Fracture Sounds has released a new free Short Strings library from their Blueprint series for the free Kontakt Player.
Many sample libraries require the full version of Kontakt; however, it is great to see companies that make their products compatible with the Kontakt Player. That way, the barrier to entry remains free.
Blueprint is an ongoing series of Kontakt libraries from Fracture Sounds. We have covered several of them on BPB, such as Greenhead Chimes and Gentle Strings.
And now, they have released the 8th instalment from the Short Strings series, which we will dive into today.
Fracture Sounds describes this library as a “small, chamber-sized ensemble, playing the staccato technique in a playful manner”.
As you might expect from a chamber strings ensemble, it has a smaller and more intimate sound as compared to something like a 60-piece string section.
However, the samples have a good amount of dynamics, which means you can also use them in more energetic compositions.
The GUI is fairly straightforward and user-friendly, which we come to expect from the Blueprint series: four main knobs, a mic mix section, and some additional settings.
The knobs include Colour, Stereo Width, Release, and Reverb. With the Stereo Width knob, you can either enhance the stereo image, or make it mono, or anything in between.
The Reverb control is a dry-wet knob with a cog wheel that allows you to tweak the reverb mode and sound. Several reverb modes are available, with nine impulse responses in the convolution mode.
The mic mix section allows you to blend between Close, Mid, and Far mics. There is also a handy Perspective slider that will enable you to control the mic levels smoothly.
Two additional settings are hidden behind another cog wheel that lets you control the instrument’s Sample Start and Velocity Response.
What I really like about the sample start control is that it tells you the latency at whatever value you set it to.
With orchestral sample libraries, knowing the latency is important to ensure a smooth MIDI performance. So knowing the latency right away saves the headache of having to figure it out manually.
Blueprint: Short Strings runs in the free Kontakt Player, which is available for Windows and macOS in VST3, AU, and AAX formats and is standalone on 64-bit machines.
Download: Blueprint: Short Strings (FREE – Requires Kontakt Player)
More:
