AudioMedia - March 2009 - (Page 36) PRO TOOLS 8 VIRTUAL INSTRUMENTS The Pro Tools virtual instruments are not scaled down versions of separately packaged products, but rather full blown instruments that have been designed and built ground-up by Digidesign’s AIR (Advanced Instrument Research) group. Boom, a retro drum machine, features a drum machine-style pattern sequencer and offers ten different electronic-oriented kits, each with extensive sound shaping capability. DB- is Digi’s Hammond B variation. It includes rotary speaker cabinet and tube preamp emulation as well as drawbars, variable percussion, and several tone wheel models. It doesn’t have as many bells and whistles as Native Instruments’ B or Logic’s EVB, but it sounds every bit as good, and the rotary speaker emulation is amazing. The Cabinet controls allow the Tube Pre-Amp settings, the microphone placement, and the rotation speed to be tweaked, but best of all, separate inputs with individual level controls allow the cabinet to be used as a plug-in on an audio track. This has quickly become one of my favourite new plug-ins as it sounds fantastic on electric guitars and vocals. Mini Grand is an acoustic grand piano that includes seven selectable piano models, with eight velocity layers per key and built-in reverb. Vacuum is a unique monophonic virtual analogue synth that employs something Digi has defined as Vacuum Tube Synthesis. Its dirty, distressed look provides huge basses and smooth leads matched to its vintage-slanted sound and packed with tons of sonic character. Lastly, Xpand! is another virtual synthesiser plug-in that offers a ton of cool sounds. It includes .GB of content; everything from keyboards to guitars, basses, drums, orchestral instruments, and rhythmic loops. Each of the five instruments is extremely high quality, doing a superb job of adding value to the PT package. be incorporated into the Edit window for users who prefer to edit their MIDI and audio in the same window. Now, in addition to toggling between the Edit and Mix windows by pressing [apple] [=], you also have the option of opening the MIDI Editor window either by pressing [ctrl] [=] or by double- > Elastic Audio regions by using either the Transpose window or the Elastic Properties window. PT includes an impressive collection of music creation and sound-processing plug-ins, including five new virtual instruments (Boom, DB- , Mini Grand, Vacuum, Xpand! ), new effects, and Eleven Free, which is Digi’s fairly limited, but exceptional sounding amplifier emulator. Also included are M-Audio’s Torq LE DJ software, and an impressive GB collection of loops from Big Fish Audio. Significant as the changes in the user interface and improved audio performance are, they don’t overshadow the improvements to the MIDI Editor window. The MIDI Editor windows can show MIDI data and automation data for auxiliary input, instrument, and MIDI tracks and, like the Edit window, it provides the ability to show additional lanes, allowing MIDI controllers, velocity, and even automation data to be simultaneously viewed and edited. This window redefines PT sequencing, putting it on the level of what is offered by current versions of Logic and Digital Performer. While the ability to edit MIDI has been a part of Pro Tools since Version nearly a decade ago, PT is the first time that MIDI data can be graphically edited beyond the restrictions of a track lane in the Edit window. PT not only allows the MIDI Editor to be opened in a window, but it can also MIDI clicking a MIDI region. The PT MIDI Editor window is very much like the familiar piano-roll style editor, so users familiar with this type of editing should quickly feel right at home. The PT notation function makes use of many of Sibelius’ features including the use of the Opus music fonts, which makes the notation quality very high. When working in the MIDI Editor, enabling the Notation Display button on the editor’s toolbar allows the notes to be edited as notation. This provides a linear view of the score with the notes running from left to right, and keeping any rulers or lanes being displayed in line with the notation. The score can be printed from within Pro Tools, or the session can be exported as a Sibelius (.sib) file for further finessing in Sibelius. Pro Tools installation, on both my studio and mobile rigs, was a breeze, and after six weeks of use, I’ve found the new GUI to be a welcome addition. It is pleasing to look at and far less fatiguing at the end of a long day. Being such a substantial visual upgrade, I was surprised at how quickly I adapted to the new look and feel of my primary studio tool. The new software did seem to demand more from the CPU than previously, especially with ReWire on the go. Digidesign in the US comments that the user interface is (inevitably) a little more powerhungry, but that plug-in instance numbers and so on are unaffected. I n Use 36 AUDIO MEDIA MARCH 2009 http://www.sonifex.co.uk http://www.sonifex.co.uk http://www.sonifex.co.uk
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