# Cubase + VEP template tutorial



## kimarnesen (Oct 2, 2017)

Do you know of a tutorial (tutorial series) which shows you step by step how to create a template in VEP and Cubase, with routing at all? I've found a lot of videos with people showing their templates, but I'm so new with this that I need to see it from the very beginning in detail. Or I could have someone helping with this, if someone out there offers such help.


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## Michael Antrum (Oct 2, 2017)

Thinkspace have a 'Template in a weekend' course, but they do charge for it. It isn't specifically for Cubase - but it does cover it fairly well - though I don't think it looks much at the use of expression maps.

But it is a reasonably comprehensive look at template creation and for me I felt it was worth the money.

Otherwise Groove 3 have a good course on VEP 6 too.


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 2, 2017)

mrarnesen said:


> Or I could have someone helping with this, if someone out there offers such help.



I actually made a Cubase + VEP template yesterday, so I could share some tips, but beware that was my first VEP template, thus someone might have better instructions. 

In short:
I have only Berlin libraries in VEP, because they're huge, and I wanted to start using them through VEP first. So basically you will need midi tracks to get the midi input from e.g. a keyboard, those midi tracks will send midi to VEP plugins inside Cubase (I have different VEP instance for different libraries, e.g. Berlin Strings, Berlin Brass, etc). Then you will need actual VEP instances, which you can add in VEP Server. Those will take the message from the VEP plugin in Cubase (the VEP plugin in Cubase has to be connected to the right VEP instance of course). Then, you can add different plugins inside the VEP instance, e.g. Kontakt, Play, etc, and load patches to them. The midi tracks can send the midi through different midi channel (the small number you can see in a midi track), thus you can add several patches in e.g. Kontakt, but remember to select the corresponding midi channel from the patch inside e.g. Kontakt. Lastly you will send the audio back from VEP to Cubase through outputs in VEP to the Audio Channels of the VEP plugins in Cubase (also they have to be setup to be the same number pair).

You could start like this (quite simple setup, no additional busses or groups inside VEP):

Start up Vienna Ensemble Pro Server.
You can change the MIDI ports available from Preferences > Instances > MIDI ports. This is basically the amount of different plugins inside one instance, I set it up to 32.
Add a new Instance, you may call it e.g. Berlin Strings or Spitfire Symphonic Strings, or some people put several different libraries to one instance. I haven't got enough experience to say, which one is better.
Inside the instance, add plugins, e.g. Kontakt, etc.
Change the MIDI port for each plugin starting from 1, if you want to send MIDI to separate plugins, which makes sense .
Add instrument patches to the plugin, e.g. Kontakt and change their MIDI channel starting from 1.
If you want to route the audio through a different output change the outputs of the patches to different output channels. E.g. I have Violins 1 Leg routed to output channel 1 and Violins Multi routed to output channel 2. (I also had to add more outputs to Kontakt, by selecting Outputs in the view button, right from the Options button, and I added 12 outputs, and Soundcard / Host output: Kt.aux 1 [1], don't ask what that means :D)
After that in main view of your VEP instance, click the + button of the plugin, and add as many output channels as you would like to have.
Change the output for each plugin and their output channels to OUT 1/OUT 2, OUT 3/OUT 4, etc, to route the audio back to Cubase.

Go back to Cubase, add Vienna Ensemble Pro from the VST Instruments Rack.
Connect it to the VEP instance.
Activate outputs for the VEP instance (Small button on the right of the VEP in the Rack), activate as many outputs as you had in the VEP instance.
Create a MIDI track, if you didn't already when adding the VEP plugin in Cubase.
Route the MIDI track output to the right VEP plugin and MIDI port (remember you set up MIDI ports in 5.).
Select the MIDI track, and you should be ready to play your keyboard and hear some sounds.
Hope that helps a bit! And ask questions, if you get stuck!

*EDIT: *This was one machine setup. Additionally I disabled Asio Guard for VEP in Cubase, and enabling it for everything else, because I have a hybrid template, and it seems to work for now.


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## kimarnesen (Oct 3, 2017)

sekkosiki said:


> I actually made a Cubase + VEP template yesterday, so I could share some tips, but beware that was my first VEP template, thus someone might have better instructions.
> 
> Hope that helps a bit! And ask questions, if you get stuck!



