EWQL or VSL?

[GeorgePaul]

Hey Guys ¡
I have some short mp3 tracks of both EWQLSO and VSL used in Gustav Holst’s The Planets, (Venus).
This work (Venus) appears in both home pages as demo. I have isolated a few segments so you can hear exactly the same passage played with both libraries, for comparison purposes. The mix is not mine and the only thing I did besides isolating the passages, was normalizing the tracks to hear them more clearly.
How can I post them in here?

[Surfwhammy]

Hey Guys ¡
I have some short mp3 tracks of both EWQLSO and VSL used in Gustav Holst’s The Planets, (Venus).
This work (Venus) appears in both home pages as demo. I have isolated a few segments so you can hear exactly the same passage played with both libraries, for comparison purposes. The mix is not mine and the only thing I did besides isolating the passages, was normalizing the tracks to hear them more clearly.
How can I post them in here?

There are two general ways to post a link to an MP3:

(1) Publish the MP3 files on your website . . .

(2) Publish the MP3 files on someone else's website . . .

PUBLISH ON YOUR WEBSITE

If you have a website, then you can FTP the MP3 files to your website and include a separate link to each MP3 file in a post to this FORUM, which is the way I do it, and since I do everything on the Mac, I like Cyberduck for doing the FTP work . . .

[NOTE: Cyberduck also works with Windows, and it is very easy to use . . . ]

Cyberduck (David V. Kocher)

I like HostBaby for music website hosting (arrangers, composers, lyricists, musicians, producers, singers, and so forth), and they have a variety of predefined website template designs that you can customize with your own images, text, and so forth, but if you do website programming and prefer to do everything yourself via code (for example, Dreamweaver [Adobe]), then they also have the option simply to host . . .

HostBaby

They also handle the domain registration and renewals if you desire, and they have email, calendars, and other enhancements that are tailored for music websites . . .

It is useful to know that they are part of the same company that does CD Baby, FilmBaby, and BookBaby, so there are synergies, and the setup fees are reasonable, where for a website there is a one-time charge if you have HostBaby handle the domain registration, and then there is a small yearly fee for renewals (currently $10 [US]), and the monthly hosting fee is $20 (US), but you get a discount if you pay for a year in advance . . .

They are honest and fair, and in particular since their focus is on creative stuff, they make a point of being very clear about not owning or claiming any copyrights and so forth, which is important . . .

PUBLISH ON SOMEONE ELSE'S WEBSITE

SoundCloud is one the more popular websites for musicians, and they have a FREE version, but they also have premium versions that have subscription fees, and they are very clear on not claiming any rights with respect to ownership of your songs and so forth . . .

SoundCloud

NOTION 3 supports uploading to SoundCloud via the "Export Audio . . . " option when you have a SoundCloud account, but this is for WAVE audio files, which are larger than MP3 files, so it takes longer to upload, but the quality will be better, depending on the genre and so forth, where for DISCO and Pop songs, the AIFF, WAVE, and MP3 versions sound pretty much identical to me, but for purposes of comparing EWQL and VSL I think that WAVE audio makes better sense, because it is a higher resolution format, in addition to being the native export format for NOTION 3 . . .



I am reasonably certain that MySpace is another way to do this, since they have instructions on creating an "Artist" account for FREE, which includes the ability to upload and publish your own songs . . .

Yet another way is YouTube, where the simple strategy is to create a video with a single image similar to a slideshow with music where the single image is displayed while the music plays, and you can do this with various applications, but you need to have a YouTube account, of course . . .

The key difference in these three strategies (SoundCloud, MySpace, and YouTube) is that YouTube will process both the audio and the video, which also might be the case with MySpace, although this is only a guess, since I have not used MySpace for music videos . . .

SoundCloud uses two strategies, as explained in this FAQ:

Sometimes our transcoding system can create audio artifacts, as we transcode all tracks to 128 kbps mp3 for streaming playback. Uploading a lossless or high-quality lossy file will usually reduce these to a minimum, but unfortunately there's not much we can do for the handful of individual tracks that are still affected.

If you choose to make your track downloadable though, the version users can download will be an exact copy of the version you uploaded, without any transcoding.

[SOURCE: Music Quality (SoundCloud FAQ) ]

With YouTube, once you publish a video, it is there essentially forever, and while you retain the rights to the material and so forth, YouTube has the right to distribute the video, which is one of the things that YouTube does, which is fine with me . . .

And my best guess is that MySpace has a similar policy . . .

THOUGHTS

At some point, it makes sense to join one of the rights management organizations like ASCAP or BMI, and you also will want to get setup for ISRC codes if you plan to do sell your songs through digital music distribution, which in some respects is a different topic, but so what . . .

So what!

I am affiliated with BMI, and when I do an official album I assign myself ISRC codes; do the BMI song registration work; and so forth and so on, but I let CD Baby do the actual digital distribution, since they have people who know how to do it, and I trust them . . .

On the other hand, unless you happen to become an overnight sensation, the most likely scenario is that you will be doing good to earn $10 a year selling songs, which in some respects tends to make the rights management and ISRC stuff a bit moot, so I have two strategies, where one strategy is that if people want to listen to the official version of a song, then I do the BMI, CD Baby, and ISRC code stuff, which maps to listeners needing to pay for the privilege, while the other way is much easier, since I simply post links to MP3 versions of songs as I work on the songs, so the "in development" versions of songs are free, where my thinking is that when nobody is buying songs, then giving them away for free is pretty much the same thing, although I include copyright notices, of course, so all I am giving away is the ability of people to download a copy of the original MP3 file, and what happens is that in a matter of days the MP3 file becomes available virtually everywhere on the planet, which is something to consider . . .

As an example of what happens when you publish something to the web, do a Google search on the specific phrase "fabulous underpants"; click on "Videos" in the left column of the results page; and provided you have SafeSearch set to "moderate" there should be a link to "(I Want) Angela Gossow's Underpants (Ya-Ya-Ya)" (The Surf Whammys) somewhere in the Top 10, with more on the next few pages . . .

At present, Captain Underpants is the reigning king of the Underpants song genre, but I am making progress, and the great aspect of this particular genre is that there is not a lot of competition, which is fabulous

"(I Want) Angela Gossow's Underpants (Ya-Ya-Ya)" (The Surf Whammys) -- YouTube music video

Fabulous!

[GeorgePaul]

Is there anyone more helpful and friendly than Surfwhammy ?

[fabiolcati]

Open a box.com account, upload your mp3s, copy the link to each file and paste it in a new post on this thread.

Really!!!

[GeorgePaul]

Thanks Surf and Fabio!

Ok, so here is the link to hear side to side a number of passages rendered with VSL and EWQLSO.
The work is VENUS from the Suite THE PLANETS by Gustav Holst. The tracks are presented as demos in both libraries’ web pages. EWQLSO Presents only a segment of the work whilst VSL presents the entire work.

The one particular track that made me decide for VSL is the track named as:

The Planets Venus Gustav Holst EWQLSO CELLOS.

As a cellist for the past 31 years, and having played as a professional for the last 25, I KNOW a cello section does not sound like that at all. Good try though.

In my opinion, both libraries have still some way to go but they are getting really close!


Cheers!

http://soundcloud.com/jorgepaulin

[labou]

Well, if you are looking for perfect orchestra rendering you aren't looking at the right libraries, both EWQL and VSL libraries supported by Notion are quite old and limited compare to what's being currently release... EWQL have now new libraries called Hollywood which are more expensive and way more extensive and complex than the original and VSL are just releasing new libraries... It is also worth looking at Kirk Hunter Concert libraries, LA Scoring Strings and Cinematic Strings, but non of them are natively supported by Notion so you will have to build your own set of rules.

[GeorgePaul]

I am not looking for the perfect sound library labou. I am just making a simple comparison between the ones that are already supported by Notion in response to a question by Jeff. I am aware that there are a number of sound libraries better than these options and if I could afford a top-of-the-line sound library, I would choose Spitfire. However, since Spitfire is not natively supported by Notion, I rather spend my time making music using Notion in its current state of development, instead of spending my time trying to learn how to make things work with unsupported sound libraries. I would not even know where to start

[iamnemo]

I use both libs with Notion but I prefer the VSL Special Edition (Vol. 1-4) samples for the scope and quality of their articulations and also the power of their sample player. I agree that EQ Symphonic Orchestra is an aging product and their samples are not bad at all but even their 64 bit PLAY engine cannot keep up with Vienna stuff.

Vienna Instruments' array of products is confusing though. Here's a breakdown:

1) Vienna Special Edition (newly repackaged into Vols 1-4) is a vast collection of instruments and articulations that should fill 95% of all acoustic orchestral needs. Check Montreal-based Guy Bacos video demos for a better idea of what wizard-level control of VSL articulations can do!

2) If very specific articulations are needed for a specific instrument you can add the "download instrument" which is actually every articulations for that instrument (I bought the Bb Clarinet for example) for about 100-150 euros apiece.

3) The Vienna Instruments player comes free but the PRO version is the new one and is VERY powerful and IMHO a must.

4) Vienna Ensemble PRO is an extremely versatile tool that lets your sequencer use slave computers (32/64 PC or Mac, mixed) over LAN to run VSL or other VSTi as if they were local. It's also a mixing environment with effects sends and you can add MIR (24 or PRO) which is the most powerful IR reverb/delay system I know where you just choose a room, place players on stage, position you microphones and voilà!

OK, maybe I sound a little biased towards VSL... it's because I am!

[Jeff Wolverton]

WOW,
You have all given me a lot to think about. I am also looking through t web sites to see who in industry is using which libraries.
Thank you for all your research and input.
Jeff
.

[wcreed51]

As George said, the VSL SE series and EWQLSO are the only two "big" libraries supported by Notion out of the box. It doesn't really mater what people are using in the industry (and it's not these two) if they don't work for you in Notion. Assuming Notion is your chosen tool.