Tezza

I bought the Kuassa Vermillion VST guitar amp for $19.00 US to also get trash and carbon thrown in. I have tried other Kuassa amps but not this one although I know what it is supposed to do. Surprise buy, maybe I'll like it, maybe I won't...oh well.

I am more of a midi and VST instrument combined with real instruments person than a loop person. I always have difficulty finding a loop that fits what I'm doing. If I want a beat, I'll chuck a bunch of midi patterns from the drum vst as a start and then change them around a bit or create something new in midi. I guess these are loops but midi loops. I don't use audio loops at all, probably missing out on something. I manually write bass lines and input keyboard and guitar through playing in or writing on the piano roll. I've become quite strict about what stays on my hard drive. I will try out stuff and if I don't like it, it's gone. I usually try it out on my laptop where I download it and it won't even make it's way on to my offline DAW if I don't like it. Great sounds are the best asset. You are better off having one great sounding piano or synth etc rather than 20 that sound awful. One set of decent plugins that you like the gui, sound and like to use, rather than thousands which you struggle to understand and will never use. Generally, you get what you pay for, with some exceptions. To be honest, I don't really know how to use audio loops to make music. I would like to use them but it just doesn't seem to work for me. I have a few of them but they just end up as hard drive filler.

link leads to a blank page for me. Entire website just leads to blank pages.

Thanks Mathew, a good explanation of their products. I still cannot work out though, even from their download manager, whether or not you can download the sample libraries to a different computer and then transfer them to another computer ie in my case, going to the library and using their fast free internet, downloading the libraries there and then returning home and transferring them over to my offline DAW. Do you know if this can be done?

I sent an email about 5 days ago to 8DIO to ask about the install/activation process and about one of their instruments. I have not yet received a reply.

That's in movie studio though which is different to Vegas Pro. The Pro version has a good selection of audio plugins, all that you would need really. VST's can run fine in Vegas Pro, I've used convolution reverbs without problems but generally I don't use complex audio plugins in Vegas. Video editors are much more data and cpu heavy than DAW's out of the box. You can certainly load up a DAW but it requires numerous tracks and plugins. With video editors, just dumping FHD video on one track and start adding a few filters and you can run into trouble if the system is not up to it. CPU heavy reverbs like the waves one, you are probably asking for trouble but one thing to be aware of, especially if you run a DAW on the same system. Best to reset your ASIO buffer up to about 1024 or higher (it doesn't matter how high) since you won't be doing any recording on the video editor and it will allow the system to run better. I generally run mine high anyway but I've been caught after recording in Cubase at 64 then switching to Vegas and dumping a convolution reverb on there together with all the video etc....whoops! I can do small projects in Vegas alone but usually I like to just put the video and camcorder/dual sound audio into vegas and then use vegas's audio controls and plugins to level and eq the audio, then burn the audio by itself to a stem when finished. Then burn off a copy of DV size video together with the audio stem to run in a DAW if I am then adding music, sound FX, atmosphere or ADR/Foley etc. Then just mix and master that out to a stereo audio file and reimport back into vegas for final edit. I've not had problems with vegas, but I know what to do with it after using it for a long time when I had a video production company. Best to run it in 24 bit audio all the time, regardless of content, if GPU hardware acceleration is not working for you, turn it off. 3 hard drives, one for os/program, one for source video and one for projects/video output. Can also use it's native, I think mxf codec but lately although not doing large projects I've just been putting camera native mov's on there.

The difference is here I've discovered: https://www.izotope.com/en/products/neutron/features.html It says that the advanced modules are available as a plugin but in standard they are not, what does that mean?

I cant see any difference between Neutron 3 advanced and Neutron 3 standard. They both have the 6 modules.

yeh, I've already got pro, been using it for years. That wouldn't stop me from getting the studio version though to see what it's like but the 16 bit audio thing is a deal breaker for me. I already stem out 24 bits from Vegas Pro to DAW but you wouldn't be able to do that with studio, you are going to only stem out 16 bit audio so it isn't really possible to compensate by using a DAW alongside the studio version. Camcorder audio might be 16 bit but from a dedicated audio recorder it is 24 bit if you do dual sound recording. You need to be able to line it all up in the video editor. You might have a number of tracks and effects recorded in 24 bit. It's basically crippleware, no reason to keep it at 16 bit, just that if they raised it to 24 bit, significantly fewer people would buy the much more expensive Vegas Pro. Most people don't even know it's 16 bit anyway. You can use it with VST effects's but these days these effects don't always work well with 16 bit. One of the reasons why even Vegas Pro can be crashy when using VST effects, because people don't set Vegas Pro to 24 bit audio, they don't realize they are running it at 16 bit.