Thank you, Sekkosiki! A long and helpful answer. Are you from Finland? 

I haven't got the chance to try out everything you explained yet, but I have made my instances in VEP. I think having one instance per instrument type works best for me. Do you add several patches of the same instrument in Kontakt so that you have different articulations on each track? Or do you just add a multi-patch and use keyswitching/expression map to change articulations? And if you want to use a string quartet, do you have one channel for each instrument in VEP, or 4 different instrument patches in one instance of Kontakt?

I have only added multi-patches in Kontakt. Like Spitfire Chamber Strings with all articulations. But there are some articulations I would rarely use, so perhaps it's better for the RAM to add several patches of only the articulations I'd be likely to use?

What I have done so far is:
Added instances in VEP:
1 Sketch (just improv tracks with piano, strings or choir)
2 Woodwinds
3 Brass
4 Percussion
5 Keys & Harp
6 Strings
7 Choir
8 Ethnic
9 Synths & FX
10 Guitar, drums and bass

All this on a slave PC. But I wonder if I should move the synths to the master and just have them in their own Kontakt instances in Cubase? As they are so different from a string library, with often many hundred different instruments, it would perhaps be easier to browse for sounds in Cubase and not having to change my VEP template?

Do you have your processing plugins in VEP or Cubase? I see now that my RAM is at 85% with all these instances in VEP, so I think I have to run reverb, eq etc in Cubase. Maybe not a bad idea when it comes to effectivity after all?


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## Grizzlymv (Oct 3, 2017)

It has been a while since last time I've played with a master/slave setup as I now run everything on a single machine with disabled tracks. But if memory recall, what I used to do was to keep all my synths and other vst that I had to play with to sculpt the sound I wanted on my master, and have the more traditional instruments on the slave (strings, brass, woods, harps, pianos, orchestral percs, guitars and basses). I also kept the choirs on the master as it's more convenient to build phrases. 

Each kontakt instances routed the instance to the stereo output of that channel set in vep (since they were from the same libraries so didn't need different mix). Then in cubase, for each vep vst pointing to an instance in vep, I had to enable the channels (click on the little circle) so I can access more than one channel set per instance.

Now how they were structures in vep we're as follow:. I had one instance per family (ie, strings ,brass, woods, etc) then one or more channel sets per libraries since each channel sets represented 1 kontakt instance. So CSS violin 1 on channel set 1, CSS violin 2 on channel set 2, etc. I was using 1 articulation per channel. Not a fan of keyswitches. 

What I discovered is that you need to find the right balance regarding the amount of instances vs machines vs channel sets within instances to get it optimal for your setup. And even if there's several tutorial about doing templates on the net, everyone of them is different as in the end, it is built to suit the needs and preferences of the composer. So what you will end up with might very well be a mix of several small parts from here and there, that will end up working for you 

I moved it away from this as I got tired of having multiple machines to maintain. Was generating more heat as well. And was long to start given all the vst to load. 

The cubase / disabled instrument tracks works better for me as it's quicker to load, even when a rare crash occur, and using only 1 machine is making it much simpler for me. Enabling/disabling tracks is almost instant so I never felt the need to keep vep in the mix, even with a template of more than 1000 tracks ( I hate having to search for libraries, waiting for them to load, then set the mix and effects. ). And I like having everything in the same place so for each track I have the midi and audio data at the same place. Easier to apply effects and so on.

I hope this helps. Good luck with your setup.


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 3, 2017)

mrarnesen said:


> Are you from Finland? I guess we are neighbors as I'm from Norway



You are welcome! Yes I am, nice to meet you neighbor! 

I've been using multipatches for everything else than very often used articulations like staccato and legato, but you can have them as a multipatch inside Kontakt in VEP and still use different midi tracks in Cubase. I have basically legato, multi longs, multi shorts and dynamics (crescendos etc) in separate midi tracks but I have one Kontakt for each instrument e.g. Violins 1, Violins 2 etc. I'm also using Expression maps for the multis.

