KVR Audio

Wine · Post by **Wine** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 12:51 am

Which one would you recommend? Both seem to do what I want and I have certainly used IK based products before. However, there are no reviews of Philharmonik. I gather it is rather "warm" but how would it go for fairly cinematic music - think Requiem for a Dream style.

I certainly like the control that seems to be inherent in GPO. Is IKM as good in this regard.

Your thoughts please.

Michael

dougsyo · Post by **dougsyo** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 3:19 am

I have both. I (and others) characterize Philharmonik as "lyrical". I'd characterize GPO as "neutral". Right now I don't have any other libraries (other than the VSL portions of Kontakt2) but I have considered getting Kirk Hunter Sapphire for the "hollywood" sound.

I'm sure others have far more detailed and descriptive responses than mine. For example, DevonB did reviews of both GPO and Philharmonik on Traxmusic.

Doug

Kim Lajoie · Post by **Kim Lajoie** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 3:53 am

Some recent developments for Miroslav Philharmonik 1.1:
1) USB key no longer required.
2) Miroslav Philharmonik sounds can now be loaded into SampleTank2.2 (which means better integration if you happen to use ST2.2).

Personally, I use Miroslav Philharmonik quite a bit. Actually, I used it in a film earlier this year qhich had a few "Requiem for a Dream" moments (I love that film, by the way!). Definitely tops for cinematic music I think.

GPO is a budget orchestra. I've heard some great things done with it, but ultimately it's a budget orchestra. Miroslav Philharmonik uses the sounds from the original Miroslav Orchestra sample libraries. These are libraries that originally cost many $1000's, and chances are you heard them countless times on television and film. It's not as detailed as some of the massive orchestras (like some of the Vienna and EWSO stuff), but the sound is second to none. I remember loading it up for the first time (back when it was in prototype!) and playing one note and recognising the sound. This is the sound. You already know that sound, and (dare I say it) you already love it.

Honestly, I don't usually do a hardsell on the general forums, but I personally use Miroslav Philharmonik and I love it!

As always, I'm happy to answer any questions you have about it.

-Kim.

Wine · Post by **Wine** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 10:38 am

Thanks for the info. Anyone else with any opinions?

Michael

timharper · Post by **timharper** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 10:55 am

http://www.westgatestudios.com/modular.htm

West gate studios have some high quality orchestral samples but they appear to be only starting to release the full range. Compared to VSL the price is decent enough as you can purchase individual instruments but I'd be curious to see how their version of solo strings will match up to that of VSL standard edition.

dickiefunk · Post by **dickiefunk** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 10:56 am

There has been some VSTI Orchestra shootouts in some of the leading magazines and GPO came out better than Philharmonik. What's also very interesting is Garritan are going to be releasing GPO Advanced next year which will have a new soundset and should be awesome!! Already GPO holds it's own and the playability/programability is the best. There is the Peter Siedlacze Complete Classical Collection which sounds great but I don't know a great deal about it. The EWQLSO Pro is my favourite but I would need to sell my car to buy it.

Waynemendozza · Post by **Waynemendozza** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 11:13 am

I use Miroslav Philharmonik. It runs stable, sounds great and is easy on CPU resources. Love it and recommend it...

luxth · Post by **luxth** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 4:12 pm

Miroslav is still today one of the most expressive things on the market. No match here for me.

Lunatique · Post by **Lunatique** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 8:28 pm

For the same price range, you really should look at Kirk Hunter's Emerald. It contains far more articulations and samples than the two mentioned.

dougsyo · Post by **dougsyo** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 9:57 pm

Lunatique wrote:For the same price range, you really should look at Kirk Hunter's Emerald. It contains far more articulations and samples than the two mentioned.

The down-side is you have to have GigaStudio/GVI or Kontakt2 in order to play it, which is extra cost above the price of the library. Unlike GPO, EWQLSO, Philharmonik, Peter <mumble>'s Advanced Orchestra, etc it doesn't come with a bundled player.

Right now both GPO and Philharmonik are on good deals - the group buy for GPO is at $139, and if you already own an IK product (including Sampletank 2LE bundled with some SR libraries) you can get Philharmonik at the crossgrade price rather than full price. You could conceivably get both of them for under $500.

Doug

stdietmar · Post by **stdietmar** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 10:14 pm

I have asked myself the same question some months ago and dediced to buy GPO. First, because it was a bit cheaper, and second, the sounds on the demo pieces seemed to be a bit more neutral (yes, i agree with dougsyo).

one important thing with GPO (same with Jazz and Big Band from Garritan) is that you make use of all the controls available to make the instruments come alive. indeed, i was first a bit disappointed by the sterile sound, until i learned to use all the volume and variation controllers.

performance of the kontakt 2 player is good , especially i added the direct from disk option from NI.

vic_france · Post by **vic_france** » Wed Dec 20, 2006 11:19 pm

Kim (esoundz) wrote:Some recent developments for Miroslav Philharmonik 1.1:
...
2) Miroslav Philharmonik sounds can now be loaded into SampleTank2.2 (which means better integration if you happen to use ST2.2).

Thanks for that info, Kim!

I quite frequently run the two, with ST2's "String Orchestra 2" backing up the Miroslav strings.. sounds beautiful together.. now, thanks to this heads up, I've just placed the Miroslav library inside the ST2Instruments folder, and can now do the whole thing inside ST2.2.
As regards Miroslav vs GPO, I find they compliment each other nicely (I managed to get GPO during Garritan's rediculously low-priced group buy last year )

Rellik · Post by **Rellik** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 1:47 am

luxth wrote:Miroslav is still today one of the most expressive things on the market. No match here for me.

Hm - I have the opposite opinion. It's one of the worst aspects of Miroslav in my opinion - poor expression. Sure, it has all the schmalz you could ask for embedded in the sample - but it's not velocity sampled, so, except for in certain circumstances, it sounds rather static and un-expressive (even with modulation for expression, the core sound is the same).

However, in other respects, Miroslav/Philharmonik is great - the average Philharmonik track sounds much more full, and just generally better, than the average GPO track that I hear (and I spent alot of time researching GPO myself). I haven't used GPO, but it's great to play long legato passages in Philharmonik - the attacks are not the greatest and overall it tends to be annoyingly inconsistent across the keyrange (in terms of attack, tone, even vibrato), and this pretty much applies across all sections, but it has a very, very nice sound to it overall.

matto · Post by **matto** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 9:23 pm

If you're debating between these two you really OWE it to yourself to also check out EW Silver (or even better Gold) and Kirk Hunter Emerald.

The programming in GPO is great but unfortunately it is let down by the rather lackluster underlying samples. Miroslav has a great basic sound but lacks expressive options that are really a necessity honestly, such as velocity switched samples and modwheel based dynamic crossfading.

So from that standpoint, each of these 2 is really "incomplete" as a basic orchestral package, although they make great add-ons. IMHO of course

.

matto

zircon · Post by **zircon** » Thu Dec 21, 2006 9:53 pm

A vote for Philharmonik here. Miroslav wasn't a standard of film, TV, and video game scoring for years for nothing. GPO is great too (I own it) but for realistic mockups.. I don't think so.

Philharmonik or GPO