Topic by jamiecw

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  • jamiecw
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Topic: Unison Width - bug or something else?

Hi everyone, please bear with me as this post might be somewhat long.

A little bit of context:
So on occasion, I have been playing on this baby grand (a Kawai) and it has that slight twang similar to the NY Steinway D Wide Unison; so have been tweaking my fav Bechstein Prelude preset on PTQ using the clean studio reverb and trying to add that unison effect so I can emulate the sound from said baby grand.

Issue discovery:
However, I have discovered something that is either a bug or PTQ just treats the unison effect differently; you can try this and see what I mean. So here it goes; if you check the settings of the NY Wide Unison it is set to 1.30. If you go the Bechstein (or any model really, I just happen to use that often) and manually set the unison to 1.30 with the same parameters for the humanize option you do not get that effect. BUT, if you use the copy/paste function from the Steinway to the Bechstein you get the unison effect; what gives?

I also compared two copies of my Bechstein Prelude (one with the unison parameter copied and the other with the unison parameter manually set and it says they are different yet the parameters themselves are identical i.e. 1.30.

That makes me believe that this is either a bug or there is more parameters being tweaked when using copy/paste?

Any thoughts?

If you got to this point, thanks in advance for reading and or replying.

J
Edit: using latest version 8.0.5

Last edited by jamiecw (28-03-2023 16:03)

Reply by Qexl

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Re: Unison Width - bug or something else?

Yes, confirmed this also on 8.0.5

What a good catch

I also would guess something along the lines of each piano model being different internally - not just about the dials on front.. and definitely something when copy/pasting just 'unison width' seems to pick up something else in the engine to also carry over, out of user view.

I'd def. say its worth reporting it as a bug.

Interesting how those numbers end up looking the same on the C. Bechstein DG although sounding certainly with more unison width. Cheers!

Pianoteq Studio Bundle (Pro plus all instruments)  - Kawai MP11 digital piano - Yamaha HS8 monitors

Reply by Philippe Guillaume

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Re: Unison Width - bug or something else?

If you Note Edit the "NY Steinway D Wide Unison" Unison width parameter, you will notice that many notes have a unison width higher than 1.3, in fact up to 5.91 for note #79. Indeed the horizontal line with the little yellow triangle on the right (reflecting the 1.3 value) could have been set higher, just to be closer to the mean value, but it does not affect the sound, it is here a pure display matter.

Philippe Guillaume's Website

Reply by Qexl

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Re: Unison Width - bug or something else?

Aha - thank you Philippe!

That "something else from the engine catching in copy/paste" turns out to be.. reality itself

Good to know it's not a bug but indeed something supposed to carry over depending on realism built in per piano.

I did give a quick glance at note-edit at the time but failed to consider the dynamic variance in the notes affected, which in hindsight obv. should be different in each different piano.

SO much detail - unmatched and always am in awe of it. Also, thanks for helping everyone understand this minutia - plenty of software is full of black-hole mysteries, whereas Pianoteq allows the exposition of these intricacies to the benefit of all. Exemplary !!

Pianoteq Studio Bundle (Pro plus all instruments)  - Kawai MP11 digital piano - Yamaha HS8 monitors

Reply by jamiecw

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Re: Unison Width - bug or something else?

Thank you both - I have standard so I cannot edit individual notes but I see how this ties in together.

I will live with the copy/paste option for now.

J