Pettinhouse Acoustic Guitar - awesome

[David Polich]

I think I like MusicLab's RealGuitar 2L just a bit more than AcousticGuitar (more tonal options), but they both share one criminal defect: no mono support. While RealGuitar 2L has mainly mono guitars (plus one stereo steel guitar), it lacks a panning option, which means, if you want to record a L/R mono guitar for double tracking, or if you just want a mono acoustic in the mix, you'll have to stick some sort of panning insert plug after RealGuitar 2L so you can pan it hard left or right and bounce the audio to mono. And while AcousticGuitar operates out of Kontakt, which means you can just pan Kontakt hard left or right to record it in mono, it's a stereo guitar, so there could be some issues there.

There is a doubled acoustic (panned hard left and hard right) in RealGuitar 2L, didn't you see it? It's in the drop-down list of available guitars.

Regarding Acoustic Guitar in Kontakt, you can use DP's "Trim" to narrow the
stereo field and pan it left or right (or use Waves S1 Imager to do the same
thing).

[Armageddon]

There is a doubled acoustic (panned hard left and hard right) in RealGuitar 2L, didn't you see it? It's in the drop-down list of available guitars.

I see a stereo steel guitar and two extra steel guitars, one labeled for double tracking, though it sounded mono to me. I'm aware that all MusicLab's VIs have this feature. Whether it's actually a hard-panned double-tracking guitar or not, I usually prefer creating two separate rhythm guitar MIDI tracks and futzing with one of them (usually the one intended for the right-hand side) by either not quantizing its performance or by applying a bit of humanization to it and nudging it ahead a few ticks before recording both sides in mono and panning them accordingly (I also will apply EQ if the two guitar tracks are coming from the same source, to further avoid phasing). I like this effect a lot better than the "doubling" techniques I've seen in other VIs, like PLAY or MusicLab's, especially because you can control the amount of sloppiness in the "humanized" side and you may also want two mono acoustic/electric guitar parts playing different things at various points. RealGuitar 2L offers you a couple of steel guitar options, and all their instruments, save the stereo steel guitar, are in mono, making it ideal for double-tracking. Unfortunately, for the eight jillion controls that it offers, none of these controls allow you to pan the instrument to one side so that you can bounce it to mono.

Regarding Acoustic Guitar in Kontakt, you can use DP's "Trim" to narrow the stereo field and pan it left or right (or use Waves S1 Imager to do the same
thing).

The solution for both AcousticGuitar and RealGuitar seems to be applying a audio plug insert after the VI in your channel strip -- doesn't MOTU have a Pan plug? The problem I have with applying Trim after AcousticGuitar is, it's really the same effect as just bouncing your VI to a mono audio file. Both sides of the stereo field are being summed into a mono file, even if you narrow the stereo field. You could just as easily simply hard pan the instrument in Kontakt and bounce to mono. Since most people would probably just keep AcousticGuitar stereo and record it that way, I can understand why it's not a feature. You're more likely to record electrics in mono (something DirectGuitar 2.1 completely allows you to do), and it's no big deal to me. If that's the worst complaint I can make about either acoustic instrument, we have indeed come a long way.

[Armageddon]

There is a doubled acoustic (panned hard left and hard right) in RealGuitar 2L, didn't you see it? It's in the drop-down list of available guitars.

Actually, shortly after my last post, I went in and messed around with RealGuitar 2L while wearing headphones, and the doubled guitars actually sound doubled in my phones (though they originally struck me as mono when I heard them on my monitors, very odd). This is what happens when I post before I think. I still prefer my method of doubling ... but those doubled guitars sound pretty damn nice.

And without going into details (mainly because I don't want to be the reason MusicLab's site gets flooded with e-mails), MusicLab officially made me a Customer For Life this morning. I can at least tell you that this is the first time in my experience a software company has actually put their money where their mouth is, and that anybody on the fence about buying and using their products should immediately run out and get them.

[zed]

...MusicLab officially made me a Customer For Life this morning. I can at least tell you that this is the first time in my experience a software company has actually put their money where their mouth is, and that anybody on the fence about buying and using their products should immediately run out and get them.

