Logic Pro X - Video Tutorial 46 - Drummer Plug-in (PART 2) Video Lecture | Logic Pro X: A Practical Hands-on Course - Music

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hello this is music tech help guy and
welcome to episode 46 of my Logic Pro 10
video tutorial series in this episode
we're going to continue working with the
new drummer plugin and if you haven't
watched the first part of this drummer
plug-in two-part series I recommend you
do so so what i've done since the first
video is i've just kind of composed a
really basic bass drum and bass drum and
guitar idea so this is what the the
drummer plugin sounds like so i'm using
one of the songwriter kits and i'm kind
of applying a bit of a eighth note swing
to it
and this is what the the guitar and bass
sound like together it's just acoustic
guitar and just a midi bass
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the very first function I want to show
you is one of the functions that I
didn't show you in the previous video
and that is the follow function what
follow does is you can make the kick and
snare pattern of the drummer region or
your drummer instrument you can make
that follow the rhythmic pattern of
either a MIDI instrument like our bass
or even an audio instrument so what I'm
going to do is let me just show you what
this sounds like now and let me just
pull the volume down a bit on the bass
and the guitar because they're really
going to get drown out there and you'll
hear that the the kind of the the
syncopation of the kick and snare
doesn't quite match what's going on
in the like the bass line
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like its it sounds ok because the drums
are swung so they kind of fit the guitar
and bass cuz they're also swung but
there's a couple little kick hits that
just don't quite you know don't quite
sync up to the bass line so the way
around this quick way around this is to
use this follow function what you do is
you just click on it and then you can
choose which track you want the kick and
snare to follow so I can choose between
my acoustic guitar audio track or the
bass software instrument track and as
you can see there just by clicking on it
you'll see that the the actual pattern
changes up here if I click on it again
you'll see it change so I'm probably
gonna get more of like a standard
quarter note kick drum pattern now
something that kind of matches the notes
in in the bass part so let's try that
with just the bass and let's see if that
syncs up a little bit better now
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yeah that syncs up a lot better and
let's bring the guitar in as well
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all right so that fits nicely I just
kind of tweaked the pattern over here a
bit let's talk about customizing the
actual drummer instrument the drummer
plug-in or instrument is actually not
its own it's not called drummer the
actual instrument plugin for drummer is
actually called the drum kit designer
which is a new plugin for for Logic 10
you can access the drum kit designer
either by clicking down here on the kit
that the drug that particularly drummer
you have selected is using or you can go
up to the to the software instrument
plug-in up here and click on it so let
me just click on that and what we can do
is we can fully customize what the kick
the snare the sound of the toms the the
hi-hat sound like for this drummer so I
can keep this exact same pattern but I
can I can pick a completely different
drum set if I want to the quick way to
do that is just to go to the presets
menu up here and choose a different
preset drum kit so let me try like the
Eastbay kit I know this is more of like
a heavy rock punk sort of sounding drum
kit it's got a little bit more punch to
it than that that the previous kit let's
try another one just to suit we've got
the scientific method kit let's try that
one a little bit warmer more of like a
sort of like a dance or disco kit I'm
actually gonna stick with the Eastbay
kit what you can do in addition to just
choosing a preset kit is you can
customize each of the drums so if I
click on the kick drum you'll actually
see that there's three different kick
drums that we can pick from let's say I
want to go with the third one you can
actually customize the tuning of each
drum so let's say I want this to be a
little bit lower I can detune it
and I can also dampen it if I feel like
it's kind of wringing out a little bit
too long so you can make it a little bit
the kind of envelope on it a little bit
shorter and if you feel like that drum
is a little too loud or a little too
soft you can pull up or pull down the
gain so I'll pull up the gain a bit
because I want to hear a little bit more
kick let's click on the snare next and
again you get three different snare
drums to pick from I kind of like the
original snare I just kind of want to
dampen it a little bit and give it a
little bit more gain now for the toms
you can individually click on each Tom
but when you click on the Tom's it
actually selects all three of them what
you'll see is that you don't get a set
of different toms on the left side for
each of the preset kits you're kind of
