# New Composer needing Tips with VEP and Logic



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Hello all, I think this is my first post!

I have scoured the forums here for years for some relevant information while working on my piano skills. I have finally begun to take a deep dive into making orchestral pieces, like movie soundtracks and trailer music and maybe dabble in classical. Inspirations for me would be Hans Zimmer, Michael Giacchino, Steve Jablonsky, Howard Shore (love Lord of the Rings), and of course John Williams.

For the most part, I turned my gaming PC with i7 6700k 16 GB of ram into a slave with an upgraded 64GB and a 1tb ssd to store the samples.
I use my macbook pro 16 inch with 16gb of ram to run logic pro. I got Nucleus on an educational discount.

I have successfully set up VEP Server to connect between the two and have had success in making instruments on various channels go through.
I do this with an instance in VEP and then i change their output to 1/2,3/4 etc. and add those appropriate aux channels into the mixer in logic while setting the tracks to the appropriate channel.

*One question is in regards to the plugin within logic. Should I always be loading in the VEP AU or the other one, and should it always be the multiple 16xstereo or 25xstereo one to make sure i get all the separate instrument tracks?*

I managed to get some success late last night by using the AU3 plugin and assigning an instance with 2 kontakt instances, one on port 1 and the other on port 2 with channels 1-4 each to operate. But I am unsure if this is the best approach. I still needed to ensure that they had outputs set for 1/2,3/4,5/6... etc. And then the logic mixer had the appropriate aux channels.


*As for VEP, I have been piling all the strings, woodwinds, brass into their own VEP instances with kontakt instances to handle the instruments with their own articulations. If there is a more advisable approach, that would be appreciated. *


Thanks in advance!

PS. I was also considering looking into the Studio One sale, if you think that it handles instruments, and midi better than Logic, would love to hear that input.


----------



## Wunderhorn (May 19, 2020)

I wouldn't use the AU3 quite yet. Generally, with Logic, in regards to multi-threading you want a number of VEP instances instead of just a few that are crammed full. Depending on what you are doing I might get a little worried about having only 16GB of RAM. That might become an issue at some point though you are avoiding it to some degree by using a slave.


----------



## Jeremy Spencer (May 19, 2020)

When using a slave setup, I simply load the basic plugin. Then I just load it up as needed (up to 16 instruments), and send it back as a stereo channel. I found that with Aux channels it made a huge mess. Alternately, I’ll load a single instance of VEPro per instrument. You end up with a ton of instances, but you then have full control over each channel. If you’re more interested in sending each instrument routed to their own channels (within a single instance), Cubase is king.


----------



## Dewdman42 (May 19, 2020)

Regarding AU vs AU3.... AU3 works ok, as long as you don't need to use any transport oriented features in the plugins you're hosting on VePro. In other words, if you need to use a plugin which has its own step sequencer or something that needs to be started with the transport of LogicPro..then don't use AU3, that aspect is not working yet.

But the AU3 version does work pretty fine otherwise...and you can get up to 768 tracks feeding a single VePro instance with it..if that's your thing...which is the main advantage of using it. with the regular AU you can have 16 midi channels per VePro instance...

I have a couple AU3 templates I made which may help you get started trying it out. 

They are now hosted on GitLab: https://gitlab.com/dewdman42/Logic-VEP-MultiPort-templates (AU3 Templates on GitLab)


----------



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Wunderhorn said:


> I wouldn't use the AU3 quite yet. Generally, with Logic, in regards to multi-threading you want a number of VEP instances instead of just a few that are crammed full. Depending on what you are doing I might get a little worried about having only 16GB of RAM. That might become an issue at some point though you are avoiding it to some degree by using a slave.



My macbook has 16gb and the slave has 64gb. Unless you think the macbook only having 16gb will be an issue when running logic, then I may consider an upgrade of some sort, whether its an iMac or build a PC and use a different DAW. The macbook pro was originally just for app development on the side, but realized I can use it to handle the DAW and let my PC do just the slave work. 



