So...Ivory is out: Any user experiences?

[Raindog]

Ivory is out for 2 days. It may be premature, but I would like to know if there are any personal experiences from forum members already?

Though I already own 3 killer piano libraries (Vintage audio´s Yamaha C7, PMI Boesendorfer 290, Worra´s Black Grand -> my favourite!) I would like to know how Ivory´s resonance and parameter adjustments work in reality and how much CPU they use (being on a rather slow Mac)
Any comments?
Best regards
Raindog

[Raindog]

No one ?

[Olivierbergman]

Ivory is out for 2 days. It may be premature, but I would like to know if there are any personal experiences from forum members already?

Though I already own 3 killer piano libraries (Vintage audio´s Yamaha C7, PMI Boesendorfer 290, Worra´s Black Grand -> my favourite!) I would like to know how Ivory´s resonance and parameter adjustments work in reality and how much CPU they use (being on a rather slow Mac)
Any comments?
Best regards
Raindog

Ivory is out only for mac OS X user. And i will neve buy a mac.

Pc user have to wait several months.

Regards,

Olivier

[maszat]

I'm afraid MANY of us are in the waiting postion, curious whether the Ivory is any more in real than what the demos show. It could be, but I just don't want to be the first to find it out :)
Maybe Synthogy want to provide a free limited demo version - just like the Old Lady, the Emperor and the Black Grand have ?

[xav93]

I tried it today (just 10 minutes), with a Fatar SL990 (not the best, but it was what I had under my hands).

It's "only" 8 stereo dynamic levels, but absolutly no fake, no bugg, no artefact, no level error... in short : perfect!

Three (Bos 290, Steinway D and Yamaha C7) very well programmed pianos.

Realtime sympathetic resonance
Pedal FX during release time
...

Almost everything is tweakable, from velocity curve to ambiance...

I wish I had a Mac and more money...

Let's wait to 2005 for PC user... Let's wait...

[Jake Johnson]

xav93:

Did you play it at a music store? (You mention in another thread that you just bought an RD 700, os it occurs to me that Guitar Center is showing off the Synthogy pianos.)

[football]

Olivier,

can you please tell me why you will never buy a Mac?

I am wondering if you had a past bad experience, and if so would you consider sharing it?

thank you

[xav93]

Yes, I tried it in a music store. But It wasn't first to try it, but to buy a new keyboard with some master keyboard fonctions. Then I took time to test the Ivory.

[JohnGrant]

I don't like the Ivory Bos, but the Steinway mp3 demos are excellent, terrific. The Yamaha, a piano I am less familiar with, is also pretty amazing. The demos are, I think, all classical, which may make it difficult for some to make an assessment. My ears are VERY impressed.


JG

[Jake Johnson]

So...any user demos, or at least reviews, for the Ivory pianos?

[roger11]

these demos at the ivory-page are bad played and recorded.
whatfore Gaspard, when you are unable to play this stuff ?!?

demos should demonstrate the dynamics and sustain, by playing just 1 key in all ranges.
and why allways Rachmaninoff´s Prelude? Bass and Diskant sounds good in all Grand´s. The middle range is important !

[football]

Roger,

I couldn't agree more.

Having a variety of styles would help users understand more of what they may be buying.

Sometimes I am shocked at how poorly the demos represent the piano.

My favorite in day to day use is still the PMI BOS. I am (so far) not wildly impressed with The Old Lady but when I get more time after the holidays I will see if I may have done something wrong installing it. I had very high expectations.

I am also surprised more people from this forum have not commented on Ivory. May be cause of the high price of admission many people are holding off for a minute.

[Nick Batzdorf]

I don't like the Ivory Bos, but the Steinway mp3 demos are excellent, terrific. The Yamaha, a piano I am less familiar with, is also pretty amazing. The demos are, I think, all classical, which may make it difficult for some to make an assessment. My ears are VERY impressed.


I have a review coming out in Mix magazine and can't really talk in public, but I will second that the Bos MP3 demos are *not at all* representative of what Ivory sounds like. As a matter of fact, I was rather shocked by the first one on their list - it sounds phasey, plastic, and thin.

Piano really shows up MP3s more than anything else.

[fozzy]

Nick,

I'll look forward to reading your review. Because at this point, judging by what I hear in the demos, I have zero interest in acquiring Ivory. Perhaps it is the demos, but none of the Ivory pianos sound very good (compared to the current crop of top tier pianos libraries --black grand, PMI Old Lady, White Grand, etc). The demos sound just as you describe "plastic", "phasey" and "thin". Nothing that makes me think there's anything special to this library.

