Spitfire ORCHESTRAL GRAND PIANO User Manual
V1.1
by
SPITFIRE
USER MANUAL
V1.0
ORCHESTRAL
GRAND PIANO
Welc o me.
anks for purchasing the Orchestral Grand Piano, an essential addition to your orchestral palette made “the
Spitre way”.
Reading manuals is a bore, so stick this next to your loo and give a read whenever you can, you may nd a host
of good tips and ideas on how to get the best out of your purchase.
About Spitre:
Spitre was formed in 2008 by a group of successful British composers as a means of producing the tools they
needed for their busy work schedules. Sick of dry, humourless, ugly, unrealistic, enormously untamable sounding libraries, Spitre set about redening the way samples were created.
Our aim is to reproduce the conditions of top movie recording sessions and approach sampling as if we were
recording a lm score one note at a time. To record performances, and parts thereof, not scientically created
samples. To capture the timbre of a world-class set of players but also to record the room they were playing in.
About is Module:
Orchestral Grand Piano is a super realistic “contextual” piano designed specically to t proudly within your
full orchestral arrangements. Having recorded it in one of the greatest studios in the world we’re condent it
will t in with any palette. But if you’re an existing Spitre user, this VI will seamlessly integrate.
Pianos tend to be recorded in a very scientic manner which is why, for larger orchestral mockups and realisations they can oen be very dicult to blend in and mix. You will have no such problems here. We simply recorded the piano as we have the rest of our modules. In situ, a real-world setting with mics placed as they would
be for any orchestral session. e end result a piano sounding as it would, where it would be and recorded as it
would be for any of the great lm scores to have been recorded in Air-Studios Lyndhurst Hall.
e piano is not designed to be super versatile, we specically designed it for one purpose; to sit in with large
cinematic arrangements. We have concentrated on this so it excels at it. We see it almost like an addition to the
brilliant percussion library where everything has been produced and recorded specic to the requirements of
orchestral cinematic arrangements.
Having said this the piano is not without it’s own sonic versatility. With four mic positions available to dial in
and mix, tape or direct signal and spacial width controls. You will be able to tailor the piano to t in with the
specics of your palette and arrangement.
System Requirements
KONTAKT
Orchestral Grand is NOT a Kontakt Player library, so you WILL need a full version Kontakt to run it. But
because it doesn’t authorise through the NI Service Centre and is personally watermarked to you. is means
you will be able to authorise it and install on all the machines you own. Owning a full version of Kontakt will
aord you the luxury of being able to edit and revise the patches to your particular preference. Remember we
pride ourselves in making truly esoteric tools, so if there’s a sample you don’t like, you can change it for another
with relative ease.
RECOMMENDED SPEC:
e better your computer, the better the performance of any Spitre module. But not to worry if you’re not
spec’d up to the hilt. All programs are provided with a set of parameters that enable you to tone back the CPU
demands of any given patch. But moving forward, we’re condent this module will keep your computer busy
for many years to come! We recommend a combination of high processor speeds, a good chunk of memory
and a devoted 7200rpm eSata, USBII, underbolt, or Firewire audio drive. e more memory you have, the
less demand placed on your drive, and having a totally devoted drive gives you the chance to load less into
memory and reduce load times. e higher the speed of your CPU, the more capable your computer will be to
deal with some of the amazing, but complicated scripts we’ve written.
PCs:
We recommend an i5, or i7 Quad or 8 Core machine with 8 Gig or above memory. Vista 64 or Windows 7.
However, it will work with SP2, Pentium or Athlon XP 1.4GHz 1Gig RAM.
MACs:
We recommend a Mac-Pro Intel Based Dual, Quad or 8 Core machine with 8 Gig or above memory. Mac OS
10.6.1 (Snow Leopard). However, we have made the module work satisfactorily on a Mac Mini 2.4 GHz and a
MacBook Pro 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Duo.
DRIVES:
Firewire, USBII, or eSata, 7200rpm. Ask your dealer for drives that are suitable for “AV use”. We always recommend as small a drive as possible, as the platter will be smaller and the seek time less. e library will eventually
take up 5-6 Gig on your hard drive. If using several large libraries, or a number of Spitre modules from the
same machine, we really recommend having your samples distributed over a number of drives. Lacie eSata or
Quadras 7200rpm we highly recommend. Moreover, an exciting development lies in the recent arrival of some
amazing solid state (SSD) drives. With seek times reduced to a fraction (0.1ms vs 6-9ms) of what standard
drives can oer, we are certain you will be able to reduce your sampler’s “pre-load” (page 15.) buer tenfold
meaning you’ll be able to load enormous orchestral palettes into a single machine.
HOST:
e Kontakt 4 platform should work comfortably on most commonly found platforms and DAWs. As always
make sure you’re as up-to-date as you can aord! If you’re planning on building or adding Spitre to an already
large orchestral palette, we recommend running your library independently of your DAW, either on your host
computer (e.g. via Re-Wire) or on a slave device (e.g.. via Midi or MOL). is will assist your loading times,
and will allow your DAW to do what it does best, sort out all your note ons and note os! We heartily endorse
Plogue Bidule (www.plogue.com) as a virtual rack/ routing system. For more advice and information about
setting up please check our website.
CONTENTS:
INSTALLATION 05
GETTING STARTED 05
THE FRONT PANEL 06
SURROUND USE 08
AFAQs 10
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