Hi,

Is there a sound in VDL:2 for hitting rods/rutes together?

Also, I am trying to make a timpani roll (mod wheel at 127) crescendo.

Can someone help me with this? Thanks!



VDL2, Kontakt2
Sibelius 4.1
XP Pro
2 GB ram

There are no samples for hitting rutes/rods together. However, you may find it a moderate substitute to use the sounds of ";rods on rims"; for the marching basses, or maybe tenorline.

RE: cresc timpani rolls, you can do this with a plugin that comes included with Sibelius, but it will take a little tweaking if you can bear with me...

1) Enter your rolls into Sibelius just how you want them to sound (minus cres/dim playback of course). This means, you've got your mod-wheel controlling roll performance, and roll ";off"; performance as you want it. Be sure necessary hairpins are also placed where you want them. If you're correctly using the mod-wheel control for VDL timpani rolls, your tremolo notes should also be set so that the ";play tremolo"; box is unchecked in the playback palette.

2) Single-click the span of music containing the bars you want to have controlling cres/dim so they are framed.

3) In the next step you'll run a plugin that will insert a series of midi commands. In order to view these be sure you have ";View Hidden Objects"; active (in the ";view"; menu).

4) Go to the Plug-ins>Playback menu and select the ";cres/dim playback."; Essentially once you run this plugin it will insert a series of controller changes over time to give the sense of cres/dim. The controllers possible to use are 7 (volume) or C11 (expression). If you're using VDL2, use C7 (volume), if you're using VDL 2.5, use C11 (expression).

5) You'll have to choose settings for ";lowest"; and ";highest"; volume settings in the plugin. Keep in mind, this is simply like using a volume knob on your stereo, so note velocity is still in play here. Meaning, if you enter a note marked triple-forte, you'll still get a loudly performed note to trigger via note velocity. This plugin will essentially turn the volume knob up or down on that loud roll. You may find some fiddling necessary, but start with a low value of 40, and a high value of 100. If you don't like your results, you'll have to delete all the invisible text expressions that were added in, then try again.

6) Note, if you have any ~C1,127 markings (i.e. timpani roll), be sure you're not deleting those if you decide to delete the series of ~C7,xx markings that result from running the plug-in.

7) When you're through with the phrase, and have the dynamics playing the way you like, find the highest volume ( i.e. ~C7,127), then alt-click it (option-click on mac) to make a copy of it into your timpani staff just following the roll part. Doing so will ensure the remainder of your timpani parts will play back with the instrument at it's fullest volume slider setting. If that's too much, you can always whittle the 127 down bit by bit until you get the volume to your liking.

This may sound a little convoluted,  and wordy, but once you get the hang of what's going on, it's actually not too difficult or time consuming and is nice to have some added control over your performance.

Hope this helps. Good luck!

Thanks for the awesome response Jim. Completely helpful.

It is RIDICULOUS how good the support for this product is.

+1 to Husky.  Thanks Jim, it's wonderful to think . o O ( Hmmmm, how do I do this? ) and to be able to find an answer with a quick search.  Your depth of knowledge in this area is really amazing.

[quote author=Jim Casella link=topic=1944.msg9759#msg9759 date=1187629913]If you're using VDL2, use C7 (volume), if you're using VDL 2.5, use C11 (expression).
[/quote]Hi Jim,
What is the reason for using Expression with VDL 2.5? Once I learned about this technique I've been using it with lots of success with VDL 2.5, using Volume, and it seems to work fine.

My understanding is that ";Volume"; is the position of the Sibelius mixer's level for that instrument. What property corresponds to ";Expression";?

Joe - It's been a while, so I'm a little rusty on the exact details. As I remember it, depending on the host (or perhaps the version of KP), invoking a volume change using controller #7 would adjust the volume for the entire [i]plugin[/i]. So other instruments/channels would end up being affected by it. Using Expression control (controller #11) allowed for better independence in controlling gradual volumes on a per-instrument basis.