Nice effort but it's still dull when played softly. What I miss from the sound is 'air'. And I'm comparing it to the sound of a real Bösendorfer recorded in a pro studio last month. You can eq and compress Pianoteq all you want, but you get artificially ringing overtones and larger that life noises at most. No 'air'. I'm beginning to doubt if it is even possible to achieve by the physical modeling approach.

So, yeah, it's rich but dull. Great for Debussy. Not so great for jazz or pop. I'm sorry I have to say it.

Sorry about the delay, but here's the preset I made a while ago. I've been playing with it quite a bit and I think that's a pretty good sign.

Anyway, it's what I was looking for (which I can't believe that Pianoteq didn't already have...a bright, cutting, rock and roll piano...that doesn't lack in depth and richness.

http://www.forum-pianoteq.com/97806c240...025b43f22b

Let me know what you think.

I'll post a preset or 2 in the next couple of days for anyone else to hear. I'd love your opinions.

Eagerly waiting ... ;-)

Thanks to jcfelice88keys's suggestions and a bit of work, I finally got a sound I was hoping for...A rich, detailed piano that's less classical in nature and more rock or jazz. I also bought the standard version and have been playing almost nonstop ever since. Definitely a good sign.

You could share your FXP preset via the 'FXP Corner' link on the website.

It turns out that the K1 "close mic" preset has 2 other mics far to the left of the piano besides the 2 main mics. Also, none of the "close mic" presets are what I would have called "close". They're still placed pretty far from the hammers and therefore lose some of the high end of the strike. Closer to the hammers is more in keeping with a rock/jazz approach than a classical one.

My "go to" preset at the moment is a variation of the C3 close mic preset. It's in your face but still has plenty of richness. I actually like it much better than the so-called rock piano YC5.

I'll post a preset or 2 in the next couple of days for anyone else to hear. I'd love your opinions.

Thanks again...and now, back to playing...

Good luck!

But I'm still a little curious...isn't it odd that there's no standard preset that sounds relatively bright? Like I said, even the YC5 Rock piano doesn't sound very "cut through the mix", at least not to my ears. Curious...

I should not go without saying that everything else...the richness of tone and character is amazing. There's a lot to explore.

Thanks again.

The standard version of Pianoteq allows one to vary the hardness values of the felt hammers, corresponding to low-, middle- and high note-on velocities.  If this is what you desire, you can even emulate a tack piano, without having to resort to EQ changes.

Other things you can do are to vary the strike points along the pianos' strings.  These have the effect of emphasizing certain harmonics, preferentially, over other harmonics in the harmonic series.

Still other other options include varying the relative loudnesses of the individual harmonic series within given strings.  This is not the same thing as EQ, because the latter only raises or lowers the loudness (and modifies the phase angles) of sounds within a given spectral range.  By modifying the spectral content of individual strings, or groups of strings, or the whole piano, you can get this Pianoteq thing to sizzle -- again, without having to resort to EQ and its resultant audio artifacts.

Perhaps there are other factors that can be modified, but these are the first to come to mind.  Hope this helps.

Cheers,

Joe

EDIT:  Oh yes, there is another factor you can control, which will make interesting contributions to the sound:  Try REDUCING the string length from its standard 2.70m down to its lowest value.  This will introduce "inharmonicity" into the sound.  The shortest explanation of inharmonicity is that the higher registers of the piano will sound more "bell-like".  <end Edit>

I've been playing with the presets that come with Play and the standard version, and it seems that everything sounds a little dull. Rich, yes, but not very bright. (and yes, I'm listening through decent speakers/in-ears)

What I'm looking for is something similar to Ivory's Studio 7Ft Bright Rock Studio Grand, or True Piano's Diamond Rock presets. Something like a David Benoit sound. I don't seem to find anything like that...which surprises me.

Yes, I know I can tweak up the EQ, but it seems that everything sounds so classical in nature...unless I'm missing something, which I very well could be. I tried the YC5 Rock piano and that wasn't much better at all. The closest I could get was from the K1 close mic and even then, tweak up the EQ quite a bit.

Sorry if this is lame. Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks!