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Red Room Palette updated to 1.2 and Sale

Larry Shelby

By Larry Shelby
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Larry Shelby

Larry Shelby

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Ok...they have now entered the "EVEN DUMBER" phase...

I got reply from my service request stating the following:

Hi Larry,

 

Thanks for getting in touch! Although the files are set up for new purchases, we're still rolling out the update for existing users, so once we have all files ready to go for existing users, we'll send out an email with instructions. In the meantime, sorry about the trouble, there's a window of time where trying to download while swapping the files will result in a corrupted download. However, I'll regenerate any lost downloads from your end! Hope this helps!

 

Best,

Christian

I responded with the following:

Isn't it kind of "dumb" to WAIT, as an existing user,
for you to send an update emails, AFTER you've already 

sent out the update email???


Just curious, as it doesn't seem to make much sense, but
what do I know..

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Larry Shelby

Larry Shelby

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Ok...so since I was one of the first to download Primary Colors, before they went to the 
Pulse System, they had to manually generate "codes" for the downloads for Pulse.  So,
when I opened Pulse and put the code in, I got an error message.  I emailed him back
with the message from the attempt to use the code.  In the mean time, I decided to log out, 
and then back in, to Pulse, and try the codes again.  That worked!

What a mess...anyways...done!

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Larry Shelby

Larry Shelby

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The Red Room guys forwarded that issue to Pulse, and they issued a fix...

The new Pulse installers are here

Mac: 

https://pulsedownloaderapp.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/v38.0.9/Pulse-38.0.9-mac.zip

PC: 

https://pulsedownloaderapp.sfo2.cdn.digitaloceanspaces.com/v38.0.9/Pulse.Setup.38.0.9.exe

6 minutes ago, Mesh said:

Wow...what a mess is right.

How are the Palette Ochestra series? Did you get these on this sale or....?

I only have the free stuff Mesh...

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Larry Shelby

Larry Shelby

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26 minutes ago, Fleer said:

I don’t even have a Pulse link, Lars. 

I'm pretty sure you probably got yours BEFORE the switch to Pulse,
so might want to either contact them, or wait until they send the "exisisting
customer" emails...they, like most, do everything "bass-ackwards" and NEW
customers get it first...then the existing ones....

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Amicus717

Amicus717

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I have the main library Palette Symphonic Sketchpad. It's...ok-ish. 

It's actually kind of an odd package, in terms of quality. For a sketchpad it is quite complete, with many useful parts -- but also a  bit  rough around the edges and  variable in quality from patch to patch.  I don't like the interface much, and the samples are a distinctly mixed bag.

It ticks all the boxes in terms of orchestral sections, with  strings, woodwinds and brass being the main players, and  additional patches for various percussion, timps, hand percussion, piano, harp, choir and some synth patches. For the ensemble patches (strings, woods and brass) Palette  has a full set of articulations (all the usual suspects, plus tenuto and major/minor trills). And surprisingly, it has a separate chamber-sized patches for each ensemble.  

There are three mic positions: Close, Decca and Hall. The Decca is the default, but with  more baked in room ambience  than I expected. I find it a bit muddy and difficult to blend with other libraries. The Close mic is a lot better for that, but needs a fair amount of added reverb.  The sound of the strings players is decent, but not the most refined sound (certainly not the glossy and pristine sound of the Albion ONE strings I regularly use). Rather, it is  solid  and workmanlike, with a hint of rasp. The basic articulations are fine, except I don't like the spiccato - too abrupt and punchy, and not enough velocity layers for my tastes. Admittedly, I haven't really played around with the settings in the GUI, so possibly that can be adjusted. The trills are a nice articulation option, and are the only parts of the package that are currently in my orchestral template, as they are the best  trill samples available to me  when it comes to  blending them with my Albion and 8Dio strings (Albion doesn't have trills, and I don't like the 8Dio ones - and while the Pallete samples  take  a bit of work, they do fit in fairly well after some reverb, panning and eq). 

The woodwinds are adequate  - nothing special, but they get the job done. The brass is okay when played en masse. But for both the winds and brass patches,  the overlap points of the instruments is  kind of obvious and does  not leave enough room for individual sections to play melodies cleanly. I also don't like the position of the brass players in the soundscape. 

There are some weird bits to the library...

The glockenspiel is really not good -- quite unusable, to my ears, which was something of a surprise. How do you mess up a glockenspiel? The Close mic sounds nice, but it's really dry and in-your-face, and thus hard to place in my orchestral soundscape. The Decca is really ambient, and has the weirdest sound when played hard -- there is a deep banging sound to the highest velocity samples, as though the percussionist is hitting his knees on the glock stand in his enthusiasm. The Hall mic is no better. Quite odd and quite unusable. 

The Harp has lots of nice strings, and one or two strings that sound brittle and obvious, and thus make the patch  hard to use. Those strings (high C and D) stand out way too much, and draw all kinds of the wrong attention to themselves. They only fit in with their brethren when played at the lowest velocity. So I don't use the harp.

