Alright, I wrote a song in FL Studio with Art Vista as a plugin. I started writing it with the compressed piano wet preset but that got me all kinds of crackling and just simply not playing the sound at all occasionally, so I switched to light piano dry. Now when I click the play button it sounds just fine. Plays back without a hitch.
The problem is with exporting the song as an mp3 file. I'll export it then listen to the mp3 and it will play fine for a couple of measures and then the audio will totally mess up and just stop and after about 30 seconds of silence I'll hear a bit more, but that's about it. I don't get it, though. It plays just fine when I click the play button in FL Studio. Is there anything I can do to, say, make it render the song to mp3 slower so it doesn't leave the plugin in the dust? This is the only plugin I've ever had this problem with.
Need help with Art Vista Virtual Grand Piano.
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- KVRAF
- 2028 posts since 18 Mar, 2004 from New York, N.Y.
Try using Voxengo recorder to capture the output of the track in real-time, then import the resulting wav file into FL Studio...
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- KVRer
- Topic Starter
- 29 posts since 6 Jul, 2006
I actually tried recording my stereo mix with a recording program, but that made it mono and the quality wasn't as pure as it would be if I exported it straight to mp3 without going through any other programs or anything.
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- KVRAF
- 3645 posts since 27 Nov, 2003 from beach side australia
what sort of system do you have?, how much Ram? i have the artvista and 1gb ram and it runs well
although those sustained notes soon add up and crash things if i'm not careful- i have to make sure the sustain pedal isnt held for too long. i dont use fruity loops tho' i tend to record to an external digital recorder. (yamaha aw16g) so i'm probably not much help
although those sustained notes soon add up and crash things if i'm not careful- i have to make sure the sustain pedal isnt held for too long. i dont use fruity loops tho' i tend to record to an external digital recorder. (yamaha aw16g) so i'm probably not much help
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- KVRAF
- 3002 posts since 24 Nov, 2003 from Heidelberg&Hamburg
Hi mate,
I own the Artvista Grand and love it. In the help-file (not available to me now) there is a great help how to reduce voices in the kontakt-player. Some settings use many voices, but reducing them doesn't affect the sound TOO much, especially if you use the piano in a song, not as solo-instrument for your pianistic masterpiece
. In case trouble stays with you, pm me, I'll have a look at the manual. Then, the maker of this piano is such a friendly person, you might want to write to him, he'll answer in detail.
I had a song with the recital hall setting that crackled on my poor laptop - reducing the voices (but please read the manual, there are 2 voice-settings, and I don't remember which one, but ONE
is not allowed to be lower than the other 
) was fine.
I own the Artvista Grand and love it. In the help-file (not available to me now) there is a great help how to reduce voices in the kontakt-player. Some settings use many voices, but reducing them doesn't affect the sound TOO much, especially if you use the piano in a song, not as solo-instrument for your pianistic masterpiece
. In case trouble stays with you, pm me, I'll have a look at the manual. Then, the maker of this piano is such a friendly person, you might want to write to him, he'll answer in detail. I had a song with the recital hall setting that crackled on my poor laptop - reducing the voices (but please read the manual, there are 2 voice-settings, and I don't remember which one, but ONE
is not allowed to be lower than the other ) was fine.-
- KVRer
- Topic Starter
- 29 posts since 6 Jul, 2006
Well, it's a solo piano song, and the problem probably has more to do with FL Studio than Art Vista now that I think of it. Because as I said before my computer seems to be able to handle the lighter piano preset just fine, it's only exporting to mp3 in FL Studio that's giving me trouble.
But, if it helps any of you help me, I've got about 500 MB of RAM. My computer is a laptop and it's got a 1.50 GHz Intel Celeron M processor.
But, if it helps any of you help me, I've got about 500 MB of RAM. My computer is a laptop and it's got a 1.50 GHz Intel Celeron M processor.
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- KVRAF
- 3002 posts since 24 Nov, 2003 from Heidelberg&Hamburg
Hi mate,MaxVdub wrote:Well, it's a solo piano song, and the problem probably has more to do with FL Studio than Art Vista now that I think of it. Because as I said before my computer seems to be able to handle the lighter piano preset just fine, it's only exporting to mp3 in FL Studio that's giving me trouble.
But, if it helps any of you help me, I've got about 500 MB of RAM. My computer is a laptop and it's got a 1.50 GHz Intel Celeron M processor.
actually I wrote this because the lighter presets loaded fine, and the more interesting ones gave the trouble. So my way of solving this as I had a similar problem was reducing the voices inside the Kontakt-player, and, getting more RAM. On my laptop, AMD AthlonXP2200+ and 512MB Ram, I couldn't get the piano to work good, so I bought more RAM and it works with reduced voices (sounds great). On the PC with more RAM (mainly used) it is no problem at all. I thought the "light" setting was a work-around and you'd wanted to use the "bigger" preset
.A 2nd try would be, if it is a solo piano song, download Tobybear's minihost, (www.tobybear.de, donationware, runs freely and is great), load your piano, and you can render it to wav with Minihost (or with EnergyXT demo, or with many others I think). Just to see if FL was the problem.
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- KVRer
- 17 posts since 27 Sep, 2004
I use FL Studio and Art Vista Virtual Grand Piano. Had the same problem too. You can use any preset you want! Just make sure that "render mode notify" is checked.
To put a checkmark at "render mode notify", left click the triangle under the "plug" in the top left hand corner of the Virtual Grand Gui, giving you a menu which includes "render mode notify"
Look to see that "render mode notify" is NOT checked. If it is NOT checked, scroll down and highlite "render mode notify", then left click.
Then check the menu to make sure that "render mode notify" is now checked.
Happy rendering!
