What's new

LogicPro + VEP and AU3

One last point, since you're coming from Cubase... All of the above is mostly talking about how to direct MIDI to the VEP plugin, up to 127 channels of it. But what about the audio?

The audio by default comes back as mixed stereo from VEP. Remember when I said above that Logic will put one and only one mixer channel on the mixer window for Inst8. That channel is where the audio will be coming back into your mixer from VEP.

If you use additional audio outs in VEP (up to 25 stereo), then you can hit the little "+" button on the side of the above mentioned mixer channel, and you will see additional AUX channels show up in the mixer which will be getting those additional outputs from VEP.

So basically you can have 127 midi channels feeding into one VEP instance...and you can have up to 25 stereo channels coming back. There is absolutely no built in correlation between the input tracks and midi channels....to the returning audio on those 25 stereo returns. You can keep it simple in stereo, mix it in VEP, route them from VEP over whatever outs you want...up to 25 stereo. But the point is there is absolutely nothing automatic that will route the first track to the audio outs 1/2, the second track to outs 3/4, etc.. You can setup that in VEP and with the above mentioned AUX's..but its not automatic.
 
The one thing I do miss coming from Cubase is the ability to show/hide tracks with key commands. I used my iPad and MetaGrid which allowed me to just show all of VSL woods as an example. Either way, I just have always felt more comfortable in Logic overall even as a relative beginner now.
You can get a workflow going to show/hide certain food groups by making use of the 32 available groups in logic.

Hit command+G to open the floating groups window.
(Make sure to have a look into the key commands window = option+K and search for groups and get familiar with the available group related key commands)

You can now select tracks and use key commands or the cog wheel icon in the top right of the groups window to add or remove these tracks to a selected group. Since at least logic 10.4 you can multi select group 1-32 to change their behavior like volume/editing etc.

Once you’ve set up your groups you can use the 32 available key commands to show/hide groups. These key commands are toggle key commands.

Logic also lets you select/add/remove members = tracks of groups.

I for example have a group for all tracks and then for each food group like strings, brass etc even groups for stems, vca, sketching etc

You can also get more granular like grouping all short articulations or all celli etc

Also don’t forget that logic has select tracks by type key commands like select all instrument tracks or all summing stacks or all vcas or all audio tracks etc
 
So basically you can have 127 midi channels feeding into one VEP instance...and you can have up to 25 stereo channels coming back

You can then create tracks for each of the 25 aux channels and use them as “instrument “ tracks. Aux channels added to the tracks view allow to send midi and have articulation sets attached to them. That way one can have kontakt or vep added as a plugin and use the seperate available aux channels to have independent control over volume, pan, audio fx and sends. I don’t use that workflow often but it is possible. Keep in mind aux tracks/channels cannot use midi fx plugins like scripter etc.
 
the aux channel trick doesn't seem to work with the AU3 plugin across ports. Let me know if you are able to test that out and get it working, but when I tried it, it didn't work.
 
Here is a VEP AU3 template with 762 tracks feeding 6 VEP instances. Delete the tracks you don't need. I will probably not be making any bigger then this

Thanks for sharing this @Dewdman42. Takes the hassle out of us trying to put it all together. really Appreciate it. Hopefully VSL fix this and provide a fully functional template to use soon.
 
Vsl did actually provide very good fully functional templates! I just added more tracks and organized it into environment layers a little bit. What we really need are improvements from Apple in LPX so that templates like this aren’t even needed and we shouldn’t have to monkey around in the environment for this
 
You can get a workflow going to show/hide certain food groups by making use of the 32 available groups in logic.

Hit command+G to open the floating groups window.
(Make sure to have a look into the key commands window = option+K and search for groups and get familiar with the available group related key commands)

You can now select tracks and use key commands or the cog wheel icon in the top right of the groups window to add or remove these tracks to a selected group. Since at least logic 10.4 you can multi select group 1-32 to change their behavior like volume/editing etc.

Once you’ve set up your groups you can use the 32 available key commands to show/hide groups. These key commands are toggle key commands.

Logic also lets you select/add/remove members = tracks of groups.

I for example have a group for all tracks and then for each food group like strings, brass etc even groups for stems, vca, sketching etc

You can also get more granular like grouping all short articulations or all celli etc

Also don’t forget that logic has select tracks by type key commands like select all instrument tracks or all summing stacks or all vcas or all audio tracks etc
This works great. Thank you very much for the detailed post.
 
I'm a bit confused on something in Logic and the template Dewdman suggested from VSL. I'm missing something fundamental in how Logic works with tracks and the mixer.

On the first track which is port 1 in the mixer I connect to VEP7 and it works as expected. I can also add aux tracks with the plus and minus buttons for routing various instruments from VEP7. Why do I not have the plus and minus buttons on port 1 of the second set of 8 ports?

The template comes with 3 sets of 8 ports with 16 MIDI channels for each port. I would think the second two sets would behave the same.