Wolfie2112 said:


> When using a slave setup, I simply load the basic plugin. Then I just load it up as needed (up to 16 instruments), and send it back as a stereo channel. I found that with Aux channels it made a huge mess. Alternately, I’ll load a single instance of VEPro per instrument. You end up with a ton of instances, but you then have full control over each channel. If you’re more interested in sending each instrument routed to their own channels (within a single instance), Cubase is king.



Are we talking in VEP or Logic?
By basic plugin, do you mean you just take a Master bus and then open kontakt or Play and throw all the instruments and their midi channels up to 16 limit?

Then have logic have all the tracks with all the channels? (I feel like you still need to use aux for the mixer to see the channels though)

I happen to have Cubase 10 as well but I find the UI not as intuitive. That is also why I was also wondering about Studio One (looking for something that will work on both windows and mac as I go across both platforms)

Thanks for the replies so far! Learning lots!


----------



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Dewdman42 said:


> Regarding AU vs AU3.... AU3 works ok, as long as you don't need to use any transport oriented features in the plugins you're hosting on VePro. In other words, if you need to use a plugin which has its own step sequencer or something that needs to be started with the transport of LogicPro..then don't use AU3, that aspect is not working yet.
> 
> But the AU3 version does work pretty fine otherwise...and you can get up to 768 tracks feeding a single VePro instance with it..if that's your thing...which is the main advantage of using it. with the regular AU you can have 16 midi channels per VePro instance...
> 
> ...



Thanks for sharing the templates. I will admit the number of tracks thing seems confusing. Are we talking midi ports * 16 channels will add up to 768 tracks or is there other trick to get it going. I was originally doing an instance with Nucleus Strings, where I would have a master bus at port 1 and have 5 aux to cover the violins articulations on a kontakt instance. Then I would would have another bus that is at midi port 2 and have channels 1-4 on another kontakt instance running viola's articulations. Not sure if this the idea you are thinking of.

As for the plugins to run in logic pro, there is VSL>Vienna Ensemble Pro/ Vienna Ensemble Pro AU > and this further breaks down into stereo and multi-output 16xStereo or 25xStereo. I am guessing I resume choosing the multiple output at all times? I know I tried running stereo and when I had a multiple outputs in kontakt running at different channels and the moment my Logic connected to VEP server, it would kill my outputs right away and only the first midi channel was successfully working with the instrument. 

Thanks again!


----------



## Dewdman42 (May 19, 2020)

erodred said:


> Thanks for sharing the templates. I will admit the number of tracks thing seems confusing.



The AU version of the VePro plugin supports 16 midi channels. what you do with those 16 midi channels is up to you. You could have 16 instruments, or you might be handling a single instrument with 16 articulations, but anyway, its up to you.. Here's the important part, _each instance of the VePro plugin, connects to one and only one VePro instance you cannot have two different VePro Plugins connecting to the same VePro instance._

So if you use AU, then you can have only 16 midi channels feeding to a single VePro Instance, and you will need a larger number of VePro instances to cover all your sounds if you are using more than 16 instruments.. 

If you want all of your sounds inside one single VePro instance, then you can only do it with AU3, which provides the possibility of up to 48 ports, 16 midi channels each (768 total midi channels). 



> As for the plugins to run in logic pro, there is VSL>Vienna Ensemble Pro/ Vienna Ensemble Pro AU > and this further breaks down into stereo and multi-output 16xStereo or 25xStereo. I am guessing I resume choosing the multiple output at all times?



Sounds like you are somewhat new to LogicPro and I suggest you get some reading materials about LogicPro or video training. The stereo vs multi-out has to do with the audio returns coming back from VePro into LogicPro. with your light weight DAW mac, I would recommend you just do all the mixing in VePro and bring it back to LogicPro in stereo from each VePro instance.

The stereo or multi-out has nothing to do with midi, its only about how the audio gets returned from the plugin. If your plugin (in this case VePro plugin), supports multi-out, then you'll have an option to add AUX channels in LogicPro for receiving that audio separated on different channels rather then mixed to stereo (per VePro instance).

Kontakt itself can also be a little complicated when working with multi-out audio. For now I would just use Stereo and you can come back to this aspect later.


