Reply by dikrek

  • Avatar
  • dikrek
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 06-02-2023
  • Posts: 235

Re: Tuning assistance appreciated for 280VC

Lemuel wrote:
dikrek wrote:
daniel_r328 wrote:

Wow bravo! The Fairchild adds a lot of legitimacy and shows how close the tweaks in the model come to the instrument in the video.

To me the reverb still gives it away - it's too clean. I'd use a shorter tail (or an external slightly more advanced reverb plugin?), and maybe experiment with adding random jitter to some of the reverb parameters (eg tone?). What I'd also do is introduce a noise floor to the sound (ie white noise track) to avoid pickup perfection. One thing I don't have experience in but am curious about is to add some artificial analogue saturation to the chain as well. It adds a kind of smear to ensure overlapping resonances aren't as cleanly separated.

I know you're not on Pro but for the record, I've found that raising the Hammer Tone to around 0.4 on the midranges makes them sound more convincing to me.

Thanks! Just added 2 more files, with 50% less hammer tone and 50% more (I can only affect the whole range but I'm curious how @dv will find that too).

Also removed the PTQ reverb and added a Lexicon 480L with the random hall mode, the tail should be - random

Plus some saturation with tape and more.

Which trends better now?

Used the sombre preset but modified. This time I'm not trying to match the recording really, but just to get a more accurate tone.

Could you try this MIDI file, Clair de Lune by Claude Debussy? It’s better balanced than your piece and could help you understand how to improve your sound in Pianoteq 9. https://forum.modartt.com/uploads.php?f...ebussy.mid

Added the result

Reply by dv

  • Avatar
  • dv
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 01-11-2021
  • Posts: 377

Re: Tuning assistance appreciated for 280VC

dikrek wrote:

This is like going to the optometrist!

This exactly is!!!

dikrek wrote:

OK, for you dv I did 2 more - they end in QRS_MoreHammerTone and QRS_LessHammerTone.

This is also for daniel_r328, replacing that reverb with the QRS, which is supposed to blend the sound better with the source.

Let me know folks!

I also recommend to try on a few different headphones and speakers, otherwise there's a high chance we're trying to optimize for a specific set of headphones or room/speaker combo...

Not sure what you did with these QRS versions (the only QRS I know is PNOmation). Whatever you did, you wonderfully removed the muffling, completely, so great job there. On the other hand, these QRS versions to me sound almost indistinguishable from my favorite which still is dv_5th_NY_Steinway_Jazz_modified.flac (exactly that optometrist feeling when they propose you 3 different lenses and they all seem identical to you, eh?)

I did try different speakers (don't have any better decent headphones), and while the signature across devices is different, the "problem" I hear is identical. Going back to vision, I think you are concentrating on fine details (say if the corners of the E are sharp 90 degrees angles or rounded) whereas I am concentrating on gross features, say if the E is slanted as in E. Oh well, we can actually even claim that our role are reversed (but I didn't want to say that you are doing "gross" stuff, I prefer saying that you are doing "fine" one).

Where do I find a list of all posts I upvoted? :(

Reply by dv

  • Avatar
  • dv
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 01-11-2021
  • Posts: 377

Re: Tuning assistance appreciated for 280VC

daniel_r328 wrote:
dikrek wrote:

This is also for daniel_r328, replacing that reverb with the QRS, which is supposed to blend the sound better with the source.

This I can confirm - QRS sounds more organic to me

If compared to the More or Less Hammer, I totally agree.
If compared to the original one(s), I can barely hear a difference.... and I have to go musical phrase by musical phrase, alternating between the two or three options, often multiple times to hear that they are not exactly the same!!

Where do I find a list of all posts I upvoted? :(

Reply by dikrek

  • Avatar
  • dikrek
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 06-02-2023
  • Posts: 235

Re: Tuning assistance appreciated for 280VC

dv wrote:
daniel_r328 wrote:
dikrek wrote:

This is also for daniel_r328, replacing that reverb with the QRS, which is supposed to blend the sound better with the source.

This I can confirm - QRS sounds more organic to me

If compared to the More or Less Hammer, I totally agree.
If compared to the original one(s), I can barely hear a difference.... and I have to go musical phrase by musical phrase, alternating between the two or three options, often multiple times to hear that they are not exactly the same!!

Then 2 QRS versions have more or less hammer tone, too similar then?

At this point I do t know what else to tweak.

Reply by Zeng Hua

  • Avatar
  • Zeng Hua
  • Member
  • Offline
  • Registered: 30-05-2025
  • Posts: 7

Re: Tuning assistance appreciated for 280VC

Hello everyone,

I’m one of those who are very critical about the Pianoteq sound but I’m probably not as good as you at tweaking the sound. I stick with Pianoteq nonetheless because I think that they use the currently most promising technology. I haven’t listened to your tweaked presets yet  (which I will probably do later) but I noticed something interesting playing around with the EQ. It seems like the metallic sound comes from the region somewhere between 1560 Hz and 2250 Hz. So my EQ settings are 1560 Hz, 0 dB; 1820 Hz, -13.0 dB; 2250 Hz, 0 dB. Something I also did was to slightly increase the bass frequencies below 400 Hz.

Even my mother who usually says that she can’t hear that Pianoteq sounds artificial said that she preferred my tweaked sound by far. I applied the EQ settings to the NY Steinway D Classical preset and the Kawai SK-EX Ryuyo preset and I think both sound better now but are certainly not perfect. I hope that this might help somehow.

Last edited by Zeng Hua (03-11-2025 10:43)