KVR :: Samples, Sampling and Sample Libraries » Wow, Spitfire Albion! [View Original Topic]
There are 73 posts in this topic.

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TristezaOrange - Mon Aug 01, 2011 11:59 pm

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http://www.spitfireaudio.com/albion.html

What's up at KvR? Why is nobody discussing this? The demos sounds wonderful - it seems like this libary has a certain quality that appeals to me that I can't put into words, something "old-time", "vintage" (not in the VA sense ) and certainly warm and fuzzy. I'm getting this as soon as I have the money.

Any comments on it? Did anyone get it already?

I'm excited about this!

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Bronto Scorpio - Tue Aug 02, 2011 12:15 am

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Wow the demos sound really great!

Cheers
Dennis

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EvilDragon - Tue Aug 02, 2011 12:24 am

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Spitfire Albion >> anything from ProjectSAM.

And the price is right. Symphobia is way too expensive in comparison (and it's a comparable product). And Albion sounds MUCH better!

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ma9sharp11 - Tue Aug 02, 2011 1:17 am

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Albion is a stunning library.

Straight out of the box it has that killer warm sound that you can even sculpt some more with the 4 recorded mic positions.

The (true) legato sections are extremely musical and inspiring to play.
There's modwheel controllable orchestral fx. The ostinatum section is incredibly useful for quickly creating tons of background patterns to propel a track.

On top of all the "conventional" orchestral stuff Spitfire processed the samples and created this "Steamband" section of atmospheric pads, drones and ambiences that are great for sound design with a warm, organic quality.

If you need a musical, inspiring, playable library than you definitely should check into Albion.

My internet connection is not the fastest. It's broadband, but broadband of the slow kind. To download the almost 18 gig, took close to 2 days. Seemed to be the longest 2 days in quite some time. But more than worth it.

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synaesthesia - Tue Aug 02, 2011 2:27 am

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I finished downloading this morning and can't wait to have a play (am currently at work, rubbish!).

The user demos and feedback so far has been really good and it sounds excellent. And there's so much content for the price. Amazing library.

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MA-Simon - Tue Aug 02, 2011 2:18 pm

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I'll just leave that here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Czjss4VThQA

Bought and downloaded it in the preorder.
Love the sound, and i will use it often etc.

But: ranges only from ~ppp-mf-f-ish
So there is no real f-fff dynamic.

So be prepared!

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Daniel James - Wed Aug 03, 2011 4:19 am

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Cheers for linking the vid Simon. I have been pretty busy of late and decided to pop in to post it only to find you beat me to it

Hope you find the vid useful!

Dan

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noizy - Wed Aug 03, 2011 4:41 am

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Very nice man. thanks for the review i love the sound

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shadoe42 - Wed Aug 03, 2011 5:14 am

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So someone clear this up cause I am rather cloudy on this. is Albion a collection of loops? or is it a library more in line with EWQLSO? or both? the ostanatum function is pretty sweet. way out of my price range at the moment but still overall this looks rather spiffy.

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EvilDragon - Wed Aug 03, 2011 5:35 am

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Both.

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synaesthesia - Wed Aug 03, 2011 7:26 am

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It's primarily playable instruments like other orchestral librariees. the difference being that you get to play sections (high and low strings, high and low brass, etc.) instead of individual instruments.

The orchestral stuff sounds great, quite different from other libraries - has this almost 'British' feel to it, if that makes any sense. But the percussion (which includes some tuned and untuned loops) and pad sounds are equally excellent. In fact, the Stephenson Steam Pads are pretty bloody amazing.

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shadoe42 - Wed Aug 03, 2011 9:38 am

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Thanks mate. I am liking everything that I hear. Sounds like a very sweet library

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zakufan - Thu Aug 04, 2011 6:42 pm

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the demos sound so good
now its on my wishlist for christmas

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noiseboyuk - Thu Aug 04, 2011 9:20 pm

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Good company too - very friendly, keep customers in the loop and the musicians are on royalties. Albion duplicates too much of what I already have for it to be a priority for me, but if I was starting again it would probably be my first purchase. It looks and sounds stunning.

