Electri6ity

[ToddKc]

Hi ToddKC,

I didn't mean to offend you. My comment about you having to tell Electri6ity what to do was more more meant as an excuse for the fact, that it unfortunately necessary to do those extra steps.

None taken, just thought I'd clear that up

Oh and Ben, I'm sure you get a lot of heat due to how difficult Electri6ity is to use. But as more and more info and such get out it should be better. Not to mention I see Electri6ity to be the start. WIth the right feedback and updates it could dominate the market for many years to come.

Wait a minute, do you work for vir2? If so, thats awesome that you actually come here and talk about/help people with your product. I have another thread going about a different company that could take some lessons from you.

Even if you don't work for them, you obviously know their stuff, and thanks for trying to help me out (to both you and kurari)!

[koolkeys]

Ben is the one who did the Kontakt scripting behind Electri6ity. I don't know if it was contract work or full employment, but he was heavily involved.

Brent

[dynamitec]

@ToddKC and koolkeys,

Yes, I'm part of the Vir2 Development team. Take a look at the Electri6ity manual credits page and you'll see what I've been involved with

[dynamitec]

Kosh wrote a nice review of Electri6ity on KVR:
http://www.kvraudio.com/user_review/4294.html

Thanks for the review!

[Kosh42EFG]

I was just shocked there were none already there... Least I could do...

Kosh

[bill45]

Ijust got nomad factory sc-226 channel strip,and their new magnetic,
tape sim plugin. they are helping to smooth out my amp sim tones.
The sc-226 is a audiomidi.com $20 no brainer deal! they are pulling
The no brainers at the end of bisiness today.
Good luck and happy new year !
Bill

[juliansader]

Hi everyone,

I purchased Electri6ity only recently and I am still learning how to use it, so I might be doing something silly wrong, but the AMT morphing does not seem to work correctly on my system.

According to Vir2's product description, "Electri6ity also utilizes the most advanced scripting to date, including the revolutionary Articulation Morphing Technology (A.M.T.) and Velocity Morphing Technology (V.M.T.), allowing for the seamless morphing from dead mute to sustain or from soft to loud."

However, when I try to use certain AMT articulations such as Muted<->Sustain or Muted<->Half Muted, I only hear a few discrete layers without any seamless morphing.

As an example, I have uploaded the following mp3:
http://www.speedyshare.com/files/260260 ... ustain.mp3

This mp3 plays the Stratocaster Muted<->Sustain articulation with the morphing CC increasing from 0 to 126 in increments of 2. Humanizing features such as noises and velocity variation have been switched off.

Strangely, the only two AMT articulations that do appear to morph smoothly, are the Sustain<->Harmonics ones, but to the best of my knowledge, such a morphing is not possible on a real electric guitar!

I am doing something wrong? Any advice would be much appreciated...

[juliansader]

to follow up...

Is it possible with Electri6ity to play tremolos during slides?

A perfect example of the sound that I am thinking of, is Dick Dale's version of the Misirlou (the well-known Pulp Fiction theme):

[Kosh42EFG]

Quick Q - Are you using velocity or the mod wheel to control the AMT? Not sure if it makes a difference, but worth a try?

[juliansader]

Quick Q - Are you using velocity or the mod wheel to control the AMT? Not sure if it makes a difference, but worth a try?

Thanks for the quick reply!

I have tried using velocity as well as CC's, but alas, I get the same result...

[dynamitec]

Hi Julian,

the thing is that: with humanzing turned off you'll get more audible gaps, since the humanizing is playing a big role in the articulation morphing. Try the same with humanzing on: articulation morphing from 0 to 127 and velocity morphing from 0 to 127. Btw. the muted morphing is much more audible played through a guitar amp with a bit of gain. I suggest you'll try that, too.

[juliansader]

Hi Benjamin,

Could you please explain in more detail how the humanization (and amping) would affect the underlying morphing articulation?

Is there a specific humanization setting that 'activates' the AMT feature, which I may have inadvertently switched off?

If I understand correctly, certain humanization features, such as noises and releases, would simply add a layer of extra sounds on top of the underlying morphing articulation. This may mask the discrete layers of the morphing articulation, but does not change the underlying discrete layers into smooth morphs.

Similarly, amp sims would just be an extra layer of sound effects that do not change Electri6ity's own sounds. (Some effects, such as compressors, may smooth out the discrete layers, but this is not the same as morphing.)