The timps are perfectly fine, and include a nicely programmed set of mod wheel crescendos that drop in a final hit upon release. They work well, and I've used them to good effect. 

The piano sounds  surprisingly decent for a small add-on to an orchestral package. Quite usable. 

The hand percussion, trailer percussion and orchestral percussion are all decent, with a generous number of different  instruments. 

The choir is very limited, but adequate for the very basic stuff (oh, ah and mm).

So, it's kind of a strange package -- almost like the alpha release of a good orchestral library, with solid potential but some genuine rough spots. It is good for sketching and works well on my laptop (where it sees most of its use, along with Da Capo).

I  bought it on sale earlier this year (I don't recall what I paid for it), and it has been useful - but I'm glad I didn't pay full price.

That's just my two cents. As always, YMMV.

Rob

Edited by Amicus717
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kitekrazy1

kitekrazy1

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5 hours ago, cclarry said:

Yes...Primary Colors also got updated.  They have also switched to "Pulse"
downloader, the same one that Impact Soundworks uses

Seems not to work without a serial number.    So far this seems like a half assed outfit and not worthy  of existing on my systems.

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Amicus717

Amicus717

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15 minutes ago, Fleer said:

Well, I think Palette is pretty, pretty good. 

I think it's a pretty decent starter kit, with lots of tools. I can see students getting a lot of good use out of it.

And its a great library for travelling with a laptop -- which is what I use it for on a regular basis. I'd really like it if they gave it some more polish, though. I haven't downloaded the update yet. Might do that later this week.

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Reid Rosefelt

Reid Rosefelt

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10 hours ago, Amicus717 said:

Rather, it is solid and workmanlike, with a hint of rasp.

For me there is more than a hint of a rasp, and that's my main issue with Palette--and I'm not the only one.   It is about as bone-dry a library as I have ever played.  For me, the sound of instruments include the rooms they are performed in.  This is why I love Orchestral Tools and the Cinematic Studio series.  They sound beautiful to me out-of-the-box, without adding any reverb or any other effects.

When I add a good reverb like Spaces II and a bit of EQ to Palette, I like it.  And you get a lot more articulations in Palette than in other "sketching" libraries like the Inspires, which have practically none.  There's a lot more bang for the buck as far as sketching libraries go in Palette, particularly if you own Melodics.  

But I would recommend Palette more not as a sketching library, but  to people who want to use it to combine with other libraries, because it's dry quality makes that easier to do than a library with baked-in ambiance.  When I load up the Inspires, I'm happy to start sketching immediately. The sound makes me want to play.  I also think Kirk Hunter's Virtuoso ensemble is incredibly inspiring.  It sounds good too and it has a very brilliant interface.

As soon as I got Palette, I asked Red Room Audio to add effects presets.  I wanted them to set up the reverb, EQ and all the other stuff that comes with it to give you a variety of out-of-the-box sounds.  A variety of aural presets as  soooo many libraries, from NI to Sonuscore to 8dio offer, from natural to sound-designy.  And the guy didn't sign on to that but he did say they were thinking about doing something with the samples.  

Anyway, I was very excited to see this update, and was disappointed that there is nothing like that in it.  If they'd done that, I would heartily recommend it to everybody. 

That said, I'm excited to try out the legato in Melodics.

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Amicus717

Amicus717

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11 minutes ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

For me there is more than a hint of a rasp, and that's my main issue with Palette--and I'm not the only one.   It is about as bone-dry a library as I have ever played.  For me, the sound of instruments include the rooms they are performed in.  This is why I love Orchestral Tools and the Cinematic Studio series.  They sound beautiful to me out-of-the-box, without adding any reverb or any other effects.

When I add a good reverb like Spaces II and a bit of EQ to Palette, I like it.  And you get a lot more articulations in Palette than in other "sketching" libraries like the Inspires, which have practically none.  There's a lot more bang for the buck as far as sketching libraries go in Palette, particularly if you own Melodics.  

But I would recommend Palette more not as a sketching library, but  to people who want to use it to combine with other libraries, because it's dry quality makes that easier to do than a library with baked-in ambiance.  When I load up the Inspires, I'm happy to start sketching immediately. The sound makes me want to play.  I also think Kirk Hunter's Virtuoso ensemble is incredibly inspiring.  It sounds good too and it has a very brilliant interface.

As soon as I got Palette, I asked Red Room Audio to add effects presets.  I wanted them to set up the reverb, EQ and all the other stuff that comes with it to give you a variety of out-of-the-box sounds.  A variety of aural presets as  soooo many libraries, from NI to Sonuscore to 8dio offer, from natural to sound-designy.  And the guy didn't sign on to that but he did say they were thinking about doing something with the samples.  

Anyway, I was very excited to see this update, and was disappointed that there is nothing like that in it.  If they'd done that, I would heartily recommend it to everybody. 

That said, I'm excited to try out the legato in Melodics.

 I find the Close mics really dry, but I find the Decca mics to have a lot of muddy ambiance baked in.  It's not a huge space, but I really don't like the sound of it. Do you find it blendable with other libraries? 

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