Yep. RealGuitar2 was my favorite software purchase of 2007 (I think that is when I got it). I love that product... with or without the patterns. That software has resulted in numerous songs which I wouldn't have come up with otherwise, and shows me how to play them all on my REAL Acoustic guitar. RG2 should be in everyone's arsenal.

[Armageddon]

Yep. RealGuitar2 was my favorite software purchase of 2007 (I think that is when I got it). I love that product... with or without the patterns. That software has resulted in numerous songs which I wouldn't have come up with otherwise, and shows me how to play them all on my REAL Acoustic guitar. RG2 should be in everyone's arsenal.

It'll probably take a little experimentation to get used to all the fancy controls on RealGuitar 2L (mostly in regards to the chords), but even casually playing around with it yields a lot of great results.

I'm a proud owner of RealStrat as of this morning, and I think it's amazing complement to DirectGuitar 2. For me, DirectGuitar 2 gets everything right but the leads, and RealStrat gets the leads perfect and kind of falters for rhythm work. It's almost eerie: one of my biggest complaints with DirectGuitar was lack of FX articulations ... RealStrat has them to spare. RealStrat's "Solo" mode has the perfect amount of pick bite, plus fancy articulations like violining, slides and the ability to trigger feedback, as well as "mono" mode for arpeggios, but I feel like it lacks a little with simple meat and potatoes rhythm work (and until I can also figure out exactly how MusicLab's chords work, casual usage with RealStrat's chord/chord and bass modes leave a bit to be desired), though DirectGuitar handles it quite well. I'd say I'd use DirectGuitar for non-metal R/L rhythm guitars (any clean Fender work, any rock stuff that doesn't demand a tight edge), RealStrat for non-metal leads, and I may end up going with Prominy LPC Clean for an end-all humbucker guitar, even though it's a huge sample set and may be hard to get around in. Another solution would be to purchase Pettihouse's HumbuckerGuitar and MusicLab's LPC and use them similarly to how I'm using DirectGuitar/RealStrat, but Prominy actually has the cheaper pricetag.

Back OT, Pettinhouse's AcousticGuitar is a great instrument, and pretty much offers the same features as RealGuitar 2L (and possibly, higher fidelity), so it ultimately boils down to a personal choice and what specific features you're going to need. Both sets offer lots of great chord and lead sounds. RealGuitar 2L offers a built-in MIDI player similar to EZ Drummer, except you could actually look at it as a front-loading arpeggiato that can trigger riffs inside of a MIDI sequence. It also has a great GUI with chord and note display (to be fair, Pettinhouse could offer the same thing; my Scarbee Pre-Bass, for example, more or less has the same interface inside of Kontakt). On the other hand, Pettinhouse's sample sets were all created by a guy who is more or less a keyboard player that wants to play guitar, and all of his sets have an unmistakable playability no other guitar VI seems to have.

[mhschmieder]

I was considering getting Orange Tree Samples Strawberry Guitar, but then discovered the loyalty discount ($10) is only good for one library by 31 December and not multiple libraries (I blew mine on the kalimba library, which I only bought because kalimba/sanza/m'bira is a family of instruments that varies quite a bit, so multiple libraries help broaden coverage).

I'm being a bit of a cheapskate, because it is already 50% off due to the Group Buy voting outcome a couple of weeks back. The audio demos are impressive, but I'm also of the mind that I should exhaust the possibilities of what I have first (a similar rationale is behind my decision NOT to buy Trilian at this point in time).

I listened to the Prominy SC audio demos and it seems deep but also not player-friendly, which offsets the sound quality since I'd rather dig out my guitar and play it for real than struggle with a cumbersome library. The advantage of Pettinhouse and RealGuitar (as well as the AAS Strum products) for me, is that they are quick-and-not-so-dirty. It's even possible to produce "keeper" tracks with them.

[Armageddon]

I was considering getting Orange Tree Samples Strawberry Guitar, but then discovered the loyalty discount ($10) is only good for one library by 31 December and not multiple libraries (I blew mine on the kalimba library, which I only bought because kalimba/sanza/m'bira is a family of instruments that varies quite a bit, so multiple libraries help broaden coverage).