----------



## Dewdman42 (May 19, 2020)

You might find it easier at this stage to just use one VePro instance per instrument. Then you won't be confused about the midi handling across multiple channels and ports. The templates I quoted can get you going, but if you want to understand what's going in, there are some advanced LogicPro concepts and you have some light reading to do first.


----------



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Dewdman42 said:


> You might find it easier at this stage to just use one VePro instance per instrument. Then you won't be confused about the midi handling across multiple channels and ports. The templates I quoted can get you going, but if you want to understand what's going in, there are some advanced LogicPro concepts and you have some light reading to do first.



Thank you for all the advice. Yeah, I am knew to Logic and DAWs in general. Been reading about things but now decided to take the plunge. I like playing piano but always wanted to flesh it out. My piano skills are quite amateur still but I figured with some clicking and dragging notes as necessary, I can make something work over time.

I will experiment a bit with the plugins and the instances. Thank you!


EDIT:

So I went to test VEP and logic again. I selected just the Vienna Ensemble Pro Stereo output. I have just two instruments in Kontakt in a VEP session, one is on channel 1, the other is on channel 2. I used the batch and make their outputs on individual channels feature (clear output section and create one individual channel for each loaded instrument). *How important is it that I do this function?* I read it in a guide posted here. I made two instances of that. As will be shown in this logic screen shot:










So from this it is my understanding that, by doing this stereo plugin into logic from VEP, all my instrument mixing and panning will be done through VEP and Logic will just handle my midi note entry. *Is that correct? And then any editing of the midi such as modulation, volume, velocity, etc will just affect that specific track though right?*

I did another approach which is using the multi output and having a string ensemble of multiple instruments and articulations. I assigned Violins and the articulations to port 1 ch1-4 and viola to port 2 ch1-4 and cello to port 3 ch 1-4, and so forth and logic looks like this:









And if I understand correctly, this format would allow me to do the mixing through logic and VEP would just be sending me the instrument data instead. It would not serve much more purpose. *Am I understanding this correctly?*


----------



## Jeremy Spencer (May 19, 2020)

erodred said:


> My macbook has 16gb and the slave has 64gb. Unless you think the macbook only having 16gb will be an issue when running logic, then I may consider an upgrade of some sort, whether its an iMac or build a PC and use a different DAW. The macbook pro was originally just for app development on the side, but realized I can use it to handle the DAW and let my PC do just the slave work.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Start VEPro 64bit Server on both master and slave. 

Insert a new software instrument. Choose VEPro as the instrument (AU Instruments/VSL/Vienna Ensemble pro/Stereo). Also choose as many instruments as you're going to use within the instance...up to 16). This instance will correspond to the VEPro instance you have loaded on the slave. 

Then, assign each track to it's own MIDI channel (that matches the slave instruments). On the slave, all of the audio out will be just a stereo pair.

That's a simple method in a nutshell. I you want to get multiple audio channel routing, the VST3 version in Cubase is, IMO, the absolute best at this. 

Like @Dewdman42 also mentioned, it's easiest to just have one instance per instrument. Takes a while to set up, but it works well in Logic.


----------



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Wolfie2112 said:


> Start VEPro 64bit Server on both master and slave.
> 
> Insert a new software instrument. Choose VEPro as the instrument (AU Instruments/VSL/Vienna Ensemble pro/Stereo). Also choose as many instruments as you're going to use within the instance...up to 16). This instance will correspond to the VEPro instance you have loaded on the slave.
> 
> ...



Thank you very much. In a post just prior to yours I shown two approached that I had figured out (It was a very productive weekend of learning and practicing for me). It seems you are telling me the first approach where I would put each instrument in their own instance is the better approach. Leaving the mixing to VEP would make it easer on my macbook with Logic?

Also why do I need to open VE Pro server on my master?

I do have Cubase 10 in possession. You think it would be best? I tried it out as well (I acquired it long ago on a student discount back when I was only running Windows, but realized I needed a bit more music theory studying under my belt before I really dived in. Since then I have acquired a macbook and thought I could try using it as a master with logic). The one show stopper for me with Cubase on Mac so far was that I am failing to send the audio out through my headphones. It always goes out the macbook speakers instead. Annoys the girlfriend when the violins hit a high pitch note during my testing.


