Getting Started - Part 1. Software Solutions.
Good day to all readers of our blog! This is the first article in the Beginning of the Way series, in which I will talk about the program part of our little recording studio. During the week, three more articles will be published - one about “iron”, the second about basic terms that we may come across, and one more about the basics of information. This series is primarily useful for beginners, experts probably will not discover anything useful for themselves.
In this article we will introduce you to five types of programs: sequencers, audio editors, VSTi (VST instruments), VST effects and samplers.
Below is a list of software under consideration:
- Image-Line FL Studio 8.
- Propellerheads Reason 4.
- Ableton Live! 7
- Steinberg Cubase 4. ( note - in general there is already the 5th, but I haven’t seen it yet if someone writes a review will be great ))
- Cockos Reaper 2.
- Adobe Audition 3.
- NI Reaktor 5.
- Izotope Ozone 4.
- NI Kontakt 2.
Some of them will be discussed in more or less detail, and some will only be mentioned for example.
')
This is taken from wikipedia . We are currently interested in software sequencers, and talk about them.
Sequencers are different, good and not very beautiful and not beautiful, in general there are many of them, but many people don’t know what to choose. In fact, the best sequencer is the one on which you best make music. Unfortunately, this truth does not come to people immediately, but it does not come to some at all. In this article, we will briefly go over the four most popular programs and one not very popular, but nevertheless worthy of attention. If someone in the future wants to learn more about any program, you can write a review.
Image-Line FL Studio 8.
FL Studio, popularly referred to as “fruit” or “frutilups”, killed many novice musicians. With the most user-friendly interface, it is ideal for beginners, who eventually lose their craving for knowledge and forget that there is other software that they might like. FL Studio, in addition to the interface, has several advantages, although it does not take disadvantages.
Pros:
- The most "successful" interface.
- The presence of step sequencer.
- Support VST / VSTi.
- Easy to learn.
Minuses:
- "Plastic" sound. ( note. In principle, this is a moot point, someone agrees with this, someone does not )
- Mostly poor support for some plugins. For example, no Waves plug-in worked normally for me, and Reaktor was constantly chasing. And I have no such problems.
- Not the most successful implementation of ReWire. For example, with Reason works very badly.
And this is our FL Studio interface. The picture is clickable, on that side you will find a huge screenshot with a description in English.
Propellerheads Reason 4.
Idol and blood enemy of thousands of musicians. Some adore him, others hate him wholeheartedly. By the way, I adore it;) Reason is a unique program, its interface is a virtual rack that holds various devices. Another feature of Reason is the lack of support for external plug-ins. Many people do not like him because of this, although this is a minus, it is solved very simply through ReWire. Yes, and there is no special need for this, Reason, even at the moment and has only three synthesizers, a drum machine, two samplers and a Rex-files player, can cope with almost any task.
The picture below shows the Reason interface with a few comments.
Pros:
- A unique interface that allows you to work wonders with switching devices. About switching, by the way there will be a separate article.
- A unique device - Combinator, a kind of mini-Reaktor.
- Excellent support for MIDI devices.
Minuses:
- No support for external plugins.
- There is no possibility to record audio: '(
Ableton Live! 7
Another beloved program of mine, which in its time replaced FL Studio for me. Live !, by the way, also has two unique features! Firstly, for some reason, many people call it “Ableton”, and secondly, it can work in two modes “Session” and “Arrangement”. The first mode, besides being the main “feature” of the program, allows you to perform live performances, and not just engage in mixing, but on the go compose music! This, of course, can be tried in other programs, but the result is likely to be unsatisfactory.
Pros:
- Ability to conduct live performances.
- Excellent support for MIDI devices.
- Excellent support for VST / VSTi plug-ins.
- Excellent support for ReWire.
Minuses:
- Not the most successful, in my opinion, interface in the “Arrangement” mode.
Steinberg Cubase 4.