Spitfire's history is in private libraries for very high end professionals, exciting times that they're now releasing such great (and cheap) commercial libraries too.

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Guido Negraszus - Mon Aug 08, 2011 3:59 pm

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I for one am disappointed with Albion. I disagree that you can compare it to Symphobia or any other Orchestral library. I have Symphobia, LA Strings and East West Gold Orchestra but I wouldn't take Albion into the same league. I can't put my finger on it what it is but I find the playability very poor and it just doesn't seem to mix well with anything I do - so far. I also downloaded it straight away and tried to use it in 3 different Orchestral tracks so far and I always ended up using LA Strings and CineBrass instead.
I also find that the programing hasn't been done well. The strings "jump" in level if you do a velocity/modwheel adjustment and it sounds very unnatural in a mix.

For those of you who don't have a decent Orchestral library yet I wouldn't recommend Albion as a first library. You can't go wrong with LA Strings or Symphobia although LA Strings is my No.1 Strings composing tool.

Having said all this I do agree that Albion does have a nice tonal quality but I find it unsatisfactory as a Orchestral library by itself.

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EvilDragon - Mon Aug 08, 2011 4:17 pm

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It's Albion, not Albian.

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Guido Negraszus - Mon Aug 08, 2011 5:00 pm

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Good Lord, what did I buy then.

Thanks for that. Corrected it!

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Waywyn - Mon Aug 08, 2011 11:52 pm

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I opened a thread regarding my demo before I've seen this one, but lemme point you towards my demo and my little walkthrough ... and sorry for my crappy headset and english!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9s0zD2R0xGM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeOnylw5sjg

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FrankT - Fri Oct 14, 2011 8:05 pm

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Anymore experiences with Albion, particularly in comparison to other orchestral libraries?
thx

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K-Bee - Sat Oct 15, 2011 3:26 am

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HOLY S***!!!! This is John Williams in a box!!!!!
Probably the best thing I've heard! It seems mostly suited for classical/film stuff though. Can you do disco strings with this??

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noiseboyuk - Sat Oct 15, 2011 4:07 am

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What, like John Williams does?

[/SARCASM] Probably the best library for disco is the little Native Instruments one - Session Strings (personally I think the PRO version isn't worth the bother based on the demos - it can't compete sonically with LASS etc, so just have the simple light version that'll do those cute scoopy fall things etc).

I don't have Albion, though I do like the demos very much. Have just ordered their new Small Strings library, they're a great company that supports musicians like CineSamples do.

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K-Bee - Sat Oct 15, 2011 4:45 am

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Yup! The infamous John Williams disco strings. Well, actually meco did the Star Wars and Close Encounters themes in that fashion.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWRWYYt47RI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kvFGFbA6LI

But Sessions Strings look interesting. I heard about them before but I was hoping I could find a library that could do it all and still be different from the ones I have in my kurzweil.
I suppose it's double or nothing then

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noiseboyuk - Sat Oct 15, 2011 5:20 am

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You know you want to!

I didn't know anyone else remembered Meco - I had an album or two back in the day. Blimey. Then there was Saturday Night Fever's 5th of Beethoven as well at about the same time. Strange days...

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FrankT - Sat Oct 15, 2011 8:39 pm

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Ok, disco scoops and falls apart (I have NI session strings and I think it is a bit a waste of space), who uses Albion for orchestration and how does it compare to the usual suspects ?

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noiseboyuk - Sat Oct 15, 2011 11:13 pm

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The ever-talented Daniel James has done a specific Albion walkthrough

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Czjss4VThQA&feature=related

and you can here it in action in his most recent tutorial

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lo-vvFc0OQc

Both terrific vids.

