Royalty Free Content Bundles

megabit wrote on 10/4/2008, 10:54 AM

Just got the promotional e-mail from SCS, and while the bundles are pretty self-explanatory, I wonder what the real value of the Loops & Samples Premium Collections is in practical terms for a Vegas user like myself? I've never actually used ACID, and all I need is some nice, royalty -free collection of music...

For instance, when I buy the Orchestral Series bundle for $149.95 (2169 MB of music), what more will I get by throwing in free Six-String Orchestra loops & samples? Is it a good deal?

Comments

Jessariah67 wrote on 10/4/2008, 11:01 AM

If you're looking for "music" then you probably want to stay away from loops - especially if you don't have a compositional background. Look into RF collections out there. The stuff on eBay is very hit & miss. VASST carries a line called TrakPaks, which give yu some creative room, but are still fairly "complete" pieces.

megabit wrote on 10/4/2008, 12:07 PM

No, I don't have any compositional background; so what you're saying is basically that - within SCS offer - Cinescore themes are better choice for my needs of editable, but fairly complete "illustrative" sound assets?

Jessariah67 wrote on 10/4/2008, 1:26 PM

If you "have to" stay with SCS, then yes, Cinescore is what you'd want over loops. That said, there are (IMO) better options out there.

farss wrote on 10/4/2008, 2:16 PM

I have Cinescore, even bought most of the Theme Packs. Installed it once, played with it for a while and that was that.
I also have SonicFirePro from Smartsound. Whenever I need music that's what I use, just so much simpler and way, way bigger library to buy from. Best thing, if a client wants to choose the music I just send them to the Smartsound website to find it. Once I have the product number if I don't already own it I buy it, then use SFPro to arrange and mix it to fit and suit. You can also export from SFPro as seperate tracks and mix in Vegas.

Bob.

video777 wrote on 10/4/2008, 2:44 PM

SmartSound and Digital Juice BackTraxx, StackTraxx, and Worship StackTraxx (you can turn the vocals off or select male or female) are essentially all I ever use. The StackTraxx are nice because you can turn any track off. If you don't want drums; turn them off in the free Juicer software. You can also export them as single tracks and then manipulate them further. With SmartSound you don't have to worry about fading in and out as you can make them any length you want them and even rearrange "blocks" of music. Very cool stuff.

UlfLaursen wrote on 10/4/2008, 9:31 PM

Allen,

Just checked out the Worship StackTraxx at DJ - very nice, I think I'll order theese. Thanks.

/Ulf

video777 wrote on 10/5/2008, 8:14 PM

Just checked out the Worship StackTraxx at DJ - very nice, I think I'll order theese. Thanks.

I already purchased five. I'll get the rest later. At this point they are price-guaranteed for something like 24 months. That means that they are not going to phase them out any time soon like they did so many of their other products. They are incredible!!!

megabit wrote on 10/6/2008, 2:24 AM

Bob,

Following your advice, I've downloaded and installed the SonicFire Pro 5 demo. I just started playing with it; In the "Export track" option, I don't see Vegas Pro 8 (there are versions 6 and 7, but grayed out - probably because I don't have them installed, or is it a Demo version limitation)?

How do I use the tracks in Vegas Pro 8.0c and/or 8.1 - other than "exporting tracks"?

farss wrote on 10/6/2008, 2:32 AM

You can only do this with the titles recorded in the last few years which are multilayered.

What it does is simply create a number of wav files, one for each track/instrument. You bring each of those into Vegas on its own track and mix away.

OR

If you're using music that's multilayered you use "mood mapping" and let SFPro handle the mixing. Say you select Dialogue as the mood of a section, then it'll fade those instruments out of the mix that conflict with speech. When you're done setting the length and moods you export the whole mix as a 16/48K and bring it into Vegas.

For a reference video I just render out a low res wmv and select that in SFPro so I know where I want to change 'moods' etc. If it's something really simple then I just put the markers at say 1:45:00 and fit it to that without a reference video.

Bob.

megabit wrote on 10/6/2008, 3:11 AM

Thanks; it does work this way.

However, how is it supposed to work with those apps that ARE present in the export destination drop-down list (like Vegas 7)? In the Help file, I read it must be open and running; does it simply put the .wav file straight onto the NLE's timeline? Is this the only difference from saving to any destination folder, and then load into Vegas (any version) or Sound Forge?

megabit wrote on 10/6/2008, 5:30 AM

Frankly, I don't see (yet) how the SonicFire is better than Cinescore in conjunction with Vegas - is it the available title quality/quantity, or the application itself, that makes you think so, Bob?

Please enlighten me; is the available collection also cheaper than Cinescore themes?

megabit wrote on 10/7/2008, 1:29 AM

OK, I now have an idea of how it works - the excellent video tutorials on SmartSound pages helped a lot.

Indeed, the collection seems to be vast - but so are the album prices...

farss wrote on 10/7/2008, 3:54 AM

"Indeed, the collection seems to be vast - but so are the album prices... "

I guess it depends on how you look at it. If you're billing clients for the music it isn't expensive at all. If I had the talent to compose something in Acid I'd be billing the clients for my time which would be more than the cost of a Smartsound track.
If I ever had something with the budget and justified for the work imagine what a composer, musicians and studio time would cost. Good music adds a heck of a lot to vision and look what good vision costs us, is it unreasonable to spend a bit to get good, usable music, especially when we can compose it to fit.

I should mention that you don't have to buy whole albums although it works out cheaper that way.

Bob.

video777 wrote on 10/7/2008, 9:11 PM

SmartSound music is done by professionals; many of whom have done soundtracks for major motion pictures. Although some of the music is cheesy (well maybe you need that from time-to-time) most of it is fantastic. Listen to Thematic Essentials, Dramatic Undertones,, Narration Backdrops, Poetic Piano, Edgy Drama TV, to name a few. While all of these don't have the ability to separate tracks they are still an excellent addition to a Royalty Free collection. Personally, I do not consider $99 for a dozen songs that can be used on any and every project I create for the rest of my life, expensive. Also, many of the older music can be bought at discounted prices. Even today there is a sale on one of the new CDs for only $49.

I augment my music with Digital Juice but still use SmartSound for much of what I do. It's also more flexible.