stuck with the toms that you get what
you can customize is the tuning the
dampening or the gain of each of the
individual Tom so you can choose to edit
all three of the Tom's at the same time
by clicking all or you can choose
individual toms the low the high the the
mid the low mid high Tom's so let's say
I want my low Tom to be a little bit
lower we'll pull the tuning down and
maybe I want my high Tom to be a little
bit higher
maybe Wow I want all the Tom's to be a
little bit louder as well there we go
it's actually pulled a low one up just a
little bit there we go
now for symbols you can edit the crashes
you can also edit the ride symbol over
here say I want my right crash over here
to be a little bit higher tuned actually
whoops you'll see it says crash left and
crash right up here so I was actually
editing the left crash there edit the
right one pull that up a bit and you can
do the same thing for the hi-hat so with
the kick and the snare you can fully
customize what sample you're using for
the Tom's and the cymbals you're a
little more limited to what you can what
you can edit but you can edit the tuning
the dampening and then the gain of it
the other thing you can do is if you are
using one of the auxiliary percussion
here as I showed in the previous video
like a tambourine or a shaker or
something you can also edit the volume
of those those are just hidden down here
hate to click on this little triangle
here and it shows the shaker the
tambourine
claps as well as some of the other kids
have cowbell and stick clicks so for
this particular pattern I am using a
tambourine so maybe I want a little bit
more tambourine I'll just pull the
tambourine volume up a bit so now let's
take a listen to what this sounds like
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and you can go in you can edit the drum
the drum set in real time as it's
playing and you know just wait a second
or two for it to update and it'll update
the sample and update all the changes
that you've made so you can kind of
customize on-the-fly
which is really nice so let's see what
this sounds like now with the the bass
and the guitar in there
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yeah that's much better for this next
example I'm actually gonna mute out the
bass and the guitar because I just kind
of want to get in and work with the
drums here as many of you probably
already know when you're working with
live drums you're not just working with
a stereo track like this and one of the
things that I talked about I believe in
the previous video is that the region up
here although it looks like a waveform
it's not actually a waveform it's
essentially just a MIDI region is what
it is one of the things that we one of
the advantages you have in recording a
real life live drum kit is you usually
have each drum on a different track and
you can individually mix each drum here
all of the drums are all on the same the
same track so you know if I want to
brighten it up a little bit go to my EQ
here I'd have to boost the signal of all
of the drums in order to brighten up the
kit
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and that doesn't sound bad but what if I
only want to brighten say the overhead
you know like the the overhead you know
Mike's like the like the the crash
cymbals and the high hat and the ride
cymbal and things like that but I don't
want to you know I don't want to
brighten the kick and the snare and the
toms that's where our kind of the
limitation is unless you use a mode for
the the drum kit designer that's called
multi output mode so let me go to my
mixer just hit command to the way you
can turn on multi output mode is you go
to the instrument plug-in here for a
drum kit designer you click on the
little arrows on the right side and what
you do is instead of choosing stereo you
choose multi output what multi output
does is it allows you to send each group
of instruments to a different auxiliary
channel strip that is a drummer aux
track so you can have like the kick drum
and an aux track the snare drum and an
aux track the hi-hat and auxiliary
percussion and an aux track the Tom's on
a separate aux track as well as the
crash cymbals on a separate track so
you're able to separate each drum on its
own track so you can add you know you
can customize what types of plugins you
want on each one you can customize the
volume and pan of each one as well so
I'm going to click on multi output and
the only real difference you'll see on
the channel strip is toward the bottom
there's this plus and minus sign well if
I click on that a couple times four
times you'll see kick snare toms hi-hat
percussion it's automatically created an
aux track that is attached to the
drummer track that will control the
signal of each of those instruments
individually so if I just solo out all
of the drummer the drummer track plus
all of its aux tracks you'll see that
now the instruments are isolated from
each other
so if I just solo out the kick track
we're just gonna hear kick sellout snare
we'll just hear the snare and the same
thing goes through the Tom's for the
hi-hat percussion you're gonna hear the
hi-hat plus the Ox percussion so we'll
hear like our tambourine or a shaker
