How are you guys getting strings to swell and decay?

[Damon]

I\'ve noticed lately alot of talk about adding more stuff to enhance swells and decays for strings in Gigastudio. I\'m 100 percent for this. http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/smile.gif I\'m having a hard time trying to get my strings to swell and decay. I hate it when strings just cutoff when you release a note. I\'ve added some release in the Giga editor, but it just makes the strings sound more fake. Do any of you use expression pedals?
Is there a way to assign my keyboard modulation to adjust the volume of the strings? If so, how do you do this in Gigastudio? Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks

[Ewen]

I use the MOD wheel to fade the volume up and down. It works well.

Of course you can use the volume pedal if you got one, but I prefer the MOD wheel.

Ewen

[Damon]

How do I do this?

[ursatz]

What I do is very painstaking - *every single note* in each exposed voice gets its own attack, swell (usually), and decay, drawn with controller 11. Sometimes, to compensate for not-so-good attacks in the samples, I\'ll start the note early, zeroing out cc11 until it\'s time for the note to sound. And I often alternate the notes of a single line between tracks so that I can get a better pseudo-legato. If you\'re interested you can hear what this sounds like at www.mp3.com/BillClark (\"http://www.mp3.com/BillClark\") (though, as IOComposer noticed, I got lazy in the fast part of the string piece, so the Debussy is probably a better example).

I do all this stuff by hand because I haven\'t found any way to approximate realistic legato lines by just playing them, no matter what combination of vol pedal/mod wheel etc. I use.

It\'s a lot of work and incredibly time-consuming.

Disclaimer: I\'m no expert on this stuff, in fact I consider myself still a newbie in the sampling world. So, you experts out there: Am I doing more work than I need to? Anybody know any short-cuts that still give you a decent legato?





[This message has been edited by ursatz (edited 02-04-2001).]

[Damon]

I figured it out. All I had to do was to assign my keyboards mod slider to volume or expression and I can control the swells and decays. Yeah, whatever! I still get terrible results. I\'m so sick of \"painstakingly\" trying to get strings to sound naturally expressive. It\'s really starting to take away from my composing having to spend all of this time tweaking out note velocities http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/frown.gif As a matter of fact, I think it is the hardest thing to program personally. I sure do hope Garys new library is gonna blow all of these string libraries away. I\'ve heard all of them, except Kirk Hunters, and I have to say I\'m pretty disappointed with what is out there.
I think I had better results with my roland orchestral 2 expansion board that only cost 220 bucks! I thought the string ensembles on that sounded better then some of the Miroslav string ensembles. The roland strings were alot more lush with a softer attack and better decay for legato phrasing. I know some of you might disagree, but at least my roland strings didn\'t have tuning problems like some of Miroslavs samples. My friend who has the Miroslav library said that some of the samples dont even fit with the rest of the samples. He said there was one particularly great violin patch that sounded good in all ranges except it had one note sounding like it was sampled from an old synthesizer! It Didn\'t even sound like the same instrument he said.
Anyone heard any update on when Garys library might be available? Also, is Kirk Hunters library better then Miroslavs string ensembles? I desperately need some better strings then the advanced orchestra compact edition I\'m using now.
OYE VE! http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/shocked.gif

[This message has been edited by Damon (edited 02-05-2001).]

[Robert Kral]

Damon and Ursatz:

I (and many others writing film and TV soundtracks) use a fader box like the Peavey PC 1600 (for example), with the fader asigned to volum controller #7. It has a longer throw than what your keyboard probably does so there\'s plenty of room for expressive swells etc. With practice it works great, and once you start getting good results by varying your fades up and down etc it becomes second nature. I use it on brass and woodwinds constantly: I never play anything without one hand on the fader adjusting the \"expression\".

As far as realistic ensmeble strings go, I still us roland\'s ensemble strings from \"Orchestral Family\" CDs more than anything else. Great realism and orc p is still on of the most beautiful patches.

[Steve]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Robert Kral:
\"I (and many others writing film and TV soundtracks) use a fader box like the Peavey PC 1600 (for example), with the fader asigned to volum controller #7. It has a longer throw than what your keyboard probably does so. . . .


Robert: Is the fader\'s throw longer than an Expression Pedal like the EV-5? Thanks,

Steve

[ursatz]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=\"1\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Robert Kral:
...With practice it works great, and once you start getting good results by varying your fades up and down etc it becomes second nature...
<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Robert,

Thanks for the information - I\'d love to have an easier way to do this stuff! A couple of questions: Do you have any examples of music produced this way that we could listen to? And, do you have to do much hand-editing of the controller data with this method?

Thanks again,
Bill

[OH]

>>but at least my roland strings didn\'t have tuning problems like some of Miroslavs samples.<<

For all those wanting to correct bad pitched samples...: http://www.celemony.com (\"http://www.celemony.com\")

Their new MELODYNE might be the solution...

[Jamieh]

I\'m having pretty good luck with the Advanced Orchestra strings and a Kenton Control Freak (similar to the Peavey 1600 mentioned earlier). If you use the AO crossfaded patches, you can not only change the volume on the fly, but the timbre of the note.

I read somewhere that the Roland strings were actually borrowed from the AO set, but I don\'t remember where I read it. Roland says that their stuff was recorded \"in Eastern Europe\" which is also where AO was recorded.

[This message has been edited by Jamieh (edited 02-05-2001).]

[Didier Rachou]

Jamieh,

Is that a Studio edition Midi freak you are using? If not, then do you find it annoying having to switch twixt banks of 8 faders whilst utilizing Kenton\'s synth presets? I am going to get one, however I like the idea of the smaller footprint of the 8 fader box, that said, the good-to-go aspect of the 16 fader Studio Edition is also attractive.

Best,
Didier

[Jamieh]

It is a studio edition. But the footprint is not bad if you have some horizontal space. Vertically it is very small--I was pleasantly surprised. It fits perfectly into my setup.

I haven\'t used it extensively. In fact, the most sliders I have used at once is 4--modulation, volume, expression and aftertouch. (My controller is very limited). The reason I got the Studio Edition (besides the fact that I couldn\'t find the other version) was that I could program the 16 buttons to correspond with C1-D#2 and use those buttons to do the keyswitching that is programmed into Advanced Orchestra, Dan Dean, and other libraries. That way I can do key switching and still get the entire instrument range on my small 48 key keyboard.

[Robert Kral]

Ursatz:

Yes you can easily check out examples of this method on the TV show I write the music for: \"Angel\" on the WB. Not sure which area you are in, in LA its on Tuesday nights, 9pm Channel 5, right after Buffy.

Probably about 7000 or more fader -thrown volume changes per episode. I\'d hate to do that dawing it by hand!!

http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/smile.gif

[This message has been edited by Robert Kral (edited 02-05-2001).]

[Louis]

For swell and decay, I use fader automation in the edit window of the pre-recorded string tracks in Pro Tools. At this point, I am able to tweak around with fader automation to get the swells and decays just the way I want them to be.

[Damon]

Thanks for the tips guys. I tried using my mod slider for expression, but I guess I need more practice at it. My strings still get to loud in some places, but the mod slider does help in bringing the decay of the sample down more smoothly instead of just adding reverb to compensate for a slightly longer release from a sample that cuts off to fast.

[Horst]

Hi,

there is a quite simple approach to improve phrasing with strings:

1. Pick a sample with a fast but still even attack with no click

2. Set Pre-Attack% in the Volume-Envelope to something between 5 and 20%

3. Set the Attack to something between 0.1 and 0.3s.

If you choose those values carefully, this will give you a relatively fast note that is suitable for legato playing but still sounds smooth enough for as onset of a phrase.

To improve this you can change these parameters while playing using a controller routed to dimension change. You would use a longer attack for the start phrase, then swith to a legato attack and again switch before the last note of the phrase to have a long release (decay).

This is not perfect but it brings great improvement with very little efforts.

Horst.

[ursatz]

Robert,

Thanks! Have to admit I\'ve never watched \"Angel\" (otherwise I would have known where to hear your music), but it will have one new viewer tonight!

Bill

[Bill]

> each exposed voice gets its own attack, swell (usually), and decay,
> drawn with controller 11.

Are there any Cakewalk users who have played with CAL scripts for automating the process of controller tweaking?

[Gulliver]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size=\"1\" face=\"Verdana, Arial\">quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Bill:
>Are there any Cakewalk users who have played with CAL scripts for automating the process of controller tweaking?<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>


I routinely use about 10 to 12 different scripts for everything from non-linear expression envelopes, velocity randomization to clean-up of double events, etc... I don\'t think i would still be using Cakewalk today if it wasn\'t for this ability to program your own scripts. It saves me tremendous amount of time and effort.

Regards,
FJ

[Damon]

Bill, I\'m using Cakewalk PA9. What do you mean by CAL scripts? What is that? I\'ve never tried using that for controller stuff. I\'d appreciate any more info on this. I\'m getting horrible results with strings using the mod slider from my XP-80.

[ursatz]

Bill,

I use a few scripts to do things like alternate a melody between two tracks (so I can slightly overlap the attacks and decays), and scaling controller values.

Damon,

I have PA8, but I think CAL is about the same in PA9. Look in the help file for CAL (Cakewalk Automation Language) and you should find it. It\'s useful for a lot of things (though it\'s also maddeningly limited language).

I wonder - would it be a good idea to set up a \"CAL scripts for Giga users\" site? The public CAL sites I\'ve seen mostly have really simple, and not very useful, scripts. On the other hand, maybe the folks who have developed lots of handy CAL scripts are professionals who don\'t want to give away their secrets. I know I\'d be happy to post my scripts, but I\'m not sure anybody else would find them useful.

[LHong]

Cakewalk-Giga users,
Wow, I\'m interested on the CAL Script too! Good idea to share them with others somehow!

BTW, about swells and decays for strings, I have used the MIDI-enhancement pluged-in for Cakewalk9 (MIDI-FX). Sometimes, it wouldn\'t do exactly what I want but it\'s handy, can get the basic job done. Likely, the CAL program, it would automates and adds (inserts) to your MIDI event tracks such as Velocity, Volume, Pitch Wheel, and Expression with a little User-Interface you can create some customs as the presets. Try-out the Demo, get your own taste and for more informs: http://www.cakewalk.com/Products/PA/SEM128.html#Downdemo (\"http://www.cakewalk.com/Products/PA/SEM128.html#Downdemo\")

[Damon]

I hope Garys new Gigastring library has some sweet sounding slow attacks (but not to slow)with a slow decay for slow passages. I\'m spending way to much time trying to tweak these damn strings out right. God, I could have been done with my demo a week ago!
Anyway, I really appreciate all the tips and info guys. Sorry if I sound to frustrated. Sometimes I wish I could just afford an orchestra to knock this song out! I\'m through for tonight, my brain is shot. http://www.northernsounds.com/ubb/NonCGI/images/icons/shocked.gif

[This message has been edited by Damon (edited 02-09-2001).]

[This message has been edited by Damon (edited 02-09-2001).]