I don't see much chatter about this company, "Imperfect Samples",and I really think the guy Matt, I think his name is, deservers some GS cred!

I'm a piano/keys player and have Ivory I and Ivory 2- both Grand and Uprights from each version as well as EW Pianos, Pianoteq and some others.

I can't believe how good the Steinway sounds. It's like night and day compared to Ivory. Any of em. All of em. You really have to get the resonance right- basically if your computer can handle it Medium to High Resonance w/ the fader bar at 1/2 w/ Hollywood On and Half Pedal On, Player selected as well as FX w/ "Sometimes" selected.

If your computer can handle that you'll be extremely pleased, I would think, with the way this piano sounds. It sounds so full- wth so much body and character it absolutely blows the others away. Furthermore, it's really kinda hard to tell how some of the others are lacking until your using one and then switch to this Steinway- it's like one of those "lights come on moments."

That's all- I'm not affiliated w/ this company in any way, shape or form- just SUPER stoked on this virtual piano.

If you read this, great job, Matt!!!!!


Scott

EDIT: One thing I need to be clear on the test below (a worthless test thanks to me! haha) regarding Ivory and IS- not Yamaha!!!!! Everything I own and use both live and in my studio pertaining to keys/piano is YAMAHA and it was that way BEFORE I was endorsed. I wouldn't have it any other way.-Scott

I completely agree.

+1 you should get the others as well as they are all pretty good (i mean white baby grand and upright piano) !!!

Yeah I've got the Braunshweig (or however it's spelled) and it's great. Kinda dark but def. has it's place. I'm def. looking into getting another 1 or 2.

I just can't get over the Steinway, man. It is SOO GOOOD!!!!!!!!

I emailed w/ Matt this morning and he said it's sorta future-proofed. Modern day computers can't do what the plug can do ie all the resonance and what not. I have a Mac Pro 12 Core 2.93Ghz w/ 64 GB Ram and I can only use about 70 percent of the plugs max.

I don't know how the hell he did it but it sounds unbelievable. Truly.

I really wish that guy and that company the best- such a rare gem in the plethora of plugs out there today!

Scott

yes, i also like the imperfect steinway BUT... why is the panning sometimes depending on the velocity of the keystroke with the PLAYER samples...???
i mean, when i play the PLAYER mic, some notes are literally "jumping" around in the panorama

Which version of their Steinway plug are you using -- I assume it's the 'mondo giant extreme' one, whatever it's called? I noticed they have a basic, 'pro' and 'extreme' version of the library.

You have THAT computer and can't run the plug to full potential? mother of god it must be CPU intense

I think I'm running Pro- not sure. I'll check and post back.

Scott

hahaha.

Yeah I talked to Matt about it yesterday- the guy who designs the plug. He said it's a future-proofed plug and modern computers, even the fastest ones money can buy, simply cannot play that many samples at once...or whatever it has to do.


The truth is, to really overload it you have to be going for a specific sound, not necessarily what a natural piano would sound like. One where it almost sounds super squashed and resonates for days (not thin- but it pops & sustains). Or, you'd have to be going for multiple mic positions. I can get away with 2 but not 3. He said at first he was gonna make it so you didn't even have that option; the other mic positions, etc would be grayed out once you selected one but chose not to to future-proof the plug.

I'm tellin' you though- this is by far and away the BEST piano VI on the market. I've either got them all or have tried them all and nothing comes even remotely close to the Steinway.


Scott

EDIT: My Mac Pro has 4 SSD RE's from OWC. Their sustained read/write sped is about 272 / 265, respectively (can't remember the 4K speed but I'm sure it's pretty good). I'm not sure if it's the CPU speed or the SSD speed that's choking when trying to add another mic position or increase the resonance too much. BUT, they now have 6G SSD's (OWC's are twice as fast as the ones I currently have) and of course there is PCIe SSD's as well as the new TB technology. If it's not CPU, I imagine those will be a huge improvement to my "measly" 3G SSD's.These things are not needed to run the Steinway properly, though.

Hey-

I'm not sure....never noticed that before. I guess I wasn't really looking but I know when I printed it it was all paned evenly. At least I think it was! ha I'll have to check.

I've never experienced the notes jumping around the panorama though, that's for sure. Maybe you should email support? Not sure...


Scott

Scott,
Could you comment a little bit on how well, or not, it collapses to mono? And also if it is dry enough to consider for live use? I also have a ton of piano samples, all the Ivory, etc. but am always looking for the perfect live piano. My faves for that application are TBO by Sampletek, and the Ivory II Yamaha. Also - at the risk of being redundant - are you running the "extreme" version, or one of the subsets?
-Phil

Hey Phil-

I have not collapsed the signal to mono, so not sure. Why would you want to do that? Just curious....

