Audio Quality is Terrible (Page 1 of 2)

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

I have a MBP M3 Max with 64gigs RAM, a corning fibre optic TB3 cable to a brand new UA Apollo X8, and a brand new set of Adam Audio A77H's. My main controller is an 88 key hammer-action Roland. I have spent years perfecting the velocity curve for that thing in Pianoteq. I typically run the Pianoteq engine at 48k and my global sample frequency is 96k.

I practice on a cheap slightly out of tune short upright piano at work every day and a crappy Yamaha MX61, and frankly Pianoteq sounds as anemic and lifeless as that old Yamaha.

It sounds like a toy. Before, when I had my awful Mackie HR824 monitors, I was more than willing to blame the lacklustre fidelity on them.
Turns out it wasn't the monitors.
I typically disable the pianoteq reverb, delay, & limiter. If I want a room sound, I'll usually choose a reasonable sized rehearsal space in Altiverb, and set the speaker positions to max left-right and the closest proximity.
I've tried many different mic configurations with the Steinway etc and the thing still sounds like a ball-less scrotum compared to the little upright piano at work.
Is there a trick for coaxing a decent sound out of this thing?

Hard to understand why you would buy Pianoteq without spending a lot of time with the freely available trial version and trying all the piano models first.

It would seem that Pianoteq is just not for you, and that's OK. I suggest selling it and buying another VST.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

mikali wrote:

Hard to understand why you would buy Pianoteq without spending a lot of time with the freely available trial version and trying all the piano models first.

It would seem that Pianoteq is just not for you, and that's OK. I suggest selling it and buying another VST.

I bought Pianoteq in 2007, have fun conjuring up more assumptions

Ah, you liked it in 2007. Perhaps uninstall Pianoteq 8.2 and re-install the version that worked for you, if you still have the installer.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

It sounds like a toy.

I've tried many different mic configurations with the Steinway etc and the thing still sounds like a ball-less scrotum compared to the little upright piano at work.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

I liked it because I had a crappy i/o and crappy monitors, up until now I didn't actually know what it really sounded like,

Anyway, you can stop defending pianoteq anytime, I'm actually looking for tips and tricks to round out the realism in this thing so it's not completely uninspiring to play it.

There is an element of trolling to your posts here as I don't see anybody being able to convince you as you are strongly opinionated. 

No mention of the audio demos Vs your own experience. I doubt you could ever like it though.

Sounds pretty damning to me.

No Modartt update or FX tip or trick is going to mask such contempt for long.
Suggest you just get a real upright piano.

Frankly I'm amazed that the Steinways and K2's you hear don't bother you instantly and make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck as you cringe with disappointment

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

Frankly I'm amazed that the Steinways and K2's you hear don't bother you instantly and make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck as you cringe with disappointment

Sounds like your ears have a different frequency response to mine. Who knew.
We get it, you don't like Pianoteq and that is perfectly OK.
Stop flogging a dead horse and buy another VST ... make sure you thoroughly test your next one before you purchase to avoid disappointment ....

mikali wrote:

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

Frankly I'm amazed that the Steinways and K2's you hear don't bother you instantly and make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck as you cringe with disappointment

Sounds like your ears have a different frequency response to mine. Who knew.
We get it, you don't like Pianoteq and that is perfectly OK.
Stop flogging a dead horse and buy another VST ... make sure you thoroughly test your next one before you purchase to avoid disappointment ....

it sounds like you keep typing for no reason

marcos daniel wrote:

For me, it is impossible to get realistic sound out of Pianoteq, at least by now. That said, I prefer its sound over the internal of my digital pianos (which are quite old now). I like Pianoteq because I like playing piano, it does not sound as a real one, but it is playable and I'm not looking to feel I'm playing a Steinway D.
Going back to your question, may be you can tweak a little the unison witdths and the condition, also the parameters in the design section. I get better results with headphones than speakers (may be because of my horrible $150 generic chinese speakers). This will not make it sound real, but a new sound avoids getting tired.
I believe that at the state of art, it is impossible to get a sound near a real piano, since in a acc. piano you have dozens of kg of wood vibrating with surface in the order of m2, any speaker is just a piece of some light material with very small area.
At the end of the day, a lot of the result depends on how you play, if you listen to Phil Best interpretations in youtube, they sound pretty convincing, because of the nuances he gives to the music.