----------



## Dewdman42 (May 19, 2020)

putting each instrument in a seperate instance means you have to mix it in LogicPro, so no that will not offload as much CPU to the PC slave.

But it is just a much more simple setup to try out for now until you can learn more about how LogicPro and VePro works. 

If you want to offload CPU process to the PC slave and mix it there in the VePro slave, you can need as few VePro instances as possible and mix all the tracks from within VePro.


----------



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Dewdman42 said:


> putting each instrument in a seperate instance means you have to mix it in LogicPro, so no that will not offload as much CPU to the PC slave.
> 
> But it is just a much more simple setup to try out for now until you can learn more about how LogicPro and VePro works.
> 
> If you want to offload CPU process to the PC slave and mix it there in the VePro slave, you can need as few VePro instances as possible and mix all the tracks from within VePro.


 
Oh I see, so if logic is hosting lots of instrument tracks from VEP, it makes no difference on processing and connecting to the slave. But if the slave has all the kontakt isntances in a VEP instance, then it will take all the processing power away from the macbook. Is that the gist of it?

I just learned how to also get all the instruments out with Cubase so I just opened a door for myself which is exciting.

Also, how does one access the higher ports in VEP? I seem to only be able to get up to port 8. so that gives me access to only 127 tracks as I heard 128th one doesn't work so well based on reading?


----------



## Dewdman42 (May 19, 2020)

erodred said:


> Oh I see, so if logic is hosting lots of instrument tracks from VEP, it makes no difference on processing and connecting to the slave.



I would not say "no difference". Any kind of plugin processing you can push into VePro instead of your LogicPro mixer is going to help you since you're trying to avoid taxing your low end mac. it can still handle some. Even with one instance per instrument you will be able to push plugins and processing onto the PC slave. But maybe not your bussed reverbs and things like that. 

I recommend you keep it simple right now until you learn more. One instance per instrument is very simple.



> But if the slave has all the kontakt isntances in a VEP instance, then it will take all the processing power away from the macbook. Is that the gist of it?



Don't over think it.




> Also, how does one access the higher ports in VEP? I seem to only be able to get up to port 8. so that gives me access to only 127 tracks as I heard 128th one doesn't work so well based on reading?



Are you talking about LogicPro or Cubase. In Cubase you use the VST3 plugin and then you have to configure preferences in VePro to specify 48 ports. Then you can assign to up to 48 ports. 

In logicPro you can also get 48 ports, but you have to use environment based template. I provided template, mentioned earlier that can handle 48 ports, 768 total channels. Its the one with 1536 in the name. Use that template if you want that, but I am not going to try to explain how it works right now, that is advanced topic.

The other template is more limited to 8 ports, it does not use the environment trick either. There are pros and cons to both templates that I am not going to explain right now either.

or keep it simple for now and just use one instance per instrument...or maybe up to 16 instruments per instance...and come back to multi-port stuff later after you know more about LogicPro.


----------



## erodred (May 19, 2020)

Dewdman42 said:


> I would not say "no difference". Any kind of plugin processing you can push into VePro instead of your LogicPro mixer is going to help you since you're trying to avoid taxing your low end mac. it can still handle some. Even with one instance per instrument you will be able to push plugins and processing onto the PC slave. But maybe not your bussed reverbs and things like that.
> 
> I recommend you keep it simple right now until you learn more. One instance per instrument is very simple.
> 
> ...



Thank you for the explanation. I will dive in and share more on these forums when something happens.


----------



## Jeremy Spencer (May 20, 2020)

erodred said:


> Oh I see, so if logic is hosting lots of instrument tracks from VEP, it makes no difference on processing and connecting to the slave. But if the slave has all the kontakt isntances in a VEP instance, then it will take all the processing power away from the macbook. Is that the gist of it?
> 
> I just learned how to also get all the instruments out with Cubase so I just opened a door for myself which is exciting.
> 
> Also, how does one access the higher ports in VEP? I seem to only be able to get up to port 8. so that gives me access to only 127 tracks as I heard 128th one doesn't work so well based on reading?