Fozzy



I have a review coming out in Mix magazine and can't really talk in public, but I will second that the Bos MP3 demos are *not at all* representative of what Ivory sounds like. As a matter of fact, I was rather shocked by the first one on their list - it sounds phasey, plastic, and thin.

Piano really shows up MP3s more than anything else.

[Nick Batzdorf]

I have the Bos Grandioso 290, and it's great for a concert sound.

You should definitely try the Ivory pianos before coming to the conclusions you've come to, though. They have nothing to do with the actual instrument, I promise. :)

[Hardy Heern]

The December issue of the UK magazine 'Computer Music' gave Ivory an, almost, unprecedented 10/10! The final paragraph of the review reads:

"The playability of Ivory is breathtaking. We couldn't help getting utterly carried away with it, getting lost in a world of virtuoso swaying and flamboyant strokes. The sound is phenomenal, the dynamics are both natural and responsive, and the control parameters innovative. At present, nothing can touch it!"

If it was fifty quid....I'd buy it.....perhaps next year in the Group Buy.:)

Frank

[JohnGrant]

I have a review coming out in Mix magazine and can't really talk in public, but I will second that the Bos MP3 demos are *not at all* representative of what Ivory sounds like. As a matter of fact, I was rather shocked by the first one on their list - it sounds phasey, plastic, and thin.

Piano really shows up MP3s more than anything else.
I should go back to the demos and re-assess my initial reaction. Maybe I was too positive, or just completely wrong. I like to think I'm picky. BTW I've got the Old L. running and, initially at least, my impression is that for sheer "realism" it doesn't match the pmi wet bos samples. So I agree with a previous post on the OL.

JG

[Up Late]

For me Ivory is simply the best I've ever heard. PLUS -- you have the ability to really get in there and tweak as much as needed to suit your composition.

[spectrum]

I got it this week and was frankly completely blown away. I'm pretty jaded when it comes to piano samples, but this is really another level of quality and playability that I've never experienced with samples.

I've heard just about everything, and have sampled many pianos myself for Roland.....Ivory is absolutely mind-boggling good!

My favs are the Steinway (wow!) and the Yamaha. The sympathetic resonance stuff is incredibly musical, the built in ambience effects are outstanding and the addition of the pad layer is really nice too. When you take off the resonance DSP, you realize how much it adds and makes it so much closer to the experience of playing a real piano.

I very rarely will endorse another companies product so highly, but in this case, I just have to!

I'm also really impressed that you can play so many voices, including the pad layer, with reasonable CPU usage. The streaming works great and the engine just has a wonderful "presence" to it that is extremely good. I was surprised that it was even quite usable on my powerbook with the internal drive! They recommend a much better system, but it's totally usable on a powerbook for live use.

The flexibility and the choices of sounds is excellent. It's great how you can so easily tailor it to your own taste, controller and playing style. It has just the right amount of controls that really alter the sound and response in meaningful ways.

I can see using this for many years to come...even in exposed solo recordings. It's the kind of instrument that you really look forward to opening and playing for long periods of time.

Highly recommended.

spectrum :-)

PS. I have no affiliation with Synthogy or this product....other than that they are also distributed by ILIO.

[Alexcremers]

So...any user demos, or at least reviews, for the Ivory pianos?


Wow, Up Late and Spectrum (of all people)! Suddenly there's positivity surrounding this "title"! I also would like to hear a "fan" demo. A swiftly made improv, anyone?

------------
Alex Cremers

[JohnGrant]

Wow, Up Late and Spectrum (of all people)! Suddenly there's positivity surrounding this "title"! I also would like to hear a "fan" demo. A swiftly made improv, anyone?

------------
Alex Cremers
Yup, that's what we need Alex. No question. Based on the demos at the site, my personal preferences for "best" sampled pianos still lie elsewhere.

JG

[fozzy]

My experience is different. For sheer realism the Old Lady gets my vote over the PMI Bos (as beautiful as it is).:p The "Old Lady" is a much "better" library --the warmth, playability, lyric qualities, and the OL's release samples and real-time sustain give it an edge over PMI's earlier libs for my uses. Among the PMI pianos, the Old lady does a better job, imo, of projecting a level of realism (as measured against classical recordings of "real" accoustic pianos) that is a big step or two beyond the Bosie. I don't have PMI's "Emperor" so I can't say about that.

