Marshall

10 minutes ago, PavlovsCat said:

UJAM is aimed at very different users than Orange Tree Samples. UJAM targets hobbyists -- a younger demographic-- who are looking for instant gratification and are not as concerned with creating their own custom parts. In short, you can fairly say that UJAM targets hobbyist users satisfied to use loops and Orange Tree Samples targets advanced amateurs and pros who prefer to play and create their own unique progressions, strumming patterns,  licks, riffs, etc. OTS has a far higher bar for sample instrument realism than UJAM. 

UJAM Virtual Guitarist line uses loops of strums, so there's no way for a user to make custom or customized patterns. Personally,  for the loop-based approach, I think Native Instruments Session Guitarist line is the best option of the two (UJAM vs SG).  But this deal is 10 bucks, so it feels like an unfair comparison at that price point (while it's not at its regular price).

DISCLOSURE: I have consulted to OTS, Pettinhouse, SonicCouture, 8Dio, Kirk Hunter Studios and many other sample and plugin developers in past years on branding, product development and marketing strategy. I haven't done paid consulting to OTS in more than a decade, so this disclosure is probably unnecessary,  but I  want to be as transparent as possible. 

Yep, that’s my take on it too. The NI offering is half price currently too. Thanks!

I thought for this price, can’t go wrong. Thought I’d listen to some demos first though - maybe I’m spoiled by my Orange Tree nylon guitar samples, but I just didn’t think the Ujam one sounded very good by comparison. And for these sort of auto-accompaniment type plugins I prefer the sound of NI’s Session Guitarist picked nylon. Others may disagree! 

The pro version is on sale at the moment for $29 - I’ve had the free version for years and it’s all I need to be honest. The other useful free resource is The loudness penalty - I use it all the time 

+1 - no monitoring add on. 

I use AKG702 headphones and a while ago found this flat EQ correction curve I think it works really well, even using included Studio One's Pro EQ plugin, then inserting it  on the listen bus. 

That said, I would like the full Sonarworks to measure my speakers' response etc, so I downloaded the 21 day free trial ahead of the anticipated sale. It hasn't gone smoothly - the current version causes a CPU overload in my Studio One project as soon as I insert it, so their tech suggested I use the previous version - that advice in itself inspired no confidence in me, but I tried it - same result. 

It's a shame - hopefully it can get sorted out. 

Yuk - out of nosiness I tried to use the link Larry posted but got the message my password had expired…can’t for the life of me remember it. 😂

The jump in results from 8 to 11 is very noticeable, and makes me happy. Not sure if I’d feel the need to update every year though 

Just to confirm - it all works, I’ve purchased and successfully installed and authorised. So you really can get an upgrade from 8 to 11, for the same price as from 9 or 10 to 11…and, they gave me an extra 5% off for signing up to emails during the checkout process 👍

Would be great to see EZBass on sale. I have enough alternatives not to be tempted by it at full price, but I know it’d be fun in conjunction with EZ Drummer 3 and EZ Keys 2. 

The above link is now showing at a reduced price - £141.75, which is £47.25 off. Based on the fact I have an email from IZotope saying I’m good with Ozone 8, I will push the button soon I guess…I just don’t understand why they don’t advertise this being available as an upgrade unless you have 9 or 10. 

Lots of other stuff has been added to the NI sale as of today too - thanks for posting! 

I contacted IZotope support and asked if there was an upgrade path from my copy of Ozone Advanced 8 to Ozone Advanced 11. They pointed me to the following link which is an upgrade path from version 9 or 10, but said I’d be able to use it for my version 8 as well. I thought that was decent of them.

Even better though, they said “Please note these items will be put on further discount for the holiday season soon 🎄” 

I think that’s really good of them to basically say “don’t buy right now”. Kudos to IZotope/NI

https://www.izotope.com/en/products/upgrade-lp/30647

I’m looking at the crossgrade option to Cubase 13 Pro from Studio One Pro…at present there’s a price of £308 on Steinberg’s site, but it says “coming soon”. When available, will resellers (which ones?) be a better option or do you have to buy direct? 

13 hours ago, Bruno de Souza Lino said:

I'd love to see how Toontrack will massage their 300+ GB drum library into a mobile app. Most mobile devices don't even have that much internal space.

True. The entire download for Logic Pro with absolutely everything included was 16GB I think.
 

Funnily enough, since my last post I’ve been playing with the inbuilt Drummer app. It always sounded good in GarageBand but it’s on another level in LP because you can convert Drummer regions to MIDI if you wish, and therefore edit every single beat if needed.
 

