# Reaper - does anyone fancy discussing where it is at now?



## dtonthept (Sep 5, 2015)

Hi folks,

I've been searching through the forum and checking out some older threads about Reaper. One of the things it is most famous for is the very fast update cycle, so when the best thread I found was started in Feb 2014, it made me think it might be time to start a fresh discussion on this.

I've been on Pro Tools, Live, and Logic for years, and have recently been learning Cubase - I don't want to be tied to Apple for Logic, Live is <AMAZING> for a certain approach, Pro Tools I am a total ninja at more for traditional engineering stuff, so I'm looking for a second home which is very much compositionally based. I'm really enjoying Cubase so far, but before my 4 month evaluation is finished I'm wondering if I should put in some time with Reaper.

There are a small number of incredibly passionate Reaper users on here, so I'm really interested to hear from you, and very interested indeed to hear from folks who are using Reaper in amongst other DAWs regularly; what you like Reaper for vs other solutions.

For me, I'm really interested in being able to run a lot of instruments, having excellent midi editing (I've never gotten into articulation swapping or expression maps, but it's an aspect of Cubase I really want to learn), super tight (like, sample accurate) timing between midi and audio, fast workflow, ideally audio editing and automation on par with Pro Tools... Oh, really I just want it ALL! 

I just downloaded a copy of Reaper and will be keen to examine any aspects of it that you folks point out, good or bad...

Thanks!

D


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## d.healey (Sep 5, 2015)

I love Reaper  I used to be a Cubase user but got frustrated with some of its limitations a few years ago and made the switch to Reaper. There are only two things I have found lacking in Reaper: 1. it doesn't have an audio editor although you can do all the sequencer type audio editing in it, and you can set up any other application to automatically open audio from within Reaper, which is good because I can switch between different audio editors for different tasks while working in Reaper. 2. It doesn't have a score editor (although one has been hinted at for version 5.1) again this isn't too much of an issue because you can link MIDI files from within Reaper to musescore or Sibelius, and I haven't found another DAW that has a decent score editor. 

I also like that Reaper is tiny, I think it's around a 75mb install at the moment, and it can be installed as a portable application so you can run it off a pen drive.

What are the things that are important to you in a DAW?


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## dtonthept (Sep 5, 2015)

Hey there! 

Thanks for the reply, much appreciated. 

Essentially I'm looking for a do it all music production DAW. I am incredibly strong in Pro Tools but noticed that I tend to actually avoid doing a lot of midi work simply because it is still clunky to program, and at late stages of a mix it's nigh on impossible to add extra parts. 

I'm most interested in your bringing up the lack of an audio editor in reaper - I actually prefer editing my audio right on the time line, zooming in as far as you need to go, as in pro tools, rather than having separate windows opened, as in cubase, logic etc. So if this is the case with reaper, I would be delighted. 

I have also always never been a template person, building every piece of music from scratch. I don't do much music to picture but have been heavily impressed at the film scoring work flows - having huge templates with everything always ready sound great, so long as I can access it, and it doesn't slow down operation for recording performers etc. 

I'm also most fascinated by developing macros and custom work flows. This is what got me very excited about Cubase, and I only recently discovered this is possible in Reaper too. 

So, in summary - very detailed and fast audio editing, large template capabilities, in depth and fast midi programming, customization options, advanced automation of both normal mix parameters and all plug ins, easy and streamlined handling of LARGE number of physical inputs and outputs (I'm currently 52 in, 56 out) 

And I would love it to feel fun to work in too. 

I'll always use Pro Tools for certain things (mostly purely engineering focused work) but would really love a different world to write, program, and record in. 

Again, really been enjoying Cubase, and starting to understand its particular way of looking at the world, but I'm not too far up the learning curve to step into Reaper if it's right. 

And! Obviously, the "what you know is what's best" argument holds a lot of water, it's just that from decades of use I have a very strong understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of Pro Tools, Able ton Live, Logic, and even Max/Msp, and feel clear I am looking for one other realm to work in. Ideally Avid would just make the midi in Pro Tools great, but I don't think that is really going to happen - and in any ways I like the idea of being in a different DAW when using a different part of my brain. 

D


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## d.healey (Sep 6, 2015)

Reaper is very strong on MIDI, much more than pro-tools. With regard to audio editing you can zoom right in on the time line and chop and edit, adjust envelopes etc. but for really detailed work I tend to use an external editor like RX3 or similar, it just has so much more power than Reaper (or any other DAW's) audio editor. Groove3 did a great set of Reaper tutorials, the ones I got were for Reaper 3 I believe, but they are a great starting point to get used to setting up tracks in Reaper and understanding its signal path and bussing system, which is quite different to Cubase's. All your other requirements I think Reaper can handle no problem, templates, lots of tracks etc.


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## dtonthept (Sep 6, 2015)

Great thanks for the extra info. I have a groove 3 full subscription so will check those vids. 

What would you say are your favourite things about reaper that you weren't getting elsewhere? Anything that comes to mind, big or little things


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 6, 2015)

I can wholeheartedly recommend Reaper as well. For me it's the unparalleled customisability that really sets it apart from just about anything else. As far as workflow enhancements go, there's almost nothing you can't setup and map to a button, hotkey or external controller.

I use Reaper for all my audio editing and sound design, but not yet for music (midi based). The only things keeping me from ditching Cubase, is that Reapers CC editing is not as comfortable and nice, and that Reaper lacks expression maps (although there are several plugins that aims to remedy this).

All in all: Give Reaper a try. If you aren't as picky as me with the feel of CC editing, I'm sure you will love it.


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## d.healey (Sep 6, 2015)

I've been mainly using Reaper for editing samples so my needs are a little different to most people. I like the fact I can write custom plugins for it right inside the interface, the batch naming tools are fantastic, especially when combined with the SWS extensions (you should check them out). I also like that you can write on the keyboard keys in the piano roll (right click on the keys to do this) and the text you put there shows up on the MIDI notes throughout the piano roll so you can easily see which key switches are being triggered without having to refer to each instrument's GUI or key switch reference, I set up track templates for each of my VIs for this. I could go on....