While I use alot of different piano libraries for different things, the "Old Lady" has displaced the PMI Bos for most classical-type things that I had previously realized with the PMI Bos.


I should go back to the demos and re-assess my initial reaction. Maybe I was too positive, or just completely wrong. I like to think I'm picky. BTW I've got the Old L. running and, initially at least, my impression is that for sheer "realism" it doesn't match the pmi wet bos samples. So I agree with a previous post on the OL.

JG

[fozzy]

You should definitely try the Ivory pianos before coming to the conclusions you've come to, though. They have nothing to do with the actual instrument, I promise. :)Cool. I'll keep my eyes and ears open. I'm always on the look out for a new piano library. Happy Holidays !

[football]

a big step or two above the Bos?

Yikes, maybe I have done something wrong on my end installing it. I don't have a DVD drive on my PC so had to dump it on my Mac and then over the Network to the PC.

It actually seems not as good as the Bos to me.

After the Holidays I will do some more research to see if I really did screw something up.

I was dying for it to be a step up from the Bos.

Come to think of it, I loved one of the demos on the Post site and I can't seem to get that same natural sound.

Anyway, more investigation to come.

Good news about Ivory also. Sounds like I'll have to pick that up.

[Journeyman]

I'd like to know how the Ivory Yamaha C7 stacks up against the Vintaudio Yamaha C7. Anybody?

[spectrum]

The big difference is the interface and the sympathetic resonance DSP stuff they are doing in Ivory.....you can't really sample that, and it's been the missing link for a long time. Good tones and recordings have been available for a long time, but this sympathetic resonance stuff is really pretty cool. (not exactly like what real strings do either, but a very musical simulation/approximation)

Ivory also has great tone, playability and control...with all the nice things like release samples and pedal noise that you find in the better libraries.

It's pretty amazing to be able to save your custom settings with exactly how you like the resonance, ambience, eq, stereo imaging and dynamic curves.

With all of that, the Ivory pianos are really versatile....from Classical, to jazz to Ambient/Film to Hard Rock and Pop....pretty much covers all the bases.

I really don't know of any other piano product that covers all the bases this well with such a great interface and customized DSP for piano. Most of them have one tone or another, but not such versatility.

spectrum

[Ante]

The big difference is the interface and the sympathetic resonance DSP stuff they are doing in Ivory.....you can't really sample that, and it's been the missing link for a long time. Good tones and recordings have been available for a long time, but this sympathetic resonance stuff is really pretty cool. (not exactly like what real strings do either, but a very musical simulation/approximation)

Ivory also has great tone, playability and control...with all the nice things like release samples and pedal noise that you find in the better libraries.

It's pretty amazing to be able to save your custom settings with exactly how you like the resonance, ambience, eq, stereo imaging and dynamic curves.

With all of that, the Ivory pianos are really versatile....from Classical, to jazz to Ambient/Film to Hard Rock and Pop....pretty much covers all the bases.

I really don't know of any other piano product that covers all the bases this well with such a great interface and customized DSP for piano. Most of them have one tone or another, but not such versatility.

spectrum

Eric,

did you try to install it on an external drive? I was about to buy it today (together with Stylus RMX), but my dealer told me, that Ivory in the moment has problems with locating the library on "non-system" drives. I don't want to put anything in my system hd :( Is it true? I had the package in my hands and left only with Stylus RMX ... not bad at all but ... hey it's Christmas ...

Ante

[fisheye]

Any experiences with live use of Ivory? Does it combine well with real instruments on stage? Like typical jazz formations? Or does it dissappear a bit in those circumstances? (a phemenon typical of some current softsamples, a problem not found in digital stage piano's)

Glad the attitude towards Ivory seems to be changing. I always had hopes for this product since it is developped by people from Kurzweil, thus with experience in very practical sample/sound engine creation.

[roger11]

@ spectrum

no affinity to ILIO ?

sorry, just got a big laugh.

[Nick Batzdorf]

Eric certainly doesn't need me to defend him, and he probably doesn't care about this comment anyway, but don't you think it's kind of nasty to accuse him of lacking ethics?

He specifically said that Ilio distributes his products. :mad:

I should add that Ilio distributes other piano libraries too!

Sorry to find this so annoying, but people need to stop and think before insulting people like this.

[football]

For me Ivory is simply the best I've ever heard. PLUS -- you have the ability to really get in there and tweak as much as needed to suit your composition.

