Experience with ProjectSAM from Native Instruments orchestral essentials?

[Billy86]

Orchestra Essentials 1 and 2 are on sale at Native Instruments for a good price. Does anyone have any experience\user insight into these?

I’m looking for some authentic sounding orchestral instruments with a good variety of articulations. I don’t do big orchestral scoring or cinematic work. Just sometimes want to add some strings or brass or woodwinds to essentially piano or guitar centric songs. For context, the big Spitfire Collections are overkill for me and way more than I want to spend. I do have some of their $29 Originals titles. They sound great, but the articulations are extremely limited. For example, no legato, which is pretty darn basic for primary orchestral instruments. 

Edited March 26, 2023 by Billy86

[OutrageProductions]

I own all of the East/West and Spitfire Orch Libs, and was watching this video for the extent of articulations: 

He does a pretty good run through, but it was too skimpy for my kind of work. Lacks the serious legato and col legno articulations for me.
As a caveat though... I do have the ProjectSAM TFO, and use it fairly often because of it's quirkyness.

This could be a decent package IMHO if you're not serious about scoring and just want to have fun!

You might also want to check out this orch: 

 

Edited March 26, 2023 by OutrageProductions

[Fleer]

I second Indiginus. Great dev. 

[Billy86]

Thanks for the replies! I think Amadeus could be what I’m looking for. That wasn’t on my radar. I’ve reached out to Idiginus to clarify which instruments have legato articulations. I agree Indiginus is great. I have their Steel instrument. 

[Patrick Derbidge]

I actually would have preferred this to Albion, which I bought because I bought into to he Spitfire hype years ago that I no longer buy into. I paid $600 for Albion Legacy and then $200 for the cross grade/upgrade to Albion One. I was able to test out Orchestra Essentials on a site that used to allow remote access for previewing project sam libraries and I immediately preferred Orchestra Essentials and regretted my Albion purchase. Since then spitfire has come out with a lot of great products but between Albion One and Orchestra Essentials, I prefer the latter. Don't get me wrong, Albion is still a great library but just overpriced IMHO. If you collect the entire Albion series,then you would have a more versatile collection but you would also spend a lot more. I'd say that the current sale for this is really good but it's only as good as you find a use for it. Don't spend money just because you can. Watch the walk through videos and decide if you can find a use for it. Guy's videos are the best for getting a feel for these project sam libraries.

 

Edited March 26, 2023 by Patrick Derbidge

[bitflipper]

Amadeus has been my go-to since its release. It doesn't have all the articulations of the biggest orchestral libraries, but it's got the essentials. Here are the ones for all the string instruments (violin, viola, cello, bass). There are both ensemble and solo instruments for all the strings, brass and woodwinds. It's pretty complete for the casual composer, and even includes the lazy composer's favorite shortcut,  symphony.nki.

[Billy86]

17 hours ago, bitflipper said:

Amadeus has been my go-to since its release. It doesn't have all the articulations of the biggest orchestral libraries, but it's got the essentials. Here are the ones for all the string instruments (violin, viola, cello, bass). There are both ensemble and solo instruments for all the strings, brass and woodwinds. It's pretty complete for the casual composer, and even includes the lazy composer's favorite shortcut,  symphony.nki.

I saw you mentioned Amadeus in the Articulation map forum, but couldn’t see a share link. Did I miss it? Would you mind sharing? Thanks. 

[Nick Blanc]

I tried it out a bit this weekend and was pleasantly surprised by the piano.