I would argue something different.
I would posit that Modartt is hedging their bets with the minimum specification platform they can deploy for because more people can afford crappier technology, which ultimately casts a wider net for potential buyers. Since the demographic of piano players who want to drop $370+ on a piece of software that only makes piano noises is fairly boutique, it's divided into different groups of enthusiasts defined by their disposable income. Because there already needs to be an investment into a fairly nice weighted keyboard, a capable computer, and more often than not, some kind of sound system assuming the user isn't condemned to do everything inside headphones, we arrive at a range of artsy users with modest incomes who are plodding through life with a 2014 i3, all the way to people like myself and beyond who have the budget for something like an M3 Max or AMD/Intel's top tiers.  The people with the least amount of CPU power far outnumber the ones with a lot of CPU power, and because we're talking about very modular software, the product does not have to be limited by the lowest common denominator cpu spec, because it's software, it's not a car.
Pianoteq has always been considered unusually expensive for a plugin when compared to the grand pantheon of plugin prices: because it does something that most plugins cannot....or at least thats the way it used to be.
When I first purchased Pianoteq, I had the flagship MacBook Pro, but running Pianoteq alongside a decent impulse reverb was seriously challenging my computer in 2007. Granted if Modartt is great at anything, code optimization is it. At that time, sampled pianos were just infested with all kinds of weird little idiosyncrasies from deresolving/aliasing tails, to weird voice priorities, and the hilarious ram demands. Pianoteq stuck out like the holy grail, because all it wanted was your cpu, and it wanted as much cpu as you could give it.
After Apple bought eMagic, they had similar issues with the Sculpture plugin and then when they purchased Alchemy from Camel, same problem, same solution...they then snagged the IP for Space Designer from eMagic, same problem, same solution, although in the form of a slightly dirty trick.
Apple has user-selectable processing thresholds set for these plugins that raised or lowered their overall capabilities, like reducing the number of decimal places in a convolving algorithm, lowering the throughput resolution of their impulse responses, etc, effectively killing off dynamic range. Anyway, lots of little arithmetic tricks to make something run on lower end hardware and nobody complains....but they DO want to know what it's really capable of and maybe save up all their bottles and cans to buy a more substantial Mac someday.
A few other DSP/Instrument developers do this so people can still be creative despite their lackluster technology budget.
But now it's 2024, we have i9-13980HX and M3 Max, and a pile of runners up that aren't even much less powerful, but we still have lots of CPU intensive software that's been optimized solely for the lowest rung. As someone who works with a lot of CPU-driven signal processing all day every day, it baffles me how much power is left over even more than it baffles me how inefficient so much software is. I don't think Modartt makes inefficient software, and it's been so long since I've seen a showstopping bug from them. I watch my core meters barely twitch as I lay across my controller with the pedal down.
What I'm saying is that, I wouldn't be offended if Pianoteq had a "stomp-on-the-gas" mode that employed a much larger, more elaborate model, the kind of model that risks a kernel panic, you know, like the old days, back when I would have to stem-out the piano track to use my impulse reverb.
Surely some of you Logic Pro users have switched on the high-cpu feature in Alchemy and heard your fans spin up.  I'd like that option for every math-intensive realtime plugin.
We do in fact have the computer power to make it convincingly real, hell we have the GPU power, and the vast majority of DSP math is everything a GPU performs in its sleep. That's a different rant for another day.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

marcos daniel wrote:

For me, it is impossible to get realistic sound out of Pianoteq, at least by now. That said, I prefer its sound over the internal of my digital pianos (which are quite old now). I like Pianoteq because I like playing piano, it does not sound as a real one, but it is playable and I'm not looking to feel I'm playing a Steinway D.
Going back to your question, may be you can tweak a little the unison witdths and the condition, also the parameters in the design section. I get better results with headphones than speakers (may be because of my horrible $150 generic chinese speakers). This will not make it sound real, but a new sound avoids getting tired.
I believe that at the state of art, it is impossible to get a sound near a real piano, since in a acc. piano you have dozens of kg of wood vibrating with surface in the order of m2, any speaker is just a piece of some light material with very small area.
At the end of the day, a lot of the result depends on how you play, if you listen to Phil Best interpretations in youtube, they sound pretty convincing, because of the nuances he gives to the music.