Hi Uplate,

could you tell me other libraries you have used so that I may gauge what you are comparing it to?

I'll probably pick this up within the next few days but am still hoping for more reinforcement.

I record mostly solo piano so it has to be pretty good. The library that has worked best so far for me is PMI Bos. The ambience effect of that one is something I am hoping to get from every library.

thank you

[JohnGrant]

Hi Uplate,

could you tell me other libraries you have used so that I may gauge what you are comparing it to?

I'll probably pick this up within the next few days but am still hoping for more reinforcement.

I record mostly solo piano so it has to be pretty good. The library that has worked best so far for me is PMI Bos. The ambience effect of that one is something I am hoping to get from every library.

thank you
The pmi bos wet remains the "realism" standard for straight piano-via-midi applications (as opposed to live piano-playing, a different kettle), even against other Post pianos. I have yet to look closely at the Black Grand, however; and the Milan Steinway can be quite convincing, even at only 3 vel layers.

I'd need to hear a wide variety of demos before I could really say anything one way or another about the Ivory. Certainly, given the demos online at the moment, the Milan and Black G win hands down as realistic Steinway samples.

Just my ears, other ears may differ.

JG

[Jake Johnson]

So...no one has a demo of Ivory or a review? (I can't tell much at all from the demos on the site.)

The only reviews I've seen speak of it in very general terms. I've yet to see answers to some basic questions:

Hall or close perspective? (Distance of mics?)
Since it doesn't let you control ADSR, how long are the attacks and decays, etc? (A huge limitation, to me, not allowing control of ADSR--you can create extremely different pianos by playing with these basic settings.)
How good is the reverb?
The filters?
Timbre of the pianos, dry, with no filters?
Balance of left and right in volume?

[spectrum]

So...no one has a demo of Ivory or a review? (I can't tell much at all from the demos on the site.)

The only reviews I've seen speak of it in very general terms. I've yet to see answers to some basic questions:

Hall or close perspective? (Distance of mics?)

Depends on the piano. Bosendorfer is Concert Hall perpective. The Steinway is more of an open mic, slightly distant sound and the Yamaha is a close mic'ed studio sound.


Since it doesn't let you control ADSR, how long are the attacks and decays, etc? (A huge limitation, to me, not allowing control of ADSR--you can create extremely different pianos by playing with these basic settings.)

I personally don't see this as a limitation at all since you have release control, which is the most important. The control over the dynamic response is really outstanding and highly tweakable. The decay is simply the natural decay of the piano.



How good is the reverb?

Extremely good! One of the best I've ever heard in an integrated plug-in...I'm amazed of the quality for a built-in verb.


The filters?

I don't think it uses any filters, but I could be wrong. The EQ is pretty versatile though...although a bit on the edgy side. Still, very usable.

The decay samples are a little bit noisy, so it would be cool if they added some filtering options.


Timbre of the pianos, dry, with no filters?

Not sure what you mean....other than the dry sound is really excellent.

If I were to describe the overall sound, I would say that it has a definite "American" sound IMO, so it sounds like it was recorded by American engineers with a lot of studio experience.

Really difference than Michel Post's work (which is also outstanding), which has a distinct European classic approach to my ears.

Both valid approaches of course (different strokes for different folks).....For my own use as a musician, it's just nice that now with Ivory there's a really good one with an American sound to it, since so many have been done with the more European recording and sampling approach.


Balance of left and right in volume?

Very even, and you also have a stereo perspective control and can change the image from audience to player perspective.

Hope that's helpful...

spectrum :-)

PS. Again...this is not my product at all and I have no affiliation with it, other than it is one of many products that is distributed by the same company that distributes my products too.

[Fogwall]

Supplementary questions:

How does the Ivory perform when it comes to string resonance, damper pedal effects etc? If comparing this with GigaPulse enabled piano libraries, The Grand VSTi etc. You can also have this comparison test as a guidance or reference here: http://www.af.lu.se/~fogwall/piano.html

[football]

I am absolutely going to pick this up in the next few days.

I'll give some feedback when I am up and running. Hopefully I'll think it's as great as Spectrum says (thanks for the detailed feedback by the way). I have high hopes.

I love that this thing comes with it's own engine.

I have a Dual 1.25 G4 running Pro Tools, so we'll see if that's enough gas to run this as an RTAS plug in.

I am very curious about the Pad you can use alongside the piano.