The real test for me will be recording, mixing and mastering an entire song in LP.  Whilst I’ve done this in Cubasis, despite my best efforts, the quality was simply not good enough to be ‘release ready’. One of the real issues was drums, although that certainly wasn’t the only problem. I’m hopeful I can produce a track that’s every bit as good as I can manage in Studio One + all my VST plugins, but we will see. 

I’ve been using this for the past couple of days. It’s absolutely brilliant. Complete game changer and if you’ve used Cubasis 3 on the iPad, this is in a different league, there is simply no comparison. The quality of the inbuilt instruments and FX are top notch and I’ve spent thousands on VSTs and sound libraries over the years! The organisation and workflow is all logical to me. Things like Scaler 2 and GeoShred work perfectly. I miss EZ Drummer 3, and EZ Keys 2, but who knows, perhaps this will spur Toontrack and others to port to iOS. 

@Reid Rosefelt great post! 
 

At present I am away from my desktop studio for periods of time, and during those times, I get my fix from iPad music making. It certainty has its strengths, but for what they call on the Audiobus forum ‘traditional linear songwriters’ (that’s me!) it is still pretty weak. I use Cubasis, it’s sort of OK, reasonably solid and I’m grateful it’s there, but it’s like stepping back 15 years or more on a desktop. There is also a real need for a great acoustic drums package like EZ Drummer.

I’ve tried hard to produce songs on my iPad to a standard I would be happy to ‘release’. Not yet managed to get past a decent demo to be honest, and have had to redo these pieces in Studio One once I am back in my studio. 

So, I am hoping Logic Pro will fill that gap to a large extent. 

That all said, making music on an iPad is great fun and I love it - it’s just different. Riffler, AUM, Drambo, GeoShred, almost anything by 4Pockets…I could go on and on, these are amazing apps. And if you already have an iPad, it’s so cheap to dive in and see if you like it! 

Not available in Spain yet, but I reckon they start work at 9am in Sweden - I’ll give it another 2 minutes 

On 5/10/2023 at 3:39 PM, fret_man said:

And if anyone wants to hear Indiginus' Renegade guitar (and Resonator guitar), you can hear them in action here. I also used Amplesound's banjo and upright bass. And there's the OrangeTree Mandolin as well. They make a nice bluegrass ensemble. If I were to add another instrument it would be Indiginus' Fiddle.

Just wanted to say I loved Merry Maggie! I only have Indigenous Electric Guitar, and the sounds are awesome. Switching between articulations can be a bit fiddly sometimes I find.

Ha ha I’m looking forward to tomorrow! Are folks relying on the Toontrack videos to find their way around? They are informative but I can’t stand the way that they come across as ‘sales’ videos, even though I’ve already bought it! Maybe it’s just me but I would rather listen to Eli Krantzberg  over on Groove 3 any day 😂.  And I appreciate that it will probably all be pretty intuitive but when I buy new software I like to know it inside out! 

I’ve used EZ Keys in so many of my songs over the years - whenever I’ve thought - this is a decent song, but it needs something else, 9 times out of 10, EZ Keys has been the answer. So yeah, should be fun diving in! 
 

The sub thing is a worry - I know it’s only £5 or $5 a month, but these things mount up. 

A significant part of the internet is in meltdown over Apple’s announcement that Logic Pro is being ported to the iPad:

Logic Pro on iPad

Just wondered if this is exciting to anyone else here? I spend a fair amount of the time I have for music on an iPad these days, and I think this is huge news! I can see many other software developers feeling the need to port their products as a result. 

If this is too off topic, please feel free to shift or delete! 
 

I will continue to wean myself off Waves irrespective of this announcement. 

15 minutes ago, steve@baselines.com said:

Thank you Marshall.  When I used to gig, people would mention Fairport Convention to us once in a while - I guess it is an influence on me!

It’s funny, I get “Jethro Tull” mentioned more than any other band when they hear my stuff. It’s not deliberate, but those influences are deeply embedded! 

Great professionally produced track. I loved the sax solo, but the whole thing has got a great rolling vibe going on. As a boy I spent many a holiday at Lyme Regis with my parents back in the 60s and early 70s. All those fossils on the beach. Lovely theme for a lyric, I really enjoyed this. 

5 hours ago, KSband said:

Really awesome guitar playing! 

Thank you for listening 😀

Classy, beautiful vibe going on. Great production, and mix. So chilled and relaxing, love it!