I would argue something different.
I would posit that Modartt is hedging their bets with the minimum specification platform they can deploy for because more people can afford crappier technology, which ultimately casts a wider net for potential buyers. Since the demographic of piano players who want to drop $370+ on a piece of software that only makes piano noises is fairly boutique, it's divided into different groups of enthusiasts defined by their disposable income. Because there already needs to be an investment into a fairly nice weighted keyboard, a capable computer, and more often than not, some kind of sound system assuming the user isn't condemned to do everything inside headphones, we arrive at a range of artsy users with modest incomes who are plodding through life with a 2014 i3, all the way to people like myself and beyond who have the budget for something like an M3 Max or AMD/Intel's top tiers.  The people with the least amount of CPU power far outnumber the ones with a lot of CPU power, and because we're talking about very modular software, the product does not have to be limited by the lowest common denominator cpu spec, because it's software, it's not a car.
Pianoteq has always been considered unusually expensive for a plugin when compared to the grand pantheon of plugin prices: because it does something that most plugins cannot....or at least thats the way it used to be.
When I first purchased Pianoteq, I had the flagship MacBook Pro, but running Pianoteq alongside a decent impulse reverb was seriously challenging my computer in 2007. Granted if Modartt is great at anything, code optimization is it. At that time, sampled pianos were just infested with all kinds of weird little idiosyncrasies from deresolving/aliasing tails, to weird voice priorities, and the hilarious ram demands. Pianoteq stuck out like the holy grail, because all it wanted was your cpu, and it wanted as much cpu as you could give it.
After Apple bought eMagic, they had similar issues with the Sculpture plugin and then when they purchased Alchemy from Camel, same problem, same solution...they then snagged the IP for Space Designer from eMagic, same problem, same solution, although in the form of a slightly dirty trick.
Apple has user-selectable processing thresholds set for these plugins that raised or lowered their overall capabilities, like reducing the number of decimal places in a convolving algorithm, lowering the throughput resolution of their impulse responses, etc, effectively killing off dynamic range. Anyway, lots of little arithmetic tricks to make something run on lower end hardware and nobody complains....but they DO want to know what it's really capable of and maybe save up all their bottles and cans to buy a more substantial Mac someday.
A few other DSP/Instrument developers do this so people can still be creative despite their lackluster technology budget.
But now it's 2024, we have i9-13980HX and M3 Max, and a pile of runners up that aren't even much less powerful, but we still have lots of CPU intensive software that's been optimized solely for the lowest rung. As someone who works with a lot of CPU-driven signal processing all day every day, it baffles me how much power is left over even more than it baffles me how inefficient so much software is. I don't think Modartt makes inefficient software, and it's been so long since I've seen a showstopping bug from them. I watch my core meters barely twitch as I lay across my controller with the pedal down.
What I'm saying is that, I wouldn't be offended if Pianoteq had a "stomp-on-the-gas" mode that employed a much larger, more elaborate model, the kind of model that risks a kernel panic, you know, like the old days, back when I would have to stem-out the piano track to use my impulse reverb.
Surely some of you Logic Pro users have switched on the high-cpu feature in Alchemy and heard your fans spin up.  I'd like that option for every math-intensive realtime plugin.
We do in fact have the computer power to make it convincingly real, hell we have the GPU power, and the vast majority of DSP math is everything a GPU performs in its sleep. That's a different rant for another day.

Check some samples I posted here:

https://gearspace.com/board/product-ale...8-a-6.html

Check them on headphones and your new speakers.