Anyway, I'll know soon enough.

[Jake Johnson]

Thanks for the details.

(Is anyone else's text getting cut
off on the right side? I can't read half
of what I or other people type. Or
have I accidentally changed my settings?

[Up Late]

Hi Uplate,

could you tell me other libraries you have used so that I may gauge what you are comparing it to?

I'll probably pick this up within the next few days but am still hoping for more reinforcement.

I record mostly solo piano so it has to be pretty good. The library that has worked best so far for me is PMI Bos. The ambience effect of that one is something I am hoping to get from every library.

thank you

football -- I have used almost all the current pianos -- PMI, Vintaudio, etc. The difference (to me) is in the extra features, all which lead to a more expressive performance. Being able to increase or decrease hammer strike sound, for example, is brilliant. These guys just did a whole heck of a lot more than just very carefully sample a great piano. All I know is that Ivory is what I use now to the exclusion of the others.

[Nick Batzdorf]

PS. Again...this is not my product at all and I have no affiliation with it, other than it is one of many products that is distributed by the same company that distributes my products too.

AHA! I knew you were a bluff, charlatan, chiseler, con man, confidence man, conniver, cozener, crook, deceiver, decoy, defrauder, dodger, double-crosser, double-dealer, enticer, fake, hypocrite, impostor, jockey, knave, masquerader, pretender, quack, rascal, rogue, scammer, shark, sharper, shyster, swindler, and trickster. :)

[Bruce A. Richardson]

The big difference is the interface and the sympathetic resonance DSP stuff they are doing in Ivory.....you can't really sample that, and it's been the missing link for a long time. Good tones and recordings have been available for a long time, but this sympathetic resonance stuff is really pretty cool. (not exactly like what real strings do either, but a very musical simulation/approximation)GigaStudio 3.0 facilitates this as well, and does so on an open platform, allowing as much or more user customization.

Edit: No negative energy implied towards Ivory, by the way. Just wanted to point out that sophisticated tools for piano reproduction, resonance modeling, et. al., DO exist outside this particular product.

[football]

I just picked it up this morning.

It sounds great, however it is popping and clicking all over the place.

I have a MDD Dual 1.25 GHZ G4 with 1.75MB of Ram running Pro Tools (002 rack)

I installed Ivory on a Lacie D2 firewire drive. I think this might be why it is performing so poorly. This model G4 is known not to work with Pro Tools and firewire drives unless a seperate firewire card is installed.

I hoped this wouldn't effect Ivory but it may be what is happening.

I am going to load just one of the pianos on my main system drive and see what happens.

Even with the performance not working well it sounds like this could be fairly incredible. Thanks again for the great feedback it helped me make a move I think I will be very happy with.

More to come.

[football]

I just installed it on the main system drive and it's working much better already.

I think this piano is going to work out great.

[Fogwall]

football, please let me know how it performs (regarding my questions). Thanks.

[football]

Hi Fogwall,

wow, this thing sounds great.

I am actually liking the Yamaha better than the Bos that comes with it.

I don't have the Steinway loaded cause I am using the main drive right now and don't really have much space left*.

I have to set the polyphony low within Ivory or the system spikes and audio drops out. It's not that bad though cause they seem to have an incredible voice stealing feature that makes it unnoticeable (to me anyways).

I hate to have to tell you this but I have extremely bad tinnitus (and other hearing problems) so their may be things about the piano I can't pick up on (noise, artifacts, strange overtones). But to my ears it is pretty incredible.

My main piano till now has been the PMI Bos. I certainly would not put that out to pasture by any means but I will start using this on sessions and see how it goes.

I have a session Monday that I will use this on. I am sure after that I will have a much better idea how this will work out in the long run. I really have pretty high hopes.

The interface is amazing for a non-techie like myself. Couldn't imagine it being any better.

Anyway, to sum it all up, this baby kicks some major ~~~! I hope a ton of people buy it, it is outstanding!



:D

[football]

Hi Fogwall,

I just went back and saw the questions you were talking about.

I don't have Giga 3 so unfortunately I have no reference to what a comparison to Giga Pulse might be.

I am sorry.

[matthew]

hi,

the best piano is Steinberg the Grand. A close second is Steinberg Virtual Guitarist.

Hands down.

[spectrum]

GigaStudio 3.0 facilitates this as well, and does so on an open platform, allowing as much or more user customization.