And yes- TOTALLY useable for LIVE. Man, it would sound amazing. A muse receptor would work great for that since Kontakt stuff works well on the Muse. I have a Muse Receptor 2 Pro I use live...right now I have Ivory II on it but am taking that plug the hell off there. ha

I think I'm running the Pro version (the middle one) but not sure. I sent an email to Matt about 30 or 40 mins ago asking him what I bought....can't remember and not sure if I can tell by looking at the plug but I'll post back here as soon as he replies.

Anyways, as you can see I cannot overstate the unbelievable quality of the Imperfect Samples Steinway. What got me first were the demos on the site...which of course always sound good no matter what you're after (for the most part) but then after using it I'm STILL blown away. It's really that good. But def. set it up properly (see one of my above posts about this).


Cheers,

Scott

OK so as for the versions, there's Basic, Pro, Complete and Extreme.

I'm pretty sure I have the Complete version since in Kontakt it shows 3 mic positions and that's what the description for Complete is. Extreme has 4 and Pro has 2.



Scott

Hi Scott,
Mono compatibility becomes important to me for live use, since a large percentage of club PA's are run in mono. I carry two speakers around, but it's important to make sure things aren't sounding phasey and weird in FOH.

I also have a Receptor 2, which is what I use for Ivory II and Sampletek in Kontakt. It has treated me well. I also have a new MB pro with Mainstage I've been using for session work that may see some stage use - but honestly, I have a lot of faith in the Receptor getting tossed around and continuing to perform well.
I end up using Ivory Vintage Upright II quite a bit in the studio.......
-Phil

Hey Phil-

I see what you're saying now. Yeah- the Receptor is extremely stable. Strangely stable. I'd be WAAAAY more comfortable w/ that LIVE than a computer, mac or pc, with two or three times the specs.

As for mono, I'm sure it sounds great but that's just a guess. I can go in and track something this week and post the stereo clip and then that clip collapsed to mono if you like. It would be in 2-4 days (something like that) to give you a better idea. Would you want it printed completely dry? No verb? No comp? No nothin'?

As for Ivory Upright 2- I agree w/ the vintage one- I'm not feelin' the modern one AT ALL. Anyways, looking fwd to trying out the Imperfect Samples upright...

Lemme know- it's no big deal....would take me 5 minutes.


Scott

P.S. For live, even in mono rooms, I always just plug stereo into my Passive Radial. My tour mgr has his own rig though and does things the way he likes.

Scott - That would be great!! Thanks!!! And yes, totally dry would be best........

Right on Phil, will do. Check back here in a day or so.


Thanks,

Scott

Hey Scott!

Don't know how I missed this. I passed on their white piano. Don't know why, just didn't seem quite right for me. But this one seems cool.

I just listened to some of their demo's. Various perspectives. Sounds pretty wooly in the low mids / bottom. I'm not sure if it's verb / EQ or low velocities or maybe the mp3. But to me it sounds like it would take a LOT of EQ to speak out with any degree of surrounding instrumention. Even in their pop track demo, it just didn't cut well. Sounds like it would be a good piano for intimate / sparse soundtrack work though. I have the "emotional piano" that I use for that, but it's not perfect. (sorry for the pun...heh) Care to comment on any of the above? Thx.

bp

Hey Dr. Bill! It's been a while....

To be honest I didn't use very much eq on the session I just did- a bit of the normal HPF and a small notch to make it bite through the mix but nothing big. I used the UAD2 Trident and it sounded great!

I'm gonna post a clip in a day or so here of the Steinway- no eq, no reverb and no compression. So please check back...I'll have it up either tomorrow or the day after.

I guess I just have a very different opinion than you on this one- but I can never thank you enough for introducing me to VE Pro!!!!!!!!

Maybe you can try it out?? (Def. the Steinway!!!! Steinway! Steinway! Steinway- can you tell I'm stoked on this piano VI???!!!!) Which do you use for your 'emotional' piano, Bill?

Thanks man,

Scott

P.S. Just an FYI: there's a setting in the plug called "Hollywood." I ALWAYS have that on. It's a night and day difference.....so I wonder if you heard something without that? I'm not exactly sure what it does but it sounds amazing.

Hey guys-

Just for the hell of it I'll print the Ivory 2 Yamaha C7 via the same MIDI.


