Black Friday Sale: Scoring Express Dorico templates from Notation Central

Dorico
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I’m really excited to announce the new Scoring Express template packages for Dorico, now available at Notation Central: Scoring Express - Notation Central

(Also wonderfully crafted for Finale by Joseph Trefler and updated for Sibelius by Philip Rothman at NYC Music Services.)

And of course, the Scoring Notes blog has the scoop: https://www.scoringnotes.com/news/scoring-express-for-dorico-and-finale

I hope these save you (and your friends) as much time as they save me, and I’ve had an absolute blast building them alongside such great colleagues.

Enjoy!

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Congratulations!

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It would be nice to see (download) a sample. I realize that might give away some “secrets”. But for that kind of money, many people might prefer to make their own templates.

As so often said on the Dorico forum - “We need to see the file”.

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If you click on individual selections (ie- “Dorico Bundle” etc.), there are photos featuring printed copies as examples.

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I’m getting this message when I try to open:

Screen Shot 2022-06-14 at 4.17.22 PM
Screen Shot 2022-06-14 at 4.17.22 PM1920×1200 99.9 KB

Sorry, too big or too small.

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I know this is explained in the documentation. What I don’t know (as I’m nowhere near a computer and haven’t needed to use the final installer) is whether the documentation is part of the installer package or external to the installer. Does anyone know?

(P.S. It’s fine - you need to jump into System Preferences > Privacy and tell it that you trust Notation Central and you want to run the installer anyway.)

edit: now that the non-fuzzy version has appeared: actually, I’m not sure that this is the message the documentation explains. Bear with me.

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Opened it by right clicking and using unarchiver.

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This is the solution explained in the documentation that’s installed… once you’ve found out how to install (I chose the same route Leo describes)

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Thoughts on getting it, or a review? I’m way too busy to worry about the niceties of developing a house style so am happy to pick it up, but other than it comes from people with way more experience than I have in engraving I have no idea.

Did you work on it Leo? Edit: OK reading the blog post it appears so - feel free to give us your thoughts on the template Leo. I mostly write video game music (Theater & Studio I guess), but someday will have time to write concert pieces.

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Thanks for this report. Apple has become ever more restrictive with their security protocols and even though the installer is signed on Mac (you can verify by clicking the lock in the upper right hand corner), it’s possible some combination of factors led to this. Sorry for the inconvenience! But yes, right-clicking and opening will get you through.

I’ll try to track that one down.

signed
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How do these templates account for page sizes (A4 vs Letter, score in landscape A3 etc.) in terms of rastal sizes or anything else related to size, distances between, margins etc.
(Is this a question at all? I’m not sure what is part of these templates, and how they relate or do not relate to the various notation, engraving, layout options etc.)

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Yes, I fully constructed the templates within the Dorico packages (honourable mention to Bernie Cossentino who did wonderful work with fonts), so I’m close enough to the project that I’m certainly not going to review it.

Each package contains a bunch of templates. Each template contains a predefined list of players (e.g. string quartet, big band, pit band) with a score layout and the usual set of part layouts ready to go.

There are hundreds of tweaks to Engraving Options, a bunch of tweaks to Layout Options (in both parts and scores), plus customised Page Template sets (previously known as Master Page sets), custom lines, custom text fonts etc., all built in and ready to go.

I said I wasn’t going to review it, but I will say that, for instance, I recently used the bulk of the chamber settings (fonts - though chamber are predominantly Academico anyway - part Layout Options, Part Page Templates, Engraving Options etc.) for an orchestral Proms commission that’s being published by a long established, reputable publisher, and their proofreader really didn’t find much. Sure, I still had to consider useful cues, pagination and System Breaks, but I did a lot less manual labour than on similar previous projects.

Everything’s set up for US paper sizes: mostly 9x12 inches for part layouts and small scores, with Tabloid (and in the case of big band templates 11x14), Letter for lead sheet templates (certainly on the Theatre side; I’d need to check for the Jazz ones). But all of the frames on the page templates are constrained correctly, in such a way that if you choose to modify the page size, the frames will still end up in correct places, and all of the fonts that (at least in my opinion) ought to be staff-relative are, so that if you change the rastral sizes (which have been carefully thought through) the right information will scale up and down accordingly. As long as the page size you’re switching to is close-ish to the original, there really shouldn’t be much left to do, though in the case of particularly chamber score layouts and a shorter page height, you may find that you need to either nudge down the space size or reduce the gap between systems in order to get an optimal number of systems on each page.

I’ve not investigated the possibility of actually releasing separate versions of the templates that are set for non-US sizes, but if the demand’s there then it’s a discussion worth having.

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Well I didn’t mean a what you thought review, obviously you think it’s great :grin: But that’s useful to know …

OK well I got it. I’m getting font errors on a Mac, I thought the installer would install those? Yes that’s the the documentation says, but didn’t happen on my Mac - help?

So far looks good, very professional, it’s more, hmmm, streamlined, modern and minimalistic, but also also a ‘harder’ look compared to the default Dorico I’ve been using which is softer and inviting, like a plushy toy if that makes sense. Not a knock, just initial impression, obviously need to spend time with it. But will make me look like I know what I’m doing, true or not.

Could you add a full orchestra, say based off the BBCSO template which is popular?

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Hmm. Font errors. Did you restart your computer? What does the error show?

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Restart, for fonts? Both Mac and PC normally pick those up without restart in my experience. It’s the Dorico box complaining of missing fonts.
image

I’ll try the PC tomorrow morning. On installation I got the Apple security runaround, and went into Prefs/Security to hit the button “Yes open it anyhow” button three times for the three packages.

Edit:

ACK, never mind, I forgot Apple doesn’t close the app when you close the last window, just needed a Dorico restart.

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Ah! That’s a relief.

As to an orchestral set, it’s certainly not imminent, but it’s not the first time the question’s been asked. We’ll certainly think about it :wink:

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OK say I have the BBCO template, what would I do to suck in as much of your template as possible?

  • Library Manager to grab all the settings
  • Export the Page Template Sets (big help there, for the life of me I can’t get a good master set finished)
  • Anything else?
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You can pull in the Page Template sets and the Layout Options through the Library Manager too, plus fonts and any other relevant collections. It’s a little slow for Layout Options as you can only do one destination layout at a time, but once you’ve got the score layout and a single part layout (or possibly two - we use a different one for grand staff instruments) you can propagate the part layout to other part layouts (excluding system formatting) from the right panel of Setup mode.

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I admit I’m not against a non-US version : the page sizes are not available here, so it would imply modifying every template I use… Though I understand it’s a NYC music services product, that option makes sense to me :wink:

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OK thanks. Installed fine on Windows too btw.

What’s the thinking on the Work number? It’s awfully prominent with that big font and box around it. I thought about using the asset tag number we use internally (of the form MX_Title_L00000001XY) but it’s too many digits to fit. Just wondering as I’ve never seen an Opus # displayed that prominently, is is commonly done?

The US sizes are a PITA, to get the part size (9x12) had to get a printer that did 18x12 sheets (rare) and fold in half. Works great and looks good but is such a weird size.