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## dtonthept (Sep 6, 2015)

Okay this is really interesting stuff from both of you, thanks! That naming the key ability sounds REALLY cool, and understanding the possibilities of scripting etc is quite enticing. 

Another forum member (whose name escapes me right now, but who originally suggested I check Reaper) had really interesting things to say about setting up huge templates but keeping unused tracks frozen... 

Please keep dropping any thoughts in here, it's very cool to have a sense of what features to look for and learn at this stage. 

D


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## dtonthept (Sep 6, 2015)

Rasmus, are there any particular customizations you've done that you really enjoy and could share?


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## kitekrazy (Sep 6, 2015)

I use to hate trying to set up Kontakt in Reaper now it's a click and all 16 channels are routed. It's a DAW where the developers communicate with it's users. (they listen) It's a DAW that doesn't use a lot of system resources. 
I'd like to hear from people who dumped an app like Cubase for Reaper.


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## d.healey (Sep 6, 2015)

Reaper is very reliant on keyboard shortcuts and is slim on menus (by default but you can add all the buttons and menu options you want). If you plan on using a lot of custom macros, like I do, then I suggest setting up a touch OSC template on a tablet so you don't have to remember all the keyboard shortcuts or go digging around in menus. It takes a while to set up and will probably be a work in progress for sometime but it's worth it.

Coming from Cubase the thing I found most confusing is Reaper's routing/bussing system, it's much easier and more logical than Cubase's in my opinion. If you have a track that's a child track (i.e. it's in a folder/parent track) then all audio from that track is routed through the parent before going to the master output, so essentially the parent is the bus and can contain any number of children - which can also be parents .


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## dtonthept (Sep 6, 2015)

Just sat down for a couple of hours with the first groove 3 course, just getting going and messing around - it really is seriously impressive and streamlined so far!


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## cyoder (Sep 6, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Another forum member (whose name escapes me right now, but who originally suggested I check Reaper) had really interesting things to say about setting up huge templates but keeping unused tracks frozen...


I doubt I was the person you're talking about, but I've been using this method recently. I assigned a shortcut to take the selected track's plugins offline/online, so it keeps larger templates ready to go but light on resources. For me this is great with the EW Hollywood Orchestra, where I've loaded up an articulation per track, balanced it, then hidden the track and taken it offline. I can load up all of the instruments from a template, then for whatever articulation I want to use, I just find it in the track manager, unhide it, and reload the plugin (with original settings) with a keystroke. It gives me easy access to all instruments and articulations without eating up all my RAM. 
/ramble

Best,


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 7, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Rasmus, are there any particular customizations you've done that you really enjoy and could share?



Nothing earth shaking really, but some of the things I've set up include:

- One click button to insert numbered regions around each selected item - based on that items name (for batch export)
- Buttons that insert a track, loads a certain VSTi on it, prefixes the trackname with the instrument-name, and auto-assigns a track icon. (Used to take me almost a minute - now takes 1 second)
- Button that creates a one octave violin run with humanization

I just got into scripting my own actions in ReaScript in the last week, and that rabbit hole seems to go very deep indeed. Can't wait to get to know that a bit more.


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## dtonthept (Sep 7, 2015)

Great replies and insights! Thank you! 

Delving deeper at my end, what's really striking me is how everything I'm learning seems like a big surprise that they made it this way, however intuitively I am able to grasp exactly why they did it, why it is so effective, and I am also saying WOW and OH THANK GOD and HOLY SHIT THAT IS REALLY COOL a lot. 

I'm even starting to think there is a chance I might be able to get out of Pro Tools too for all my mixing work... Still early days but I never even imagined I would ever consider that for an instance! 

For anyone curious, I'd highly recommended grabbing the installer plus the groove 3 reaper 3 course... I had never really understood why Reaper was getting the hype, thought it was just because it was cheap, but I'm really getting it now. 

Having said all of this, I am only going through tutorials, I haven't driven her in anger across bumpy terrain yet


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## Lannister (Sep 7, 2015)

There's a load of videos on the REAPER website too, some of which I think are from groove3 originally.

They're for REAPER 4.xx and up, so more recent if you're watching version 3 videos.

http://www.reaper.fm/videos.php


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## samphony (Sep 7, 2015)

Kenny Gioa is the king if it's about reaper in my opinion. Although I am a logic/Ableton Live veteran, thanks to him I understand reaper much much better. I'm trying projects just for fun from time to time but haven't done any serious work with it yet.

I like the sws extension a lot especially the possibility to grab the grid to align the tempo in the same way cubase does it.
Another cool thing is the sws snapshots. Just wow.

kenny gs videos, a portable install and curiosity helped me to get an idea what's possible with reaper. And indeed for over a year now I'm able to nearly mimic my Logic Pro workflow.

I haven't fully understand the new vst3 Vienna ensemble pro setup inside reaper just yet. Disabling and hiding tracks is also cool.

I'm now on the hunt for a scripter who could realize
"Show only tracks with content at edit cursor" because that is a really cool workflow feature in cubendo. Maybe something is possible with lua and macros and what not.


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## dtonthept (Sep 7, 2015)

Hi hi, 

Yes Kenny really is great...! I finished all my reaper 3 tutorials then saw that the reaper 4 course was also a from scratch course! Feel like it's time to make a simple template and mess around with making some music now, then delve deeper into some other tutorials.


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 8, 2015)

samphony said:


> I'm now on the hunt for a scripter who could realize
> "Show only tracks with content at edit cursor" because that is a really cool workflow feature in cubendo. Maybe something is possible with lua and macros and what not.



