In this article I will cover how to use Logic Pro to compose music for film. I’ve been using Logic for over 2 years now and recently I was asked to help write music for a short film.  Naturally my program of choice was Logic (I’m still on version 8 but this article should apply to 9 as well).  So here I would like to share my experience and provide an intro tutorial for working with video in Logic.

First, we need to get the video into Logic. This can be done easily by navigating to Options – Movie – Open Movie.

The video I used was a .mov file (about 4 minutes long) but I’ve also imported just about every other kind of video file into Logic without any issues. After Logic does its thing and imports the video in you will have a small “Movie” window in the upper left corner like so:

When you double click the movie window it will detach from the sidebar and expand for full viewing.  If you’re lucky enough to have a second monitor you can detach and drag this window onto it for a much easier viewing experience.

The next thing I would highly recommend you do is go back to the Options – Movie menu and select Create Scene Marker – Entire Movie. This will create handy scene markers underneath the bar markers.

I found this to be extremely helpful when I wanted to line up crucial hits and cues to the movie.  The scene markers are also displayed in all editing windows such as the Piano Roll, so you can fine tune everything.

Believe it or not that’s pretty much the gist of getting a video into Logic.  It’s an easy process and once I had everything set up in this fashion I found it very intuitive working with the Logic interface on one screen and watching the results on another.

One thing I should note here *** Working with a video in Logic (especially an HD video) was very resource intensive on my February 2008 Macbook Pro with 2GB of RAM.  The final project had about 35 channels and the computer was not able to handle it without frequent playback errors.  So if you are thinking about scoring a feature film you want to make sure you have a lot of RAM and enough processing power to get the job done. ***

Ready to see the results? Here is the final version of the short film Alderwood Ch.2 which was selected as a Top 5 video in a nationwide contest by Canon and Vimeo.  It is now up to voters to select a winner.

Alderwood – Chapter 2 from Kenny Mosher on Vimeo.

If you have a moment please vote for Alderwood Ch.2 by clicking below:
http://vimeo.com/groups/beyondthestill

-PJ

The rumor mill has been swirling for months over at www.appleinsider.com with reports that the Mac Mini will get a much needed revamp, along with new iMacs featuring Intel Quad Processors.  It has also been reported that iWork is due for an update and I personally think that iLife will see an update as well.  Perhaps in light of the new Pro Tools release, Apple will make an announcement regarding Logic and Logic Express too! Hopefully, since this is Apple’s last year at Macworld, they’ll go out with a bang.  We’ll keep you posted.

Have any expectations or predictions for Macworld 2009? Tell us about it in the comments!

-PJ

Click here to view the embedded video.

Transcript:  This video will show you how to use and record the Evoc PS 20 Vocoder Synth in Logic Pro.   This video will also help people who are having trouble recording from the vocoder.  Ok, first you need to create a new Audio Track, making sure your microphone is set as the input.  Next, create a new software instrument. From the mixer window, set the software instrument input to the Evoc PS 20 Vocoder Synth (Stereo).  With the Evoc synth open select a preset (I used Electric Vocoder) and then select Input 1 from the Side Chain menu at the top right corner of the synth.

 To experiment with the synth, record enable both tracks and mute the Audio 1 track.  Singing through your microphone while playing your MIDI keyboard will produce the vocoder effect.  The problem is you are only modulating the synth with the microphone, while you are recording audio from the mic.  To actually hear what you recorded, you need to change the side chain in the Evoc Synth to Audio 1. With the audio track now modulating the vocoder synth instead of the microphone you can hear what you recorded.  There you have it! 

Questions? Email me or drop a comment below. 

-PJ

This Logic Pro 8.0.2 update addresses specific customer and compatibility issues of Logic Pro 8.0 and WaveBurner 1.5. This update is recommended for all Logic Studio users. For more information about this release, please go to: Late Breaking News as well as Logic 8.0.2 Details.

