening to demos. I agree that people have various methods of working and if these were shared, hopefully a substantive dialogue could emerge to the benefit of everyone. This is how the scientific community works and it results as a fertile bed of shared ideas that lead to new insights and methods. The website is a general overview of how one person works. http://web.me.com/stephenwbeatty/Site/Welcome.html

Regards,

Stephen W. Beatty 

[G.R. Baumann]

That is a fantastic idea Guy. I just had a chance to look at VI Pro last night [jaw dropping]. While Pauls excellent videos are a great help to get an overview and idea, it might be an idea as well to supply a few well layed out VIP presets as a starting point as well, perhaps using SE as a basis. With the wealth of options available, it can be a little bit a daunting experience for a new user to find a start and create useful presets. Having said that, a complex instrument such as VIP certainly requires a learning curve, time and effort to familiarize yourself with the options available. It is not as easy as say Symphobia style - plugin and play - but offers much more attention to details of course, hence needs expertise to handle it. Off I go.... learning.... :)

[Tom23]

I'm very impressed with Christian K's work.  Would love to see him teach a class on VI.  I've spent years learning VI techniques that work for me & suspect that this sort of "class" would have sped up the process, & would result in less pulling-of-hair for those climbing the learning curve.

[Tom23]

I'm very impressed with Christian K's work.  Would love to see him teach a class on VI.  I've spent years learning VI techniques that work for me & suspect that this sort of "class" would have sped up the process, & would result in less pulling-of-hair for those climbing the learning curve.

[Stephen W. Beatty]

I posted another composition with notes on my website

http://web.me.com/stephenwbeatty/Site/Welcome.html

Hopefully, the notes with the music will help with the tearing of hair and gnashing of

teeth in frustration. I am trying to present some of the problems that I deal with

everyday some of which still are in process.

Regards,

Stephen W. Beatty  

[GoranTch]

Hi Stephen,

the Audiocation Akademie's first VSL online course will also be given in English in near future. Here is the link to the announcement for the German version:

http://community.vsl.co.at/forums/t/28098.aspx

If you would like to be notified on the release of the English version, please send me an email at goran@audiocation.de.

[gabriel81]

I am currently struggeling with getting "good" string sound out of Standard Edition. I think it would help to make lots tutorials for beginners (edition)

I think Guys movies are excellent but mainly for the bigger libs.

So A project with only strings (e.g.: quartet), with lots of Cell Crossfades (e.g.: I find the attacks of the sustain and legato patches very slow) and all the controller information would be immense valuable for me.

Gabriel

[GoranTch]

@gabriel81 said:

I am currently struggeling with getting "good" string sound out of Standard Edition.

Take a look at my second link (under the line). Has some, in my immodest opinion fairly "good" string sound done with the VSL SE (Bach and Schumann examples could be of interest to you, Bruckner is deliberatly very "dirty" (emulating an old LP master).

[gabriel81]

I was already visiting your sites before (and pondering you training offer as well)

These examples are SE only? Very nice ;)

[GoranTch]

@gabriel81 said:

I was already visiting your sites before (and pondering you training offer as well)

These examples are SE only? Very nice 😉

Thanks, I am glad you like them. Yes, all VSL examples (Mozart is not VSL) with the exception of some patches in Schumann's string quartett and the piano part in Bach's Piano Concerto are SE exclusively (that is, all Bach and Bruckner strings). In the meantime I have included two new masters of Bach's Air on G string (on the English demo page) - the third (old "analog" master) is a combination of VSL SE and HSO strings.

If you'll have any questions related to the course, don't hesitate to ask.