Monster "music". I am sometimes confident that if the “cube” cannot do anything, it cannot be done in principle. Even theoretically impossible. Unfortunately, for the extensive possibilities, the interface had to be complicated, and now the path to learning Cubase is accessible only to the most diligent and stubborn. Moreover, in order to work comfortably with Cubase, it is advisable to find a second monitor. By the way, and the system requirements he is not the smallest. I will not write about the pros, because too many of them.
Minuses:
- A very unfriendly interface, but with the presence of a MIDI keyboard and a good MIDI controller, everything seems to be getting better.
Cockos Reaper 2.
And here is the special guest of our party, about which many probably have not heard! Reaper is quite young (at the end of 2005 version 0.01 was released), but a very powerful sequencer, which by the way was made by none other than Justin Frankel ! With a weight of only 3.5 MB and a relatively low price, the Reaper is a full-fledged sequencer with VST / VSTi support, audio recording and good support for MIDI devices. Moreover, it is developing at an enormous speed (currently version 2.55), it works well through ReWire both as a client and as a server. In general, at least you need to pay attention to it.
In the picture below you can see what the Reaper looks like. The picture is clickable.
Pros:
- Small price, small size, small system requirements.
- Support VST / VSTi.
- A good implementation of ReWire.
I will not say anything about the drawbacks yet, since I started using the ripper literally about three months ago, and have not noticed anything significant yet.
This is taken from wikipedia .
Audio editor in my opinion one of the most important things in the arsenal of a musician. No matter how cool your sequencer is, no matter how well it records audio, but it’s better than a specialized program. I will tell you on the example of Adobe Audition (formerly Cool Edit PRO), because worked mostly with him and a little with sound forge.
First, I'll tell you why we even need an audio editor. We need it in the main line for recording audio. Some also use it (for example, I) for information. Since I use a rizon I sometimes lack some monitoring functions, and I like to reduce more with the help of third-party plug-ins, and Audition just supports them. It is also convenient to “cut” files with audio editors, and sometimes there is such a need.
Secondly, I would like to tell you exactly how to work with audio editors, but since there is no universal answer to this question, I will tell you how I do it. Before I sit down at the Audition, in the season I have at least a sketch of the future composition, and as a maximum, the composition is ready completely. We save each track into a separate file, shove it all into the editor, hang up the effects where necessary and begin to mix. This is an option without recording audio. An example may not be the most successful, but for clarity, it will come down.
This is taken from wikipedia .
VST plug-ins connect to sequencers and some audio editor as plug-ins and serve like all plug-ins to extend or change functionality.
VST plug-ins are of two types:
- VST-tools (VSTi).
- VST effects.
I think everyone understands what the differences are between VST instruments and VST effects, so we will not dwell on this.
NI Reaktor will be our instrument, and the Izotope Ozone effect.
NI Reaktor 5.
Perhaps for example, I chose not the easiest tool, but I want to talk about it. Reaktor is not one tool, and not a dozen, and not even a hundred and not a thousand. It has as many tools as you want. Reaktor is a virtual environment for creating your own tools that are assembled from different “parts”. The screenshot below shows the interface of the plugin, which can be used to roughly understand the scheme of its work.
In the future, a series of articles about this wonderful plugin will appear.
Izotope Ozone 4.
Izotope Ozone is the “complete mastering system,” as the authors themselves call it. Simply put, a mastering program, one of my favorites. It has on board a bunch of useful utilities such as a maximizer, equalizer, reverb and a lot of other things. It looks something like this:
PS By the way, some VST plug-ins and tools have standalone options.
This is taken from wikipedia .
Of course, at the moment “iron” samplers are of little interest to us, but it was still informative;)
So, sampler. A sampler is a program that plays back previously recorded audio files. The sampler itself is nothing, it cannot synthesize sound, but can only reproduce the already recorded one. But this is his main advantage!