The second link in the quote above has a full list of fixes for this update. Just glancing over the list I’m happy to see a number of Ultrabeat bugs I’ve been running into are now fixed. Here’s to improved software!

-PJ

This is just like the Pro Tools video on automating tempo tracks, except now I show you how to make tempo changes in Logic Pro.Transcript:

In this video from The Studio Files .com, I show you how to automate the tempo track in Logic Pro. I have a four bar loop here, let’s listen to it. Now let’s say halfway through (or in bar 3), I wanted to automate the tempo so that it would go a lot slower. First go up to the tempo drop down and click the arrow. I have my pencil tool assigned to command+click. Just put your pencil tool where you want to change the tempo and click. It lowered my tempo to 117, which isn’t what I want. You can grab the line and move up and down to make the tempo either slower or faster. Let’s listen back now. Sounds good. That’s how to automate tempo changes in Logic Pro.

C

The Studio Files

This video will be just like the Pro Tools bouncing to disk video, only now I am in Logic. I show the same basic process and menu selection options.

Transcript:

In this video from The Studio Files .com, I am going to show you how to bounce to disk in Logic Pro. Bouncing to disk is one of the faster ways to export a mixdown from Logic Pro in a variety of file formats, whether you are exporting an mp3 file to email to a friend, or the final wave mix to send to a mastering house. First, you need to tell Logic what to bounce, and you do that with the loop selection up here. If you click and drag from the start to the end of your song, Logic will bounce that whole region. But, since I am going to bounce in realtime, I will just select the first four bars here. And, once you have that selected, just go to File>Bounce. Now first let’s make a name for our bounce. Let’s first make a name for our track (PIT first bounce). Now, rather than putting it into the bounces folder, which is actually very convenient, I am going to put it on the desktop. Look over here at the destination format. You can actually bounce multiple file formats at a time. For now, I am just going to bounce an mp3. These default settings are pretty good to start with. 192 kbps with variable bit rate encoding, highest quality, joint stereo. Notice that in my start and end times, Logic filled in those boxes with my loop settings. I am going to bounce it in real time as well. Hit F11 and go to the desktop where we bounced it, and there it is. Now you know how to bounce tracks to disk in Logic Pro.

C

The Studio Files

This video will show you how to create, setup, and use instrument tracks in Logic Pro. First, I show you how to pick instruments from the library browser. Then, I show you two different ways to create instruments in the Mixer window (first with manually inserting instruments, and then by using the channel strip settings).

Transcript:

In this video from the studio files .com, I am going to show you how to make and use instrument tracks in Logic Pro. This is very close to the article I posted earlier and the Pro Tools video, except that we are in Logic Pro, and I thought a video would be better than an article. Let’s create a new track in the Arrange window, Track>new. We will create one new software instrument. Let’s resize the track. Notice Logic automatically opened up the Library browser for me. With this, you can search through and click on any instrument that you want, and Logic will automatically load up those sounds on the track. I’ll pick a keyboard, a clavinet, and a “Direct Clav”. Now switch to a European Celtic harp. This is a fast way to get sounds going. You can always tweak the individual settings later to make it sound how you want, but to get a great base, this is awesome. Here’s another way. Let’s make another new instrument track. This time, rather than using the library browser, let’s go into the mixer window with Apple+2. If you go to the input for that instrument track, you can see all the different instruments that Logic makes available. Let’s pick the electric piano EVP88. As we discussed in the Aux sends video, use presets if you aren’t familiar with the programs. Let’s pick a “Suitcase” Rhodes. Here’s a final way to make instruments, its very similar to the library browser. Go up to the channel strip setting and click on that. It looks just like the library browser (with slight differences). Let’s load up an acoustic guitar. This is just a quick intro to instruments in Logic Pro, but they are very quick to access and sound great.

C

The Studio Files

This video will show you how to setup effects sends using aux tracks and buses. I use a sample of my voice and apply reverb and delay using two different busses and aux effects tracks.