Strawberry Guitar was one that I looked at pretty hard, but it's fairly expensive, and I got the creeping feeling that I was gonna buy it and it would turn out to be Hans Zimmer Guitars all over again. It gets a lot of positive word-of-mouth, though.

I listened to the Prominy SC audio demos and it seems deep but also not player-friendly, which offsets the sound quality since I'd rather dig out my guitar and play it for real than struggle with a cumbersome library. The advantage of Pettinhouse and RealGuitar (as well as the AAS Strum products) for me, is that they are quick-and-not-so-dirty. It's even possible to produce "keeper" tracks with them.

The programming aspect makes me a little uneasy, but in the end, I veered in Prominy's direction mainly because it covers all the bases, possibly even more bases than I could ever need.

I have Strum Electric, and while there's a certain level of playability there (I love the velocity-sensitive monophonic feature for those fret runs), all the tinkering I did with the controls couldn't make it real enough for me. And having both Strum Electric and RealStrat side-by-side, with many of the same features, really makes Strum look lame by comparison. In fact, having Strum first and seeing how similar RealGuitar/RealStrat's layouts were almost turned me off of trying MusicLab's stuff out. Great that you can get something out of it, though! I certainly think Strum has its merits.

I love Pettinhouse's stuff, and I agree that getting great tracks out of DirectGuitar/AcousticGuitar/etc. is a no-brainer (I don't recall ever really seeing a user's manual, aside from a couple of .txt notes; I just dived into DirectGuitar 2 and figured out everything in a couple of hours of playing). RealGuitar 2L is definitely my go-to acoustic instrument (though I'm sure it might not stack up so well against Acoustic Legends, etc.), and I feel that DirectGuitar 2/RealStrat cover my non-hardcore electric needs -- I think what I like about turning to a completely different library for LPC is, not only is the sound going to be different, but the playing style, just by virtue of being a completely different library with different articulations, will also be unique in comparison to DirectGuitar or RealStrat, which will further enhance projects where I'd want to double a Strat with a Les Paul, or if I want a hard-edged solo as opposed to a warmer and friendlier one.

The programming and the sheer size of the library will probably have me cowering, though, and I have a bad feeling I'll be doing more composing via mouse than with actual playing. With this in mind, here's a question for you: how does AcousticGuitar compare in playability to Acoustic Legends HD?

[mhschmieder]

I got turned off to Acoustic Legends by their early audio demos, which sounded like a bunch of discrete notes. That made me suspicious of how well programmed it was, which is a separate issue from how well sampled it might be (and it does cover the most models of acoustics of any library, so remains unique in that regard).

I have yet to hear much of anything positive about it (except at vi-control, whose opinions I generally disagree with very strongly), or anything negative for that matter. I suspect it hasn't sold all that well. Note that they have an aggressive cross-grade pricing scheme.

Prominy SC is on sale right now, like a lot of stuff, so the time has never been better, but it is still a very expensive product. I actually like its demos way better than the Les Paul demos from Prominy. Chances are they have learned and gotten better. Most good vendors do.

I have their PCP80 but it's hard to work with. I have to produce it more than I would like to, to get its timbre even close to what I want and to get it to sit in the mix. It was VERY expensive at the time I bought it, so I have strong regrets over the purchase. It is now much cheaper, due to competition (it didn't have any when I bought it). Mostly though I wish they had given the option of including the CP-80's natural sound vs. exclusively its direct (electronic) sound.

[Armageddon]

I got turned off to Acoustic Legends by their early audio demos, which sounded like a bunch of discrete notes. That made me suspicious of how well programmed it was, which is a separate issue from how well sampled it might be (and it does cover the most models of acoustics of any library, so remains unique in that regard).

I have yet to hear much of anything positive about it (except at vi-control, whose opinions I generally disagree with very strongly), or anything negative for that matter. I suspect it hasn't sold all that well. Note that they have an aggressive cross-grade pricing scheme.

