Thanks, OTS, you guys are awesome

[J-Rokujuushi]

I just wanted to let you guys know how awesome your libraries have been for me. I know most of my posts have been about problems I've encountered when using them, but those problems truly make up a minority of the time I've spent with them and I thought this would be a great opportunity to give them some of the praise they deserve.

I've been toying around with music as a hobby, and I recently started taking classes for audio and sound production. Every Thursday they have us give a presentation to the class about something relating to audio technology. For my last project, I gave a track-by-track demonstration of a game music arrangement I made for a friend's birthday. Two of the students play guitar, and until I showed them the MIDI piano roll, they thought I had gotten someone to play the guitars in my track.

Cooler than that, though, is that the instructor has made some pretty big-name contacts in the audio industry. One such contact, Bryan Bell (this guy), dropped by the class today and the instructor had me give him a repeat of my presentation. Bryan was pretty impressed by the fact that I had done the whole thing in MIDI, and a large part of that is because of the quality of the sound libraries I use.

So thanks for the awesome libraries. As much as I'd like to take credit for it, I know that Strawberry, Cherry and the other libraries I used played a large part in making it sound as good as it did.

[Gregjazz]

Wow, I can't thank you enough for your kind words!

[J-Rokujuushi]

Sure you can, just keep making awesome libraries!

Speaking of which, I've got another couple of success stories:

One of the students in my class recorded a simple chord progression on his guitar, and I took it and expanded upon it with some bass (Corebass Cherry), drums, and a dulcimer. My regular instructor was out that day, so I asked the other instructor who was filling in to listen to it and give me some feedback. He's a bassist and really started getting into the track, playing air bass along with it. When it was finished, he asked if I was really using samples because it sounded so good.

I also let him listen to the track I mentioned in my previous post. I wish I had a video camera at the time because his jaw dropped when the lead guitar came in. Again, he asked if I was really using samples, so I told him about Strawberry. It left him speechless, other than a simple, "That was good."

[Gregjazz]

My goal with developing sample libraries is to give users even just a hint of the joy and excitement of playing the real instrument.

Man, you're going to love the update for Evolution Electric Guitar. I already have two dozen presets (you can load/save external presets for easy sharing) made just from messing around with it.

[J-Rokujuushi]

EEG gives me more than just a hint. I have a guitar and I know what it's like to play, but EEG gives me great guitar tracks without any recording setup, gives me better sound than anything I've recorded, and lets me have guitar tracks better than anything my present skill level lets me play.

The only thing I haven't been able to figure out with EEG is how to get a good heavy "chug" sound with palm mutes. If I could get that figured out, I'd probably stop using Shreddage and use EEG for everything.

I'm definitely looking forward to the new Evolution updates. Everything I've heard about it has me excited, especially considering how much I love using the current library.