Here you go: https://www.dropbox.com/s/69gsqcokzwagti3/AZ - Show only tracks with content at cursor.lua?dl=0


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## samphony (Sep 8, 2015)

Always work on a project and try to stay in one environment as much as possible to learn and develop a workflow.


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## samphony (Sep 8, 2015)

Rasmus Hartvig said:


> Here you go: https://www.dropbox.com/s/69gsqcokzwagti3/AZ - Show only tracks with content at cursor.lua?dl=0



I'll give it a try and let you know. is this a toggle key command to toggle between show all tracks and show only tracks with content at edit cursor?


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 8, 2015)

samphony said:


> I'll give it a try and let you know. is this a toggle key command to toggle between show all tracks and show only tracks with content at edit cursor?



It's not a toggle since that is a bit more difficult to make (afaik LUA actions can't remember state between each time they're run). But try downloading the file again. I just updated it so if the cursor doesn't intersect any mediaitems, all tracks are shown (instead of hiding all tracks, which you probably never want).


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## samphony (Sep 8, 2015)

Rasmus Hartvig said:


> It's not a toggle since that is a bit more difficult to make (afaik LUA actions can't remember state between each time they're run). But try downloading the file again. I just updated it so if the cursor doesn't intersect any mediaitems, all tracks are shown (instead of hiding all tracks, which you probably never want).



Thanks. I'll give that a try. As you are fit in terms of scripting. Do you know if there is a plugin or if it is possible to switch between the event channels 1-16 while playing? I know I can select midi notes and change their event channel afterwards.

Thanks


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 8, 2015)

samphony said:


> Do you know if there is a plugin or if it is possible to switch between the event channels 1-16 while playing? I know I can select midi notes and change their event channel afterwards.



I'm pretty much a beginner when it comes to ReaScript, but I guess it should be possible.
Try checking out this plugin that Blake Robinson made: http://syntheticorchestra.com/articulatereaper/

I haven't tried it myself yet, since I still do all my music in Cubase - but it seems like it can do what you need.


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## ThomasL (Sep 8, 2015)

Rasmus Hartvig said:


> Here you go: https://www.dropbox.com/s/69gsqcokzwagti3/AZ - Show only tracks with content at cursor.lua?dl=0


Gonna test that one soon, many thanks Rasmus!


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## samphony (Sep 8, 2015)

Rasmus Hartvig said:


> I'm pretty much a beginner when it comes to ReaScript, but I guess it should be possible.
> Try checking out this plugin that Blake Robinson made: http://syntheticorchestra.com/articulatereaper/
> 
> I haven't tried it myself yet, since I still do all my music in Cubase - but it seems like it can do what you need.


Thanks for your efforts rasmus! 

The Blake plugin is great for mouse editing after stuff is played in. I'm looking to mimic my LPX workflow where I can play live and change event channels while playing. No biggie just nice to have when playing around.


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## ThomasL (Sep 8, 2015)

samphony said:


> I like the sws extension a lot especially the possibility to grab the grid to align the tempo in the same way cubase does it.


Huh? Some kind of "beatmapping" I guess? Care to elaborate? This is one of those things that gets me back into Logic, mapping tempo to a played MIDI track. Didn't know that Reaper could do it.


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## samphony (Sep 8, 2015)

ThomasL said:


> Huh? Some kind of "beatmapping" I guess? Care to elaborate? This is one of those things that gets me back into Logic, mapping tempo to a played MIDI track. Didn't know that Reaper could do it.



Hey Thomas,
Here you go.







http://wiki.cockos.com/wiki/index.php/Tempo_manipulation_with_SWS

I've created a macro that behaves the same way like logics lock region to smpte and assigned the tempo mapping to the T key. So you hold the T key while moving the cursor.


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## ThomasL (Sep 8, 2015)

Thanks! Gonna have to read up on that then!


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## samphony (Sep 8, 2015)

I do all serious work still in logic and alchemy is my new best friend I love importing images like I did with meta synth in the past. Reaper is a daw with a lot of potential in my opinion but like studio one I have the feeling its strength is more in the audio department. 

I also haven't found a good GUI yet.


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## Hannes_F (Sep 8, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> What would you say are your favourite things about reaper



The routing
Multichannel tracks


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## dtonthept (Sep 9, 2015)

Hey Samphony, what are the key midi things you feel are missing from Reaper at the moment?

This video about a customized midi setup more or less tipped me over the edge to wanting to try Reaper, it looked great for the type of programming I do: 

And this Theme/GUI seems to be getting a lot of love, though I haven't tried it yet myself!

http://www.houseofwhitetie.com/reaper/imperial/wt_imperial.html

Looking forward to checking out these other extensions that have been posted.


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## dtonthept (Sep 10, 2015)

Okay, this is the big question, you all sitting down with hands on buzzers? 

Is it possible, in Reaper, to edit automation Pro Tools style, whereby you can select a chunk of time which has no automation nodes on it, then switch to the trim tool and slide it up or down? In other words, can this be done without having to make the four nodes?

I haven't found an action that does it yet, but imagine it must be something that could be scripted or custom built? 

Crossing my fingers here...


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 11, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Is it possible, in Reaper, to edit automation Pro Tools style, whereby you can select a chunk of time which has no automation nodes on it, then switch to the trim tool and slide it up or down? In other words, can this be done without having to make the four nodes?



Ctrl+shift and drag the curve. Didn't even know about that until now, but it is awesome!


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## EvilDragon (Sep 11, 2015)

samphony said:


> I also haven't found a good GUI yet.



I guess that one is very subjective. Here's mine (dual monitor screenshot):






There are some great themes in the theming section of the Reaper forum. Some of them are unfinished, though, but some of them might be what you're asking for. But probably it's a good question - what are you asking for from the theme?


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## dtonthept (Sep 11, 2015)

Rasmus Hartvig said:


> Ctrl+shift and drag the curve. Didn't even know about that until now, but it is awesome!