Is it better than with your settings? For the file from piano-midi.de

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

dikrek wrote:

Check some samples I posted here:

https://gearspace.com/board/product-ale...8-a-6.html

Check them on headphones and your new speakers.

Is it better than with your settings? For the file from piano-midi.de

can you link to a specific midi file so I can test it?

http://piano-midi.de/midis/rachmaninow/...ormat0.mid

ok whoever made this midi file is a god

This was a fun bunch of dynamics to wrangle

I used my modified NY Steinway D (limiter off), and I put it inside a very modified rehearsal suite [Davout Studio A-Paris] thanks to Altiverb 8.x
The audio files are shared from one of my servers

This file is a 48khz 320kbs mp3 [9 MB]
http://gofile.me/6fCJB/JutUJF3zU

This file is a 24/96 aiff [125 MB]
http://gofile.me/6fCJB/ycpQ9BDOv

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

ok whoever made this midi file is a god

This was a fun bunch of dynamics to wrangle

I used my modified NY Steinway D (limiter off), and I put it inside a very modified rehearsal suite [Davout Studio A-Paris] thanks to Altiverb 8.x
The audio files are shared from one of my servers

This file is a 48khz 320kbs mp3 [9 MB]
http://gofile.me/6fCJB/JutUJF3zU

This file is a 24/96 aiff [125 MB]
http://gofile.me/6fCJB/ycpQ9BDOv

Whatever DAW you’re using didn’t import the tempo info properly. It’s totally wrong. Listen to the file directly in Pianoteq. Or to my samples on gearspace

dikrek wrote:

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

ok whoever made this midi file is a god

This was a fun bunch of dynamics to wrangle

I used my modified NY Steinway D (limiter off), and I put it inside a very modified rehearsal suite [Davout Studio A-Paris] thanks to Altiverb 8.x
The audio files are shared from one of my servers

This file is a 48khz 320kbs mp3 [9 MB]
http://gofile.me/6fCJB/JutUJF3zU

This file is a 24/96 aiff [125 MB]
http://gofile.me/6fCJB/ycpQ9BDOv

Whatever DAW you’re using didn’t import the tempo info properly. It’s totally wrong. Listen to the file directly in Pianoteq. Or to my samples on gearspace

Really?  Logic asked me if I wanted to bring in the tempo track and I said yes, I observed multiple tempo changes during playback

http://gofile.me/6fCJB/HQWvEn4Zf

what are bars 1 to 9 supposed to be at?

dikrek wrote:

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

http://gofile.me/6fCJB/HQWvEn4Zf

what are bars 1 to 9 supposed to be at?

Not sure - away from my computer and listening on my phone. But in the gear space page I used Logic for the first 3 examples so it worked for me - I also accepted the import of tempo when it asked. But your exported mp3 is hugely shorter.

My question though is more aimed at you:

How do the samples I posted sound on your system?

I think I know what happened, there was tempo information in the template I made but what's weird, is that Logic automatically placed the midi file at bar 9

I fix

dikrek wrote:

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

http://gofile.me/6fCJB/HQWvEn4Zf

what are bars 1 to 9 supposed to be at?

Not sure - away from my computer and listening on my phone. But in the gear space page I used Logic for the first 3 examples so it worked for me - I also accepted the import of tempo when it asked. But your exported mp3 is hugely shorter.

My question though is more aimed at you:

How do the samples I posted sound on your system?

I think I know what happened, there was tempo information in the template I made but what's weird, is that Logic automatically placed the midi file at bar 9

I fix

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

dikrek wrote:

Not sure - away from my computer and listening on my phone. But in the gear space page I used Logic for the first 3 examples so it worked for me - I also accepted the import of tempo when it asked. But your exported mp3 is hugely shorter.

My question though is more aimed at you:

How do the samples I posted sound on your system?

I think I know what happened, there was tempo information in the template I made but what's weird, is that Logic automatically placed the midi file at bar 9

I fix

Allow me to join the topic, PlaceboMessiah.

There's a big difference between playing MIDI files and playing the piano yourself. The elements of human imperfection are what make it sound beautiful. This cannot be found in MIDI files from many sources. (Maybe in the future.). Who knows.