Transcript:

In this video from The Studio Files .com, I am going to show you how to use busses and aux tracks to setup effects in Logic Studio Pro. Let’s listen to the dry version of my sampled voice (which means no effects). We want to put reverb on that track. Go to the mixer window with apple+2. Now you will notice I have two aux tracks here already. Those are two tracks that I have setup to route the audio to my recording program so you guys can hear what is going on. Up in the “sends” area, click and hold on a spot, and you will notice that there are 64 different sends available. Let’s pick bus 10 to be our reverb bus. Notice Logic automatically created an Aux track with the input of bus 10. Label that “Reverb” by double-clicking the name. Now just insert a reverb plug-in, so that any audio coming to this aux track will be processed with reverb. Space Designer>Mono to Stereo. Sometimes these programs can be confusing, so for starters, use the preset menu here. Let’s pick a medium space, a plate, and “Ice Plate”. Now by dialing up this knob, we will start to add more and more reverb to my voice sample. Here is the sample with a little bit of reverb, I will hit the space bar to play. Now, let’s dial it way up, so you can really hear it. Let’s turn that down for a bit here. I will show you how to do a delay effects send. Use the next bus (bus 11). Again, Logic automatically creates an aux track with that input. Rather than just putting a plug-in insert, let’s go to the channel strip setting menu. Logic has many premade effects that you can choose with a click. We will choose a 1/4 note tape delay. Logic automatically put in a compressor, EQ and tape delay. Let’s open that up. Finally, we will add a little of both the reverb and the delay, and see how that sounds. I would recommend experimenting a few ways: first, insert your own plug-ins, and then try out the channel strip settings. Its very useful and very fast.

C

The Studio Files

This video will show you how to export an OMF interchange (and an AAF) in Logic Pro. Before I get to OMF/AAF, I show you how to export all tracks as audio files. This is a great function to use if you need to transfer from Logic to Pro Tools (since you can’t import an OMF with Pro Tools until you buy the DV Toolkit). Finally, I show you how to import an OMF in Logic (which is basically the same process as importing an AAF).

Transcript:

In this video from The Studio Files .com, I am going to talk about exporting and importing different file formats in Logic Pro. We are going to show you how to export an OMF and an AAF, but first, let’s talk about exporting each track as an audio file. This is for all you Pro Tools users who haven’t bought the expensive DV Toolkit yet. Go to File>Export>All Tracks as Audio Files. Logic will ask you where to put these files. I will put them on the Desktop (creating a new folder called “Audio Export”). Now, for the save format, keep it in whatever the project was originally recorded. Also leave the export in the original bit depth (in this case, 24 bit). And hit Save. You’ll notice Logic is going to scroll through our file here and look for any audio regions. Its almost like a bounce, although sometimes it can take a little longer than a bounce, and it definitely takes longer than an OMF or AAF export, but for DAWs like Pro Tools that cannot open an OMF or AAF file, this is an awesome feature. Once its done, I will hit F11 to zoom out of Logic. On my desktop, I made the Audio Export folder, and if you open that up, you will see all of our wave files here nice and neat. In Pro Tools, just go to Import Audio, and import the files in this folder. It will place each wave file on it own track if you want. Now onto exporting OMF files. Same menu: File>Export>Project as an OMF file. There are two different versions of OMF files, Version 1 and Version 2. Stick with Version 2. Version 1 is an old format, it doesn’t have as many functions (or the same compatibility). Include the audio. For “Convert Interleaved to Split Stereo”, I would leave it checked. Some DAWs only like split stereo, and you can always re-interleave the files later. Don’t convert from 24 bit to 16 bit, because you will have to apply dither. Again, Logic will ask us where we want to save it. I’ll put it on the desktop again, we will call it video OMF. And save it. This is really quick. Hit F11, and there is the OMF file. Let’s go back into Logic for one final export. Let’s make an AAF file. Go to File>Export>Project as AAF File. This is very similar to an OMF, except now you have an AAF file and an audio files folder to keep track of. Let’s put it on the desktop again. We’ll change the bit depth back to 24 bit, as its the original project bit depth. Let’s call it VIDEO AAF and hit save. Very similar to the OMF, it will copy the audio files here. Hit F11 to see the desktop. Here they are, you have an AAF and the audio files folder. Keep track of those when you are transferring from computer to computer or DAW to DAW, because you will need both of those to import the AAF. Let’s talk about importing. Let’s close this project so we can import one. The AAF and the OMF import almost the exact same way, so we will just do one. Close this project, now in order to import this, you actually have to have a new project open. We’ll create an empty project. Now go to File>Import and choose our OMF file that saved. It will ask us where we want to import the audio data. Since we didn’t save this yet (and there is no Audio Files folder) I am just going to make a folder. If you did save the project, definitely choose the Audio Files folder. Now it will import the audio, and it will look just like the audio in our original file. And now you know how to export and import OMF, AAF, and individual tracks in Logic Pro.