This is the main advantage of having slave, it takes the extra load off your master machine. In other words, the slave gets to do all the “heavy lifting”. In essence, you could have 1000+ instruments loaded up on the slave (resource permitting) and still chug along smoothly with the MacBook.

Regarding extra audio channels, just open the preferences in VEPro and choose the number you would like.


----------



## erodred (May 20, 2020)

Wolfie2112 said:


> This is the main advantage of having slave, it takes the extra load off your master machine. In other words, the slave gets to do all the “heavy lifting”. In essence, you could have 1000+ instruments loaded up on the slave (resource permitting) and still chug along smoothly with the MacBook.
> 
> Regarding extra audio channels, just open the preferences in VEPro and choose the number you would like.



Yeah, my understanding is that with all my VI, the PC will be handling a lot more of the strain than my macbook, and most of its resources will be dedicated to just running my DAW. I am hoping it will be able to handle all my instruments and what not. I guess the trick to help it maintain itself without buckling would be to freeze tracks?


----------



## Dewdman42 (May 20, 2020)

you won't need to freeze any tracks if you put all the plugins in VePro. The CPU on your MacBook will barely move.


----------



## erodred (May 20, 2020)

Dewdman42 said:


> you won't need to freeze any tracks if you put all the plugins in VePro. The CPU on your MacBook will barely move.



Got it! Thanks!


----------



## Composerbell (Apr 25, 2022)

Hi, I thought I might resurrect this thread a bit. I too am new to VEP, and now 2 years into the future, AU3 seems to have improved a bit since this thread first happened.

I'm still confused about something with this ports situation though, if anyone can clarify this for me. The Logic system of Auxes seems really great to me (I've used it with Kontakt Multis hosted within Logic for years now) which allows multiple midi channels to return on the same track - it feels like they're just regular instrument tracks until you want to dig into the UI! Mixing on the same track as the midi, no separation between midi tracks and returns. Love it.

But with the multiple ports, this doesn't seem possible? As far as I can figure out, I can't seem to make aux tracks which access the other ports. And conversely, I can make (I dunno how else to describe it) "main" tracks which access the other ports, but they're always recieving on 1-2, because they're not aux tracks?

Do I make any sense? Is there something I'm doing wrong? How would I make a track which can transmit on Port 2 and recieve VEP output on 3-4?


----------



## Dewdman42 (Apr 25, 2022)

The aux track trick you mention is a useful but undocumented feature in logicpro. Unfortunately it does not currently work across au3 ports.


----------



## Composerbell (Apr 25, 2022)

Dewdman42 said:


> The aux track trick you mention is a useful but undocumented feature in logicpro. Unfortunately it does not currently work across au3 ports.


Ah shucks, so I'm not missing anything. Well, it does look like it works fine if you want to mix in VEP and just have a stereo return for everything lol. Not sure what the point of AU3 really is in that case then.


----------



## Dewdman42 (Apr 25, 2022)

Having many midi channels going to a single vepro instance is very useful! You can mix them in vepro and /or you can bring back up to 25 stereo aux feeds from each vepro instance as you wish. It’s just that you bring back the aux channels on different mixer channels then the source midi tracks


----------



## Composerbell (Apr 25, 2022)

ohhhh yes ok. Right. You CAN have them return through the 25 stereo channels so you have pretty decent mix control, they're just split from the midi tracks! Annoying to me, but I do see the usefulness there.

I guess I could see something like doing each instrument on its own port (and thus getting 16 channels for various articulations and such per instrument), and up to 25 ports with their own stereo returns.

So you'd still be limited from getting a separate stereo return from all of the ports, but 25 is still quite a bit to work with in that context. Thanks!


----------



## Jeremy Spencer (Apr 25, 2022)

Composerbell said:


> ohhhh yes ok. Right. You CAN have them return through the 25 stereo channels so you have pretty decent mix control, they're just split from the midi tracks! Annoying to me, but I do see the usefulness there.
> 
> I guess I could see something like doing each instrument on its own port (and thus getting 16 channels for various articulations and such per instrument), and up to 25 ports with their own stereo returns.
> 
> So you'd still be limited from getting a separate stereo return from all of the ports, but 25 is still quite a bit to work with in that context. Thanks!