Scott

Thanks for the info, Scott: I wasn't aware of this one.

Yes, it sounds very good, very natural. Not that it matters, but the demos are pretty weak, IMO -- just a bunch of new Agey pieces, no Classical or Jazz. I would have liked to heard something like a Beethoven piano sonata, as well as some Jazz standard played through this excellent library. Even so, I'm going to buy iT later tonight

Those samples sound excellent!

I just quickly recorded the first one of Steinway samples (Pianissimo), and collapsed to mono, and found that the sound became like comb filtered. Maybe because of the added verb. Also, I heard a little too much of damper noise. I guess they used spaced stereo, relatively close micing. Have to find out how they (dry samples) work in mix. In any case, it'll be very good for solo piano.

anyone wants to share a link to the store website? As a piano player myself im quite interested in it!

Imperfect Samples™ - Sample Libraries with Realistic Performance

Scott - thanks for the info. I'll be very interested to hear your clips. I agree on someone else's assessment of their demos.

My "emotional" piano is the Tonehammer piano. They are revamping their busiiness and "splitting" the busiiness, so if you dig it, you can get it for $75 until then end of the month, but IMO, tonehammer in general is one of the best and most interesting companies doing interesting samples out there. Here's a link to that piano -

Emotional Piano |

I'll try to watch for your clips. Thanks for the effort!

bp

so you other users dont experience this wild "panning"?

steinway player

for comparison, the same part with the "close" mic position, without the wild "panning":

steinway close

i have the same problem, though not that significant, with the fazioli "inside" mic position:

fazioli inside

(system is a fully updated kontakt 4.2.3 inside logic on a mac pro with 10.6.8, SSD and 12GB - so that should not bring those problems)

THANKS for answering heh

One should be aware though that one of the new companies already announces version 2 (!) of this piano library.

Emotional Piano

"For version 2.0, we’ve improved overall playability, added a new ui with a full set of automatable performance and effects controls, fixed a few minor bugs and refined the overall experience."

Hey there-

I just got an email back from Matt regarding your specific problem and he said he's never heard of it. But, he's asked that you please email him with the MIDI file and an mp3 displaying the issue.

His email (the support email) is info at imperfectsamples dot com


Hope you can find some help.

Also, please check back tomorrow for Stereo, Mono and Yamaha C7 (Ivory 2) mp3 postings.


Thanks,

Scott

Hey guys-

So below are the links to the two Mp3s. Please note I did not print the MONO version of the Steinway because it sounded horrible. Super flangey. I guess this VI was recorded in stereo and is truly meant to be played in stereo. That said, for recording purposes summing the left and right channels it sounded fine….but in Kontakt, going out only one channel is no good. I will email Matt about this issue.

Anyways, attached are two quick clips, one take of playing whatever (I tried to fit in low stuff, high stuff, whole note chords, 1/4 note chords, etc) of the Imperfect Samples Steinway and the Ivory 2 Yamaha C7. There is no reverb, eq, compression, nothin’. I didn’t touch the MIDI, no quantizing or anything…straight out of my Aurora converters and that’s it.

I left the Ivory Yamaha at it’s default settings and turned off all the FX. As for the Steinway, it doesn’t have default settings and what really shapes it’s sound is the sympathetic resonance. I had that set at medium. You can hear in the samples that the Steinway has more resonance going on but you’ll definitely be able to get a feel for both pianos: they are very, very different sounding. Furthermore, the sympathetic resonance, in my opinion, is one of the main things that makes IS Steinway such a strong piano VI and part of what is so difficult in sampling a piano. The Yamaha’s resonance was set to medium (12 o’clock) by default.


Thanks,

Scott

P.S. I’ll post back here with what Matt says about playing MONO for live purposes (rather than just summing it to mono in a DAW).


IMPERFECT SAMPLES: STEINWAY

SYNTHOGY IVORY 2: YAMAHA C7


EDIT: One thing I need to be clear on is this was a test (a worthless test thanks to me! haha) regarding Ivory and IS- not Yamaha!!!!! Everything I own and use both live and in my studio pertaining to keys/piano is YAMAHA and it was that way BEFORE I was endorsed. I wouldn't have it any other way.-Scott

Edit #2: The mp3's are copyrighted and owned by Wind-up Records, 2011

I know they are two different makes/models of piano, but the two aren't even close in terms of quality/realism, IMO. As a person who plays a C5 once a week in a martini bar, and a C3 often in church, I've never liked the Ivory version (much better is the SampleTekk White Grand).

Thanks for the demo's -- very convincing