Audiolatry has just released Easy Strings – a free (or ‘pay what you want’) ROMpler for macOS and Windows users. This ROMpler features samples recorded from violin, viola, and cello ensembles.
It’s not a deeply sampled instrument, as the developer Audiolatry states; hence, only one velocity layer is available.
The goal of this plugin was to create an easy-to-use instrument that can be used across EDM genres, where the realism of virtual strings is not always a desired option.
Easy Strings is split into 3 pages: Violin, Viola, and Cello.
Each page hosts 4 playing techniques of the respective instrument: Sustain Vibrato, Tremolo, Pizzicato, and Spiccato, resulting in 12 presets in total. Sustain Vibrato and Tremolo are looped for continuous playback.
The GUI brings typical controls and effects found in other Audiolatry ROMplers, including ADSR envelope, global gain & panning, reverb, delay, chorus, and LoFi modules.
At the center of the plugin, you can find a picture of the selected instrument standing on a virtual stage, with a nice animation of the lightning getting more intense according to the signal’s amplitude.
The layout is minimalistic but clear, with simple controls spread out in an uncluttered interface.
On the left are controls over the Envelope and overall instrument Volume. The effects section on the right includes Reverb, Chorus, Delay, and LoFi.
Each effect gives you access to three parameters, one being the Mix amount.
Don’t expect to find premium-sounding effects, but those can quickly customize the dry sound and even turn the sampled strings into something else.
For instance, you can activate the Cab switch and turn up the Wear knob found in the LoFi module for some weird, unnatural pitch drifting.
Since this plugin isn’t designed to be your next Hans Zimmer scoring toolkit, I’d suggest exploiting its features to create unique and unrealistic string sounds on purpose.
Additionally, the samples are recorded at 44.1 kHz, 16-bit audio quality, so don’t expect plenty of detail and dynamics.
One of the advantages of Easy Strings is its low disk usage, needing just 134 MB of space.
It’s available as VST, VST3, and AU for 64-bit Windows and Mac machines.
And as always, if you enjoy using the software, consider donating to the developer.
Download: Easy Strings (FREE or pay what you want)
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Last Updated on December 27, 2023 by Tomislav Zlatic.