That was my main concern, as well. 19 GBs seems great on paper, and I realize it's really impossible to get a demo version of a sample set and know what you're getting into, but there are a lot of sample sets out there where you hear the audio demos, think it covers all the ground you'll need, buy it, load it and realize that the demo programmers were well-paid for their time. Like I keep saying, Pettinhouse's stuff was at least programmed by one keyboardist who probably goes through the same frustrations with guitar VIs that we do, and after buying one product, like I did with DirectGuitar 2, you pretty much know how the others will be handled.

Prominy SC is on sale right now, like a lot of stuff, so the time has never been better, but it is still a very expensive product. I actually like its demos way better than the Les Paul demos from Prominy. Chances are they have learned and gotten better. Most good vendors do.

SC actually has about 10 more GBs(!) in its library than the LPC ... but they're different guitars, so it's tough to say if it's an actual improvement or if it's just that the difference in guitars is more suited to their programming. Also, I didn't check, but is Prominy's SC amped-only, or do they include a clean version, like LPC? I'm buying Prominy's LPC Clean version, although the claim that they recorded it in a natural room, rather than direct (because "it sounded more natural that way") bothers me a little.

[Armageddon]

Sorry for going OT again, but I just discovered today, via playing around with the VI inside DP and running it through an Amplitude 2 insert, that RealStrat (as well as RealLPC and RealGuitar 2L), features auto-legato in Chord mode. Most sample sets and guitar VIs allow you to sustain chord samples, but it generally sounds terrible (coff!MORcoff!); in the case of distorted guitar chords, you either wind up with an unnatural buildup that sounds nothing like a distorted electric guitar playing continuously strummed chords, or you wind up sounding like a keyboard playing distorted guitar chords. And if you elect not to sustain and simply draw notes to as close as possible before the next continuous note, you still wind up with what I call "chunks": a chord that abruptly chunks out before the next continuous chord begins. Given that continuous chord work is a large part of modern guitar music, you'd think the "big boys" would be more savvy about creating sample sets that could do this.

Well, it turns out that MusicLab's VIs do. In fact, at first, I thought it was either an error with the VI, that my computer was somehow lagging or that my MIDI controller was shot, but once I realized that RealStrat was actually creating legato chords in response to my playing, I was completely blown away. It does it all without using sustain, and if you switch to staccato chords, or any sort of chord work where there's ample pause between keystrikes, it reverts back to normal play. But if you're playing, say, a chorus in an alternative rock song and you want your continuous C-major chord to remain open, then switch up to a D minor or whatever and keep this playing style going, MusicLab's VIs automatically keep the chords open for you. Let me reinterate: this is a feature on a product with a 200 MB installer with a total footprint of 2 GB (assuming you elect to have a soundbank in each and every sample rate from 44.1 to 192 -- you can also choose only to load soundbanks in the sample rates you're actually planning on using, which makes its total footprint smaller). I have never experienced a guitar VI that could convincingly do this (even Pettinhouse's DirectGuitar relies on sustain, though it's playing single notes only, not chord samples, so it automatically has a different mindset) and am completely in awe that RealStrat/RealGuitar can do it so effortlessly.

[David Polich]

Now if only RealStrat actually sounded like a strat - that
would be great..

I stopped using it because of the tone. It just doesn't sound
like a strat to me, it sounds like a clavinet. I don't care
about the features, it's the tone I'm after. At least the
Pettinhouse guitars sound like recorded guitars. The
behaviors I can mimic with my own playing and some MIDI editing.

I used RealGuitar 2 for a long long time, and until Pettinhouse
Acoustic was released I thought RG2 was the best acoustic guitar
VI out there. But Pettinhouse just blows it away IMO. The
difference is not subtle. Pettinhouse sounds like a guitar in
a room recorded with great mics. RG2 sounds like an acoustic
with a pickup plugged directly into a mixer. RG2 is still quite
good, and it's chord recognition and keyswitching is awesome.
But just comparing tone - I don't think there is any contest.

The reason I use sampled guitar VI's is to work out the arrangement
and then give it to an actual guitar player to record the parts
for real. It's very rare that I'd ever keep a sampled part for
the final production, unless it's playing "behind" a real
guitar and they are both assigned to the same part in the
arrangement. Exceptions have included some arpeggiated
clean electrics and strummed acoustic parts for some records I've
done.

