VSL Special Edition vs GPO4 In Notion 3

[DaddyO]

I currently use Notion 3 with GPO4. Is there anyone who has used both GPO4 and VSL Special Edition and can compare the accuracy of their interaction with Notion 3 articulations and dynamics? I figure VSL probably sounds better, but I want to see if there are performance advantages as well.

[DaddyO]

Oh my word. I finally purchased and received VSL SE Vol 1 and, though I will need to rework dynamics and a few other things because of the differences in response to rules, I simply cannot believe the vast gulf in sound between VSL SE and GPO4. I will need to experiment further, but I feel that if I can eventually get VSL SE Vol 1 Plus and some of the hoped for improvements in Notion 4 I will be in seventh heaven (don't know if anyone uses that expression anymore).

[fzd]

I use VSL for several months (I was faithful to GPO before) : it's, for me, like night and day.
I don't deny GPO, because it is a good library of sounds at a very reasonable price.
The VSL library is extraordinary, with Notion3 perfectly usable, but the price is still very high.
If you have the possibility to buy it, does not hesitate for a moment!

Best,

François

[DaddyO]

Francois (or anyone),

Perhaps you can help me with something. I'm trying to start working with the VSL SE 4 Instance Template provided with Notion 3 (yesterday I only replaced the instruments in a pre-existing score originally written using GPO4). Anyway, I have started a new project with the template and I get no instrument sound no matter which instrument I use for note entry. I'm sure it's something simple I don't understand, but I'm kind of stuck until I figure it out.

Edited to add: When I go back to my "original GPO" template where I swapped out GPO instruments for VSL instruments, I notice that not all instruments sound. When I open the Staff VSTI Interface for the instruments that do not sound I get the appropriate Vienna Instruments window, but the instrument's sounding range on the virtual keyboard display at the bottom is ghosted. The instruments that sound properly show the instrument's sounding range on the keyboard. And I can't figure out what makes one sound and the other not. For example the Flute I sounds, the Flute 2 does not. All the ensemble 3-player sounds of the woodwinds do not sound, but the ensemble sounds of the brass DO sound. So there appears to be no consistency about what sounds and what doesn't.

Boy, it looks like I could use some real help to figure these two very different problems out. On the Notion 3 Template I get no sounds, on my own created original GPO template with the instruments swapped out for VSL instruments, I get sound on some and not on others.

I've reread the VST section of the Notion 3 User Manual and still don't have a clue what's going on in either case.

[Surfwhammy]

I do not have GPO or VSL, but I have encountered the "no sound" problem, and it happens when I swap one VSTi virtual instrument for another VSTi virtual instrument (where "VSTi virtual instrument" is the way I distinguish VST instruments from VST effects plug-ins) . . .

Several things can cause this, including a difference in the register or range of swapped instruments, which is even more of a problem for me, because I use a treble clef for everything and set the way the notes on the treble clef are played via the option where you configure a clef to play notes up to two octaves lower or two octaves higher, where for bass I use a treble clef but set it to play notes two octaves lower, and if I swap a bass instrument for something that has a higher natural range it gets a bit confusing. This works for me, because here in the sound isolation studio there are only 12 notes, but there are 8 or so octaves, which makes everything very simple; and I do everything in the key of C Major, which requires doing nothing, but I add sharps and flats when notes sound better flatted or sharped; and I set the tuning preference to use 440-Hz for "Concert A", which is totally "not European", and for reference 440-Hz is not the default value, so if you want to use 440-Hz for "Concert A", then you have to set it explicitly in NOTION 3 Preferences, but so what . . .

So what!

The strategy that I use is to create a new staff and assign the correct VSTi virtual instrument to it. Then I can copy the notes from the original staff onto the newly created staff, followed by deleting the original staff, with plenty of "Save" or "Save As" steps during the process, and this works nicely but takes a while longer . . .

If you are using VSTi virtual instruments, then I would avoid the standard NOTION 3 predefined templates, but then I write DISCO and Pop songs about ladies underpants and there are no predefined templates for this subgenre, really . . .

Really!

P. S. Once you get a score configured the way you want it, you can save it as a user-defined template, and it will appear in the NOTION 3 template menu where you can use it as the starting point for a new score, so one way to approach the problem is to get it working one instrument at a time or whatever, and when everything works, do a "Save As" a few times, and then post a question in the FORUM about how to get it recognized as a NOTION 3 template . . .

