I also think that the mapping is wrong... I never liked the agile legatos and thought that something sounded very off, but haven't figured out what exactly. And to be honest: Sorry, Paul, but just neglecting the agile legatos and use the normal ones instead... if this new recording approach isn't good or just was a try, than offer us an alternative. At the current state the patches are useless when playing everything under maj 3rds. The VI instruments had excellent fast and trill legatos.

Would be nice to have some clarification from VSL! Maybe the normal legatos have some issues, too ... For example, the new lyrical legato of the solo horns (which I dislike at all) has similar "problems" with certain intervals. And it's, maybe, because of the same reason, i.e. recording scales instead of dedicated landing notes.

If the Synchron legatos and agile legatos are captured with this new approach, by playing scales, I don't think that this is good at all. The VI legatos had dedicated landing notes. I know it's very tedious to record and edit, but sounds way more real and is the best proof why the VI instruments still excel in this regard. This is just a guess here, because I don't know how the normal Synchron legatos were recorded.

Addendum:

Hm... I don't really know what I should think of these legatos. I find it extremely difficult to get a smooth result. Very bumpy sometimes and the loudnesses jump here and there (that's nearly Spitfire Audio level). I tried the all time favourites like "Princess Leia" or "Jurassic Park". Impossible for me. They sound better with the normal legatos.

Maybe I'm too dumb to use these patches. I have the same "problem" with the normal legatos across the board. Sometimes I have the feeling that the transitions don't get loaded or triggered properly.

Have you changed something? In my opinion, it's not as smooth as the VI instruments. You have to extremely overlap the notes and, to my feeling, play in a duration or fashion or something (I don't know exactly) to "imitate" the same emotion the horn player played during recording. If this is your new approach to legatos, I don't like it at all. Not a big fan of this. :(

And the sound of the transitions is sometimes very "processed" or "synthy" (I don't have a better word), like if the sample has been stretched. That's a thing in all of the Synchron libraries to be honest. Maybe it's because of the microphones and processing you used. The VI instruments legatos don't have this sound aesthetic.

I would also highly recommend a render function like in VI Pro. Never understood how this new stretch feature should be used in realtime in terms of performance. Can't work. *shaking head*

I guess it's very complicated with the multiple microphones. You would have to stay with this exact setup when using the rendered patch.

I would rather appreciate a mic merge feature like in the SINE player. That would be great.

Sorry! I mean the dB settings for threshold and gain. Gain is overall almost the same, but the threshold changes. And from these "values" I thought it could be related to the natural volumes. It's really a noob question, because I have no experience with compressors at all.

I have some questions on the room mixes in the Prime Edition or bigger Synchron libraries.

• Which microphones are used for the mixes and what volume levels? Can they be compared to the "Wide Surround to Stereo" mixes?
• Is the room mix identical for each instrument?

I really love the new presets manager in MIR 3D and especially the one for the Synchron Stage.

Three questions:

• Is there a way to duplicate a complete Vienna Standards preset with all instruments included? Haven't found a way to do it.
• Is there a way to have multiple microphone arrangements in one user preset for quick A/B testing. At the moment I have to duplicate the whole preset.
• I don't like the behaviour that the presets list is closed/collapsed when I close and re-open the manager window again.

Bump!

I know, you guys at VSL don't talk about future releases, but the integration of Interval Map was on the agenda some very long time ago. Would be nice to hear something. Maybe it's really too complicated with the dimension trees? I mean you could add something like a "mini" module which is nested in one of the dimensions and then opens in another window (something like an "expert" mode and maybe looks exactly like Interval Map in VI Pro) where you can change the patches.

In the meantime I have made a small detour (see the attached screenshot).

I have made a preset with legatos and shorts which are triggered by velocity. On higher velocities (around 80) I play shorts and on lower ones I trigger legato. It's by far not the best option, but at least I can have shorts and longs in one patch. It's limited, because I can't control the shorts with velocity.

My dream scenario goes even further and that's currently not possible. I know, I know it's very complex, but it can absolutely be achieved with a clever combination of dimensions. The only thing missing is an option to choose only the "starting note" and "playing intervals/legato" (as with Interval Map).