Other humanization features, such as velocity variation, pitch variation, or up and down strokes, would cause variability, but also without changing the underlying discrete layers into actual smooth morphs. In the case of up and down strokes, the variability is caused by switching between different sets of sounds, each of which has discrete layers.

[dynamitec]

If I understand correctly, certain humanization features, such as noises and releases, would simply add a layer of extra sounds on top of the underlying morphing articulation. This may mask the discrete layers of the morphing articulation, but does not change the underlying discrete layers into smooth morphs.

Well, I can't tell you how everything works under the hood. I hope you can understand this. All I can say is, that humanizing and layering matters as much as the underlying samples do.

Simply try the same experiment you posted (for both velocity and articulation) with a default instrument after loading up - with nothing turned off.

May I ask why you did turn off everything in the first place and why you posted such in depth question about how Electri6ity works under the hood after you did that? Haven't you been satisyfied with the results you got using a default instrument?

[juliansader]

If I understand correctly, certain humanization features, such as noises and releases, would simply add a layer of extra sounds on top of the underlying morphing articulation. This may mask the discrete layers of the morphing articulation, but does not change the underlying discrete layers into smooth morphs.

Well, I can't tell you how everything works under the hood. I hope you can understand this. All I can say is, that humanizing and layering matters as much as the underlying samples do.

No problem - I am not sneakily trying to find out what is going on under the hood. I am just trying to figure out how to switch on the seamless morphing!

Are you saying that there are indeed humanization settings under the Settings tab that switch on the seamless AMT morphing? Could you please point out which settings these are?

Simply try the same experiment you posted (for both velocity and articulation) with a default instrument after loading up - with nothing turned off.

I have indeed done these experiments, but unfortunately even with the default instruments my system still don't have the seamless morphing.

I have uploaded the following mp3, which uses the default Stratocaster DI. As before, I do not have any AMT seamless morphing and the discrete layers are very noticeable, even though there are alternate upstroke and downstroke variation, as well as all the other default humanizations such as volume variation and pick position variation. (I think the default instrument also has an extra Ghost note layer at low velocities.)
http://www.speedyshare.com/files/260355 ... er_ins.mp3

May I ask why you did turn off everything in the first place and why you posted such in depth question about how Electri6ity works under the hood after you did that?

Why? I am trying to learn how to use Electri6ity, so I am playing with all the different settings, switching them on and off, combining different settings, etc.

I am sorry if there was a miscommunication: I am not a competitor sample library developer that is trying to figure out Vir2's secrets. I am simply a user that is trying to understand how to work with Electri6ity, and my question was very simple: why do I not get seamless AMT morphing on my system and how do I switch it on?

Haven't you been satisyfied with the results you got using a default instrument?

Not yet! But I trust that I will be very satisfied as soon as I learn how to switch on AMT morphing. (And when all the other questions that I sent to Vir2's customer support are also answered.)

[dynamitec]

Well, if you play your example back through any amp with a bit of gain, you'll clearly hear the muted notes morph from dead muted to muted. With DI samples you'll hear a small gap between muted and half mutes (which is barely audible played trough an amp). The gap you'll hear between sustain and half-muted also exists on a real guitar. Either you muted the strings or not. As soon as you mute them, you can adjust the level of muting with the pressure of your palm- but as soon as you just slighely touch the strings, the sustain notes aren't sustain notes anymore, they sound completely different. So you'll have this gap on a real guitar as well.

Btw. regarding the harmonics morphing: it's possible on a real guitar. Depending on how you play the pinch harmonics you'll get more harmonics or less.

Anyway, I suggest you start learning Electri6ity more in a musical way. Playing back single notes DI without any amping etc. won't get you the results you are after. You'll need to play chords, licks etc. using both AMT and VMT. And a good guitar amp is essential!

As soon as you start doing that you'll see that Electri6ity will allow you do mimic pretty much everything a real guitarist could do. E.g. playing some powerchords from muted to sustain, so you'll get that typical muted to sustain sound.

May I ask if you are a guitarist? If so, have you tried to play your example on a real guitar? You'll see that it's very hard for a real guitarist to achive a smooth 'blending' from muted to sustain with more than 4 or 5 steps! Same goes for velocity morphing.