However, since I have Pianoteq version 6, there have been a lot of improvements in version 7, until 8.1.3, and until 8.2. Please read the topic in this link:

https://forum.modartt.com/viewtopic.php?id=11214

I too have lots of MIDI files in JAZZ that I always listen to on my phone. The sounds are very different than when I play it myself on my Kawai. I think this version is way better than before. Please read my rant on my previous topic when you have time. Modartt went beyond what I expected on this 8.2. I believe there are people who have better ears than me, which I am grateful for. Younger ears need to join the forum to give more feedback to improve the sound.

Back to your file. If you can post your own playing, I think Modartt can address the problem because they did solved my problems as well.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

dikrek wrote:

Not sure - away from my computer and listening on my phone. But in the gear space page I used Logic for the first 3 examples so it worked for me - I also accepted the import of tempo when it asked. But your exported mp3 is hugely shorter.

My question though is more aimed at you:

How do the samples I posted sound on your system?

I think I know what happened, there was tempo information in the template I made but what's weird, is that Logic automatically placed the midi file at bar 9

I fix

Cool. How did my Blüthner sample sound on your system? Very curious. I tried it on Sennheiser HD560S headphones and I thought it sounded good on those.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

dikrek wrote:

Cool. How did my Blüthner sample sound on your system? Very curious. I tried it on Sennheiser HD560S headphones and I thought it sounded good on those.

you can immediately tell the Bluthner has big balls on it. Like if I was making a scary soundtrack for a dark forest, the Bluthner is coming out. I might actually buy that one. (I'm running 8.x Standard) There's something a tiny bit artificial about its FF attack transients, but I think I'll mess it up a little to see if I can make it sound less robotic. The Adams def show it off tho.

The beginning of the piece and then starting in minute 2 are the pieces where you can see the impact of the Blüthner. Clarity and power. The Bechstein is good too.

But I only got the Steinways and Blüthner because I liked the latter and I know Modartt will keep updating the Steinways the most, so from a long-term standpoint it’s a better investment (maybe).

But I mostly use Blüthner.

So you’re saying it sounds good on your system then?

all the other modern pianos disappeared after that version.

Quite a sea change in the making?

Perhaps the OP should actually be a pro user then he can mess up the individual key tuning to his heart's content?

Is it coming down to rejection of synthetic tuning perfection of Pianoteq Vs the possibly janky stretch tuning of that piano at work?

I know I liked the Bluthner the best in version 5.  The difference in warmth and character compared to all the other modern pianos disappeared after that version. I suspect if I went back I wouldn't like it, but you never know.

PlaceboMessiah wrote:

Key Fumbler wrote:

Perhaps the OP should actually be a pro user then he can mess up the individual key tuning to his heart's content?

I seem to have this feature in the standard version

You have limited control over the individual keys in Standard yes. It's more than enough for me however if you have more exacting standards; I have too many posts here considering my meagre skill levels - more waffle than Birdseye as the saying goes in Britain.

Pro gets you a lot more per note control:
"Powerful note editing
Pianoteq PRO offers note-by-note adjustment for no less than 30 parameters:

Volume
Detune
Dynamics
Unison Width
Unison Balance
Direct Sound Duration
Hammer Hardness Piano
Hammer Hardness Mezzo
Hammer Hardness Forte
Spectrum Profile
Hammer Noise
Strike Point
Pickup Symmetry
Pickup Distance
Impedance
Cutoff
Q Factor
String Length
Sympathetic Resonance
Pinch Harmonic Point
Duplex Scale Resonance
Damper Position
Damping Duration
Mute
Damper Noise
Key Release Noise
Blooming Energy
Blooming Inertia
Aftertouch Sensitivity
Hammer Tine Noise"

Nice piont.. but those are not really anomalies per se.. just reality.. you adjust a 1 click soundboard change, it will alter all notes to some extent for example.. but for sure, Pro allows limiting certain things to a range, or down to 1 note.

Hey BTW thinking about the sense of lack of ooomph mentioned...