Also, if you’re using AU3, your tempo-sync’d patches won’t work properly (if you use any of those).


----------



## Dewdman42 (Apr 25, 2022)

Composerbell said:


> ohhhh yes ok. Right. You CAN have them return through the 25 stereo channels so you have pretty decent mix control, they're just split from the midi tracks! Annoying to me, but I do see the usefulness there.
> 
> I guess I could see something like doing each instrument on its own port (and thus getting 16 channels for various articulations and such per instrument), and up to 25 ports with their own stereo returns.
> 
> So you'd still be limited from getting a separate stereo return from all of the ports, but 25 is still quite a bit to work with in that context. Thanks!


You don't necessarily need to think of each midi port meaning anything significant. its just a way to have more midi channels, up to 768. You can reduce the number of VePro instances you use, if that is what you want, by having more instruments listening (on more midi channels) in that VePro instance. How you go about bringing that audio back from VePro into LogicPro is up to you, but you are limited to 25 stereo returns for now. I usually just mix it all in VePro anyway. If you need to get something isolated in the LogicPro mixer for whatever reason, to make stems or any other reason, then you can simply create an AUX, and use those OUTPUTS from VePro for the instruments that you need to mix separately in LogicPro.

If you really really want to mix entirely in LogicPro...then basically you will want no more than 25 instruments per VePro Instance. In simple form that is only 25 midi channels needed, which is basically two ports. But if you are, in some cases, using articulations by channel for some reason, then you might have more midi channels used for a single instrument (each articulation listening on a different midi channel in VePro... that is regardless of whether you are using seperate midi tracks for those articulations..but if you had 25 instruments set up that way with say 10 midi channels per instrument, then that is 250 midi channels needed right there, which you can accomplish with AU3...and each of those 25 instruments can come back on a buss, mixing the articulations in VePro , but mixing the overall instrument in LogicPro through a single mixer channel.

For example.

What Jeremy Spencer said is also true, AU3/VePro7 does not currently handle transport sync properly so if you are using a plugin that has its own sequencer or time-oriented playback that syncs with the transport, you can't use that with AU3. You can simply put that thing in its own VePro instance and use the AU2 plugin for that one in LogicPro. Or a few of them, theoretically up to 16 of them in one VePro Instance. Then all the rest of your instruments can be AU3 without issue.

Another thing is that LogicPro's patch library feature does not appear to properly remember AU3 port settings, so if you try to save patches to load later...using AU3 multi-port arrangements, you might run into issues. I haven't tested any of this in a while so its possible that a recent version of LogicPro may have fixed any of these issues... VSL considers AU3 to still be beta.


----------



## Composerbell (Apr 25, 2022)

Jeremy Spencer said:


> Also, if you’re using AU3, your tempo-sync’d patches won’t work properly (if you use any of those).


Oh really? I'm still figuring out all this stuff, come to think of it, I hadn't actually tried any tempo sync'd patches yet in my experimentation. Good to know!

Seeing as the ports are pretty much useless with how I want to work (with returns and midi on the same track) it doesn't really seem like there's any point in me using the AU3 versions anyways. I figured I'd go AU3 for...longevity, I guess? But this thread started in 2020 so obviously AU3 isn't making AU2 obsolete very quickly.


----------



## Composerbell (Apr 25, 2022)

Dewdman42 said:


> You don't necessarily need to think of each midi port meaning anything significant. its just a way to have more midi channels, up to 768. You can reduce the number of VePro instances you use, if that is what you want, by having more instruments listening (on more midi channels) in that VePro instance. How you go about bringing that audio back from VePro into LogicPro is up to you, but you are limited to 25 stereo returns for now. I usually just mix it all in VePro anyway. If you need to get something isolated in the LogicPro mixer for whatever reason, to make stems or any other reason, then you can simply create an AUX, and use those OUTPUTS from VePro for the instruments that you need to mix separately in LogicPro.
> 
> If you really really want to mix entirely in LogicPro...then basically you will want no more than 25 instruments per VePro Instance. In simple form that is only 25 midi channels needed, which is basically two ports. But if you are, in some cases, using articulations by channel for some reason, then you might have more midi channels used for a single instrument (each articulation listening on a different midi channel in VePro... that is regardless of whether you are using seperate midi tracks for those articulations..but if you had 25 instruments set up that way with say 10 midi channels per instrument, then that is 250 midi channels needed right there, which you can accomplish with AU3...and each of those 25 instruments can come back on a buss, mixing the articulations in VePro , but mixing the overall instrument in LogicPro through a single mixer channel.
> 
> ...