Edit: No negative energy implied towards Ivory, by the way. Just wanted to point out that sophisticated tools for piano reproduction, resonance modeling, et. al., DO exist outside this particular product.

Good point Bruce....I'm not as familiar with the newest Giga 3.0 libraries that utilize this feature, so my comments about Ivory should be taken in that light.

That site with the sympathetic resonance comparison tests was really interesting...it'll be cool to see this guy's tests on Ivory when he gets to it.

I just really liked how Ivory put all the elements together in a very musical sounding and versatile interface.

BTW, I don't think that ANY piano sample really replaces another, because different sounds are always needed for so many types of musical settings. Especially on piano....a good variety is essential for the working composer and pianist that does different genres. I think some of the Giga libraries I've heard and played are really awesome too.

What really impressed me about Ivory was that they got such a good variety of sounds and put a useful set of meaningful controls to tailor the sound to your own taste within an engine and plug-in that worked really well on my Mac rig. Up until this instrument, I'm not aware of any other library product that covers so many different quality sounds in one package, with this particular set of features....it just rings my bell. It's very likely that it might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I don't think any piano product can ever do that now.

:-)

spectrum

[spectrum]

It's very likely that it might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I don't think any piano product can ever do that now.

Except Virtual Guitarist of course....

;-)

spectrum

[Fogwall]

Thanks, football. If you have the time to take a closer look at the string resonance features let me know.

Matthew, I'm myself a The Grand user. Unfortunately it has a serious bug when using the string resonance feature, some notes become out of tune! Steinberg and Wizoo are well aware of that (but prefer not talking about it too much). Good news is that a version 2 of The Grand is on its way (don't know any date though).

[Alexcremers]

It's very likely that it might not be everyone's cup of tea, but I don't think any piano product can ever do that now.


Would a real piano do the trick?

[David Abraham]

Hi Fogwall,

I am actually liking the Yamaha better than the Bos that comes with it.

I don't have the Steinway loaded cause I am using the main drive right now and don't really have much space left*.


Of the demos on the ILIO page the Yamaha was may favorite, even though I prefer a Steinway...I heard what seemed to be noise/hiss build up in the Steinway which also seems to be in every other Steinway library I demo. Don't hear it as much in speakers, but the SONY MDR-7506's always reveal the noise.

Is it really 32 Gigs? and if so it looks like it's possible to select the piano you want to install? 32Gigs would be too much for my laptop.

Finally, when it ships I hope the PC version works as well as the MAC version.

[c4]

Is ivory a stand alone instrument as well as a plug in or do you need a host to run it? I would like to have a piano that didnt need kontakt or gigasampler..

[Jake Johnson]

You need a vsti host, but there are several out there.

Does anyone know when Ivory will be out for pc's?

[Martin Hines]

I installed Ivory on a Lacie D2 firewire drive. I think this might be why it is performing so poorly. This model G4 is known not to work with Pro Tools and firewire drives unless a seperate firewire card is installed.

You can buy the LaCie FW800 PCI card for $70, and it doubles the transfer rate (vs. FW400 or USB 2.0):
http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=3701042

[JohnGrant]

hi,

the best piano is Steinberg the Grand. A close second is Steinberg Virtual Guitarist.

Hands down.
Not

JG

[Nick Batzdorf]

Come on, John, everyone knows Virtual Guitarist is the best piano ever! :eek:

[Paul Thomson]

Hi All,

Jumped into this one a bit late.. But: been using Ivory now for over a month. Also have 3 other 'name' libs, but I just find myself going back to Ivory again and again.

Its installed on a Lacie BigDisk on FW2 with a G5 running tools. Works like a dream. And I totally love messing with the controls - especially the action noise.

I can def recommend this one to fellow NSers.

Cheers

Paul :o

[JohnGrant]

Hi All,

Jumped into this one a bit late.. But: been using Ivory now for over a month. Also have 3 other 'name' libs, but I just find myself going back to Ivory again and again.

Its installed on a Lacie BigDisk on FW2 with a G5 running tools. Works like a dream. And I totally love messing with the controls - especially the action noise.

I can def recommend this one to fellow NSers.

Cheers

Paul :o
Give us some demos! The piano may be great to play live, but what does the recorded (solo) result actually sound like? That's the rub.

JG

[wind]

I wish I had a Mac and more money......


haha it's one or the other

[roger11]

something about my experiences with Ivory:

i am just using the Steinway D, Imperial and C7 are out of discussion.
The only thing i can say is: 6 Layers are not enaugh.

sure, during playing the amplitude of the sustained notes may overlap the " Layer-Jumping ", but you still play in a different way because of these dynamical steps.

in piano the sound is quite nice, sustain as well ( cause of no loops ).