C

The Studio Files

Now that you learned how to group your tracks together in Logic Pro (by watching the video posted right below this one) you are ready to edit drums. I cover two types of drum editing. First, I show you how to edit multitrack drums (with a group) to fix timing issues/errors. Then, I show you how to disable the group to edit individual tracks to remove pops, clicks, false hits… etc.

Transcript:

Now that all of our drums are grouped together, we are ready to edit drums in Logic Pro. Let’s go into the arrange window with [key command] Apple+1. Now before you start editing, look at a couple things. First, in the upper right hand corner [of the arrange window], there is the drag menu. There are five different options, but I am going to suggest crossfade (X-Fade) simply because, that means when you make edits and regions overlap, Logic will automatically draw crossfades in. Also, there are three different cursor (or mouse) options. There are choices for left click, command+click, and right click. I am OK with my left click on the pointer tool for selecting and dragging regions, and my right click is on the scissors tool for making edits, but I am going to change my command+click to the text tool (rather than the Marquee). That way, if I need to rename any audio regions, I can do it pretty easily. In the bottom right hand corner of the arrange window, click the waveform zoom button. You will notice a slider appears. By moving the slider up and down, it will increase and decrease the individual waveform zoom on each track. That’s really helpful when you are editing drums, because you can see the transient peaks a lot better. So let’s leave some zoom on. Ok, lets listen to the drums and find a spot that needs an edit. There’s one. Here, that kick drum that hits when the guitars come back in sounds like it is a little bit early. For those of you who don’t know, to zoom in and out, click your cursor in the timeline, and then either move your mouse up to zoom out, or down to zoom in. Now, we know that kick drum is early. So, lets zoom in on it both horizontally and vertically. Since our tracks are grouped together, if you zoom in on one track, they will all zoom the same. So, put your cursor in the bottom left hand corner of the track name, and click and drag downwards. Notice all of the drums zoom in together (since they are in a group). To make edit points, we have our right click assigned to the scissors tool, so that’s going to be very fast. Make an edit point right before the kick drum starts. And make another edit point somewhere before the next transient. In this case, its our next snare hit. Now just drag to the right. As a reference point, look down here. The guitars and bass all start a little bit later than the kick drum. So if we can edit our kick to start when they do, it will probably fix the problem. Logic is a little confused about how to display our crossfade since the way the regions overlap, but click in there regions over here [to the right], and the crossfade is fixed. Now drag back with the edge edit tool. That will appear automatically if you put your cursor near the end of a waveform. And Logic automatically put in a crossfade on those regions. Let’s zoom out and listen to that. Its a lot better, let’s listen one more time. Great. Now there’s one more type of editing you may have to do when one drum has a little “bop” [artifact] in it, whether the drummer hits the mic or the cable got kicked, and you don’t want to edit all your drums at once. I have an instance of this over here in my low tom. Where the cable must have gotten stepped on or something. Listen to the nasty noise in the left channel. Hear that? And you can actually see it [the noise]. Now, we just want to edit our low tom, so we need to disable the “ALL DRUMS” group. Lets go into the mixer window with Apple+2. And just like we did before, highlight all your drums, and in the group selection box, just go to “No Group”. That will disable the group. OK, back to the Arrange window with Apple+1. Let’s just edit that noise out completely. So, using your scissors tool, make an edit right before that nasty noise and right after it. Click [select it] and delete with the delete key. Lets see how that sounds. That’s a lot better. Now if you are getting pops and clicks, you are going to need to use the fade tool to fade in and out at your edit points. Now you know how to edit multitrack drums all at one time, and you know how to go in and do “surgical strikes” on bad noises on individual drum tracks.