Just stood out, you put Alti mics max wide. So thought.. maybe you like making your own spaces - and here's just something I thought to offer.

When I'm making a chain of FX for Pianoteq or any VSTi really, I think of areas around the end-listener's POV, in relation to the piano, as they will hear it in a mix. (or put myself of course in front of a piano in player position, if using it for playing in real time for myself). Mostly, I'm talking about recordings for others to hear or the various kinds of 'album sound' people are aiming for often tho..

So maybe a series of tips in no specific order - mix and match 'em.. esp. if using a DAW and plugins..

- generally speaking, subtle can beat wild changes.
- try 'Note FX' to bring in some subtle 1 or 2cent swimming in held notes (to me, that's like 'doppler' echo return, theoretically.. worth using).
- Keep Pianoteq's reverb on... maybe adjust level of it, and tone, and shorten it to 'cabinet' lengths.
- place Pianoteq into a spatial plane (not reverb - use a plugin emulating a studio space - many good ones).
- think of reverb as not 1 thing. Use more than 1 - tastefully and for different reasons. Just don't hope a nice reverb will give you a final sound. After you make something from your reverb work, finish with another reverb on the master bus.
- Mid Side signal processing. Can be done in a DAW or within plugins (more common now that in past times in digital tools). Too many reasons to suggest this is worth trying. There are now actually good plugins doing more boutique proprietary versions of this... but it can help the stereo image and more, in various ways. (not to mention isolating Mid or centered content for 'differentiated' tweaking... like minuscule time delays... different EQs, balance between the 2, only putting reverb on the sides, only on the mids.. different revs on both - etc. - it's like a 3rd dimension to stereo mixing, but not that actually complex.)
- Don't think one plugin will make something sound brilliant. I enjoy various plugins because they make wonderful reverb/whatever.. but the absolutely won't just work with anything. There really can be things to alter - either end.
- Don't mix metaphor too much.. when placing mics in Pianoteq, and then in something spatially related (like reverb or a studio space plugin) maybe don't go way wide or anything too different, esp. at a 'first step' stage.. You can build in width later, you don't have to rip the fabric of reality.
- I love wide - love it - but mono and quasi mono has a place.. in fact, make your piano narrower (stereo width in the mic pane) - and try panning it left or right a little (for a specific part or in practice), and adding reverb to the opposite side.. that can all be subtle or hard panning depending on how Sgt. Pepper you want it. Nobody even has to hear it levels of subtle can be what many might want to aim for.. like keeping alteratinos to anything under like 5% moves or whatever works. But it's fun to hard pan, double up, pull EQ stunts and put only one instance or side (or Mid/SideS) through some extra processing.
- Wrap around more sense of space, after you get the initial dimensioning kind of where it works best. Maybe saying that twice here - just though of it that way.. leaving in case it helps someone.
- saturation is not scary - Pianoteq's one is quite nice, right-click to change it.. maybe you only want a less soft-knee to help git rid of any hint of it (*because nobody plays too loud). But certainly, I rarely turn it off, even though I use other limiters with it - maybe more than one - and one on the main bus. Everything tickling something, few heavy handed.
- ducking.
- Pianoteq's recent 'resonances-only' plugin trick.
- hardware emulations right down to consoles (mixing desks of various types these days are pretty good).
more baubles to consider for sure.

Never stop and never give up on things. When I tripped over Pianoteq around 2014, it was well beyond where you found it further back in 07. It had so much potential - I could feel that, like you must have.

The thing which made me keep using it (even when it didn't work as well as I wanted back then), was that, I found Philippe and Julien's working ideals going quite a way back - the old 'excellent engineering' from the start was not only plain to see.. but also the vision was there.. results along the way... the attention to component parts (inre physics, not just "what a big piano can be in a space".. so much more than, and quite different to, those kinds of broader brush strokes we might make in reproducting a studio workflow with plugins).. the fact it was actually not slowing down in therms of new improvements/enhancements etc.. and that's undoubtedly all still as valid today as before.

But - I know - sometimes, I feel it goes north, then south for my use cases - and back but always better in various ways.

