DVZ Info from Musikmesse

**Andrew Aversa** · 03-30-2007, 09:11 AM

A friend of mine at Musikmesse yesterday had the opportunity to speak with Chris Stone (of Audio Impressions) to find out the scoop on their upcoming DVZ product. I'm quite surprised at what he said!

* The library is only 8gb - this is NOT a typo.
* Chris estimates the price to be about $10,000
* This price INCLUDES 5 computers - a "turnkey solution" - constructed by the same people who built Harry Gregson Williams' computer setup, as well as the setup for Hans Zimmer's work on Pirates of the Caribbean 2
* There is no way to run the library on one computer
* A cut-down version with brass + strings only may be available, with 3 computers at a reduced cost of $6,000
* The CPU drain comes from the fact that the instruments are "cloned" across the different computers - "twenty violins are made from one". Chris said that there can be over 500-800 MIDI CC messages per BEAT!
* You control the placement of the virtual instruments in the virtual space
* Release date estimated to be within 2 months

Very interesting info. The total price of the setup seems to be much more reasonable, now considering that the computers are included. The 8gb figure is also interesting. I was surprised at first, but I suppose if most of the articulations are created on the fly and/or using physical modeling (that phrase wasn't specifically used, but I suspect it may be involved) and creative programming, filtering, and EQ is used to further sculpt the sound, you might not *need* 500gb to accurately capture everything.

Thoughts?

**tfishbein82** · 03-30-2007, 09:13 AM

Originally Posted by Andrew Aversa

A friend of mine at Musikmesse yesterday had the opportunity to speak with Christ Stone...

Come on now... that's a bit much. He's just developing sample software.

**Andrew Aversa** · 03-30-2007, 09:14 AM

Whoops.

**tfishbein82** · 03-30-2007, 09:16 AM

Seriously though, this sounds much more reasonable than initial estimates. But I want to hear audio demos! Any news on when AI will provide those?

**Tomke** · 03-30-2007, 09:32 AM

Originally Posted by Andrew Aversa

* The library is only 8gb - this is NOT a typo.
* There is no way to run the library on one computer

Running 8 Gb of samples on one computer isn't really possible today anyway - even without cloning - so it's not that surprising to distribute 'only' 8 Gb over linked CPUs.

In my ears, this sounds as if somebody actually thought about practical everyday usage before selling. 10 grand is a bit much for me, but I'll be sure to follow this around.

**Jeff Beal** · 03-30-2007, 10:28 AM

Sounds pretty cool - thanks for the info. I have to give these guys credit for coming up w/an novel idea and the tech. to realize it - esp. on this idea of real-time ensemble building. It's kind of like what guys have been doing with GPO (and more hours actually creating the ensembles more manually)-

The only poss. 'down' side I see (as opposed to the obvious higher end price point) is the multiple computer thing. I'm trying to move to a setup with a less 'maximum' # of CPUs I need to have maintained and up and running to get my work done. But this price is very similar to what some would spend on an all out VSL or EWQLSO setup etc., so the proof will have to be in the quality results that can be acheived with it-

Now.... where is the NEW VERSION OF LOGIC PRO? hoping for NAB next month-

**Gamera** · 03-30-2007, 03:42 PM

Here are the questions as I see them. Given that we have orchestral libraries now that range in price from a couple hundred (GPO) to 2k - 3k, is this going to sound 7k to 9k better? Is it going to be 7k to 9k more playable? Think about that in percentage terms. For some folks with that kind of funding, maybe. But that's not the average person. I'm curious as to what kind of business model they're thinking about since this is seemingly a very small audience.

- G

**Von Richter** · 03-30-2007, 03:47 PM

Very interesting... actually not a bad price for all that hardware, if it delivers the results. I will say the workflow they are going for is potentially very pleasing and intuitive.

Can you imagine the tech support nightmare they might be facing with all those potential points of mechanical failure? Scary thought. Good components are a must.

**Tomdini** · 03-30-2007, 04:05 PM

Originally Posted by Gamera

Here are the questions as I see them. Given that we have orchestral libraries now that range in price from a couple hundred (GPO) to 2k - 3k, is this going to sound 7k to 9k better? Is it going to be 7k to 9k more playable? Think about that in percentage terms. For some folks with that kind of funding, maybe. But that's not the average person. I'm curious as to what kind of business model they're thinking about since this is seemingly a very small audience.

- G

The whole VSL VI package costs 11k or so. So AI isn't the only company aiming at high-end (or at least, quite affluent) users. And by all accounts, despite the locked player, composers appear to generally find VSL quite easy to play and use.

As far as sound quality... everybody seems to generally agree that nobody has quite nailed orchestral strings, yet. Although, the sound quality of one lib versus another is the most subjective thing ever. Some of my fellows have, indeed, cobbled together a collection of libs that sound just the way they want, and are totally satisfied.

Some string samples are closer than others, in terms of ideal tone, but from what I can see (as well as my own feelings on the subject), people are kind of waiting for the "generally accepted" string library (kind of how ProjectSAM is the generally accepted brass library). The key to VSL's sound qualiity, in the end, is good engineering. EQ it right, mix it right, and (most importantly, in my opinion), reverb it right - and VSL sounds very beautiful, top to bottom.

Where I think VSL will still have AI beat is in the section-by-section department. No time soon will I have the chunk of funds laying around to purchase VSL all at once, but I can pick and choose and build up a collection as I go. AI doesn't appear to be willing to do that, and if they do, it won't be as thorough a subdivision of libraries as VSL. And who can blame them - with all those computers to set up, keeping on hand a steady supply of every possible configuration a user might purchase would be logistically impossible, I think.

Plus, I guess you'd have to send in your custom AI rig every time you added a section or two to the library? Ugh...

I think we have enough playable libraries out there that sound really good. AI's going to have to decimate the competition with sheer aural quality, in order to make a dent in the market.

-Tom