C

The Studio Files

This video shows the process of grouping tracks in Logic Studio Pro. Specifically, I show you how to group your drum tracks together to prepare them for editing. The next video in this series will show you how to edit drums once you group them. Later today, I am going to post that video, so be sure to check back.

Transcript:

This is thestudiofiles.com video on how to group tracks together in Logic Studio Pro. Its really essentially to learn how to do this because when you are working with a large number of tracks or when you are editing drums, it will save a lot of time by editing things with a group. So lets go into the mixer window with [key command] Apple+2. Now, you want to group similar tracks together; so, for instance, I have a snare top and a snare bottom mic. So highlight those two tracks, then right above the automation [selection] button you’ll see there is a blank space. Click in there, and you will see the thirty-two different groups Logic has available. Lets pick group 20 for the snares. Now the Group Settings dialog box opens, lets call [this group] snare (it makes sense…); and, there are a bunch of different check boxes that you can choose to indicate how you want your tracks to be grouped together. For now, we are just going to check “Region Selection (Edit)”, which will make the tracks edit together, and track zoom, so they will zoom [vertically] together. Let’s do the same thing for our toms, we have low tom, mid tom, and high tom. Go into the group menu. The next available group is twenty-one. Call the group “Toms” and check “Region Selection (Edit)” and “Track Zoom” again. And finally, group the overheads. Now the most important group when editing drums is the “All Drums” group. You need to make a group that selects all your drums at once. Again, this is the most important group when you are editing, which you will see in our next video. So highlight all your drum tracks and choose the next available group (which is twenty-three). Call it “ALL DRUMS”. Stay tuned for our next video coming up really soon on how to use these groups when you are editing drums in Logic Pro.

C

The Studio Files

Logic comes with a TON of instruments and sounds. Plus, it is very easy to get started making music with the media/loop browsers. Whether you are new to virtual instruments altogether and need a tutorial, or are switching to Logic from another DAW (like Pro Tools), this article should help you become fluent in setting up and making great sounds with Logic’s virtual instruments.

The easiest way to create an instrument track in Logic is to choose Track>New in the arrange window.

Then just choose “software instrument”. When the track is created, Logic will automatically open the browser on the right side of the screen. Here you will see TONS of different instrument groups. Click through to find a sound you like. (In this case, I am choosing Bosendorfer Piano Studio. Notice that with my instrument track selected, if I make a selection in the browser, my track automatically changes to that sound. Also, Logic will automatically insert EQ and effects into that track’s channel strip. In the picture below, I selected Bosendorfer Piano Studio; Logic changed my instrument to the piano sound, and added channel EQ (which you can see in the channel strip in the bottom LEFT corner of the picture).

Try loading up some other sounds, being sure to watch the channel strip to see what effects Logic loads up.

Another way to load up instruments is to make a new instrument track, but rather loading up sounds with the browser, you pick the instruments and effects yourself. Create a new instrument track, just as we did before. This time, go into the Mixer window. If you click on the “input” of the new instrument track, you will see all the possible instruments to choose from. Lets pick the EFM1 (stereo). Probably the easiest way to get great sounds (at least at first) is to use a preset. Access the presets in the menu (shown in the picture below). Cycle through them, pick one you like, and then start tweaking!