here and then the the main drummer track
actually holds the crash cymbals so now
what I can do is I can take the plugins
off of this track that I want taken off
and actually one quick thing I'm gonna
need to do real quick is just set these
buses to plus two here just so you can
hear what's going on there but for now
don't worry about what these buses are
doing the drummer plug-in comes with one
bus scent that's going to a reverb bus
to is just so that you can hear what I'm
hearing it goes to my it basically sends
the output of logic to my screen capture
software so don't worry about that for
now so so yeah so now I can I should be
able to kind of individually mix each
one of those aux tracks so if I just
start with the main drummer track that's
going to contain the overheads like the
the crash cymbals as well as the ride
cymbal
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I can kind of mix that channel
individually now I'm just gonna add a
bit of EQ and compression just to kind
of you know flatten the dynamics a
little bit as well as to brighten it up
a bit and then pull the volume down on
it
kick drum I want to brighten it up with
a bit of EQ for the snare drum and I'm
going to add a bit of EQ as well and
probably compress it
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for the Tom's I'm probably gonna EQ
those as well
just give them a little bit more you
know brightness in the high end give it
a little low-end boost as well and then
for the hi-hat I'm going to kind of copy
over the EQ signature from the overhead
track you can do that just by holding
option on the plug-in just pulling it
over it duplicates it for us and for the
hi-hat since I'm kind of visualizing
this on the left or right side of the
kid I'm gonna kind of pull it over to
the right side of the kit they're just
the pan let's see what that sounds like
now with just just all of our drummer
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so I've eat queued and compressed a few
things more or less just kind of bread
and butter you know basic things that
you would do you know I'm like just like
you would do like on live drums just to
kind of brighten things up a bit maybe
make certain tracks a little more punchy
a little more poppy sounding one of the
things that you're given on your drummer
track is a bus on your son's and this
bus is used for reverb I'm actually
gonna remove that and start from scratch
just to show you how to properly add
reverb and you'll see that when you
whenever you create a drummer track it
automatically will create an aux track
with the space designer plug-in on it
which is a reverb plug-in it's just a
convolution reverb plug-in I'm gonna go
ahead and delete that aux track and I'm
going to start from scratch for you so
what we need to do that the proper way
to add reverb to drums to multitrack
drums really any multitrack session is
not to add reverb on every single
channel strip you're first of all you're
wasting processing power and if you
decide to change the type of reverb you
want you're gonna have to replace all of
those plugins so I don't want to put
five reverb plugins on here what I want
to do is I want to use my sense to bus
the signal bus some signal from the each
of these audio tracks over to an aux
track and so I can have a separate sort
of like wet you know like a wet control
just for for reverb and then the dry
control will be on these aux tracks so
what I'm going to do is go up to options
and go to create new auxiliary channel
strip or create a new aux track which is
control N and I'm on my new aux track
I'm going to call this drum verb and I'm
on the inserts I'm gonna put the under
reverb I'm gonna use the space designer
plug-in it's a really awesome
convolution reverb plug-in it's honestly
this plug-in alone is worth the $200
price of logic so let me go to medium
spaces will go to halls let's go to
plate and we'll use a drum plate reverb
now whenever you're using time-based
plugins like chorus delay
on an ox track you want to make sure
that the dry signal of the plug-in is
all the way down and that the reverb
signal the wet signal it doesn't have to
be all the way up what is up you don't
want to have the dry signal in here
because that's just gonna duplicate the
signal from our other tracks on this
track so what we what our goal here is
that on this aux on the Sox track whoops
I'm getting some signal there what we're
what the goal here is that we want this
aux track to just contain the wet signal
just just the reverb on the Sox track
not the dry signal from our other drums
and actually just to make this a little
easier to see I'm just gonna hide my I'm
just gonna go ahead and hide my bass and
my guitar tracks just you don't have to
look at those there we go so this drum
vert track will just have reverb on it
and the dry signal will be coming from
these other drum tracks so what we need
to do is we need to make this drum verb
aux track have an input of a bus so
we'll go up to the input and we'll say
bus one since we're not using bus one we
are using bus two for my video capture
so now that the input of that drum verb
track is bus one we're gonna go to the
sentence on each of these tracks and
