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Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Sun May 13, 2018 10:12 am
by tavasti
Suggestions which is / are best free or cheap symphony orchestra soundfonts?

Re: Best orchestral sounfont?

Posted: Sun May 13, 2018 8:07 pm
by tavasti
Ok, after some search and testing, something found:

- Sonatina is quite good, but it at least all instruments with tremolo missing
- Compifont has tremolos (not convinced about quality of all)
- Agean Symphonic Orchestra does not sound like real instruments at all

Re: Best orchestral sounfont?

Posted: Mon May 14, 2018 12:44 am
by Michael Willis
tavasti wrote:Ok, after some search and testing, something found:

- Sonatina is quite good, but it at least all instruments with tremolo missing
- Compifont has tremolos (not convinced about quality of all)
- Agean Symphonic Orchestra does not sound like real instruments at all
If you like the original SSO, you should try Peter Eastman's SSO2, which includes tremolo samples for all string sections.

You also might be interested in the following:
No Budget Orchestra
Versillian Studios Chamber Orchestra
Virtual Playing Orchestra

Here's a piece that I made with VPO: Pumpernickel and Periwinkle

If you like the sound of VPO and you're using Ardour, take a look at this Ardour template

Re: Best orchestral sounfont?

Posted: Fri May 18, 2018 6:53 pm
by tavasti
First test, maybe not complete, but demonstrates the sounds https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig8W33z7cv

Mostly with Sonatina, something from Virtually Playing Orchestra

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Sun Nov 25, 2018 1:44 pm
by tavasti
Returning to this topic. Is there free or affordable orchestral soundfonts which have multiple velocity layers?

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Mon Nov 26, 2018 8:47 pm
by Michael Willis
tavasti wrote:multiple velocity layers?
Many of the above mentioned ones have multiple velocity layers.

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 12:14 pm
by Lyberta
tavasti wrote:Returning to this topic. Is there free or affordable orchestral soundfonts which have multiple velocity layers?
The free as in freedom one is VSCO, others are proprietary.

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 12:57 pm
by d.healey
Lyberta wrote:The free as in freedom one is VSCO, others are proprietary.
Does that really matter when there are no free SFZ players that are any good?

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 7:58 pm
by tavasti
d.healey wrote:
Lyberta wrote:The free as in freedom one is VSCO, others are proprietary.
Does that really matter when there are no free SFZ players that are any good?
I was considering repacking some sfz to sf2. sf2 does not support round robins, but several velocity layers work ok. And one possibility is to place roundrobins to near each other on velocity, and randomize velocities a bit in daw?

For that repacking this might be usefull: https://github.com/freepats/tools

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Tue Nov 27, 2018 8:23 pm
by Michael Willis
tavasti wrote:I was considering repacking some sfz to sf2.
You might be interested in Aegean Symphonic Orchestra, somebody already did such a conversion to sf2.

Re: Best orchestral sounfont?

Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2018 12:54 am
by Arthurx
Michael Willis wrote:
Here's a piece that I made with VPO: Pumpernickel and Periwinkle

If you like the sound of VPO and you're using Ardour, take a look at this Ardour template
Hi Michael,

The sound is convincing. When I have time I will try your ardour preset.

Re: Best orchestral soundfont?

Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2018 1:16 am
by j_e_f_f_g
Here's a demo of the "No Budget Orchestra".

https://soundcloud.com/j_e_f_f_g/nerd-medley

Re: Best orchestral sounfont?

Posted: Sat Dec 22, 2018 5:29 pm
by Michael Willis
Arthurx wrote:Hi Michael,

The sound is convincing. When I have time I will try your ardour preset.
Nice. I must admit, I've learned a lot since I made that template, I have been considering overhauling it to be much more simple. Right now it has dozens of busses, but lately I found a way to give each section its own stage presence without all of the busses.

Let me know if you would be interested in an update to the template before you get started.