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Liero - Sun Oct 16, 2011 12:08 am

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I posted some of my thoughts on this newer thread:

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=4690561#4690561

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FrankT - Sun Oct 16, 2011 12:45 am

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Just watched it, in deed very good! Dan stresses that Albion is best for the more underscore type of music. That is fine with me, especially if you dont own the bombastic libraries a la Symphobia.

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FrankT - Sun Oct 16, 2011 12:45 am

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thanks, I saw this and will respond in the thread.

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K-Bee - Sun Oct 16, 2011 12:55 am

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Actually, I don't want to but when it comes to sample libraries, it's like I have a second mind or something
And as for Meco or other euro-tinged disco from that era....don't get me started! Love the symphonic overlong disco suites by Alec R Costandinos, Cerrone, Boris Midney, Patric Juvet etc..

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MA-Simon - Sun Oct 16, 2011 12:15 pm

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Huhu, just tought i'd share that with you:

Orchestral Logo
http://soundcloud.com/ma-simon/startup-logo-sound-test

All things are Albion except the Tambourin, Tabular Bells, Triangle and Cymbal clash.

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J van E - Mon Oct 17, 2011 11:23 am

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WOW! My goodness... I was looking for a good string library but this one, although not being a real string library, sounds awesome! And if I am not mistaken you can get pretty convincing results with it rather quickly! I just read a review on some film scoring site which said that a lot of what you can do with Albion will take hours of layering and editing with other more normal orchestral libraries. Man, this one sounds GREAT! And the best thing: it's cheaper than all the libraries I've seen so far!

Awesome. I am going to check out some more video's...!

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Saqs - Thu Oct 20, 2011 5:39 am

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Anyone on the fence may want to wait another month or so since ProjectSam just announced what seems to be a pretty direct counter to Albion.

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J van E - Fri Oct 21, 2011 2:12 am

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Hm... Albion is ONE product, ONE thought, ONE idea: ProjectSam's offering is a mixture of various products, put together in one box. I wonder if that would work together as well as Albion does. The price is low though, compared to Symphobian... Still, I don't really like 'collections'...

P.S. I purchased Albion this week, so perhaps hence my scepticism...

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Saqs - Fri Oct 21, 2011 6:04 am

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No need for buyers remorse lol. You're pretty safe with Albion. But SAMs stuff is all pretty damn good as well. Its just another alternative which is always good.

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J van E - Fri Oct 21, 2011 9:39 am

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Yes, I certainly don't regret my purchase! I'm having big fun with it. This is my very first try at creating some cinematic music. Just fooling around, nothing very original!

http://soundcloud.com/jeroen-van-engelenhoven/first-albion

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Sequent - Fri Oct 21, 2011 9:41 am

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The new Project Sam library most definitely looks like their answer to Albion. The price looks attractive... I think it would be about $100 less than Albion's price.

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MA-Simon - Mon Oct 24, 2011 7:41 am

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Hey, here is a short cue i made with Albion and VSL Woodwinds:

http://soundcloud.com/ma-simon/ragos

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meldavid - Sat May 26, 2012 6:32 pm

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Go internet, go, go, go! Taking soooo long...

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JPQ - Mon May 28, 2012 11:14 am

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Any ideas how well blend with kontakt factory library orchestral sounds ? and/or miroslav philharmonik ?

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synchronizer - Mon May 28, 2012 12:00 pm

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I can assure you that you're going to want to replace both of those libraries if you are able to purchase Albion. It's on a higher level---

I wish I could have it...

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JPQ - Mon May 28, 2012 12:35 pm

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Good know you comment even you dont have it. and i need good solo sounds and maybe somekind quick tool like this.

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EvilDragon - Mon May 28, 2012 12:48 pm

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However Albion sounds better, more natural.

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Sequent - Mon May 28, 2012 1:05 pm

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They each have their different strengths. Albion without a doubt sounds fabulous. But OE sounds good as well. Cinematic Strings also sounds fabulous, btw.