[NOTE: On the Mac, the predefined templates are stored in the application package or bundle, and you can edit the list of template files, where you begin by right-clicking on the application ("Notion 3.app") and selecting the context menu item "Show Package Contents", which shows the contents of the package in Finder as folders and files, where you will find a folder under "Resources" called "Templates", and if you expand the "Templates" folder you will see that it has a set of NOTION 3 scores each of which begins with an integer, where the integer determines the order in which the templates are listed in the NOTION 3 template menu, so if the last one is 22, then when you add another one prefix the file name with "23 ", including the space, so that it is similar to "23 My VSL Template.notion" or whatever, and put it in the "Templates" folder, when you restart NOTION 3, it will appear at the bottom of the list of templates. Basically, just follow the pattern for file names and so forth. The strategy is similar conceptually in a general way on a Windows machine, but the specifics are a bit different, so if you are doing digital music production on a Windows machine, you will want to get help from one of the Windows folks who participate here . . . ]

[DaddyO]

Thanks for the suggestions, Surfwhammy. The saving a Notion file as a template I had figured out through a Google search, and the intrument register is not the issue (I have moved notes around on a staff to test this).

But I think you're probably on the right track in terms of starting a template from square one.

Women's underpants, hmm... sure you haven't been "whamming" that surf a bit too long, my friend? Just kidding, of course. Like I said, thanks for the suggestions.

[Surfwhammy]

Another thing that might be happening involves "voices", where there can be multiple "voices" on a single staff . . .

There is a view option to show the "voices" in multiple colors, but it is set OFF by default, so you need to set it ON to see the "voices" in color coded format . . .

The way you show "voice" colors is to select the "Show" menu item on the "View" menu, and in the flyout submenu for "Show" there is an item named "Show Voice Colors" . . .

Some VSTi virtual instruments allow multiple parts or whatever, where as an example SampleTank allows up to 16 parts for one instance or staff, and these can be different articulations of the same general instrument, but they also can be different instruments, and the way a "part" is selected is based on articulations, dynamics, and rules, which for me is vastly confusing, so I keep everything simple by having only one part for each staff whenever possible . . .

The folks who use GPO and VSL can provide better information, but my guess is that some of the GPO templates are doing something similar, where what appears to be one VSTi virtual instrument actually has a set of articulations, dynamics, and so forth that are triggered by corresponding articulations and dynamics in the music notation, where this additionally is mapped more precisely using rules, hence if you simply swap a GPO instrument and replace it with a VSL instrument, you probably are not getting an equivalent mapping of articulations, dynamics, rules, parts, and so forth, hence "no sound" . . .

Also, some instruments that essentially are the same based on name will be different with respect to the notes they actually can play, where hand bells and harps are excellent examples . . .

Hand bells usually have a limited range, but there are hand bells that have a wide range, and the same thing happens with harps, where one harp might have only two or three octaves of notes, but another harp will have a full range of notes, where for harps the one with the full range of notes usually is called "Concert Harp" . . .

Whether this is any help is another matter, but I think that some of it probably is happening with GPO and VSL, and if it is, then the "no sound" staves probably have disjoint or incongruent mappings between GPO and VSL . . .

Lots of FUN . . .

[Surfwhammy]

There is another aspect, which is very important to understand, and it is that the NOTION 3 bundled instruments are not VSTi virtual instruments, as is the case with the NOTION 2 bundled instruments. This is done specifically to make it possible to get a full, deep and rich orchestra to fit into a single NOTION 3 score . . .

[NOTE: The NOTION 3 bundled instruments (N2 and N3) are very nice, but you need a calibrated full-range studio monitor system to get them to sound best when you are mixing and mastering, which is another discussion. They are used in concerts, Broadway plays, and so forth, and all those venues have calibrated full-range sound systems. Some of the VSTi virtual instruments are nice and most of them probably sound better when you listen with commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) studio monitor systems, but in many respects this is an illusion, because there are no full-range COTS studio monitor systems available anywhere on this planet at the dawn of the early-21st century, which is explained in my ongoing topic in the IK Multimedia FORUM (see below), where the key is to get the Kustom deep bass subwoofers to augment the Kustom PA loudspeakers, and while my guess is that most folks think they are hearing music accurately when they listen to COTS bookshelf studio monitors, but they are vastly deluded, because most of the COTS bookshelf studio monitors will not reproduce the lowest notes on a string bass or electric bass guitar at standard tuning ("Concert A" = 440-Hz) at equal loudness, and some of them only go down as low as 110-Hz, which is the fundamental pitch of the "A" string on an electric guitar and is one octave higher than the "A" string of an electric bass or string bass . . . ]

The Fabulous Affordable Studio Monitor System Project (IK Multimedia FORUM)

The problem with VSTi virtual instruments, which includes VST effects plug-ins, is that for all practical purposes all of them are "heavy" in terms of computer resources, and this is particularly important, because NOTION 3 is a 32-bit application both in Mac OS X and Windows, hence it is subject to 32-bit application workspace limitations . . .