we're gonna make the sense go to bus one
and by the way if you select all those
tracks if you select all those tracks
while you a sign of send or you know
assign bus one to it it'll sign bus one
to all of them and while they're all
selected if you pull the bus amount up
the send amount up it will adjust all of
the sentence so if you're still a bit
confused about how this works a send
essentially just is like a virtual like
a busses like a virtual pathway between
two tracks at least in the software
world it's a virtual path weighed so
it's a way to send a little bit of
signal from here over to here and that
the amount of signal that's sent is
based on this little knob here so what
we're gonna what we're doing is we're
sending a little bit of say the
overheads the
the snare and so forth over to this ox
tracks that we can have a wet signal
that's just you know just reverb so for
the overheads for the cymbals I want you
know a little bit of reverb for the kick
I don't quite want as much reverb for
the snare I want quite a bit for the
Tom's I want quite a bit and for the
hi-hat one a little bit less so you can
vary the amount of reverb you're gonna
hear for each instrument by adjusting
the bus amount so now if I hit play each
of our drummer tracks are sending signal
over to this ops track to create a wet
signal to create a reverb signal and if
I just solo that drum verb you'll hear
just the wet signal just the reverb
signal and hang on you're gonna I'm
gonna turn this to bus two for you to
hear that there you go let's try that
again
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so the amount of reverb you're gonna
hear is based on the amount of reverb
you're gonna hear on this aux track is
based on the send amount for each of
these tracks here alright so let's see
what this sounds like all together now
that I've got my my busses all set up
properly alright let's try that now with
our base and our guitar as well just
gonna unhide those in order to hide
tracks
you just hit H and then you press the H
on the track to actually hide the track
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and there you go that's the that's the
drummer plug in one of the things you
can do with this is let's say you want
to take these drum parts and you want
them to be kind of like their own
individual audio track as opposed to
having to work with MIDI you know let's
say you're taking this drum pattern you
want to move it over to Pro Tools or
some other DW what you can do is you can
take the signal of each one of these
drum tracks as well as the drum verb
track and you can send it to another bus
you know say starting on bus three and
then what you can do is you can record
each of those aux tracks to an audio
track so looking at my mixer here I've
got drummer kick snare Tom so that's
five drums plus six that with the verb
so what I'm going to do is I'm going to
create six audio tracks oops that's not
audio tracks six yeah audio tracks there
we go
so the first one will be the the cymbals
the second one will be the kick and the
snare then the Tom's then the hi-hat
then the reverb signal go back to my
mixer here and what I'm gonna do is I'm
going to make the inputs on these B bus
three four five six seven and eight and
the way you can do that is you can just
hold a while they're all selected you
can hold option and choose your first
bus bus three it'll actually set them up
in order three four five six seven eight
as opposed to having to go and
individually choose them then what I'm
gonna do is for each of my drum tracks
I'm gonna do the same thing but for the
output so for the output starting here
this is going to be three plus three so
I have three four five six seven and
then for eight I gotta go over to the
drum verb here and choose eight bus a
and so what we're going to do is we're
gonna print the signal from each of
these tracks each of these ox
tracks onto these audio tracks so I have
basically an audio hard copy of it that
I can you know not real I guess it's not
really a hard copy of a waveform copy of
it that's not you know based on MIDI so
that I can drag that audio recording
over into another program like Pro Tools
or what you know Cubase or whatever
you're using so now what I can do is I
can arm each of these audio tracks and
just hit record I'm going to let it ring
for a little bit just to give the
waveform a little bit of tail there and
basically what's happened is each of the
individual drums that were on those aux
tracks is including the reverb track as
well have been now transferred over to a
new audio file so I no longer need my
drummer track up I no longer need any of
my aux tracks up so I can get rid of the
the drum verb track let me just assign
the the bus of these over to bus to so
you can hear it in the screen capture
and what we have now is just five audio
tracks that contain the output from the
drummer plug-in and I could take these
five drum tracks and take them over to
whatever dwo and to work with and you
can solo them and individually mix them
just like you would you know say a live
drummer where each drum is is recorded
to a different track so that concludes
this video I hope you enjoyed it and
thanks again for watching