Hi Rasmus,

I'm so excited about this - I just loaded up Reaper to try it and it only moves the entire line instead of just the area selected, are you getting the same behaviour?

In other words, even if there was already a ton of automation elsewhere, but I wanted to select a two bar area and JUST move that, I currently have to go and draw two nodes at either end of that area in order to do so. In Pro Tools you can just select an area, and immediately you can hold control when using your tool, and it will only move that area, automatically making nodes at either end of the selection.


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## dtonthept (Sep 11, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> I guess that one is very subjective. Here's mine (dual monitor screenshot):
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Hey thanks for this screen grab, what's the window you have docked on the extreme right, next to your midi window? Thanks!


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## tack (Sep 11, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> I guess that one is very subjective. Here's mine (dual monitor screenshot):


Which theme is that?


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## EvilDragon (Sep 11, 2015)

That's the first version of RADO theme with some of my own tweaks.

In the MIDI editor, on the right side, that's the Track List. You can enable it from the Contents menu. This is where you can select which tracks containing MIDI items are visible and/or editable, etc.


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## dtonthept (Sep 11, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> That's the first version of RADO theme with some of my own tweaks.
> 
> In the MIDI editor, on the right side, that's the Track List. You can enable it from the Contents menu. This is where you can select which tracks containing MIDI items are visible and/or editable, etc.



Awesome, I was hoping that might be the case! My study hasn't gotten quite that far yet and I was hoping that feature existed. Thanks!


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## dtonthept (Sep 11, 2015)

Hmmm I just went through the manual and it specifically tells you to draw the four nodes to be able to move a specific section of automation, no sign of what I'm after. I guess it's time to start posting direct of the dedicated feature request part of the reaper forum to test out the fast and responsive updates part of the company!


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## Rasmus Hartvig (Sep 11, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Hmmm I just went through the manual and it specifically tells you to draw the four nodes to be able to move a specific section of automation, no sign of what I'm after.



That's strange, because I got the other way working easily. I made a two bar time selection around an un-automated volume curve and dragged the curve with ctrl+shift held in. That automatically created the four nodes.
What version / os are you using? 
I'm on Reaper 5.01 on Windows.


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## dtonthept (Sep 11, 2015)

Rasmus Hartvig said:


> That's strange, because I got the other way working easily. I made a two bar time selection around an un-automated volume curve and dragged the curve with ctrl+shift held in. That automatically created the four nodes.
> What version / os are you using?
> I'm on Reaper 5.01 on Windows.



Oh, do you mean there was already automation on the track elsewhere? Or could you please clarify what you mean by unautomated volume curve? 

I'm not at my computer at the moment, but could you try this on a totally new track with no automation at all and see if it works? Or if it will then drag the entire lane instead? Might be that there has to be automation on the track already... 

I'm on a Mac and the latest reaper version, but very curious to run a PC soon. 

And very curious to get to the bottom of this. I'm getting a tad nervous that reaper might not be so good at selecting and manipulating musical chunks of automation - that is to say, selecting and duplicating a bar of automation, or selecting eight bars elsewhere and offsetting it... 

I'm actually mixing all day in pro tools for clients at the moment so haven't had time to play around much myself


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## EvilDragon (Sep 12, 2015)

You can make a time selection and use the trim slider on the envelope lane to influence the time selection, and Ctrl+Shift does work within time selection over here:


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## dtonthept (Sep 12, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> You can make a time selection and use the trim slider on the envelope lane to influence the time selection, and Ctrl+Shift does work within time selection over here:



OH MY GOD EVIL DRAGON I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!! 

Thank you thank you!!! I had been searching everywhere for that. Any other tips or tricks up your sleeve? 

And just stating the obvious, that technique works on any and all types of automation/envelope lanes? 

Thanks again


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## EvilDragon (Sep 12, 2015)

Yeah that works on all envelopes.


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## samphony (Sep 12, 2015)

Does any of you use VEP? I haven't figured out how to assign tracks to multiple ports yet. I found how to send to either of one of the ports but not to all of them.

So the idea is to load one VEP plugin that leads to an instance with all strings loaded. I found the pin connector in the Reaper fx window where I load the VEP server plugin.

It's easy to set up the first 16midi channels for midi port 1 but my strings instance is setup to receive 48ports a 16midi channels.

Any idea?


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## dtonthept (Sep 12, 2015)

Awesome! Just got to my studio and tried it out, you'll be totally unsurprised to know it works beautifully.

I figured out why it wasn't working before - me being on a mac I should have been holding down command + shift, it's the old PC ctrl = mac command trick. Can't believe I forgot that!

Evil Dragon, do you have any scripts etc that you've found useful for editing envelopes etc? I just came across Raymond Radet's site and have been pretty impressed with his work. Yet to incorporate them into my workflow but it's really fascinating seeing these deep diving methods being pioneered out there.


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## dtonthept (Sep 12, 2015)

I haven't tried VEP yet, but actually was going to ask everyone if anyone had done a comparison between using VEP and ReaMote. Samphony are you running a slave machine?

ReaMote looks amazing in that, from what I understand, your instruments will be processed on your slave machine, but the GUI etc remains in your Reaper session, in other words, no having to flip to a different application to adjust things. Obviously the benefits of VEP involve the fact that you don't have to load your samples etc whenever you load a session, but I'm really wondering if there is a way to do it with ReaMote that would be more efficient. Scrianinoff made a post about how fast Reaper's track freeze function is - he has a big template that he runs on his laptop with Kontakt instruments frozen everywhere, it then loads incredibly quickly, and he has a custom key command set to unfreeze tracks when he wants to play them, which only takes a couple of seconds... Hmmmmm possibilities....


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## samphony (Sep 12, 2015)

In Logic I can name regions by tracks and tracks by regions. 
Is there an equivalent in reaper?