Mike
To put a checkmark at "render mode notify", left click the triangle under the "plug" in the top left hand corner of the Virtual Grand Gui, giving you a menu which includes "render mode notify"
Look to see that "render mode notify" is NOT checked. If it is NOT checked, scroll down and highlite "render mode notify", then left click.
Then check the menu to make sure that "render mode notify" is now checked.
Happy rendering!
Mike
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- KVRer
- Topic Starter
- 29 posts since 6 Jul, 2006
Oh, another question, since you seem to know about this stuff, is there any way to keep art vista from getting overdriven? With the lighter piano I didn't have any problems but the darker tone of the compressed piano seems to get overdriven very easily. And it seems to get overdriven within the plugin itself, as it will sound overdriven even if it's not coming close to maxing out in my host.
I compensated for this by turning the volume way down on the plugin itself and turning the host way up and normalizing the volume after rendering, but I'm wondering if there's a better solution.
Edit: Actually, after having checked this out a bit more my "solution" doesn't even really work. It's still overdriven, just really quiet. This really sucks, 'cause I like to use wide dynamics, but overdrive does not sound nice on piano.
I compensated for this by turning the volume way down on the plugin itself and turning the host way up and normalizing the volume after rendering, but I'm wondering if there's a better solution.
Edit: Actually, after having checked this out a bit more my "solution" doesn't even really work. It's still overdriven, just really quiet. This really sucks, 'cause I like to use wide dynamics, but overdrive does not sound nice on piano.
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- KVRer
- 17 posts since 27 Sep, 2004
Ya I see what you mean. Since the other presets work fine over here, let's assume it's that particular preset. Let's also assume it's working properly.
I was able to get a signal that stayed between -10 DB and 0 with several simultaneous notes (and no overdrive) by lowering the volume NOT on the plugin, but on the "midi out" piano scroll where your notes probably are, or if your notes are directly inside the Virtual Piano's piano scroll, lower that volume.
You want the volume level to be low enough so that the loudest moment in your piece does not "overdrive". (Please forgive me if anywhere in my help I'm "stating the obvious"!)
Now if this piece has a large dynamic range (that you are effectively killing), you will want to compress the piano again--if what you're trying to get is decent volume even from soft single notes; use another compressor on an insert channel. There's no good preset for piano, so your best bet is to tweak away. Actually I looked again, and "master 2" with a lower ratio (7:1 is probably too tight, but might work in a busy mix)is a good place to start.
This will take most of the dynamic "range" out of the piano.
You might want to try all of the above in conjunction with lowering the velocities in the piano scroll, either all of them ar once to preserve their intergrity (piano scroll, hold down alt and press x, cursor over "multiply" and left click the nob, roll mouse downward). Or just lower the velocities of certain notes. This of course will effect the integrity of the velocities between the notes, ie the part that supposed to sound a bit louder--won't anymore.
If you are going to have a "final limiter" or Final Compressor" on your overall mix, you of course need to leave some headroom on your piano--that's why you don't want the FL Compressor in your insert channel to have too high a ratio, and soft might be a better choice than hard.
That's all I've got for now.Btw, the solution for rendering holds for all Kontakt machines, I would guess all Native Instrument plugs working in FL
Edit: I just reread your post--since smoothing out everything (rock sound) isn't what your after (where did I get that idea?), step one (lowering channel volume) might be all you need to do. If not, proceed to step two, etc...
Take care
I was able to get a signal that stayed between -10 DB and 0 with several simultaneous notes (and no overdrive) by lowering the volume NOT on the plugin, but on the "midi out" piano scroll where your notes probably are, or if your notes are directly inside the Virtual Piano's piano scroll, lower that volume.
You want the volume level to be low enough so that the loudest moment in your piece does not "overdrive". (Please forgive me if anywhere in my help I'm "stating the obvious"!)
Now if this piece has a large dynamic range (that you are effectively killing), you will want to compress the piano again--if what you're trying to get is decent volume even from soft single notes; use another compressor on an insert channel. There's no good preset for piano, so your best bet is to tweak away. Actually I looked again, and "master 2" with a lower ratio (7:1 is probably too tight, but might work in a busy mix)is a good place to start.
This will take most of the dynamic "range" out of the piano.
You might want to try all of the above in conjunction with lowering the velocities in the piano scroll, either all of them ar once to preserve their intergrity (piano scroll, hold down alt and press x, cursor over "multiply" and left click the nob, roll mouse downward). Or just lower the velocities of certain notes. This of course will effect the integrity of the velocities between the notes, ie the part that supposed to sound a bit louder--won't anymore.
If you are going to have a "final limiter" or Final Compressor" on your overall mix, you of course need to leave some headroom on your piano--that's why you don't want the FL Compressor in your insert channel to have too high a ratio, and soft might be a better choice than hard.
That's all I've got for now.Btw, the solution for rendering holds for all Kontakt machines, I would guess all Native Instrument plugs working in FL
Edit: I just reread your post--since smoothing out everything (rock sound) isn't what your after (where did I get that idea?), step one (lowering channel volume) might be all you need to do. If not, proceed to step two, etc...
Take care
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- KVRer
- Topic Starter
- 29 posts since 6 Jul, 2006
Well, what I did was lower the channel volume of the MIDI Out I was using. That doesn't work, it just overdrives at a lower volume. So what I'll probably do is just limit the note velocity like you said. And I'm not going to bother with compressors. I don't really understand how to use them or anything.
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- KVRAF
- 3645 posts since 27 Nov, 2003 from beach side australia
one thing i noticed is if i turn the power on my midi keyboard on, after the artvista piano has loaded then it sets the volume on the artvista to full which tends to overdrive everything, -not sure its related to your problem ,but a little quirk i noticed anyway.