You want, for example, to add some “live” instruments to your track, for example, a cello. At present, it is impossible to synthesize the sound of such an instrument; technologies do not allow it. But to record a cello sound in a studio using professional equipment is possible. Then the recorded sounds are edited in a special way and packed into sound banks. Now we insert the “bank” into our favorite sampler (for example, NI Kontakt 2) and enjoy the sounds of our favorite instrument.
The only minus of samplers is the size of the libraries for them. 10-20 GB is the normal size for a sound bank, but you have to pay for quality.
The most important thing that I would like to say is about DJ software. I practically didn’t work with him and I can’t really say anything, so I have a huge request to the readers of our blog - write someone a tiny review of software for DJs, lines 10-15. Just to make it clear why he is needed and what happens.
PS At 01:06 and the article is just now ready. I apologize for the delay, and for possible grammatical errors, tomorrow I'll fix everything. I am going to sleep ...
UPDATED .
Thank you so much to SantaCluster for the specified grammatical errors. All errors about which it was said and not said were corrected.
UPDATED .
Fixed screen to Cubase. The hosts of steinberg.net changed the address to the picture and sent it to “Access denied!”.
Summary.
In this article we will introduce you to five types of programs: sequencers, audio editors, VSTi (VST instruments), VST effects and samplers.
Below is a list of software under consideration:
- Image-Line FL Studio 8.
- Propellerheads Reason 4.
- Ableton Live! 7
- Steinberg Cubase 4. ( note - in general there is already the 5th, but I haven’t seen it yet if someone writes a review will be great ))
- Cockos Reaper 2.
- Adobe Audition 3.
- NI Reaktor 5.
- Izotope Ozone 4.
- NI Kontakt 2.
Some of them will be discussed in more or less detail, and some will only be mentioned for example.
')
Sequencers.
Sequencer (or sequencer, from the English. "Sequence" - the sequence) - a hardware or software device for recording and playing MIDI messages. The principle of the sequencer is that a MIDI device, such as a keyboard synthesizer, MIDI keyboard, controller, drum machine, etc., sends a stream of MIDI messages containing complete information about the tempo, selected voices, and the notes played , effect settings, etc. The sequencer records these messages in the internal memory for later playback. Thus, the sequencer in its functions is completely analogous to a tape recorder (and most often equipped with a tape recorder type control), except that it records not audio data, but commands for various MIDI devices.
This is taken from wikipedia . We are currently interested in software sequencers, and talk about them.
Sequencers are different, good and not very beautiful and not beautiful, in general there are many of them, but many people don’t know what to choose. In fact, the best sequencer is the one on which you best make music. Unfortunately, this truth does not come to people immediately, but it does not come to some at all. In this article, we will briefly go over the four most popular programs and one not very popular, but nevertheless worthy of attention. If someone in the future wants to learn more about any program, you can write a review.
Image-Line FL Studio 8.
FL Studio, popularly referred to as “fruit” or “frutilups”, killed many novice musicians. With the most user-friendly interface, it is ideal for beginners, who eventually lose their craving for knowledge and forget that there is other software that they might like. FL Studio, in addition to the interface, has several advantages, although it does not take disadvantages.
Pros:
- The most "successful" interface.
- The presence of step sequencer.
- Support VST / VSTi.
- Easy to learn.
Minuses:
- "Plastic" sound. ( note. In principle, this is a moot point, someone agrees with this, someone does not )
- Mostly poor support for some plugins. For example, no Waves plug-in worked normally for me, and Reaktor was constantly chasing. And I have no such problems.
- Not the most successful implementation of ReWire. For example, with Reason works very badly.
And this is our FL Studio interface. The picture is clickable, on that side you will find a huge screenshot with a description in English.
Propellerheads Reason 4.