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## samphony (Sep 12, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> I haven't tried VEP yet, but actually was going to ask everyone if anyone had done a comparison between using VEP and ReaMote. Samphony are you running a slave machine?
> 
> ReaMote looks amazing in that, from what I understand, your instruments will be processed on your slave machine, but the GUI etc remains in your Reaper session, in other words, no having to flip to a different application to adjust things. Obviously the benefits of VEP involve the fact that you don't have to load your samples etc whenever you load a session, but I'm really wondering if there is a way to do it with ReaMote that would be more efficient. Scrianinoff made a post about how fast Reaper's track freeze function is - he has a big template that he runs on his laptop with Kontakt instruments frozen everywhere, it then loads incredibly quickly, and he has a custom key command set to unfreeze tracks when he wants to play them, which only takes a couple of seconds... Hmmmmm possibilities....



I never needed a slave yet but looking forward to setup 1-2 of them in the next months.

I've created a macro that deactivates the track and hides it. That way the session loads fast. 

I find no matter what DAW one uses setting up templates is a dynamic and sometimes daunting task. Once you have everything in place and did your house keeping the template loads up quickly. Regarding kontakt I like to load all instances purged no matter if it is inside the DAW or in VEP although 
I'm running everything SSD based 

As soon as you recall a project you are working on where you've hosted kontakt and a lot of them the purge function doesn't apply (who would go through all kontakt instances before closing a big project anyways?)

That's where VEP comes in handy. I wouldn't mind if kontakt 6 would offer a "load instruments purged" on load by default. That would cut down in loading time when recalling projects.


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## EvilDragon (Sep 12, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Evil Dragon, do you have any scripts etc that you've found useful for editing envelopes etc?



Nope I just use what's in there in Reaper. Was fine for me. Of course, SWS extensions are a must!


As for VEP, you need to use MIDI busses in Reaper, and then map those MIDI busses to VST3 ports (there's an option for that when you right-click the I/O button in the plugin window, then select MIDI Input in the dropdown menu). Reaper has 16 busses so you can't use all 48 ports of VEP, only 16 for now.

Then for every track you want to have your MIDI data on, you send MIDI to the VEP track via those busses. Set it up once, then store it as a track template

I don't use VEP so I can't provide you with a track template, but I hope this helps.



samphony said:


> In Logic I can name regions by tracks and tracks by regions.
> Is there an equivalent in reaper?



First let's get the nomenclature straight. "Region" in Reaper is not the same thing as "region" in other DAWs. I assume you meant items, or?


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## samphony (Sep 12, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> Nope I just use what's in there in Reaper. Was fine for me. Of course, SWS extensions are a must!
> 
> 
> As for VEP, you need to use MIDI busses in Reaper, and then map those MIDI busses to VST3 ports (there's an option for that when you right-click the I/O button in the plugin window, then select MIDI Input in the dropdown menu). Reaper has 16 busses so you can't use all 48 ports of VEP, only 16 for now.
> ...


Region = item. Yes. 

Thanks for clarifying the VEP bus relationship.


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## EvilDragon (Sep 12, 2015)

SWS extensions have actions to name the track according to the name of first item on the track or in the project. As for naming items according to tracks, I guess you could use Xenakios/SWS: Auto-rename selected takes action, use this format: [trackname] [inctrackorder]


Always search the action list


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## samphony (Sep 12, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> SWS extensions have actions to name the track according to the name of first item on the track or in the project. As for naming items according to tracks, I guess you could use Xenakios/SWS: Auto-rename selected takes action, use this format: [trackname] [inctrackorder]
> 
> 
> Always search the action list



Thanks


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## samphony (Sep 12, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Awesome! Just got to my studio and tried it out, you'll be totally unsurprised to know it works beautifully.
> 
> I figured out why it wasn't working before - me being on a mac I should have been holding down command + shift, it's the old PC ctrl = mac command trick. Can't believe I forgot that!
> 
> Evil Dragon, do you have any scripts etc that you've found useful for editing envelopes etc? I just came across Raymond Radet's site and have been pretty impressed with his work. Yet to incorporate them into my workflow but it's really fascinating seeing these deep diving methods being pioneered out there.



These scripts might come in handy if you are after envelope operations.

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=157604


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## Darthmorphling (Sep 12, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> I haven't tried VEP yet, but actually was going to ask everyone if anyone had done a comparison between using VEP and ReaMote. Samphony are you running a slave machine?
> 
> ReaMote looks amazing in that, from what I understand, your instruments will be processed on your slave machine, but the GUI etc remains in your Reaper session, in other words, no having to flip to a different application to adjust things. Obviously the benefits of VEP involve the fact that you don't have to load your samples etc whenever you load a session, but I'm really wondering if there is a way to do it with ReaMote that would be more efficient. Scrianinoff made a post about how fast Reaper's track freeze function is - he has a big template that he runs on his laptop with Kontakt instruments frozen everywhere, it then loads incredibly quickly, and he has a custom key command set to unfreeze tracks when he wants to play them, which only takes a couple of seconds... Hmmmmm possibilities....



I have been in the process of figuring out how to use Reaper like VEPro, but on the same machine. I think I have it figured out and will share the results when I get home later. You might be able to apply it to using a slave machine, but I cannot test that unfortunately.


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## Darthmorphling (Sep 12, 2015)

Here is what I have and it mostly works. You need to have your regular Reaper install and a portable install. You also need to to have ReaRoute installed, which doesn't get installed by default. In the portable install, you choose ReaRoute ASIO as your audio device. The regular install uses your regular interface. You also need to have midi yoke installed. In the attached file there are two reaper files. Open the vst host file in the portable install and the vst template in the regular install.

When you select Track 1 in the Template project, it sends midi to track 1 in the portable install. The ReaSynth track in the portable install sends its audio to track 2 in the regular install. I have a send from track 2, to track 3. This is because in order to hear the audio, track 2 needs to be armed. I have it set for monitoring only. It then sends its audio to track 3 that doesn't need to be armed.