----------

anyway, my physical Steinway B is laughing about these try´s...:-)

[matthew]

Quote:
Originally Posted by matthew
hi,

the best piano is Steinberg the Grand. A close second is Steinberg Virtual Guitarist.

Hands down.

Not

JG

i thought you knew i was joking. There is only like about one usable patch from Virtual Guitarist and two from Electric Edition. That was a joke too.

but seriously, i agree with your opinion on the best pianos: Milanaudio, Steinway B, etc etc

[JohnGrant]

i thought you knew i was joking. There is only like about one usable patch from Virtual Guitarist and two from Electric Edition. That was a joke too.

but seriously, i agree with your opinion on the best pianos: Milanaudio, Steinway B, etc etc

I must be getting old! Anyhow, I wish Milanaudio would add another couple of layers to his Milan Steinway, and make a Gigastudio version of it!

JG

[Ante]

I got Ivory 2 days ago and all I can't say is, that I'm really impressed. When I compared other libraries there always seemed to lack something. Ivory simply rocks. It's huge and if you like to play with the sustain pedal be prepared (good comp & fast harddisk) or you will have a "slow disk" flashing all the time. The sounds and the variation (like Eric said) is fabulous.

greets

Ante

[Nick Batzdorf]

You might be surprised at the note-stealing algorithm. Try setting the polyphony to 24 voices.

[samwhite]

Ooooooh, PC version please, please, please!!!!!

[Olivier]

Hello !


does Ivory reproduce real harmonics of a piano ?

here are the harmonics rules pedal up of my real Grand Piano :

can Ivory reproduce that ?

With A5 is down (played) :

if [keys(A1 or A2 or A3 or A4 or D2 or D3 or D4) are down] and [keys A5 is down] then play the
A5 harmonics samples

With A4 is down (played) :

if [keys(A1 or A2 or A3 or D2 or D3 ) are down] and [keys A4 is down] then play the
A5 harmonics samples

With A3 is down (played) :

if [keys(A1 or A2 or D2 ) are down] and [keys A3 is down] then play the
A5 harmonics samples

With A2 is down (played) :

if [keys(A1 ) are down] and [keys A2 is down] then play the
A5 harmonics samples

you can apply this rules to others note with n,x variables


Regards,

Olivier

[JohnGrant]

Olivier, do you own this sample? IF so, what are your impressions of it?

JG

[Olivier]

Hi,

no, i don't...

I'm a PC user and I have to wait the PC version.

:)

Regards,

Olivier

[Nick Batzdorf]

If I understand you, Olivier, no sampled piano will ever do that. The number of samples to record would be a factor, i.e. 1x2x3...88. That would take literally several lifetimes. If you feel the need for that (and need MIDI in), it's God's way of telling you to buy a Yamaha Disklavier. :)

What Ivory has is a resonance processor, sort of like what reverb is to a room.

[Fogwall]

Olivier, you left out one of the right parenthesis in all your formulas, making them difficult to understand.. (must blame on something)

I'll send you a private message.

[Jake Johnson]

Olivier:

I don't quite understand your equation. Can you give us one of the lines filled out with the actual numbers\notes\frequencies, so we have a key to go by?

I'm not sure it would always take enormous numbers of samples to duplicate the sound he's talking about: the existing samples could be used. What would be needed is the program to indicate that what is to be played are specific harmonics in the existing samples instead of the fundamental (although, often, the fundamental of upper notes would be what is played as one of the first few harmonics for lower notes.) Not a small task, given the possible number of combinations of notes, but the notes\frequencies themselves are there in the samples. This is how the Gem ProMega works (as a GEM representative explained to me): a hard strike sample for each note, and then the program figures out, based on velocity and key combinations, what harmonics to play.

Like the new Synthful, in other words. (I posted a query about pianos in that thread, but no one responded...Hurt my feelings, guys.)

[kirk]

Funny only one post in this thread mentions the hiss on the fade outs...

you only really notice it wearing phones and holding a banged chord until it dies...but then its annoying bec. you want this product to be perfect...

then I found setting the dynamic range to max made the hiss harder to hear... and so now, playing away over Dynaudio speakers (BM6?) I don't notice it....

kind 'a in heaven w/ a newly acquired MP9500 with really heavy action (I won't use its internal sounds) and playing the Ivory....