Now, what if you have an instrument that can utilize multiple outputs? (If you are familiar with Strike, Structure, or many EastWest instruments, this is for you). You don’t have to create aux tracks and assign the correct inputs, Logic will do that for you. Try selecting an instrument that can send multiple outputs. In this case, I am going to choose the EXS24 sampler, and I will choose the multiple output version.

Now just click the “+” under the solo button, and an Aux track with the next output the software as its input will be created. So, the first time I click the”+”, an aux track with an input of “EXS24 3-4″ will be created (the next time, “EXS24 5-6″, etc…) Using instruments with multiple outputs is a little more complicated that we are going to get in this article, but expect more soon on that topic.

With instruments and loops in Logic, you can make great sounding music really quickly. (If you need a refresher on how to use loops in Logic, see our article HERE). If you have questions about Logic instruments, or need more information on a specific topic, post in the comments here or send me an email.

C

The Studio Files

One aspect of digital audio that Logic Pro handles differently than any other DAW is routing tracks through busses and aux tracks. In most other DAWs (including Pro Tools LE), busses exist separate from auxilliary (or Aux) tracks. Also, in other DAWs, a “bus” is typically mono (so “Bus 1″ is mono, and if you wanted stereo, you’d select “Bus 1-2″. In Logic Studio, these things are handled a little bit differently. Remember though, no matter what DAW you are in, a “bus” and an “aux” are two very different things. I like to think of a bus as an imaginary placeholder, where you can send audio. An Aux track is a special track made to access and affect the audio assigned to those buses. Aux tracks have many other uses besides bus routing. For example, if you want to record a track with a digital effect printed on it, you can use an Aux track as your input (with the plug-in effect active) and then route the audio from the Aux track to its audio track (through the use of a bus). Anyway, back to explaining these concepts in Logic:

Let’s look at track creation in Pro Tools. When you select to make a new track, you can make audio tracks, aux tracks (or “input” as PT calls it), instrument tracks, MIDI, etc… So, no matter what you are using the aux track for, you can make as many as you want from here (and then assign their function, inputs, and outputs later).

In Logic Studio 8, things are different. To a certain extent, Apple tried to simplify things by blurring the difference between an aux track and a bus (although in the end, it seems as though its actually a little more confusing) If you look in the “Create New Track” dialog box, you will notice that creation of an Aux track is not an option. To create Aux tracks, you have to either route a track’s send or output to a bus.  EDIT: You can also make a new Aux track by clicking Options>Create New Aux Channel Strip in the Mixer window, or by clicking the “+” button on the far left hand side of the mixer. When you do that, Logic will automatically create a new aux track with that bus as its input (on the RH side of the mixer). Notice below, I assigned a track’s output to bus 2, and Logic automatically created a new Aux track with an input of bus 2.

In some situations, it is convenient. In most situations, I don’t really like it. I hope Apple will make this feature switchable on/off in the Preferences (or have a key command to hold down to disable it). Here are some reasons why I find it a little inconvenient:

• For situations where you aren’t using the bus for effects (reverb, delay, etc), you don’t need that extra Aux track
• When you are summing things (so for example if you are assigning all your drums to Bus 1), the aux track is created on the far right side of the mixer (and you can’t drag it over near your drums). I think this makes the mixer a little disorganized at times, especially when you have a lot of groups to sum and a lot of effects.
• If you are using the bus to route to an audio track, you need to either mute or disable the output of the “automatically-created-aux-track” (explained below)

If I want to sum audio through the use of a bus (maybe to “record” your mix at the end of the day), normally you would just output all of your tracks to a bus, and create an audio track with that input, and hit record. In Logic, since the audio will also be going to the Aux track that was automatically created, you need to stop the Aux from playing (or else the audio will be playing twice through your master bus, once from the audio track and once from the aux track, and this could distort your master output, hurt your speakers/ears…etc). You can just mute the aux track, but I would suggest going one step further. Assign the output of the Aux track to “No Output”. In the first picture below, you will see the audio playing both through the audio track (labeled “PRINT”) and the aux track (labeled “AUX IN”). In the second picture, I assign the output to “No Output”.