I want something like this:

[Dimension Controller 1: Interval Map]
Starting Note: Sustain with altered, longer attack curve ----------> [Dimension Controller 2: Velocity]
Intervals (definable time threshold): Legato ----------> [Maybe: Normal Legato < > Fast Legato]

[Dimension Controller 2: Velocity]
Staccato ----------> [Dimension Controller 3: Speed]
Portato ----------> [Dimension Controller 3: Speed]

[Dimension Controller 3: Speed]
Staccato Bold < > Staccato Agile
Portato Bold < > Portato Agile

The presets are really handy for guys like me who don't have engineering experience. But unfortunately there are some instruments missing, e.g. Dimension Brass (only trumpets available).

I'm wondering where to start on my own... What does these values indicate? Only looking at the numbers I could think that these have something to do with the natural volumes or maybe the distance the instruments were recorded at.

Hi Andreas, 

Hm... you probably changed something in my account. :D Now it works without problems. Very curious.

Happy Holidays, too!

Awesome...! Need new glasses. :P

---

Dietz, I have another thing and didn't want to start a new thread:

I wanted to separate the dry and wet component in VE Pro. It works for one instrument, but if I add more there are cracks and other sounds. Is this normal? Actually I know how to do this and it worked in previous versions. At the moment it only works if I do it for each instrument separately, but I want this for strings, brass and woodwinds as a section.

Yes, that's true. At the moment I hesitated to add new capsules or the ambisonics order, because I have absolutely no clues where to start. :)

Thanks and sorry for all the confusion. I still think that the natural volume are not correct. But the issue that I had were really the volume offset of the center microphones I was dealing with. :)

[ EDIT: Accidentally deleted this paragraph... :( ]

For quite some time I always have to login daily, my user data won't get saved no matter what I do. And that's on all of my machines (macOS Big Sur/Monterey, Safari). But that's not really a problem.

After the login I can't see my individual prices anymore. I have to put something in the basket first in order to "activate" the pricing system. Is there anything that can be done? I already deleted the cache etc.

Concerning the natural volume settings:

The natural volumes are right if all the instruments are at the same position. If distance dependent scaling is enabled (and yes it should be), the natural volumes should automatically be compensated. Do I move the instrument further back, the volume should be increased automatically. Of course, I'm talking only about the VI instruments with natural volume applied. This is a feature I want to set on the wishlist. 

I compared with really all Synchron libraries and the Synchron Stage venue. The natural volumes are really spot on (with some exception mentioned earlier).

Thanks, Dietz, for the thorough reply. Very appreciated as always! 

I don't want to use delay, it was just for comparison reasons. I think I indeed confused myself, because there are so many variables to deal with, especially the individual capsules you can edit. For example: I tested various setups with dry volume offsets on the center capsule (in my case a Blumlein with center).

I started to balance my template from the strings (dimension strings), and this was indeed the mistake. I already mentioned in another thread that the natural volume overview isn't right on certain instruments. For example, the dimension strings had -15, now -12, and I think they need -21. Maybe the numbers have been mixed up.

Of course, you are always saying that natural volume should not be used with other libraries, but that's not true. I tried with all other libraries I have (Synchron, Hollywood, Spitfire) and the volume balancing is really spot on, except some minor things which are not right in the overview (overview vs. the implementation in MIR Pro). The important thing is you always have to use a combination of main + spot when referencing.

After much more experiments I have discovered the following:

The volume scaling is CORRECT but only if you treat your instruments as "recorded WITHOUT spot microphones". In my opinion, the volume scaling has to be applied ONLY to the WET signal, not the dry. Because a spot microphone mixed in means you add volume to the mix. With the volume scaling enabled it would mean you only hear the main microphone. And this is something I never understood with MIR Pro. You always hear both signals with MIR Pro, i.e. the concept of main + spot. In a normal recording scenario you delay the spot microphone, but still has it's volume. With the volume scaling you move the spots further back and lose this volume, which is not right. Yes, the concept of MIR Pro is to have perfectly time-aligned spots, but the "real" spots are, as said, delayed and don't lose volume.