Idol and blood enemy of thousands of musicians. Some adore him, others hate him wholeheartedly. By the way, I adore it;) Reason is a unique program, its interface is a virtual rack that holds various devices. Another feature of Reason is the lack of support for external plug-ins. Many people do not like him because of this, although this is a minus, it is solved very simply through ReWire. Yes, and there is no special need for this, Reason, even at the moment and has only three synthesizers, a drum machine, two samplers and a Rex-files player, can cope with almost any task.
The picture below shows the Reason interface with a few comments.
Pros:
- A unique interface that allows you to work wonders with switching devices. About switching, by the way there will be a separate article.
- A unique device - Combinator, a kind of mini-Reaktor.
- Excellent support for MIDI devices.
Minuses:
- No support for external plugins.
- There is no possibility to record audio: '(
Ableton Live! 7
Another beloved program of mine, which in its time replaced FL Studio for me. Live !, by the way, also has two unique features! Firstly, for some reason, many people call it “Ableton”, and secondly, it can work in two modes “Session” and “Arrangement”. The first mode, besides being the main “feature” of the program, allows you to perform live performances, and not just engage in mixing, but on the go compose music! This, of course, can be tried in other programs, but the result is likely to be unsatisfactory.
Pros:
- Ability to conduct live performances.
- Excellent support for MIDI devices.
- Excellent support for VST / VSTi plug-ins.
- Excellent support for ReWire.
Minuses:
- Not the most successful, in my opinion, interface in the “Arrangement” mode.
Steinberg Cubase 4.
Monster "music". I am sometimes confident that if the “cube” cannot do anything, it cannot be done in principle. Even theoretically impossible. Unfortunately, for the extensive possibilities, the interface had to be complicated, and now the path to learning Cubase is accessible only to the most diligent and stubborn. Moreover, in order to work comfortably with Cubase, it is advisable to find a second monitor. By the way, and the system requirements he is not the smallest. I will not write about the pros, because too many of them.
Minuses:
- A very unfriendly interface, but with the presence of a MIDI keyboard and a good MIDI controller, everything seems to be getting better.
Cockos Reaper 2.
And here is the special guest of our party, about which many probably have not heard! Reaper is quite young (at the end of 2005 version 0.01 was released), but a very powerful sequencer, which by the way was made by none other than Justin Frankel ! With a weight of only 3.5 MB and a relatively low price, the Reaper is a full-fledged sequencer with VST / VSTi support, audio recording and good support for MIDI devices. Moreover, it is developing at an enormous speed (currently version 2.55), it works well through ReWire both as a client and as a server. In general, at least you need to pay attention to it.
In the picture below you can see what the Reaper looks like. The picture is clickable.
Pros:
- Small price, small size, small system requirements.
- Support VST / VSTi.
- A good implementation of ReWire.
I will not say anything about the drawbacks yet, since I started using the ripper literally about three months ago, and have not noticed anything significant yet.
Audio Editors
An audio editor is a program that includes a set of tools that allow you to edit music files on your computer. The editor allows you to work with sound, depending on the set of tools and its capabilities. The most well-known audio editors are Adobe Audition, Sony Sound Forge, WaveLab, Audacity, Acid Music Studio, etc.
This is taken from wikipedia .
Audio editor in my opinion one of the most important things in the arsenal of a musician. No matter how cool your sequencer is, no matter how well it records audio, but it’s better than a specialized program. I will tell you on the example of Adobe Audition (formerly Cool Edit PRO), because worked mostly with him and a little with sound forge.
First, I'll tell you why we even need an audio editor. We need it in the main line for recording audio. Some also use it (for example, I) for information. Since I use a rizon I sometimes lack some monitoring functions, and I like to reduce more with the help of third-party plug-ins, and Audition just supports them. It is also convenient to “cut” files with audio editors, and sometimes there is such a need.