VSTi virtual instruments and VST effects plug-ins are loaded into the same 32-bit application workspace as NOTION 3, and the guideline I use here in the sound isolation studio for IK Multimedia VSTi virtual instruments (Miroslav Philharmonik, SampleTank, SampleMoog, SampleTron, and Sonik Synth 2) is that a single NOTION 3 score can handle approximately 20 to 25 staves, and this is the rule I use for Kontakt 5 (Native Instruments), which also is a VSTI virtual instrument . . .

MachFive 3 (MOTU) is extraordinarily "heavy" in terms of computer resources, so I use only 1 or perhaps 2 staves with a MachFive 3 instrument, which reduces the total from (a) 20 to 25 to (b) approximately 10 or 11 . . .

And the way I handle everything is to clone NOTION 3 scores, where I start with a NOTION 3 score and work on its instruments until I am happy with the framework for the song, at which time I do a "Save As" and essentially clone the original NOTION 3 score, where I keep 5 or so staves common in all the clones to serve as a reference point, and this then frees 20 staves for use with other instrument, but as noted when I need to do something with a MachFive 3 VSTi virtual instrument, the total number of staves for the cloned NOTION 3 score is reduced accordingly . . .

This works for me, because by the time I have parts for 20 instruments I know enough about the song only to need a few common instruments to know what to do next in terms of identifying by the common instruments how the measures correspond to verses, choruses, and so forth . . .

And I record the NOTION 3 generated audio as soundbites in Digital Performer 7.24 (MOTU) via ReWire (Propellerhead Software), which works very nicely in Mac OS X, where I also have to combine tracks in Digital Performer 7.24, because it also is a 32-bit application and having more than 50 tracks at a time is a bit much for it to handle, so I merge tracks every so often to free currently dedicated tracks, which basically is the technique that Phil Spector used for his "Wall of Sound" and George Martin used when he was producing the Beatles. It requires a bit more planning, but once you do it a few times, it becomes intuitive . . .

A single song might have as many as 500 to 1,000 instruments, which in turn maps to perhaps 50 cloned and modified NOTION 3 scores, where I keep track of the clones by appending "PT-n" to the name of the file and by keeping all the files in a common folder, where the file names might be {"Song-Pt-1.notion", "Song-Pt-2.notion", . . . , "Song-Pt-n.notion"}. It is a simple strategy, but it works, and once you do it for a few songs, it does not take so much extra time to manage everything, and the basic technique is called "layering", where a song is composed and constructed in layers, one layer at a time . . .

Regarding the need for 500 to 1,000 instruments, this mostly is because I like to "sparkle" instruments, which is the name I use for the technique where the notes of a single instrument are put into motion across what I call the "Rainbow Panning Arc™" which runs from far-left to top-center to far-right, where if you listen with headphones to the following "sparkled" Psaltery Harp, it will make sense . . .



[NOTE: This song has three VSTi virtual instruments (a Psaltery Harp, and two synthesized basses), but only the Psaltery Harp is "sparkled". The two synthesized basses are positioned at top-center . . . ]

Music Notation for "Sparkles" -- PDF (89KB, 5 pages)

"Sparkles" (The Surf Whammys) -- MP3 (4.3MB, 298-kbps [VBR], approximately 1 minute and 55 seconds)

"Full Sparkling" involves having 8 staves, each of which is panned to a separate location, and then the notes of the original instrument are placed on the 8 staves depending on where you want the notes to be heard. It takes me about two hours to "sparkle" a single instrument for a 3 minute song, and I like the way it sounds, because it adds motion to the song, but it also is possible to "sparkle" instruments with fewer staves or panning locations, so it depends on how much motion you want an instrument to have with respect to panning locations . . .

This is how a few measures of a "sparkled" Latin Percussion instrument (guiro and shaker) look in NOTION 3 . . .



So, when the instruments are "sparkled", which requires up to 8 staves per instrument, it is not so unusual to have 500 to 1,000 staves or whatever, where the upper part of the range is for 125 fully "sparkled" instruments, which is not a lot of instruments, really . . .

Really!