With the strings it's not a problem, because they are at the front, but with the other instruments I always switched between volume scaling on and off, only to understand that the volume scaling itself is the problem. ;)

I would like to hear what Dietz has to say about this. Would be nice to have a feature which disables the volume scaling on the spots (i.e. dry) signal. Of course, with VE Pro I can separate the dry and wet signal and compensate the volume, but it's tedious, because I don't exactly know the volume differences which are applied by the scaling. Or is there a rule of thumb (1m = XX db)?

Wooow.... Thank you very much! 

The patches are great, these legatos should have been there from the beginning. When can we expect the other instruments? ;P

In my opinion, they come closer to the VI legatos and work perfectly for faster lines, too. I was never a fan of the new agile legatos, very unrealistic for me.

Thanks, Beat.

But I'm not interested in keyswitches at all. My whole point is to bring the patch handling forwards and reduce keyswitches. I want a "performance legato" which Spitfire (*) had introduced; more and more developers also make something similar. Keyswitches is a really traditional, old-school system which absolutely is no fun to play. I want to concentrate on performing and not to think about switching articulations.

VI Pro has "Interval Map" as controller type. And it does what I want. In my opinion, the Synchron Player need some more innovations in this regard; VI Pro has more features.

It's not only about attacks, I want to play all kinds of shorts and longs, depending on velocity and speed (the way I set it up in VI Pro). With "Interval Map" I can influence both the starting note and the intervals. So I can layer shorts on the legatos, too, for example.

---

(*) If you should not be familiar with Spitfire's performance legato, just search Google: "spitfire performance legato" and you will see what it does.

BUMP!

As I recently bought several new Synchron libraries I really miss the "Interval Map" controller as said already several times.

If it's tricky to implement I can understand, but I don't need the entire function, only the starting note. You already have this feature available with the marcato starts. I only want to have more attack options and play shorts and longs with one-and-only "performance" patch.

I have a new idea:

Why not give parallel mode another option? We currently have "Mix" and "XF". What about "Mix, only starting note"? Okay, it's not the same as Interval Map, because I can't change the attack of the sustain on the first note, but it comes close.

I'm really looking forward to some feedback. You have so many great features and ideas with your software. Please make it finally happen!

Hi Paul,

thanks for the clarification, because the sentence can be understood in several ways (at least I did).

Actually I don't need TLC and the replacement licenses when the iLok is broken. Should I get Zero Downtime? I mean, it's not expensive, but it sounds to me that all of my licenses are safe nevertheless.

I don't have problems with my iLok, but I'm considering to buy Zero Downtime. As I'm not working professionally with the samples I actually don't need it.

Reading the FAQs on the iLok website (https://ilok.com/#!zdt-details) there is a statement I don't fully understand:

„For a broken iLok USB, PACE is authorized by software publishers to replace only those licenses we can recover from the broken device.“

I thought that with Zero Downtime I would be 100% safe. But in the case that PACE is NOT able to recover all licenses, do I have to purchase them again? That would be a huge investment.

Thanks!

But could you please introduce a feature to lock the microphones? That would be very helpful. Maybe with a little padlock icon...?

And I also would welcome a feature to customize the visibility of the grid. On the Synchron Stage it's barely visible. Maybe with a slider...?

Concerning the design:
Maybe it's because I'm a media designer. ;) In my opinion, the old 2D ones remind me of (hi-res) illustrations in books, while the 3D ones look a bit "cheap", because of the flat and simple textures. The old ones looked more organic to me. For comparison: It's the same with Apple and it's skeuomorphism. Don't understand me wrong, I'm totally fine with the other venues, but the Synrchon Stage is really a bit "boring".

Thanks, didn't know that. That's an important information. Maybe the volume should be locked so that one don't (deliberately) change it.

Thanks! I have the latest version installed, but the values still differ from the overview. Or is the overview not correct?

I also have another question off-topic:
Is the natural volume pre or post MIR?

I'm asking, because I think it's "better" to have the volume reduced before MIR... I can't remember if the previous version of MIR handled this differently. For example: When comparing to the SYNCHRON-ized instruments, the volume should be reduced rather in VI Pro, say, before MIR. Maybe I'm only imagining and it's irrelevant at which point you reduce the volume. ;)