The only thing that puts me off Vegas movie studio is the audio bit depth of 16 bits. I like 24 or 32 bit float when working with audio in video.

That's also what I thought, Elements was advertised everywhere else on sale at $29.00, the full version was $99.00 on sale. Only at these 2 venues which are apparently the same company, was the full version advertised at $29.00.

Yeah, you can get dust in the motherboard slot sometimes, has happened to me a couple of times. I used a camera lens brush and blower to clean out the slot and then wiped the ram stick connections with the guitar rag and then checked everything with a magnifying glass before reseating the ram. There's probably a professional way to do this but it worked for me. As a habit, I give it a good clean before installing or switching ram because it can happen after you put new ram in. If you've got a bit of dust in the computer, when you pull the old ram out, dust can fall in and then when you put the new ram in, it just pushes the dust further down, lodging it somewhere it shouldn't be. The other thing of course is mismatched ram, sticks that aren't the same. I've never had a ram stick go bad on me but I did damage a slot once (rendering it unuseable). That was when I first got computers and was a bit clumsy with my ram install procedure.

Cat, did you get a licence?

I doubt you will get any third party plugins, this is version 11, not the one on the Magix website.

You can change your country and the add to cart button becomes clickable but even if you pay with paypal you have to fill out all the address information and phone number on their site to get to checkout and your address will also be supplied by Paypal. You could put in a dodgy address I guess but there would be uncertainty about what would happen.

Are you sure it is Nectar 3 and not Nectar 3 elements. Has anyone downloaded and installed and run it? I don't have Isotope stuff how is it authorized? ilok or whatever. I would imagine you have to install direct to your DAW ie you can't download it on to a separate computer and then transfer it, is that right?

Your latency settings might be a bit too low for good mixing performance on that machine with that audio interface. You would want to be setting it at least to 256 but preferably 512. I have a similar computer to you. Mine is set to 512 or 1024 usually. If I'm recording vocals or guitar I don't need to change it as I direct monitor off the interface for that. It's only if I want to record using the midi keyboard or guitar sim in real time that I change it. Then I run it at 64. Sometimes I might mute a number of tracks because I don't need all tracks to record. I can run it at 64 all the time but there will be the occasional glitch if I do that. Sometimes I leave it on 64 without realizing until I get a glitch and then check it. I find 64 is good for real time recording with amp sim and USB midi keyboard. I generally don't freeze tracks because I like everything to remain in midi until the end. 128 might be a good compromise for recording and mixing if you are recording a lot with midi keyboard and don't want to keep changing things but if you have a lot of tracks and are getting some glitching or hiccups on playback, that setting is probably responsible.

A boy came home from his first bass lesson. His dad asked him how it went. "Today we learned the E string." The boy came home from his second lesson and dad asked him how it went. "Today we learned the A string." The boy came home from his third lesson. Dad asked, "So did you learn the D string today?" "Nope. Today I had a gig."

Its back to $92.00 now.

Just another GUI disaster as far as I am concerned, too much going on, it's just a drum kit ffs. Used to be better when they first came out. I wouldn't use them even if they were free.

The nice thing about Pianoteq is that because it is modelled and not sampled, you get access to all 127 midi velocities. I think it's the only VST piano that does that. What it means is there is a very responsive feel when you play it. It's very responsive to touch. NI's pianos have somewhere between 12 and 18 velocity layers. There is a massive difference when you are comparing the two in relation to directly playing, for example if you are learning to play piano or want to sharpen your technique. However, when it comes to playing back midi files for piano and mixing them in, there is less of a difference because you don't need many velocity layers in order to mix in the pianos (unless it's by itself, which is advantageous). Ultimately you are going to even out the velocities through compression anyway to fit it in the mix. I tend to use velocity layers as a sort of psuedo compression anyway. If some notes are sticking out, I even it out through manipulating velocity values a bit before applying compression and having 12 - 18 layers is fine for that, compression mops up the rest. Playing Pianoteq as a Psuedo piano on a midi keyboard by itself or with a sparse mix is very nice, it sounds and feels good. But in a busy mix, I can swap it out with other piano's and they will suit just as well. I tend to use other pianos more because they are easier to quickly adjust. Pianoteq is a tweakers delight for the dedicated single instrument piano player but is way overkill for just putting a piano in a mix. I don't want to spend the rest of my life working out how everything works, it's just GUI filler for me.