This technique will be important if you want to sum your mix “in the box” and print your mixes to a stereo track within your project file. (That will be the subject of a video and article coming up very soon). If you have any questions about bussing and auxes, post in the comments here or send me an email. I hope anyone who is switching from Pro Tools LE to Logic Studio is finding these articles somewhat helpful. Please let me know if there is a specific topic you’d like me to cover or make a video of.

C

The Studio Files

If that is the first group you are assigning, a “Group Settings” dialog box will open. If it’s not, and you want to access that window, just click in the area you would to assign a track, and you will see it as an option (“Open Group Settings”). The box looks like:

In this box, you find a whole bunch of assignable parameters (which is very similar to the box in Pro Tools when you make group). Here there seem to be a few more options (like individual options for each send, etc.). Be sure to assign a name to your groups. Its a lot easier to identify “guitars”, “drums”, “synths” than it is “1″, “2″, “3″… Here are my groups all assigned, customized (in the Group Settings box), and labeled.

Ok, now for Automation.

First lets hit the easier stuff: volume and pan. My favorite way to do automation is to first put the track into an appropriate automation mode (usually latch or touch, depending on what I am doing). Then, play the song, and move the fader/pan knob where you want the automation to occur. Now, since you are using a mouse (or maybe you are blessed and have a control surface), its likely that you didn’t get that “perfect” curve on the first try. Rather than trying 10 more times to get it perfect, I would just edit it in the arrange window. Go there, and click on the track that you are automating. Now, hit “A” or, select “Track Automation” in the View menu at the top of the arrange window. (Use your hotkeys!) Now, the track will change to automation. In the picture below, I have automated this guitar chord to pan from left to right.

Now, either using the pencil tool to draw, or the pointer tool to grab automation points, make the automation anyway you would like. This same process applies to volume, pan, and sends. And, the process of automating plug-ins is really just as easy.

Lets say I had a chorus plug-in on that guitar track we have been automating. I want to automate the “Rate” of the chorus during that first chord. So, again, put the track into a record mode (latch, touch, or write) and play the song where you want to automate. Then, just drag the “Rate” knob of the chorus plug-in as you please. In the picture below, you will see that the view of the track automatically switched to the chorus automation while I was recording it.

Again, now just use the pointer of the editor tool to tweak the automation to your liking (or do another take if you were way off to save time). Now, to get back to your other automated parameters (remember, we automated the Pan earlier on this track) just click the menu underneath the track name:

Now, just remember to watch out when you are automating tracks in a group. If you aren’t careful, you can apply automation across all tracks in your group (even when you don’t want it). To prevent it, just make the proper options are deselected in the Group Settings dialog box we talked about earlier. (Most notably, make sure the “Automation Mode” button is not checked if you DO NOT want your tracks to write automation together).

That’s all for now. If you have questions about this article, need more detail (or into some of the trickier stuff), or have questions about automation or groups in general, just post in the comments here or email me.

C

The Studio Files

Even for people not running Digidesign hardware, a lot of problems seem to be emerging when Logic Studio users upgrade to 10.5.2. Most notably, MainStage is completely unusable by some in 10.5.2 (although many people also report slight problems with 10.5.1 as well). Also, Logic Studio seems to not use resources properly, with constant spikes and errors. This is not true for all people, but many are running into these problems.

So, whether you are running Digidesign hardware or not, your best bet is to use Leopard 10.5.1 (and a clean install of Leopard, not just an upgrade from Tiger) with both Pro Tools and Logic. I can’t guarantee that it will work (as Pro Tools LE is not compatible with Leopard as of yet), but it is your best shot at getting everything working.

If you are having a problem with anything similar to the above^^, post in the comments here or send me an email. There are some different options to try to get things working on your machine. Remember, before you do any upgrades or major installs, be sure to Time Machine your system (or at least copy important files to a separate drive).

C

The Studio Files