Kirk

[Alexcremers]

Funny, all talk but no play. Where are them enthusiast demos, huh?

[Nick Batzdorf]

Funny only one post in this thread mentions the hiss on the fade outs...

I didn't notice it, but my guess - without taking the time to listen - is that it's unavoidable unless you record the piano in something like VSL's Silent Stage with a ridiculously low noise floor. The reason is why lots of compressors have gates at the end of the chain: compression brings up everything that's at a low level, including noise.

They could also use noise reduction, but they probably didn't want to change the sound.

[JohnGrant]

Funny, all talk but no play. Where are them enthusiast demos, huh?

I second that emotion. Walk the talk!

JG

[fisheye]

Funny, all talk but no play. Where are them enthusiast demos, huh?

This feels like a disbeliever. Do you request recordings at other piano-sample-threads as well? Or only Ivory.

I do like to hear some recordings as well, but you sound very ironic. Why?

[Alexcremers]

Do you request recordings at other piano-sample-threads as well?

Yes, I do. Especially when there are no playable demos like the ones PMI or SampleTekk are providing.

------------
Alex Cremers

[Jake Johnson]

It seems strange to me, too, that there is so little information about Ivory and so few demos. The reviews of Ivory seem to speak in very general terms, never mentioning the details of the quality of the filters, the individual samples, etc. Maybe pc users, having had Giga and other softsamplers around for so long, are just more likely to dive under the hood of the software than Mac users? And have more piano sets to compare Ivory to?

[fozzy]

The demos are not very impressive, at least to my ears, so far for this product. Still I'm still hoping that I'll be pleasantly surprised by this one (I look forward to Nick's review). I'll definitely need to hear more convincing demos before I jump.

(Nick, will your review be available online for those of us interested in reading it?? )

I don't think we'll get a playable demo with this one. Too bad.:(

[Nick Batzdorf]

I'm not sure when it's coming out, Fozzy, but Mix puts their content online at mixonline.com.

And I promise I didn't talk about the color of the filters. Being a Mac user, I'm way too shallow for that. :rolleyes:

[samwhite]

Hi all!

What about this review AND demos?

www.macjams.com/article.php?story=20041115104933214

Best,
Sam

[fisheye]

I think Ivory isn't made for composers looking for sounds that fit in the soundtrack. For those users, a gigastudio sample of course would be much more useful since they can tweak endlessly and they have the knowledge and experience to do so.

However, for players, it's a different story. They aren't sound-engineers, but pianists. They don't have all the knowlegde and experience to tweak everything under the hood. They rely on the qualities of the developers to create something they can use instantly in a very musical way, with just a few musically programmed knobs. Just like a pianist relies on the Steinway engineers (for example) and tuners to make it work for them.

Pianists don't talk about filters, envelopes, etc. They talk about playability, inspiration, translating hands-movements into the sound. And that's what has been said here and at other sites; in their opinion it's very playable. And I think that's why so little has been said about the technical stuff yet.

Just the fact that Ivory is created by someone who has been making piano-sound-engines for live use for over 30 years says a lot to me.

I hope for a trial-version, but I'm afraid it won't be made, since it has software. Like there is no trial for Gigastudio and Kontakt. Some shops will probably have it installed for their customers to try it out.

[Olivier]

hi,

new link in flash :

http://www.ilio.com/spotlight/?fromFlash=1

Regards,

Olivier

[Raindog]

I have quite a few piano libraries (Boesendorfer PMI 290, Vintaudio C7, Rainpiano, Worra´s white and black Grand, and Artvista´s Malmsjö Grand). I´m still looking for an "all in one" piano for live performances. I have my powerbook (867 MHz, 1 GByte RAM) tuned with an internal 7200 rpm/( Mbyte cache) harddsisk (just great) and would be curious if I could run Ivory even when using the sustain pedal extensively without serious dropouts. I could use an external firewire drive as well if this performs much better but I doubt that my cpu power will be enough to perform the piano properly.

Has anyone got any live experience with this setup??
Thanks for your help
Raindog

[Nick Batzdorf]

You can run it or any other samples on a FW drive no problem. I do.

[Raindog]

You can run it or any other samples on a FW drive no problem. I do.

And is my above mentioned cpu strong enough to prevent dropouts? It doesn´t always work with Halion 3 or PMI Boesendorfer.
Thanks for your help
Regards
Raindog