I also think it has a lot to do with the situation. If I was in a Classic Rock band, Omnisphere 2 may not be as popular. Guido’s VB3 and Classic Keys from NI may take the cake. If I am playing a house of worship (contemporary) O2 may be more relevant. DJ/EDM - Serum or Sylenth is hard to beat (I would choose Serum). Piano I can’t comment on, as I am not really a pianist. I thought LL sounded good, but next to classic keys by NI, LL is parked more often than not. My home studio, I still use Steinberg products and switch between ProTools (which has a great audio capture ability), and Cubase which has great workflow and automation capabilities (I don’t like the audio recording in Cubase though). I own Ableton and Studio One, as well. Ableton I use session view live, mostly, but Ableton 10 is supposed to make their DAW more intuitive.
BTW, I own a UI24R and it works seamlessly with C3 to incorporate VST effects for vocals and instruments in a live show. I plan to heavily promote C3 on the UI24R Facebook page. C3 with UI24 is an amazing powerhouse for a great sounding show.
Right now I have to say Native instruments Kontakt using Orange Tree guitar samples from the Evolution line and Rob Papen Blue 2 and Predator 2 also the Korg Legacy collection with the M1 and Wavestation .
For me still outstanding is Nexus from Refx.
E.g. the Bigtone libraries has for me the most impressive Pads/Patches.
These Pads/Patches are really complexe and goose bumps are guaranteed.
Generally disadvantage with Nexus is the work in sort out all the rave, techno,
dance, trance patches, which i don’t need
Also interesting are all the Hollywood libraries with ready to play orchestras for
scores. BUT: the sound quality of the orchestras are not comparable with
other Kontakt libraries.
Nexus has beside a lot of impressive patches really good choir presets.
Arps are also outstanding.
Omnisphere always one of the best VST for me on the market.
For me a lot of impressive and complexe pads/patches.
Still outstanding choirs in comparisson to other instruments/VST.
Always new impressive libraries from PluginGuru with a lot of ready to play
sets (inkl. beats/rhythms + patches)
Transfuser is a really great plugin with ready to play instruments. Either solo instruments or
in combination with the Transfuser beats.
It includes a huge set of different e.g. guitar riffs, guitar arps. Same with basses or brasses.
The soundquality is on very high level.
For e.g. Soul-Jazz, Smooth-Jazz, Funk, Soul for me one of the best VST on the market.
“The Orchestra” for contact is for me one of the best ready to play orchestra with a lot of
ready scores.
Keyscape has the most impressive library of E-Pianos and Pianos.
Alchemy from Camel Audio >>> is not available furthermore!
But, really great pads.
Zebra, some really great pads.
Stylus RMX…for me further one of the best beat/drum automization solution.
Easy to handle. A lot of variations.
Never heard of Transfuser. Will take a look! In addition to all those listed I have to add Toontrack Superior 3-EZDrummer. With all the drum fakery I’m called on to do nothing else comes close IMHO, at least for the sound I like.
edit- Ah, AIR Tech. I don’t really do their stuff, apart from Velvet.
Omnisphere 2.5 hands down. If you have one of the supported synths, it’s like having two of those synths as omnisphere integrates and can be controlled by the hardware. Nothing else comes close. Not serum, not nexus, not diva, not hive. Get omnisphere. With over 10,000 patches, it will provide everything you need.
