Guitars/Amps?

[sghoughton]

Hi,

I have a couple questions about guitars and amp VSTs.

I've mostly played with orchestral stuff but just got Kontakt 2 and have been playing with the electric guitar in that.

Then i found a few of the amp sims and this stuff has been damn fun.

So, i guess this will lead to the inevitable purchase of amplitube 2. But, what do you feed it with? I don't play guitar so thats not an option (and really dont know much about them). I'd be looking for good opinions on guitar VSTs but i guess at this point a little understanding might help too. I'd imagine that if you're going through an amp, you'd want to start with a clean guitar (is that correct) and if thats the case, what are the differences in clean guitars - could you end up with similar final results if you get any decent guitar sym?

Is there any point in buying a non-clean guitar library if you have an amp sym? And would amplitube or others get you most of the sounds you could hear in anything from 50s-modern day sounds? Or would there still be a missing link?

thanks for any info

steve

[Derek up North]

Steve,

You could do a *lot* worse than picking up a copy of SampleTank 2 and playing with the guitars (and Amplitube effects) that come with it. The cheapest way into the "family" of SampleTank products would be to pick up a sound set which comes with SampleTank 2 LE, like the electric guitar one here:

http://www.esoundz.com/details/viewDeta ... ductID=130

I am a guitarist but, perversely perhaps, find playing guitar sounds from a keyboard very satisfying (I think because it means I play things I would never play on an actual guitar). You are right to consider the kind of guitar sound you start with before all the effects/amp sims kick in - you could argue that the "cleanest" guitar sound would be something like a spanish acoustic, but that will give you a very different result than something like a Fender Strat or a semi-acoustic jazz guitar (both very "clean" electric guitars).

Face it, guitars are like synths, drums, violins or any other instrument - they all sound different so you just have to buy one of every kind

If you do go down the eSoundz route then you need to be aware of two things:

1. It's addictive. I have SampleTank 2L, the Guitar Collection expansion tank, Sonic Synth, Miroslav Philharmonik and (soon) the World Instruments from the current group buy (a couple of nice acoustic guitars in that too!)

2. If you register with eSoundz you can get $5 towards your next purchase when you refer someone whilst making a purchase (someone like, oh let's say derekupnorth )

I know this is the Sonic Reality forum but it would be remiss of me not to give an honourable mention to what I consider to be the best of the competition - the guitars in Manystation are very good indeed and their forthcoming ManyGuitar product does look promising:

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=100644

As usual there are just too many quality products out there!

Regards,

Derek.