karma1959
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ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums? - SOLVED (?)
Hi guys, I'm running BFD3 for drums and found when switching the ProChannel's Pre / Post FX button to 'Post', the effects made a DRASTIC difference, whereas on other instruments (guitar, bass, keys), the Pre / Post selection didn't have a noticeable effect to me. So why such a drastic difference only when using BFD? Is it because BFD3 is playing back MIDI in realtime, and that's a different place in the signal chain than playing back regular digital audio through the ProChannel? I'm not using any effects in the FX Bin - only using the ProChannel effects. Thanks in advance, Russ
post edited by karma1959 - January 18, 16 10:04 AM
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Bristol_Jonesey
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 5:18 AM
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Interesting.
without any Fx in the Fx bin I'm struggling to think why it would sound any different Pre or Post.
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karma1959
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 9:50 AM
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In retrospect, this is probably a naïve question, since BFD3 itself is located in the FX Bin. I never considered it an 'effect', but it is physically located in the FX bin, so having the ProChannel set to "pre" means those effects aren't applied to anything, since the BFD3 plugin is reading MIDI in from another channel real-time.
That's my guess - if I'm wrong, someone please chime in.
Russ
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KPerry
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 10:00 AM
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Sounds likely - better practice to insert soft-synths like BFD3 into the synth rack (insert synth command).
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scook
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 10:05 AM
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You may have your answer. Have you tried inserting BFD as a synth instead of using the FX rack to host the plug-in. While adding a synth to the FX rack works, AFAIK it has not been the recommended practice for years.
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Bristol_Jonesey
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 10:05 AM
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Sounds totally plausible.
I agree with KPerry - insert BFD as a synth into the Synth rack
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Beepster
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 10:05 AM
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karma1959
In retrospect, this is probably a naïve question, since BFD3 itself is located in the FX Bin. I never considered it an 'effect', but it is physically located in the FX bin, so having the ProChannel set to "pre" means those effects aren't applied to anything, since the BFD3 plugin is reading MIDI in from another channel real-time.
That's my guess - if I'm wrong, someone please chime in.
Russ
Why are you putting BFD in the FX Bin? If you are using it as a drum sampler insert it into the Synth Rack (as KPerry says). There are times where you want to put synths and instruments in the FX bin (in this case maybe to access effects in BFD?) but otherwise always put it in the Synth Rack. Cheers.
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Beepster
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 10:12 AM
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And if it weren't in the FX Rack I was going to say that certain sounds at certain volume levels are going to react very differently to effects and their position in the signal chain. So drum sounds, which are very different than guitar/bass/etc, would very possibly sound quite different when moved in the chain. Also with dynamic effects such as compressors if the highest sounds are louder/softer shoter/longer it will make a big difference to how the sound gets processed. That's why we generally don't use the same type of compression settings on a guitar or vocal as we would on drums.
For EQ... kind of the same thing but with frequency. If one sound has vastly different frequencies than another naturally the same EQ can yank out or accentuate certain frequencies much more drastically.
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karma1959
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 11:36 AM
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Thanks all. To be honest, not sure why I've put it in the FX Bin. I typically record digital audio and don't use soft synths, with the exception of BFD3, so probably just inserted it without thinking much about it. I've always used it this way without issue, but will use the synth rack going forward per recommendations.
Thanks
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Bristol_Jonesey
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 11:43 AM
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And welcome to the wonderful world of Drum Maps & routing!! (Unless you do it all inside BFD of course)
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karma1959
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 12:06 AM
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Thanks for all the detailed info.
Interestingly, the synth rack also displays the BFD3 instance loaded into the FX Bin, the same as if BFD3 was inserted directly via the synth rack. So is the main difference that inserting via the synth rack allows you to automatically create outputs per track? (This would be reason enough to do it, as I've been pondering how to easily map each BFD3 drum's output to an individual track in Sonar.) Or is there something else I'm missing?
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scook
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 12:17 AM
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Yes, any plug-in which has "Enable MIDI Output" turned on is automatically added to the synth rack. Some FX plug-in can generate MIDI data, they too appear in the synth rack when added to an audio track FX rack.
The main visible difference is the "Insert Soft Synth Options" dialog. I believe there are some other differences inside SONAR but I have no details.
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John
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Re: ProChannel Pre / Post - Why such a drastic effect on BFD drums?
January 18, 16 12:22 AM
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Bristol_Jonesey
And welcome to the wonderful world of Drum Maps & routing!! (Unless you do it all inside BFD of course)
BFD3 sends the drum map to Sonar. No need to deal with the drum map manager. BFD3 can load various drum maps internally. Any change to the mapping will show up in Sonar.
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