I think I wont put everything to VEP like synths, drums, or other light to resources instruments. Just the "bread snd butter" and heavy libraries.


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## garyhiebner (Oct 3, 2017)

Y


sekkosiki said:


> You are welcome! Yes I am, nice to meet you neighbor!
> 
> I've been using multipatches for everything else than very often used articulations like staccato and legato, but you can have them as a multipatch inside Kontakt in VEP and still use different midi tracks in Cubase. I have basically legato, multi longs, multi shorts and dynamics (crescendos etc) in separate midi tracks but I have one Kontakt for each instrument e.g. Violins 1, Violins 2 etc. I'm also using Expression maps for the multis.
> 
> I think I wont put everything to VEP like synths, drums, or other light to resources instruments. Just the "bread snd butter" and heavy libraries.


ou say you running it all on one machine. What the specs of your machine


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 3, 2017)

garyhiebner said:


> Y
> 
> ou say you running it all on one machine. What the specs of your machine



I have an i7 5820k overclocked to 4.6GHz, 64GB ram, Asus x99 Pro, all libraries and Cubase on SSDs.


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## kimarnesen (Oct 3, 2017)

sekkosiki said:


> You are welcome! Yes I am, nice to meet you neighbor!
> 
> I've been using multipatches for everything else than very often used articulations like staccato and legato, but you can have them as a multipatch inside Kontakt in VEP and still use different midi tracks in Cubase. I have basically legato, multi longs, multi shorts and dynamics (crescendos etc) in separate midi tracks but I have one Kontakt for each instrument e.g. Violins 1, Violins 2 etc. I'm also using Expression maps for the multis.
> 
> I think I wont put everything to VEP like synths, drums, or other light to resources instruments. Just the "bread snd butter" and heavy libraries.



Awesome. Rautavaara, Sallinen, Kortekangas, Kostiainen, Kähärä, Linkola, just some of my Finnish favorites 

So you have seperate articulations tracks AND a multi-track for the same library? To quickly find the most used articulations or?


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## kimarnesen (Oct 3, 2017)

Grizzlymv said:


> I hope this helps. Good luck with your setup.



Thank you. You have a more powerful computer than me, so perhaps my slave + master in total is comparable to your single machine. Where did/do you have your processing plugins, like reverb? Did you have reverb on every channel in VEP or did you create a string reverb bus, trumpet reverb bus etc?

I'm gonna use Altiverb 7 and 2Caudio breeze on all instruments to create the feeling of one space. But not sure where to have it yet.


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## kimarnesen (Oct 3, 2017)

mikeybabes said:


> Thinkspace have a 'Template in a weekend' course, but they do charge for it. It isn't specifically for Cubase - but it does cover it fairly well - though I don't think it looks much at the use of expression maps.
> 
> But it is a reasonably comprehensive look at template creation and for me I felt it was worth the money.
> 
> Otherwise Groove 3 have a good course on VEP 6 too.



Btw, the Thinkspace course is gold!


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 3, 2017)

kimarnesen said:


> Thank you. You have a more powerful computer than me, so perhaps my slave + master in total is comparable to your single machine. Where did/do you have your processing plugins, like reverb? Did you have reverb on every channel in VEP or did you create a string reverb bus, trumpet reverb bus etc?
> 
> I'm gonna use Altiverb 7 and 2Caudio breeze on all instruments to create the feeling of one space. But not sure where to have it yet.



I think it's more easy to handle if you have reverb fx tracks in Cubase, and you will send e.g. string bus to the reverb fx track. I'm having that setup in Cubase.



kimarnesen said:


> Awesome. Rautavaara, Sallinen, Kortekangas, Kostiainen, Kähärä, Linkola, just some of my Finnish favorites
> 
> So you have seperate articulations tracks AND a multi-track for the same library? To quickly find the most used articulations or?



Yes those composers are brilliant!

Yes! Exactly, legato tracks, staccatos, and multi-tracks for the same library => To find the most used articulations. Some people have all the articulations in separate tracks, but I have some of them separate and some of them in multis.