This last update for example, is much improved - much better in various ways - yet, kind of does un-glue some things in recording in ways I feel might impact others, for now.. not saying it's just worse in that aspect... but what I've dug into to know for sure here, is that it will give better results, with more work - and that's reality. So, although 'something' may now be hitting my templates differently, causing some different types of saturations - OK I stood back and thought... this may hurt some new users (who used to be able to more easily pull better "recorded piano" sounds, which work well with 'default other plugins for recording') - but it's not the end. For my use-cases, I found this update needs more focus (old fashioned sound-engineering hat on), to get 'the best' from it. But, when doing that, it's better by far.

No doubt - after getting this upgrade in, it makes a bed ready to plant whatever comes next.. and to be honest, I'm never too worried about 'the next update', even if I personally think sometimes, an update changes 'the floor' or 'water line' for some specific things I'd maybe not want for myself (and by extension seeing that others might also feel something changed fundamentally in a yet to click way).

I like the product - and they seem to always zig-zag and follow a natural wave of discovery, refinement, and addition with the engine... it adds up, almost like adding little clumps of clay to a sculpture, shaping those in ever decades... I can't complain overall.

PlacebMessiah wrote:

when you make a broad adjustment in something like "bloom", no matter how tiny, there's always some note or two that's suddenly becoming a behaviour problem compared to the rest of the keyboard. I suspect that's why the "pro" features exist

That's a fine observation. I think worth another parse..

One of my secret sauce detailing tweaks, is to identify the kind of bloom (if any) I want to have, by turning 'energy' way up to just hear it most obviously, then altering the length of the ramp by altering 'inertia'.. that's most likely to suit a piece. And it can be limited to for example trebles.. maybe it picks up some metal brandy wine tones you like up there, but might spoil some things about the bass... or maybe it's what you only want on bass for certain pianos to bring out something expressive in a kind of subtle extra growl you are aiming for

Anyway tho, when the length seems to suit the part, I set the 'energy' way back down, hardly ever going over 0.06 (when the goal is clean/realistic). Lots of small tweaks can work wonders, rather than some open surgery.

For sure though, if you're going for a piano from your imagination that doesn't need to remain a piano, trying things with blooming plus note FX envelope can create some smooth delayed attacks and on-ramps per note - in case wanting some good old-synth on ramps.

But - somewhere between - for a lot of things, you find they work well together.. like 'direct duration' and 'impedance'.  Pushing things hard in opposite directions, then bringing them back to kind of sensible zones.. like adversarial learnign (like in AI) best way to find your own sound.. break all the things! and put it back together.. reload defaults, realize just how far from reality your early attempts will go - but keep doing it. It's an absolute gas using Pianoteq for non-piano tracking - I can't enjoy using other piano products after the usefulness of it kicked in.

Also liked your pickup on polishing certain ranges, then extending or getting some eventual tactics for workflow - true. Esp. for non-classical solo recording, It can work well that way - various other recording contexts.

Also, fwiw you could just polish the range within a recorded part.. why fix an entire piano, if your piano part is just contained within 4 octaves (you could in Pro do all kinds of wierd things to the un-heard ranges which may give novel effect to the ranges in the recording!), mainly with the melody to focus on.. if maybe working in to a mix. Just a note on that.. I think it's less daunting as a prospect, to think of editing finish pieces - you know the range on the track - no need to focus on what is not going to be heard. But - that's from the standpoint of "I probably won't play this piano again". But for sure, I have presets I made which I still use - and still make presets I play - but often a project just seems like it calls for some obvious tweaks and you may get to a point where you're not losing your mind over whole piano editing by default. It's a win in any case with Pianoteq I feel

Thanks @dikrek for showing a nice plugin array. I think, like an Alti or whatever, a lot of users outside this thread might not consider that maybe you can do more than just compress and add reverb. There's a world of spatial plugins to place the piano within (not stupid experimental toys) as well as hardware emulations for myriad studio equipment (also not junk or fakery/trickery).

There are always 2 things people talk about, as if it's the same thing.. and that's playing in the room IRT vs. recording.