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Sequent - Mon May 28, 2012 1:09 pm

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You know... that Spitfire has a 30% educational discount? It would still be a lot of money but if you save up for it you would probably have it before you know it.

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synchronizer - Mon May 28, 2012 1:10 pm

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That would be about $550 with the %30 discount. Wow haha...at least it's not more expensive.

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Sequent - Mon May 28, 2012 1:12 pm

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Congratulations!!! You are going to love it.

Just fyi... if you haven't been to the Spitfire site lately... Albion II is on its way in a couple months or so.

And of course, a really nice update to Albion I is immanent!

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Sequent - Mon May 28, 2012 1:35 pm

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In the bigger scheme of things, it isn't really that much. I don't know what your Summer schedule is going to be like... and I think it would be far more important to focus on school first, but if you're able to work a bit during the Summer break you could most likely afford it easily.

I remember a while back two brothers I knew worked all through the Summer to pool their money together to get an Apple IIe. ...and that was almost four times more expensive than Albion at the time!

If you REALLY REALLY want it then you can figure out a way of reaching that goal.

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synchronizer - Mon May 28, 2012 1:37 pm

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Yep. You're very good at being optimistic, and yes I'm sure I can find some solution. Thanks.

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Sequent - Mon May 28, 2012 1:51 pm

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You have to be optimistic, especially in these times!

Good luck on your musical journey... and don't get too hung up on getting the latest and greatest. If you can get it, then absolutely go for it. But if you can't get it or can't get it until later, don't let that stop you from creating great things with what you already have.

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synchronizer - Mon May 28, 2012 4:42 pm

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Ack! I made a mistake! If the 30% discount is applied to the pound price, then Albion is approximately $280~, excluding VAT and Paypal conversion. It would probably go up to about $300/$310. Paypal isn't exactly friendly to foreigners, as the currency converter that paypal uses makes products more expensive than they ought to be.

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meldavid - Tue Jun 05, 2012 10:53 am

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Hi, is there any truth in this comment I read at the VSL forums (original thread here, 4 posts down) which reads:



So you can't use Spitfire sample libraries like Albion and Solo Strings for commercial releases?

And they are selling a limited number of licenses?

Was the poster just trying to persuade towards buying the VSL product? This is my guess are there weren't any warnings alerting me to the above restrictions when purchasing Albion.

Please can someone clarify these restrictions with me as I am considering other Spitfire products at the moment like Solo Strings and Albion II.

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synchronizer - Tue Jun 05, 2012 10:57 am

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It's incorrect. Before the relatively recent site update, there WERE super expensive sample libraries available only to a select few people. These even included contact numbers of real musicians. So no, Albion and Solo Strings are available to the public.

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illumin - Tue Jun 05, 2012 11:58 am

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I just recently go this library with a student discount!!! No looking back here!

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synchronizer - Tue Jun 05, 2012 12:04 pm

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$300. Heh. Enjoy!

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meldavid - Tue Jun 05, 2012 7:41 pm

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Isn't it more like $399? I paid $574.38 AUD, so x 0.7 = $402.066 which is roughly the same as US dollars.

Wish they also had discounts for non-professional musos or the unemployed, lol. Do they ever send out discount vouchers for future purchases, or have sale periods after the special introductory price? I didn't have Kontakt when Albion was released so missed out.

I'm definitely going to need some good solo instruments to complement Albion,
although the Kontakt factory VSL will suffice for now.

I did a mock-up of Secret of Mana's intro theme using Albion's strings and brass, and it sounds excellent, although the winds didn't work as well as a solo flute with vibrato. Will be posting it on Youtube when I've tidied it up.

Are there any impulse responses of the studio they used to record the Albion instruments?

And what tape saturation plugin can you apply to non-Albion instruments to get them to gel together better? Is Sonar's Pro Channel saturation plugs ok? Or VC-64 Vintage Channel?

