Competitions for virtual instruments users?

[Michal Cielecki]

Greetings,
From what I could find, those competitions for composers out there are score writing oriented. Are there any competitions that are pure audio ones, game/film music oriented, for users of virtual instruments?
I know there were competitions under CGEmpire (won't be anymore), East West is making a contest with scoring a film every year (I think).
Are there any other compos for people using virtual instruments (especially virtual orchestras)?

Cheers,
Michal

[Kento]

Oh, that's interesting! Unfortunately, I don't know of any, but keep us posted!

What setup do you use for virtual instruments? Does anybody use the default Garritan package that comes with Finale, or does it not seem to suffice?

[Michal Cielecki]

What did you mean by the setup for virtual instruments?

IMHO today Garritan is really outdated. I tried it once and did not really like the sounds, too synthy to my taste. I managed to get some realistic results even with East West Symphonic Orchestra Silver Pro XP. Without Finale - I use sequencer to do the music programming. Personally I am a newbie to the orchestration - I do everything by ear.

Cheers,
Michal

[Kento]

Have you used any programs directly from Finale? I would like to use better sounds, but the first sounds I'm most likely to use are ones I can load into Finale via Kontakt player, if only for the fact that there isn't an extra hassle of setting up a new program.

[Michal Cielecki]

I don't use Finale or any other scoring software, since I'm not a trained orchestrator. I just program my music in a sequencer. I use FL Studio 8.

[Donny Pike]

Aloha Michal, Try this site http://www.composition-contest.com/index2.php

[Michal Cielecki]

Thanks, but I was actually wanted to know about something bigger, yearly contests or so. Never found such, except the East West one (which will be soon I guess, they are preparing a trailer for a film to score as far as I know).

Cheers,
Michal

[Donny Pike]

It's not a big contest and it's reviewed by composers at the contest. No money involved but you can hear some very good music from time to time. I have been submitting there for a few years and found that monthly contests have made me a more productive writer. You can join Taxi. It's almost like a contest with screener s instead of reviewers. Have you tried Google?
Donny

[Michal Cielecki]

Google? Never heard of it. ;)


Cheers,
Michal

[Simon Godden]

Have you ever heard of "V.I Control", Michal? It is a site DEVOTED to what you are looking for. That website has the best cinematic mock-up artists in the world, and if there are any competitions of the sort you are describing, they would certainly know. And I've a good idea they'd welcome onboard a man with your talents.

[Simon Godden]

Michal, you are FAR too talented not to be able read music. Learn while you're still young, please.

[Simon Godden]

I've just bought Finale 2010 (with Garritan), but I intend to use it just for scoring. If you want better sounds, you really need a sequencer. It's okay if work with scores, I do all the time, because most sequencers have score editors on them. But with a sequencer, you have far more control over the audio output and the programme is far more powerful.

[Mario Ruiz Calle]

My setup consists of:
ewql's symphonic orchestra, colossus and stormdrums.
ProjectSAM's symphobia (this one sounds really great and helps when you need the work done fast.) and I'm willing to get Truestrike.
Fxpansion's BFD2 and GURU
Propellerhead's Reason
Everything under Pro tools.

I think that garritan had it's time, but there are definately better vst's around there, and basically, i think it's not a matter of saying this one is better than the other, there are a lot of state of the art vsts and there will always be 3 or 4 that everyone will be arguing about "this is best" "no the other is best" "are you kidding me?" and stuff like that.

I think vienna is the best thing around but its the most expensive one, followed by eastwest SO but as i said, it depends of the goal. I found myself using symphobia a lot more than ewqlso because it gets the work done faster, and sadly, deadlines exist.