It needs to be set up this way as you cannot record your midi without recording audio on track 2. Hence having it be monitoring only. With the audio routed to track 3, I can record the midi in track 1 without recording the audio. Track 3 is set to record output, but there is another problem: you cannot render its audio as a stem. Instead, you have to arm it and hit record.

I'm sure there are some who can get this figured out better than I and hopefully they will chime in.

I'm guesssing the VEPro would be better for this, but apparently there are some issues with that and Reaper anyway.


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## Darthmorphling (Sep 14, 2015)

I wrote midiyoke, but I am actually using Loopmidi.


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## dtonthept (Sep 14, 2015)

I'll look forward to checking this stuff out, thanks!


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## dtonthept (Sep 14, 2015)

Hey does anyone want to share what they've put in their toolbars? I was really fascinated by that midi editor toolbar video I linked to earlier, I'm very interested to see what other folks are using in any or all of their editors etc... 

D


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## cyoder (Sep 14, 2015)

I've been putting some time into customizing the midi toolbar as well as creating a modular template, and then adding them to a toolbar on the right side to load more quickly. I'm mostly done now, but I'll probably be tweaking it for the next forever...

Best,


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## dtonthept (Sep 14, 2015)

Cyoder that looks really interesting, thanks! Are those buttons for colours set up in the window behind? And would you be able to expand on what you mean by modular template? Does that mean those buttons on the right will instantly load up specific tracks/instruments etc? And you have different tabs with different groups of instruments? Very very curious to hear about this, it's never even crossed my mind before - sounds like a really cool approach! Do they have all their routing etc set up? Anything you need to bear in mind for this approach? And do you find this works better and faster than having an everything always on template? Gotta say the simplicity, and not having 3,000 tracks at the start of every project is very appealing to me indeed. Really cool idea!!


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## cyoder (Sep 14, 2015)

dtonthept said:


> Are those buttons for colours set up in the window behind?


Yes, that's EvilDragon's Color Toolbar, with a few additions of my own.


dtonthept said:


> would you be able to expand on what you mean by modular template?


By modular, I mean that I have sets of instruments or sections of the orchestra already set up and laid out as tracks, pre-balanced, etc. to be loaded as templates (First tab is orchestral, second is ethnic/bits and bobs). I mostly am trying out this idea because due to RAM and CPU limitations, my computer runs out of steam quickly if I try to have everything loaded at once. I honestly can't say if it works better and faster yet since I just finished it, but I'm hoping it will cut down on project setup time. Some downsides are that it will take a whole lot of tweaking/resaving of templates to get it balanced well, and as it is now I have to reroute tracks to reverb again every time (although this is just drag and drop in Reaper 5). I'm still trying to refine the idea in my head, so I'll probably be tweaking this at the expense of writing music far into the future! Oh the joys of technology...

Hope that clarifies, I'm rather excited by the potential of this idea myself.

Best,


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## Rv5 (Sep 15, 2015)

Still running into issues with Reaper 5 and VEP in order to achieve a large template -

For example in CuBase 8 I'm connected to one instance of VEP5 on a slave with 48 midi sends and 256 channel return.

Reaper only allows for 16 midi sends and I can only get 64 channel return though this just might be a setting I've not yet found. Also the midi routing seems buggy, when using the vst3 midi busses cc information is sent on bus 1 but bus 2+ no midi cc seems to be sending.

Then there remains the issue that Reaper is telling VEP to restart its audio engine each time play is pressed in Reaper.
This is the 'flush fx' message as when 'flush fx on stop' is selected it does the same thing upon stopping playback. So when you press play in Reaper, VEP restarts the audio engine. This means for every instance of VEP there is an added delay to playback which becomes noticeable after a handful of instances, which would be needed to accommodate the limited sends and returns (for larger templates).

A 'do not flush fx on start' option would be ideal, but the request has gone unnoticed, while others find the same problem there does not seem to be enough users attempting a large VEP template in Reaper to really support this.

Was hoping the VST3 support would get things going but alas, Reaper 5 just isn't there for large orchestral templates in VEP (unless I'm missing something - is anyone else getting on okay with this?). It's a shame - Reaper is amazing, so much of it makes sense and it's so close to being bob on (regarding these requirements anyway!).


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## Scrianinoff (Sep 15, 2015)

For what's it's worth. I dumped VE Pro for the time being, and that may very well be a very long time. My template of only frozen tracks takes less than 10 seconds to load. Unfreezing a track takes only literally 2 seconds. And my template holds 5 to 6 times the number of instruments I can load on a 32GB slave. I have everything at hand, ready to play in just 2 seconds, no searching for the right instance, no debugging VE Pro or Cubase after every other update. I can run huge orchestration without even a single crackle. I will probably never go back. On top of that I never had such low latency. And, I can run the exact same template on my 32GB laptop. Well, I think it would run even on a 16GB laptop.


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## EvilDragon (Sep 15, 2015)

Scrianinoff said:


> For what's it's worth. I dumped VE Pro for the time being, and that may very well be a very long time. My template of only frozen tracks takes less than 10 seconds to load. Unfreezing a track takes only literally 2 seconds. And my template holds 5 to 6 times the number of instruments I can load on a 32GB slave. I have everything at hand, ready to play in just 2 seconds, no searching for the right instance, no debugging VE Pro or Cubase after every other update. I can run huge orchestration without even a single crackle. I will probably never go back. On top of that I never had such low latency. And, I can run the exact same template on my 32GB laptop. Well, I think it would run even on a 16GB laptop.



That's quite amazing to read.  So, you basically use one instance of Kontakt per NKI? Or do you have some multis constructed as well?

I also think it's pretty great to have a frozen template, then you just fire stuff up at will. With SSDs in game, should be an absolutely smooth experience.


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## dtonthept (Sep 15, 2015)

Oh! Scrianinoff!! There you are!! Remember me? I took your advice, and it was great advice indeed. Very happy to have you chipping in on this one at this point in time. Your frozen template idea is super cool, I think for me running a cross between your situation and what cyoder is doing would work really well. 