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illumin - Tue Jun 05, 2012 8:07 pm

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They have 4 different mic positions so a couple of those capture the ambience/reverb.

And yes...it was roughly 399usd with the student discount. I only have a student id because I've been taking a few classes here and there to keep me up to date with my day work

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synchronizer - Wed Jun 06, 2012 2:07 am

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So the taxes/conversion added $100. Sigh.

So, would you recommend having Albion as your first orchestral library for use with everything? I was thinking that combining it with La Scoring Strings first chair (the solo instruments) would be great.

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illumin - Wed Jun 06, 2012 8:41 am

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I would honestly say yes. The similar option is ProjectSAM's Orchestral Essentials which is $399USD normally priced, but from what I've heard, it is quite good, but always big sounding, so it may be less versatile. Albion sound's are quite beautiful and warm. There is some delay, purposely recorded for realism, so in the manual it does mention that you may need to adjust your track delay compensation as needed. But it does cover your orchestral needs...strings, percussion, effects, impacts, ambient...etc. The dynamics are great, especially for softer playing but it is capable of bigger and louder too. Check out Alex Pfeffer's demo on youtube. And they should be releasing a nice update to it shortly with added sounds and a rebuild of its Ostinatum script (think of LASS's ART script). You won't be disappointed, and with a EDU discount if you have that option, you really can't go wrong. Also, from what I've heard, LASS is a good compliment for solo and divisi parts, so FC may be good for the solo stuff. I still need solo strings, but am still deciding which direction to go. I really like LASS, but I'm also really liking 8DIO's stuff, though more expensive and doesn't have a solo strings version that has all strings, not just violins (ie. Adagio Violins) but they sound so amazing.

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Sequent - Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:06 am

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Imo, both Albion and OE are good to have. They both offer combinations of instruments that might be more difficult to do convincingly using a traditional style library. The ready made combos serve as a nice shortcut to those common combinations. Amongst other things, OE has a lot of nice special effects type string, etc. effects that would be almost impossible to do otherwise.

I think I would recommend Albion first over OE. Albion just has such an absolutely gorgeous sound and is so inspirational to work with, and the ostinatum script is fun (and is going to be made even better as was mentioned).

For solo strings I eventually want to get Spitfire. In the meantime I have Dan Dean Solo Strings Advanced, which was just recently on sale for $50 - which was an unbeatable deal, imo, if nothing else, at least for the short term.

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MA-Simon - Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:14 am

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The delay issue has somewhat been adressed in the V2 update. (a little tighter spiccs + retuning of the Brass Hi longs etc.) There is also a new delay compensation function avaiable for selecting room/ambient mic positions without the close mics. And V3 brings Round Robin Legato transitions as well

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illumin - Wed Jun 06, 2012 9:06 pm

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But its still there a tad (I'm on v2 as well). But I'm not complaining because it's understood. Just stated that because it is on purpose for realism, to capture the pro players playing, in case someone overlooks that note after they've made the purchase...

Nonetheless....An very nice first orchestral library, and although I don't have PS's Orchestral Essentials, I would agree that they would tremendously compliment each other well. I have a lot of FX sounds and such from my other libraries, so I'm good with not having OE "yet"!!!

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Sequent - Sat Jun 16, 2012 1:46 pm

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Looks like the v3 update to Albion I is out now!

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illumin - Sat Jun 16, 2012 4:39 pm

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Man... I'm out for the weekend... Guess I have to wait!

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MA-Simon - Sat Jun 16, 2012 7:18 pm

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I will say this: It's totally awesome!
Brass is fantastic and the new round robin legato is like a whole new library.

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illumin - Sat Jun 16, 2012 7:21 pm

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Gee thanks!

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meldavid - Sat Jun 16, 2012 9:33 pm

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If you are on Mac make sure you are careful how you handle the 'samples' folder, as Finder does a simple folder replace, not merge behaviour, like in Windows.