It's also not just about audio files, I've found that different DAW's seem to make certain VSTi's sound different or better than others. At least they do to my ears. They also can have different latency capability when playing through a midi keyboard. Responsiveness also contributes to a better or worse perceived sound. I notice it more when I start layering more complex midi sounds, mixing pianos and synths etc. None of these differences are necessarily better or worse but to be honest, the DAW's sound quite different to me when I do this. Mixcraft sounds "grainy" which is good for dirtier sounds, Cakewalk sounds "analog", deeper and thicker, good for making VST instruments more "live". Harrison mixbus takes that same sound to another level. Cubase sounds "clinical" can be very clean and revealing, which is good for mixing. Protools sounds "boxy", like the high and low end have had cuts automatically applied, I don't really use protools much though, I don't find it good for midi. These are all probably exaggerated descriptions, just what it sounds like to me.

That's more like what a bouncer on the door of a nightclub would say when you've hit one to many clubs for the night. Or if you don't meet the dress standards. Have you tried putting on a shirt and tie with decent shoes and then resubmitting the request?

So I guess you can look at it as an actual video shoot then. The screen recording is just another "take" that you can use. I am looking at it as screen recording type teaching. Typically you might end up with 5 files for this then: 1. Introductory full frame video 2. Webcam or video of the face to overlay (if you want this) 3. Full screen video of the screen 4. Introductory audio 5. Narration audio It probably would be better to edit all of this in a dedicated NLE. The webcam, screen and narration can be captured at once and the introductory video and audio can be done separately. So one workflow could be to use the video camera to record webcam footage and narration audio (audio, direct to camera) In which case you would need only to record the screen via computer. Or for simplicity and depending on the strength of your computer, record a dedicated webcam, narration audio and screen all direct to the computer. Use the video camera for introductory video and audio only. Even with this you would want a decent mic solution rather than using the webcam mic. So you want something that can record audio from a separate source, the webcam and the screen. I was thinking of using the laptop but there is no reason I couldn't use the Desktop PC to do this, that has the UR44 attached and I would get better audio. Given ACDsee's single user licence, it might make sense to install it on the Desktop PC rather than the laptop.

Thanks for that, I've tried all of those, except the Nvidia one. The problem is, all these provide part functionality but they don't provide a video editor with text and images, webcam and screen recording all in one and the ability to capture it all at the same time. There are free version NLE's like Davinci, Hitfilm, Lightworks etc but they don't do screen capture or webcam capture. The free version of Bandicam has no linear editing function and neither does OBS. Camstudio I wouldn't bother with, it's immensely buggy and development on the project is stalled. Flashback is what I was using, they advertise all the things it can do but those things are not available in the free version, you have to upgrade to the pro version. Shadowplay is mainly a screen recorder. You can certainly combine the different functions of the different free programs on offer but you don't get Camtasia style functions all in one for free as far as I can tell, there's always something missing. Having everything in one program makes it easier. Being able to capture the screen, audio and webcam into the same application at the same time and then edit it on the timeline can make everything a lot quicker if you are doing training videos. It might be better to record the webcam, screen and audio narration into separate files and then drag them all into a professional NLE for highest quality. For that purpose you could use the free version of Davinci, Lightworks or Hitfilm etc but you would still need something to do all the initial capturing. I've got Vegas which I like. I want to try and set up to capture from a GH3 (as webcam), a lavalier mic and the screen at the same time. I could get away with the webcam since that will only be small anyway but being able to get audio in from the lavalier or shotgun or both via the laptop computer or through the UR44 into the Desktop would up the quality. What I can't stand is when the training videos record audio from the webcam and you get that echoy, distant thin sound. The reviews I've seen of video studio seem to be comparing it to other NLE's like Premiere or Davinci but that is not what it is made for. I've yet to run it, I hope I can burn the audio off the timeline in some way to take to a dedicated audio editor or it might have eq and compression but I doubt it. Ill fire it up tomorrow, see how it goes.