Digidesigns Pro Tools Bundles
If I needed to set up a home recording studio that was quick, easy and cheap first package I’d take a serious look at would be Digidesigns Pro Tools Bundles.
Digidesign has put together 4 of these bundles ranging from around the 600 dollar mark up to about a thousand. (talking big sale price here not list) They are: Read more
Dithering, what is that and do we need it?
- Analogue is infinitely continuous, digital is bits (zoom in on a file and see the Read more
Logic To Pro Tools MIDI & Audio Transfer Procedures
Moving MIDI
- In Logic, consolidate the MIDI data on each track by selecting it all and choosing ‘Merge Objects per tracks’ from the local Functions menu.
- Then select all the MIDI and go to ‘Export Selection as MIDI file’ from the File menu. This creates a standard type 1 (multi-track) MIDI file.
- In Pro Tools, create a new Session and choose ‘Import MIDI/Track’ from the File menu. Point to the file, and leave ‘Use Tempo from MIDI file’.
Moving Audio: Quick Method (no time-stamping)
- In Logic, name your audio tracks using the ‘Function > Track > Create Trackname’ menu option in the Arrange page.
- Record a small section of silence into an audio track at the exact start of the song.
- Paste this new region into the exact start of all other audio tracks.
- Bounce the audio tracks to single whole files by selecting all the audio in each track (one at a time) and using the glue tool. At this point it’s a good idea to go into the Audio Window and use the ‘Move Files’ operation (from the Audio Files menu) to move the new files to a new folder, where you can find them more easily.
- Quit Logic and launch Pro Tools.
- Either open a new Session, or the one with the transferred MIDI data (if there was any). Choose ‘Import Audio to Tracks’ from the File menu and select the audio files you created in Logic.
If all has gone to plan, this should create all the tracks as required, with the audio spotted to the start of the Session.
Moving Audio: Longer Method (using time-stamping)
Time-stamping is the process of exporting the start position of audio regions to their parent audio files. SDII-format audio files are capable of storing edit information about the start and end points of selected sections of the file, and a time-stamp for where those sections appear in your project. This is what we’re taking advantage of with the following method of moving audio…
- In Logic, name your audio tracks using the ‘Function > Track > Create Trackname’ menu option in the Arrange page.
- Select all audio regions in the arrange page (across all tracks), and choose ‘Tracknames To Objects’ from the View menu.
- With all your audio still selected, choose ‘Convert Regions to Individual Regions’ from the local Audio menu. At this point, every clip of audio in the arrange page will be individually named and referenced.
- Open the Audio window and choose ‘Select Unused’ from the Edit menu. Hit delete/backspace to remove all regions that don’t appear in the arrangement.
- Select everything that’s left, and choose ‘Export SDII Regions’ from the Audio Files menu.
- Now use the ‘Move Files’ command (again in the Audio Files menu) to put all the audio into one folder where you can find it later.
- Now take a screenshot of the arrange page (command-shift-3). This will help you create the right tracks and remember which regions are parts of stereo pairs.
- Quit Logic and launch Pro Tools.
- Open your Session with the converted MIDI, or create a new Session, and make sure the start time and tempo matches the Logic song. Make the required number of tracks.
- Choose ‘Import Audio’ from the Region List menu. Locate the first audio file and you’ll be shown a list of all regions within the file that you created in Logic. Add the regions (not the whole file), and repeat for each audio file used in the song. When you’re done you’ll have a list of all the audio clips from the Logic song in the Region List.
- Choose Spot mode, and drop the regions into their tracks, one-by-one. Each time you’ll be presented with the Spot dialogue. At the bottom of the box you’ll see the ‘User Time Stamp’, and by clicking the arrow next to this, you can enter the value as your chosen Spot location.
This is a long-winded process, but you should end up with a Session that looks exactly the same as the original Logic arrangement.
© Matt Bellingham 2003 – 2006
Pro Tools Shortcuts
Pro Tools Keyboard Shortcuts
(for Pro Tools|HD, Pro Tools LE, and Pro Tools M-Powered Systems on Windows)
Would recommend printing this .pdf out, for the everyday reference.
Here’s the link: Pro Tools Keyboard Shortcuts
Snare drum and noise as a fix….
If you have a badly recorded snare drum but you don’t want to replace the entire snare with samples, try to trigger a white or pink noise via the key input of your dynamics unit. It’s fairly straight forward in Pro Tools. If you want to know how that works exactly, check out the sine wave triggering post for the kick drum. The only difference is to generate a noise with the signal generator in Pro Tools. It can fix a badly recorded snare quite comfortably.