Very helpful! I've been mixing in Logic for 15 years now, so the idea of not having that kind of control there makes me really uncomfortable lol. Thus my desire to route everything back so I can basically work in Logic and have it feel like everything is hosted in there like I'm used to. I have a strong tendency to do things like Fabfilter-Q3 dynamic EQing on individual tracks because of an individual sample resonating or something, and bouncing back and forth with VEP to do that on a project by project basis seems like a poor workflow.

And yeah, I like having every articulation on a separate track in most cases, so I can just read a label and play without needing to find the right keyswitch, make sure it's active, check the articulation map, or whatever. Just select desired track and record!


----------



## Dewdman42 (Apr 25, 2022)

Composerbell said:


> Very helpful! I've been mixing in Logic for 15 years now, so the idea of not having that kind of control there makes me really uncomfortable lol. Thus my desire to route everything back so I can basically work in Logic and have it feel like everything is hosted in there like I'm used to. I have a strong tendency to do things like Fabfilter-Q3 dynamic EQing on individual tracks because of an individual sample resonating or something, and bouncing back and forth with VEP to do that on a project by project basis seems like a poor workflow.



The Mixer in VePro is quite good. There are pros and cons both ways. Certainly if you do a lot of automation it will be more simple in LogicPro, though still possible when using the VePro Mixer. Just think of the VePro Mixer as a sub-mixer that is part of the overall mixing environment of LogicPro. The only downside is none of the LogicPro built in FX will be available.

But as I said, you can use 25 AUXes per VePro instance with LogicPro and mix it all in LogicPro too. These limitations are limitations of LogicPro.




Composerbell said:


> And yeah, I like having every articulation on a separate track in most cases, so I can just read a label and play without needing to find the right keyswitch, make sure it's active, check the articulation map, or whatever. Just select desired track and record!



That is definitely where AU3 would be easier... with Au2 you'd pretty much end up having a single instrument per VePro instance. Well hey...some people like to work that way too!


----------



## Composerbell (Apr 25, 2022)

Dewdman42 said:


> The Mixer in VePro is quite good. There are pros and cons both ways. Certainly if you do a lot of automation it will be more simple in LogicPro, though still possible when using the VePro Mixer. Just think of the VePro Mixer as a sub-mixer that is part of the overall mixing environment of LogicPro. The only downside is none of the LogicPro built in FX will be available.
> 
> But as I said, you can use 25 AUXes per VePro instance with LogicPro and mix it all in LogicPro too. These limitations are limitations of LogicPro.
> 
> That is definitely where AU3 would be easier... with Au2 you'd pretty much end up having a single instrument per VePro instance. Well hey...some people like to work that way too!


Yeah I'm new to VEP, so maybe I should try giving mixing in it a swing - automation is very helpful, but in theory I shouldn't be automating EQs and stuff all that much, so maybe I just need to mix something once and then those settings become pre-set instead of something I figure out from scratch every time. I should give that more consideration.

And yeah, it's looking like I'm going to be creating a truck ton of instances. That doesn't sound ideal, but also...no particular downside, I guess? Just means more tracks in Logic with the plugin that I have to keep track of. That's where organizing the instruments/articulations by set can be really helpful, I've seen people do wonky stuff where they load a bunch of random things into Kontakt (VEP or localhost), and I just wonder how they ever find which instance they need to click on to get to the UI again....lol


----------



## Dewdman42 (Apr 25, 2022)

Composerbell said:


> Yeah I'm new to VEP, so maybe I should try giving mixing in it a swing - automation is very helpful, but in theory I shouldn't be automating EQs and stuff all that much, so maybe I just need to mix something once and then those settings become pre-set instead of something I figure out from scratch every time. I should give that more consideration.



exactly. Especially for orch mockups.


----------