For squeaks, slides, and assorted noises such as bridge
strikes, etc., I have recorded a bunch of those myself using
my Schecter Blackjack and/or my Taylor 610. I have a small
library of samples like this I've built up over time and
I drop them in alongside the sampled VI tracks to add to the
realism. Or I'll just record them on an audio track in time
with the sequence - it always works better because many
sampled guitar effects are at one tempo and don't time-stretch.

[Armageddon]

Now if only RealStrat actually sounded like a strat - that
would be great..

I stopped using it because of the tone. It just doesn't sound
like a strat to me, it sounds like a clavinet. I don't care
about the features, it's the tone I'm after. At least the
Pettinhouse guitars sound like recorded guitars. The
behaviors I can mimic with my own playing and some MIDI editing.

An interesting observation! One of the things to remember is (and I just figured this out myself), RealStrat (and likely, RealLPC and RealGuitar 2) defaults to "Auto Hammer On". Not sure why, but if you switch this off, it deadens a lot of that "clavinet" sound (and you can assign a keyswitch or a pedal to perform a "Hammer On"). I mainly snagged RealStrat to use as a solo Strat, because I didn't feel like DirectGuitar 2 was great at that. I love DirectGuitar for rhythm guitar work, though, and as a meat and potatoes rhythm guitar, you can't beat it. Also, there's a huge difference between a guitar recorded at 24-bit/96 kHz and one that kind of blurs a lower-end sample recording with an advanced MIDI engine (which is how the Real series manages its chord and articulation work). I think DirectGuitar 2 and RealStrat complement each other well, and I can get very satisfying solos out of RealStrat, though I've just started scraping the surface of all the articulations, keyswitches and programming to really get the most out of it. And to be honest, the further I delve into RealStrat, the more I start liking it for chord work, as well. In any event, I like having the option of both instruments.

I used RealGuitar 2 for a long long time, and until Pettinhouse
Acoustic was released I thought RG2 was the best acoustic guitar
VI out there. But Pettinhouse just blows it away IMO. The
difference is not subtle. Pettinhouse sounds like a guitar in
a room recorded with great mics. RG2 sounds like an acoustic
with a pickup plugged directly into a mixer. RG2 is still quite
good, and it's chord recognition and keyswitching is awesome.
But just comparing tone - I don't think there is any contest.

Again, it goes back to the size (sample rate and bit-depth) of the sample set's recording. RealGuitar 2L does lack "air", though, but I can live with that. Before going virtual, I was recording acoustics from my PROteus MPS+, EQ-ing their tones to taste and added Waves' TrueVerb "Rock Guitar Room" to the signal chain before the actual hall reverb. "Rock Guitar Room" is early reflections only, so it gave my acoustics a nice body and some air before it hit the regular reverb (I also used it on distorted guitars). It's a bit of a tradeoff, I'll admit, but I just like the versatility and features of RealGuitar 2L more.

For squeaks, slides, and assorted noises such as bridge
strikes, etc., I have recorded a bunch of those myself using
my Schecter Blackjack and/or my Taylor 610. I have a small
library of samples like this I've built up over time and
I drop them in alongside the sampled VI tracks to add to the
realism. Or I'll just record them on an audio track in time
with the sequence - it always works better because many
sampled guitar effects are at one tempo and don't time-stretch.

I like having those articulations entered automatically (aside from the fact that I'm not using them as scratch tracks for real players and I don't have a set of real acoustics or the ability to play them) because they're subtle enough not to be obvious and it's one less thing I have to sweat when composing or engineering. Pettinhouse's sample sets add them automatically, so does the Real series ... but it winds up being a matter of personal taste.

[zed]

I used RealGuitar 2 for a long long time, and until Pettinhouse
Acoustic was released I thought RG2 was the best acoustic guitar
VI out there. But Pettinhouse just blows it away IMO. The
difference is not subtle. Pettinhouse sounds like a guitar in
a room recorded with great mics. RG2 sounds like an acoustic
with a pickup plugged directly into a mixer.

