Working with a virtual orchestra

[chibear]

What's probably going to be a many many part series on working with virtual orchestra instruments. I'll bring it to the top when there are new postings.

Preparing Instruments
Panning and Early Reflections

[freightgod]

Thank you! I haven't viewed yet, but I've gotten a lot out of your other videos and look forward to getting a workflow down. The effort is much appreciated!

[freightgod]

A thought after viewing Preparing Instruments. I can kind of understand e.q.ing your virtual instruments, but since we're dealing with samples, isn't it superfluous to totally 'mute' the very lowest and highest frequencies where there isn't any info anyway? But I get the point, no harm in it, and it's more sensible to look at.

I kind of lost interest in the second video because it was a little plugin specific.

[chibear]

A thought after viewing Preparing Instruments. I can kind of understand e.q.ing your virtual instruments, but since we're dealing with samples, isn't it superfluous to totally 'mute' the very lowest and highest frequencies where there isn't any info anyway? But I get the point, no harm in it, and it's more sensible to look at.

I kind of lost interest in the second video because it was a little plugin specific.

There is a lot of added information in the lowest frequencies in samples from line hum to unwanted room resonances. The issue is when you multiply this by 30x or 40x and add reverb, losing a whole bunch of headroom, possible dynamic range, and a muddier mix. A lot of the pros recommend a blanket high pass filter on the master bus of projects using samples. This is just more instrument specific. At the top end there is a digital harshness that is neither becoming nor 'real' sounding and when left in can set people's teeth on edge. Grant it some people think my approach is overkill; on the other hand I hear an aweful lot of muddy and downright ugly orchestra mixes on different forums.

It is possible to accomplish the essence of video 2 with normal Mixcraft plugins, but they are much more complicated and finaky than the solutions I presented. I tried using both the Acoustica Pro Reverb and Fusion field and adjustments that took 10 seconds in my demo took 15 minutes using a combination of panning and stock verbs. However, aside from the plugin issue, there are three methods presented for adding ERs.

[bobbyathome]

These are very helpful. Thanks.