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## Grizzlymv (Oct 3, 2017)

kimarnesen said:


> Thank you. You have a more powerful computer than me, so perhaps my slave + master in total is comparable to your single machine. Where did/do you have your processing plugins, like reverb? Did you have reverb on every channel in VEP or did you create a string reverb bus, trumpet reverb bus etc?



Actually I'd created an fx track with my reverb on it. Then I'd add it in the send of every tracks which would need it and adjust the amount accordingly. 

For vst like CSS, I'd route all tracks to a CSS group track where I could apply effects or EQ as needed for the whole lib. Saving some resources there. And then those vst group tracks would go to stem tracks (strings, brass, hybrid percs etc) that would then go to master bus. That allows me some great level of granularity/flexibility. I pushed it further since I moved to disabled tracks and ditched vep. 

My old setup was master/slave on 2x 2010 Mac pros with 32 gb of ram. But with my current machine I barely use half of the resources even with heavy tracks.


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## kimarnesen (Oct 3, 2017)

sekkosiki said:


> I think it's more easy to handle if you have reverb fx tracks in Cubase, and you will send e.g. string bus to the reverb fx track. I'm having that setup in Cubase.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



It makes sense if you have passages with just legato, or just staccato. But what if you have a theme like this, with 5 articulations within 3 bars.










https://ibb.co/gW7Htw





Would you first have one midi note on the staccato track, then the next one on a marcato track, then some in the legato, one note on a trill track, and then 3 notes on the staccato, before the last one on the legato track?

Edit: Sorry for the img mess.


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 3, 2017)

kimarnesen said:


> It makes sense if you have passages with just legato, or just staccato. But what if you have a theme like this, with 5 articulations within 3 bars.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I select the tracks of the instrument, e.g. Violin 1, and edit them in the same note editor.

I'm having some articulations separate also because of mixing. It's easier to put an eq to an separate track than to a specific patch in a multi.


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## kimarnesen (Oct 4, 2017)

sekkosiki said:


> I select the tracks of the instrument, e.g. Violin 1, and edit them in the same note editor.
> 
> I'm having some articulations separate also because of mixing. It's easier to put an eq to an separate track than to a specific patch in a multi.



If you have a theme with let's say 5 different articulations, like the image I uploaded, would you record it on one track, and move the midi notes to different articulation tracks? Coming from the notation software tradition, this is quite new for me.


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## Lassi Tani (Oct 4, 2017)

kimarnesen said:


> If you have a theme with let's say 5 different articulations, like the image I uploaded, would you record it on one track, and move the midi notes to different articulation tracks? Coming from the notation software tradition, this is quite new for me.



Hmm no, if it's the same instrument. I just use different articulation tracks, but editing them in the same note editor window. If I'm using e.g. string ensemble track for sketching, then yes. And I don't have many different articulation tracks per instrument, just a few and the rest articulations are loaded in the same Kontakt instance.


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## JaikumarS (Oct 4, 2017)

kimarnesen said:


> Do you know of a tutorial (tutorial series) which shows you step by step how to create a template in VEP and Cubase, with routing at all? I've found a lot of videos with people showing their templates, but I'm so new with this that I need to see it from the very beginning in detail. Or I could have someone helping with this, if someone out there offers such help.




https://vi-control.net/community/threads/vienna-ensemble-pro-tutorial-thread.65405/


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## kimarnesen (Oct 4, 2017)

JaikumarS said:


> https://vi-control.net/community/threads/vienna-ensemble-pro-tutorial-thread.65405/



Thanks, I've been considering Lemur but it seems too time-consuming.


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## dog1978 (Oct 5, 2017)

I've done a few videos about VEPro. In the future I will do some videos about my Cubase template.


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## JaikumarS (Oct 5, 2017)

dog1978 said:


> I've done a few videos about VEPro. In the future I will do some videos about my Cubase template.



I'd posted it on the thread. Thank you


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## dog1978 (Oct 5, 2017)

JaikumarS said:


> I'd posted it on the thread. Thank you


Thanks


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## kimarnesen (Oct 5, 2017)

dog1978 said:


> I've done a few videos about VEPro. In the future I will do some videos about my Cubase template.




Awesome, will watch your videos!


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## foxby (Oct 13, 2017)

Great skills and very informative videos, I also let you a PM.
Awesome job!


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