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illumin - Sun Jun 17, 2012 10:51 pm

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I am home now, and downloading! Yea...I read the instructions first, but thanks for the heads up. Lots of new content, especially for an update...Awesome!

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illumin - Wed Jun 20, 2012 9:11 am

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Man....so I've got it installed, but not a chance yet to play with the update still. How's the experience so far?

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Karmacomposer - Sat Jun 23, 2012 6:54 am

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Someone advised to me Albion. I am looking at Garritan Instant Orchestra.

I already own EWQL Symphonic Orchestra Gold XP, Kirk Hunter Emerald and Virtuoso Pro, Kontakt (NOT the latest version - I think I own NI Komplete 4) and Miroslav Philharmonik (sampletank).

I also own EWQL Symphonic Choirs and Storm Drum 1.

So I am pretty well stocked up on orchestral instruments and am not up to upgrading Komplete to the most recent version (Kontakt acts really finicky for me - never can rely on it).

I just need some orchestral effects, much like Vivace has. However, I really like what I hear with Garritan Instant Orchestra for what I am missing and the Aria engine looks great.

Would Albion help me in any way? Symphobia (1 and 2) is a bit expensive for me right now - money is VERY tight - and I can JUST afford Garritan at $150. Spending $400 to $700 is just impossible right now PLUS I have to get the newest Kontakt.

Of course, I am not in a rush and can wait for a big client to come in - but until then, I feel Garritan IO would serve its purpose for now.

What do you all think? With all that I have, would Albion really be needed?

Mike

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Sequent - Sat Jun 23, 2012 11:08 am

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Mike, I think you answered your own question quite well.

If you really need another library then sure, go for GIO. You can always get Albion later. I don't think Spitfire Audio is going to go away for a while. And I think you will be really happy with GIO in the meantime. Maybe you'll even decide that you don't need anything else. I know that even some Garritan nay-sayers have commented that it sounds really good.

You're on Komplete 4... so what version of Kontakt is that? It sounds like you're having a lot of trouble, so probably a wise thing to stay away from Kontakt based libraries until you can afford a more recent version (and resolve whatever other computer issues might be making it so problematic for you ). I don't remember right now whether Albion comes with Kontakt Player (I think it probably does) but it does require at least that you have the latest version 4 of Kontakt. You would have to double check. Also Spitfire is a British company so you're putting our dollar up against their British Pound... so kind of expensive if you're in the U.S.

Project Sam items aren't an issue as far as Kontakt since they do come with the player. OE requires v5. Also, you are aware that Vivace is also Kontakt based? (v5.02 required and compatible with the free player)

All of which is why I said, I think you answered your own question already.

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Karmacomposer - Sat Jun 23, 2012 3:56 pm

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I have Kontakt 2 - that is what comes with Komplete 4. It is a pain in my tush.

I have noticed that the Kontakt 2 player is much more stable than Komplete 4's Kontakt 2. I have no problems with that - and I use it for Garritan JABB v2, EWQLSO Gold XP Pro, EWQLS Choirs, Stormdrum, Kirk Hunter Emerald and other libraries (they come with it). I just cannot edit anything or make combis. I don't know why, but a brand new install of Komplete 4 plus updates cripples Kontakt 2 - I cannot even define the core library folder - it just hangs.

I have no other software of any kind that crashes on my system. It is totally stable and without problems. Just Kontakt 2.

Mike

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synchronizer - Sat Jun 23, 2012 3:58 pm

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Kontakt 2 is extremely outdated, and most sample libraries today use Kontakt 3.5 or 4, minimum.

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Karmacomposer - Sat Jun 23, 2012 4:04 pm

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Yeah, I know. I am just not willing to update to Komplete whatever at this point - always updating each and every year - I just cannot afford it and I don't even use most of the product.

Oh well. Does not matter. I am mostly using Halion, Vsampler and whatever comes with my sample libraries anyway.

Mike

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There are 73 posts in this topic.