Those are 2 very different things - and where probably the most arguments/annoying conversations stem.. but, I'm happy with 'in room' as it is with some tweaks which can be quick/easy... but for recording - I really wish people didn't keep asking Modartt to bring more 'rooms' or 'make it sound more like that hit record'... I do think, the piano is brilliant, workable in any recording context (emulation these days makes this old dog more than happy).

It's just obvious that, think of Pianoteq as the piano in a studio (adjusting things is the not-easy part of course) - and think what happens to that recording... it may not go on tape any more, but you could use a good tape emulation (so valuable and various reasons to do so, none of which have to do with making a horrible or old-fashioned sound, although that's the charm for some use cases).

There's maybe not just 1 compressor, but why not 3? - or not just 1 reverb in a lot of nice setups, maybe more than 3 - even one subtle one on the mix bus... nothing is new, except that it's only stuff people either really want to deep dive into, or not - and I have found, mostly not here - and I don't mind.. but people I think posting on this forum can also do their own thing, and not say much about it.. so who knows, who is doing what with Pianoteq - but it is mostly people having problems using it, who post - so a lot of discussions about maybe 'fantastic plugin chains for recording' NEVER happens. For sure a big reason is, when someone tries, there are probably just the wrong 'market' for that data who want to help and learn - but the progress remains on basics - and there are the ones who don't understand what 'examples' are and rip everyone to shreds instead of chilling and knowing people are showing "hard pushed things people can hear".. like saying, "Here's foley of a forest with birds in it.. listen to the red faced piper..." can you hear that one tiny bird, or would it help to turn up the bird in isolation? Yeah.. that's the thing which drives me insane - cannot show example of anything, without someone wanting to hear 'said tiny alteration' in a final mix. And I don't share much of anything near final outside closer circles, not going to put anything finished online.. that's just how it is for me. (yes, wierd old guy stuff - but have had my career, not here to focus on me - kind of crazy getting 2 common criticsms.. one "you don't share enough" and simultaneously "show off".. no line for that - damned either way - but mostly I have quit sharing or trying to get beyond basics here - but not complaining - it's what it is - and whilst there may be a few people caring to talk sometimes about some things to do with recording pianos, it seems it rarely goes beyond feature request or people describing their amateur setups - all good - but not for me.. I like to see it - like to help if I can - and like this thread maybe I sit out and think "Do I really want to join in on that?").

But definitely, a lot of people in here are highly skilled pianists, capable, charming, friendly, and for them, the recording arts may hold little of interest. Understandable.

But there are some, also who love that there can be 20 plugins running (each having a meaningful 'real world' role even) - depending on what you want to hear.. that's the thing problematic to many I believe..

Just being stranded in some way between what they know (today) they want to hear... but not knowing like, where to start with what tricks and tools you might deploy to make things sound 'finished'.

BTW - indeed, I've found lots of virtual instruments behave unexpectedly when dropping them into some pretty sweet scenes - and had to double-back to remove whatever I overlooked (could be as simple as a 50s slap-back delay or something which I might have forgotten that preset had on it - even mild things of course can jank with other things, like rhythmically perhaps, aligning some things to sub-sets of time.. by ears or mathematics.).

But - that's mainly talking about recoding which is a very different thing to 'piano sitting in front of you in the room' - and for that, I am OK clinging closer to defaults - that is, to me, where every user will apply their own value system in terms of suspension of disbelief and gain enjoyment or annoyance until they find a place for it and some tweaks etc.

But for sure - IMHO Pianoteq gives any kind of piano user great options, if not the best for their specific thing. My bases are covered. The above is a morning coffee typeathon, I'm sure I doubled up on some things, maybe misplaced descriptions - just hoping it gives anyone reading some worthwhile ideas to check out, leverage.

A lot of tasty stuff going on in that production

Some things of a Trevor Horn.. and/or Giorgio Moroder-esque nature, among other things baked in there. Layers of sounds, real and synthetic - done with some high-end 80s sparkle you can't just easily create.

Cheers, and indeed pretty sweet!! I like it.