VSL Special Edition vst libraries - USER reviews?

I use VSL mostly for strings. Steep learning curve - you should watch the DVD tutorial. Still worth it, the sounds are great and with key switching you can get some very realistic articulations. I also have Garritan Personal Orchestra - very nice for less money, but if you're doing serious scoring go for VSL. Good luck!

Very easy to use. Quick learning curve. You can not group instruments. Every instrument has to have it's own instance. That is its only downside. But remember 1st Violins are played as 1. Trumpets are 1 etc....solo instruments will all need their own. If you have any inkling on how to orchestrate the correct way you will love this library. Look at getting Kontact 3 either as an alternative or in combo with VSL SE. Kontact 3 you will be able to load 16 instruments at once, But you will want the melodies/solo instruments to come from VSL SE. VSL's playability is fantastic. Learning how to use keyswitching for different articulations will really help and is not hard to learn. Kontact 3 has VSL samples in them that will crecendo and brighten using the mod wheel. These sound fantastic and make a huge difference.

If you are serious about the Orchestra then jump on it. If you want to program all your strings as one (Not orchestrating differently for Violin2, Viola, Celli, Dbass etc.) then you will be wasting your money. Then I would guess a program like Symphonia would be better, but eventually your orchestrations and orch effects will sound just like everyone else who has that library.

I hope that helped.

Yes, but the Kontakt Vienna library is only a taste of things. The Special Edition libraries are much larger, although also more expensive. Although I do agree that the Kontakt edition of it is great and I personally use it, it's not really the same thing.

I do think that anyone who is going to be using a lot of samples should have Kontakt. It's my main instrument plugin personally. But I rarely use the factory library, despite it's quality, outside of the orchestral stuff.

Brent

I totally agree. I was just suggesting he compare the two, and maybe there's enough stuff in the Kontakt library to get him started.

East West Gold sits on my hard drive hardly used. I've found the strings almost worthless as they don't have a legato mode and sound synthy to me. I use the Garritan libray quite a bit more.

VSL Special Edition is a nice library although the dongle causes me problems from time to time. The best thing in the VSL is the performance legato patches. I mix the VSL strings with the Kirk Hunter strings. With Vienna Ensemble 2, which is a free download, you can load up 16 instruments in one instance. It's also x64 compatible.

Jim

ORIGINAL: Desperate Dan
...
We all got it wrong the Best Sounding was EAST WEST Platinum with *Hollywood* type sounds Second came the Live Strings and third VSL. All of them were the top of the Range in their sets. The VSL apparently costs 14000 Euros and the EAST WEST was a bit cheaper. The Client finally went with the EAST WEST and is very Satisfied.

I must admit I was pretty impressed with the Sounds and ended up Getting the EAST WEST GOLD Symphonic which to be honest blew the Garritan Away but then Garritan is 2Gb and GOLD is 16Gb, maybe you can't compare.

So the live strings came in second, LOL. Just goes to show how the "Hollywood sound" has come to be so pervasive that's what a lot of us expect our strings to sound like nowadays.

Dan, you mention the 2GB Garritan -- is this GPO you're talking about?


JD

And to all users commenting, thankyou firstly! - You seem to get a lot of VSL instruments with Kontakt - the price of Kontakt3 and VSL Special Edition are the same, which makes the K3 seem more appealing as it has all those other instruments . . .

Do you think there are -enough- of the VSL instruments in K3 to do rich scoring with?