Secondly, I would like to tell you exactly how to work with audio editors, but since there is no universal answer to this question, I will tell you how I do it. Before I sit down at the Audition, in the season I have at least a sketch of the future composition, and as a maximum, the composition is ready completely. We save each track into a separate file, shove it all into the editor, hang up the effects where necessary and begin to mix. This is an option without recording audio. An example may not be the most successful, but for clarity, it will come down.
VSTi (VST instruments) and VST effects.
Virtual Studio Technology (VST) is a format of resource-dependent (native) real-time plug-ins developed by Propellerhead and, subsequently, transmitted by Steinberg. Currently there are hundreds of plug-ins in this format, it has become one of the most common formats for sound programs. VST applications differ from DirectX plug-ins in several ways; in particular, they exist for Windows, Mac OS X and Linux. In addition, unlike earlier versions of DirectX, VST plug-ins have an advanced automation interface.
This is taken from wikipedia .
VST plug-ins connect to sequencers and some audio editor as plug-ins and serve like all plug-ins to extend or change functionality.
VST plug-ins are of two types:
- VST-tools (VSTi).
- VST effects.
I think everyone understands what the differences are between VST instruments and VST effects, so we will not dwell on this.
NI Reaktor will be our instrument, and the Izotope Ozone effect.
NI Reaktor 5.
Perhaps for example, I chose not the easiest tool, but I want to talk about it. Reaktor is not one tool, and not a dozen, and not even a hundred and not a thousand. It has as many tools as you want. Reaktor is a virtual environment for creating your own tools that are assembled from different “parts”. The screenshot below shows the interface of the plugin, which can be used to roughly understand the scheme of its work.
In the future, a series of articles about this wonderful plugin will appear.
Izotope Ozone 4.
Izotope Ozone is the “complete mastering system,” as the authors themselves call it. Simply put, a mastering program, one of my favorites. It has on board a bunch of useful utilities such as a maximizer, equalizer, reverb and a lot of other things. It looks something like this:
PS By the way, some VST plug-ins and tools have standalone options.
Semplers
Sampler (English sampler) - an electronic musical instrument that allows you to record, edit and play sounds. The difference from other electromusical instruments (EMI), for example synthesizers, is that instead of oscillators (wave generators), a recorded (digitized sound) recorded in memory is used, which is expanded on a MIDI keyboard, changing the pitch according to specified conditions. Currently, there are many such devices and their virtual counterparts. Often a sampler is an option or basis for an EMP. The release of publicly available digital samplers stimulated the emergence of new musical trends, primarily Hip-Hop, UK Hardcore, Acid house.
This is taken from wikipedia .
Of course, at the moment “iron” samplers are of little interest to us, but it was still informative;)
So, sampler. A sampler is a program that plays back previously recorded audio files. The sampler itself is nothing, it cannot synthesize sound, but can only reproduce the already recorded one. But this is his main advantage!
You want, for example, to add some “live” instruments to your track, for example, a cello. At present, it is impossible to synthesize the sound of such an instrument; technologies do not allow it. But to record a cello sound in a studio using professional equipment is possible. Then the recorded sounds are edited in a special way and packed into sound banks. Now we insert the “bank” into our favorite sampler (for example, NI Kontakt 2) and enjoy the sounds of our favorite instrument.
The only minus of samplers is the size of the libraries for them. 10-20 GB is the normal size for a sound bank, but you have to pay for quality.
Conclusion
The most important thing that I would like to say is about DJ software. I practically didn’t work with him and I can’t really say anything, so I have a huge request to the readers of our blog - write someone a tiny review of software for DJs, lines 10-15. Just to make it clear why he is needed and what happens.
PS At 01:06 and the article is just now ready. I apologize for the delay, and for possible grammatical errors, tomorrow I'll fix everything. I am going to sleep ...
UPDATED .
Thank you so much to SantaCluster for the specified grammatical errors. All errors about which it was said and not said were corrected.
UPDATED .
Fixed screen to Cubase. The hosts of steinberg.net changed the address to the picture and sent it to “Access denied!”.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/51992/
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