Hi Guys,

I am looking at investing in either Symphobia or Symphobia 2. I'm not in a position to buy both libraries, even though they are described as "complimentary" to each other on Project SAM's website.

I am not sure which package to go for. The big appeal of Symphobia 2 is the presence of legato string samples with real legato transitions. Apparently Symphobia 1 was lacking these legato samples, and placed more emphasis on staccato string samples with fast attack.

From the demos I have heard online, it appears that Symphobia still offers up a good selection of staccato strings, which sounds as though it is the more versatile of the two options...

My only concern is that it seems that a lot of the sections of Symphobia 2 are recorded in octaves. This will be handy for some things, but I want to be sure that all the important sections of the orchestra are available in unison as well, not just in octaves.

I'd love some feedback from anyone who has used both - or who has had a great result and lots of flexibility with just Symphobia 2... before I take the plunge and make the purchase (as it's a pretty expensive product!).

Look forward to hearing from anyone who has some thoughts on this!

Cheers,
Mike

I've used both for a couple years, but personally I would get Spitfire's Albion 1 instead of Symphobia 1 or 2. You could add Abion 2 or 3 to that and only be a little over the price either Symphobia 1 or 2. The material is recorded better and is a lot fresher sounding IMO. I have all 3 Albions.

Hey Sean,

Thanks for your thoughts. I have had a listen to some of the Albion demos and the sound is definitely a warmer, more natural sound compared to the processed, "perfect" sound of the Symphobia samples.

There were some concerns raised on various forums when Albion was released, specifically (1) that the "round robin" alternating samples were offset in some cases, meaning parts could sound out of time randomly and (2) that some of the brass were flat. Both of these were intentional (I believe) on Spitfire's part, to increase the sense of authenticity - however in a demo I heard on youtube, the brass did sound out of tune! Do you know if they have released an update that fixes those issues?

My other question was... in terms of "multis", big layered patches for quickly coming up with orchestral ideas, are these strong in Albion? Symphobia has some really big, powerful multis which are great for dramatic scoring, and I got the feeling that Albion was more focussed on more gentle patches.

Anyway - I will go back and have another listen. The tone of Albion's samples definitely appealed to me, it really sounded warm and very "real" (they seem to have kept the noise of the "room" in there, and some little sounds like bows hitting violins) so I could be very tempted to go with this option.

Any other feedback on Albion, or on my original Symphobia questions, would be gratefully received!!

Cheers,
Mike

The Albions have all had several updates each that have corrected and improved a lot of the initial concerns...which I never noticed that much anyway. The Symphobias are good, but over-priced IMO and over-used to death. I also feel that working with Symphobia is a dumbed-down way to work......but hey, it can be quicker to write when in a hurry.....except when you need to score everything out.....then the nightmare begins.

Multis- personally I would just take a day and make your own mutis based on how YOU personally like to work. Then you can just recall them on your projects. I think its better than being locked into layered patches with Symphobia.

When it comes down to it, if you are a good writer and know what you are doing you can make great music from any high-end library. Let us know what you eventually choose.