I'd love it if you could share some screenshots with us, I'm really curious to see how you have set up your template, your toolbars, etc. 

I'm not a big user of expression maps, but, coming from Cubase, what has been your workaround in Reaper?


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## dtonthept (Sep 15, 2015)

cyoder said:


> Hope that clarifies, I'm rather excited by the potential of this idea myself.



Yes that is super useful, thank you! Lots for me to think about. Also very cool that those colours are from EvilDragon


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## Rv5 (Sep 15, 2015)

I'm aware of this in CuBase - disabling tracks so they don't load up - are you doing this in Reaper and if so how? I remember Alex Pfeffer talking about freezing in CuBase for some huge templates, if it's doable in Reaper that'd be cool!


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## samphony (Sep 15, 2015)

Scrianinoff said:


> For what's it's worth. I dumped VE Pro for the time being, and that may very well be a very long time. My template of only frozen tracks takes less than 10 seconds to load. Unfreezing a track takes only literally 2 seconds. And my template holds 5 to 6 times the number of instruments I can load on a 32GB slave. I have everything at hand, ready to play in just 2 seconds, no searching for the right instance, no debugging VE Pro or Cubase after every other update. I can run huge orchestration without even a single crackle. I will probably never go back. On top of that I never had such low latency. And, I can run the exact same template on my 32GB laptop. Well, I think it would run even on a 16GB laptop.


Great approach. So you basically setup everything like kontakt and other VI's including routing etc and apply a simple freeze action?

Why do you prefer freeze over deactivate and hide? I'm still learning reaper (if I find time to play with it). I've setup an Action macro that deactivates the track including all plugins and an Action that activates it if needed.

I'm obsessed by speed so if a template or project starts up under 30-20sec I prefer that over what I was used to in the past with 3-7min.

It's true even if you load up a massive template it's just for convenience most of the time no one needs all instruments from that template all the time. That's why a modular approach like loading sections fast or unfreezeing or deactivating tracks was long overdue.

Although I'm using VEP since its first appearance I have to admit that it never was problem free on a single machine. What bothers me most are the disconnection times when switching projects. I think regarding reaper I will pass using VEP at all as it is very efficient even with larger sessions.

How does your freezing workflow looks like if you are open to share that.

I can share my macro for activating/deactivating tracks of course.


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## Ozymandias (Sep 15, 2015)

Rv5 said:


> I'm aware of this in CuBase - disabling tracks so they don't load up - are you doing this in Reaper and if so how?



If you just want to unload instruments from memory with settings preserved, there are actions for setting track FX offline/online (SWS extension has additional actions for specific FX slots).

Works very well with Kontakt.


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## Scrianinoff (Sep 15, 2015)

I have not used deactivate yet. I use freeze also for its intended purpose to freeze tracks mid project. So freezing all vst is the same operation. One thing less to remember that way for me. Deactivate might be faster though. But how much faster than 2 seconds do I need to get? Mind you, even a track holding Sable 1-4 fully loaded with Vi1 patches loads in 3 seconds. I don't use toolbars, I like key commands.

The manual on the Reaper site is really good. As they say: RTFM!  My laptop is not your average laptop though. It's an Alienware with an i7 3820qm overclocked to 4.1 GHz, 32GB ram and 4TB of SSD spread over 4 drives. My template holds the full Spitfire orchestra, everything 8dio, EW Hollywood, half of VSL, almost all choirs available, and lots of other libs that aren't such space hogs.


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## Darthmorphling (Sep 15, 2015)

Here is a link to my orchestral template. I think it may answer some of the questions you may have about routing. The pic doesn't show this, but there are 16 midi tracks for each folder. I just have some hidden.

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=124617

I just installed a new SSD drive for my sample libraries, and I plan on updating this template to include the ideas in this thread. I will share it once completed as well.


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## samphony (Sep 15, 2015)

Scrianinoff said:


> I have not used deactivate yet. I use freeze also for its intended purpose to freeze tracks mid project. So freezing all vst is the same operation. One thing less to remember that way for me. Deactivate might be faster though. But how much faster than 2 seconds do I need to get? Mind you, even a track holding Sable 1-4 fully loaded with Vi1 patches loads in 3 seconds. I don't use toolbars, I like key commands.
> 
> The manual on the Reaper site is really good. As they say: RTFM!  My laptop is not your average laptop though. It's an Alienware with an i7 3820qm overclocked to 4.1 GHz, 32GB ram and 4TB of SSD spread over 4 drives. My template holds the full Spitfire orchestra, everything 8dio, EW Hollywood, half of VSL, almost all choirs available, and lots of other libs that aren't such space hogs.


So. Freezing a track with midi data between 01:00:00:00-01:09:15:00 takes 2sec? Or are you talking about empty tracks?

I'll try your approach see where it leads. It at least sounds promising. Oh I'm too a key commands only addict


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## d.healey (Sep 15, 2015)

I tend to have one template with all my 'usual' instruments loaded, then if I need other instruments I have individual track templates set up that I can add to any project in about 3 clicks.


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## ThomasL (Sep 15, 2015)

This thread is opening my eyes in so many ways. Thanks!


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## dtonthept (Sep 15, 2015)

d.healey said:


> I tend to have one template with all my 'usual' instruments loaded, then if I need other instruments I have individual track templates set up that I can add to any project in about 3 clicks.



Do you have to assign any sends etc when you import a track template track?


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## d.healey (Sep 15, 2015)

No because I have everything going through bus tracks


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## dtonthept (Sep 15, 2015)

d.healey said:


> No because I have everything going through bus tracks



Okay cool, so your template tracks already have that bussing assigned?


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## d.healey (Sep 15, 2015)

When I add a template track I just put it inside the folder (bus track) that I want. So if I'm adding a trumpet it goes in under the brass parent track which has all my generic brass sends set up. Sometimes I will add extra sends/inserts to specific tracks but it depends on what I'm working on.