Oh come on now. RG2 sounds very good. If you want more of a room sound you just add a little convolution reverb.

Pettinhouse Acoustic Guitar may be good, but it doesn't turn RealGuitar2 into chopped liver by any stretch of the imagination. Believe me, if I thought that what I am hearing in those Pettinhouse demos sounded strikingly better than what I can get out of RG2 I would have bought the product immediately. But they don't. They sound great... but no more convincing to my ears...

Both products sound less real than a real guitar, and yet sound better than a real guitar that suffers from any number of real world deficiencies (including poor micing or inadequate musicianship).

[Armageddon]

I used RealGuitar 2 for a long long time, and until Pettinhouse
Acoustic was released I thought RG2 was the best acoustic guitar
VI out there. But Pettinhouse just blows it away IMO. The
difference is not subtle. Pettinhouse sounds like a guitar in
a room recorded with great mics. RG2 sounds like an acoustic
with a pickup plugged directly into a mixer.

Oh come on now. RG2 sounds very good. If you want more of a room sound you just add a little convolution reverb.

Pettinhouse Acoustic Guitar may be good, but it doesn't turn RealGuitar2 into chopped liver by any stretch of the imagination. Believe me, if I thought that what I am hearing in those Pettinhouse demos sounded strikingly better than what I can get out of RG2 I would have bought the product immediately. But they don't. They sound great... but no more convincing to my ears...

Both products sound less real than a real guitar, and yet sound better than a real guitar that suffers from any number of real world deficiencies (including poor micing or inadequate musicianship).

One thing AcousticGuitar definitely lacks is variety. RealGuitar 2L has a nylon, two mono steel guitars, a stereo steel guitar and a "doubled" steel guitar, plus, a twelve-string. I won't argue that there's a difference in sound, but RealGuitar 2L certainly doesn't sound like, say, the acoustic instrument in GarageBand or anything. There's enough articulations, both automatic and programmable, to make it sound extremely convincing, and the soundset addresses all your basic recording needs. It's also a matter of taste -- if you plan on having a soloed acoustic and you want the best fidelity around, you'll likely veer more towards AcousticGuitar. That's not to say RealGuitar 2L lacks fidelity, either. I personally like both libraries, but I chose RealGuitar 2L for the flexibility and for having enough sounds to address anything I'd need an acoustic for. In the case of RealStrat, I still can't figure out how to do the basic pick chugs/open chord combos to allow me to do that kind of rhythm guitar track, so I have DirectGuitar 2 around to handle the rhythm stuff, RealStrat to handle my lead work and it seems to work out great. Not sure if the same thing would apply to AcousticGuitar/RealGuitar 2L, though ...

I also passed on buying Prominy's Clean LPC library for Kontakt. Mainly, I just don't have that hard drive space to spare. Not only does it eat up about 30 GBs all by its lonesome, but you'll need an extra 30 on top of that to convert/import it from Kontakt 2 to Kontakt 3. And I view it like buying the $10,000 version of Vienna Symphony; there's probably dozens of articulations and samples that I can't imagine needing to use. I'll likely wind up repeating myself by purchasing Pettinhouse Humbucker and RealLPC, instead.

[Armageddon]

I've spent half of these posts complaining that RealGuitar 2L/RealStrat/etc. didn't have built-in panning options. I even brought this up on MusicLab's site. They responded that they didn't put in a panning option because most DAWs already had panning options in their channel strips. I thought they were nuts, and mumbled something about finding a panning plug I could insert in a channel after an instance of RealStrat. Of course, yesterday, I decided to go into DP 6.03 and tool around with RealStrat/Amplitude 2 (no way to process a VI through an amp sim without host software, more's the pity), and when I went to RealStrat's channel strip in the Mixing Board, what do I discover? VI instrument tracks all have panning built into their channel strips. I guess I'd always assumed that stereo VI tracks were like regular stereo audio tracks, and lacked pan controls, but I tried hard-panning RealStrat with the DP's pan knob and sure enough, it works like a charm. I assume this has been a feature since DP 4 or so? Good thing it wasn't a snake, I'd be dead right now.