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## tack (Sep 15, 2015)

Scrianinoff said:


> My template holds the full Spitfire orchestra, everything 8dio, EW Hollywood, half of VSL, almost all choirs available, and lots of other libs that aren't such space hogs.


EvilDragon asked a question I'm interested in too: do you have a separate Kontakt instance per instrument in your template, so you can freeze/unfreeze them individually? This is obviously goes against conventional wisdom, but maybe conventional wisdom is a bit obsolete on today's hardware?

Or do you split the difference and have a single Kontakt instance holding all the NKIs you pretty much always use, and separate Kontakt instances for each instrument that you less frequently call upon?


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## tack (Sep 15, 2015)

d.healey said:


> When I add a template track I just put it inside the folder (bus track) that I want. So if I'm adding a trumpet it goes in under the brass parent track which has all my generic brass sends set up. Sometimes I will add extra sends/inserts to specific tracks but it depends on what I'm working on.


So you don't have per-instrument sends to e.g. a reverb track? I have a Kontakt instrument group template that sets up a Kontakt buss and a reverb track, and then 16 subtracks (corresponding to the 16 MIDI channels within the Kontakt instance). But each sub track has the send to the reverb buss set up. If I were to insert from a template that didn't include the reverb buss (for one-offs) then AFAICT the reverb send would need to be manually setup. That's not terribly onerous I suppose.


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## samphony (Sep 15, 2015)

Anyone who is interested. 
My convention for orchestral instruments is 1 kontakt instance per instrument eg 1 kontakt instance = V1 Sable with 16 articulations on 16 midi channels. Articulations can then be changed via "event channel" key commands or via Blakes midi tool (mouse centric workflow).
The midi notes are colored by event channel. 
That way I only need 1 track for eg V1 Sable etc and articulations stay intact because the notes event channel triggers them. I still get the flexibility to add tracks sending midi to the main track if I want to trigger single articulations per track.

At least that's how I work in Logic Pro and it seems possible to mimic in reaper. 

What I haven't found yet is a plugin or tool that lets me switch event channel changes while recording via key switches. (Similar to cubase remote keys/Logic environment tool)

In logic I have an environment tool that is set to a key switch range. Usually C-2 - D#-1.
If I then play a legato line on the track and trigger key switch E-2 I can switch to spiccato which is on midi channel 5 in that kontakt instance and that will get recorded into the note event channel.

Would be cool to have such a tool in reaper. For now I play the line and edit the event channels after they are recorded.


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## EvilDragon (Sep 16, 2015)

samphony said:


> In logic I have an environment tool that is set to a key switch range. Usually C-2 - D#-1.
> If I then play a legato line on the track and trigger key switch E-2 I can switch to spiccato which is on midi channel 5 in that kontakt instance and that will get recorded into the note event channel.
> 
> Would be cool to have such a tool in reaper. For now I play the line and edit the event channels after they are recorded.



That sounds like something that could definitely be done with a JS FX.


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## d.healey (Sep 16, 2015)

samphony said:


> What I haven't found yet is a plugin or tool that lets me switch event channel changes while recording via key switches. (Similar to cubase remote keys/Logic environment tool)



I made this plugin for Reaper a few years ago that allows you to switch MIDI channel via key switches, is that what you're after?
http://stash.reaper.fm/v/11328/Multi Channel MIDI Keyswitch



tack said:


> EvilDragon asked a question I'm interested in too: do you have a separate Kontakt instance per instrument in your template, so you can freeze/unfreeze them individually? This is obviously goes against conventional wisdom, but maybe conventional wisdom is a bit obsolete on today's hardware?
> 
> Or do you split the difference and have a single Kontakt instance holding all the NKIs you pretty much always use, and separate Kontakt instances for each instrument that you less frequently call upon?



I don't know about conventional wisdom, I thought it was generally accepted that multiple instances is more efficient than one large instance, but I come from the world of EW Play engine with this theory not Kontakt. I never freeze anything, I don't run a huge template.



tack said:


> So you don't have per-instrument sends to e.g. a reverb track? I have a Kontakt instrument group template that sets up a Kontakt buss and a reverb track, and then 16 subtracks (corresponding to the 16 MIDI channels within the Kontakt instance). But each sub track has the send to the reverb buss set up. If I were to insert from a template that didn't include the reverb buss (for one-offs) then AFAICT the reverb send would need to be manually setup. That's not terribly onerous I suppose.



I really don't get that detailed with my templates. I just want to write music and hand it to some musicians .


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## EvilDragon (Sep 16, 2015)

One empty instance of Kontakt adds 60-70 MB of RAM overhead. So it IS conservative to fit one instance with articulations of one whole orchestra section, for example, across multiple MIDI channels.


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## d.healey (Sep 16, 2015)

EvilDragon said:


> One empty instance of Kontakt adds 60-70 MB of RAM overhead. So it IS conservative to fit one instance with articulations of one whole orchestra section, for example, across multiple MIDI channels.


Duly noted


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## dtonthept (Sep 21, 2015)

Hey next question for this thread, I just re-read it all and wanted to go back to one of my original queries.

Does anyone know if MIDI (internal triggering of instruments) is reliably sample accurate? Obviously, using MIDI ticks, it won't be sample resolution adjustable, I just need to know that if I program a kick drum on a given beat, that it will reliably and consistently play at exactly the same place so that I can layer it up with other low end stuff and keep it in phase.

I'd normally just test this at my leisure - I'm just slammed with existing projects in Pro Tools so am doing my forum surfing while away from the studio.

Thanks!


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## EvilDragon (Sep 22, 2015)

Yes, if you let Reaper take care of timestamping MIDI events (which is the default option IIRC).


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## dtonthept (Sep 22, 2015)

Yay so awesome, thanks!


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