Thanks,
Aaron
 
Yes they should... but its possible that the templates provided by VSL accidentally didn't use the multi out version fo the VEP plugin. Go to those channels, and add that plugin again and make sure its using the version with 16 stereo outs (or 25 stereo outs if you're on 10.4.5). Then you should see the +/- button appear on the mixer channel.

multiout.jpg
 
I just had figured that out and then read your post. You are of course correct. I'm bummed that I didn't start my template with the one you graciously provided because it's organized really well. I really wish I understood how you built and organized it. Is there a way to just copy a set of 8 ports to get more tracks? I tried highlighting the last set of 8 ports labeled VEP 6 and dragging with the alt key. It worked, but it looked funky in the mixer. I'm not worried about the numbers being the same but something happened in the organizational part.

Thanks,
Aaron
 
Not sure I understand what you need to do, are you wanting to extend the VSL ones or the one I made?

In general, if you need more tracks than what are there, then you'll have to get your hands dirty in the environment. The one I did has 762 tracks.. if you need more then that, I will have to send you instructions for the easiest way to do that, which I can't do tonight.

You can re-organize the tracks in the arranger view any way you want, they don't need to be grouped in the folders as they are in order to function. VSL only did that for clarity, but the underlying track-channel links will work regardless of how they are organized in folders. So just drag the tracks around in any order you want and using any folders you want, it will all be fine.

The only other change in my version of the Template is that I organized the environment objects into layers which is not that important really...but might make it a little easier to add another VEP instance compared to VSL's templates. But its still not trivial, will take 15 minutes of manual labor to add another 127 tracks and a 7th VEP instance.
 
Not sure I understand what you need to do, are you wanting to extend the VSL ones or the one I made?

In general, if you need more tracks than what are there, then you'll have to get your hands dirty in the environment. The one I did has 762 tracks.. if you need more then that, I will have to send you instructions for the easiest way to do that, which I can't do tonight.

You can re-organize the tracks in the arranger view any way you want, they don't need to be grouped in the folders as they are in order to function. VSL only did that for clarity, but the underlying track-channel links will work regardless of how they are organized in folders. So just drag the tracks around in any order you want and using any folders you want, it will all be fine.

The only other change in my version of the Template is that I organized the environment objects into layers which is not that important really...but might make it a little easier to add another VEP instance compared to VSL's templates. But its still not trivial, will take 15 minutes of manual labor to add another 127 tracks and a 7th VEP instance.
Yes, I'm interested in adding more tracks with the template you did. I opened the environment and felt like what my theory students go through when I teach 3rd semester chromatic harmony - a complete idiot, clueless and like a deer in headlights.

Well I seriously would pay you for the time. You have been incredibly generous with advice and sharing your hard work as others have as well.

Also, it seems to have worked on VSL's template when I dragged a set with the alt key, but maybe it won't work as intended when I actually start using it to compose.

Thanks,
Aaron
 
Also don’t forget if you have tracks in the tracks view you want to assign to environment objects you can open tracks view and environment side by side and drag multiple selected channel strips from the environment onto tracks
 
One last point I want to make. Why all the mumbo jumbo you ask, why can't we just duplicate the tracks in the arrange page for god's sake!?!?!?!

I agree. Make sure and send a feature request to Apple for this.

Here is why. When you do the duplicate tracks thing from the arrange page, it doesn't do that important step of changing the channel parameter to Inst7, in the above instructions. So all the new tracks end up with underlying environment objects that are still all pointing to Inst6. Duplicating multi-timbral tracks only works for up to 16 tracks for the first 16 midi channels. After that LogicPro is not currently programmed to know what to do, its still stupid about multiport AU3 capabilities, it doesn't know how to increment things properly across ports, as well as channels and even Inst objects. It could be made a lot smarter and avoid all this mumbo jumbo. Wouldn't be hard for them to do at all, but sometimes I wonder if they actually use LPX over there in Cupertino.

We need LPX to have at least two or three features added to make this easier. One would be so that from the new tracks wizard, we can specify 127 parts and LPX should create 127 of those channel strips with the port and midi channel set consecutively for each one. Bam, problem solved.

Also we need the Create Track->Other->Next Channel, to be smart enough to roll across from port 1, channel16 to port2, channel 1, etc..

Also if duplicating tracks, maybe assume we want to new Inst channel, so rather then assuming we want more tracks as Inst6, how about duplicate will create the same set of tracks but pointing at inst7.. something like that..
 
Last edited:
Haha exactly what I suggested as well. So yes sending feedback via the logic pro menu is a must for anyone who is serious about enhancements.
 
I am by NO means an environment guru.
I would beg the differ.

Dewdman42, all I can say is WOW! I really do appreciate all the detailed instructions. Your instructions are great because they don't assume anything which is really good for someone who doesn't know a program very well yet.

Guess what I'm doing all day Sunday?

And thanks for the tip Samphony.
 
Alright, here is an updated VEP AU3 template with 1270 tracks feeding 10 VEP instances. Thanks to @agarner32 for contributing some time to work on it also.

Notes
  • The VEP plugins are instantiated in their stereo mode, in order to make sure they will open in LPX 10.4.4 without problems. If you plan to use multi-audio-outs, just swap the plugins on each of the 10 instrument channel strips to the 16 or 25 stereo channel multi-out modes.

  • Note that the tracks can be rearranged in any order you like and moved in or out of folders in any fashion you wish

  • Note also that if you DELETE a track, the inner environment underpinnings will be deleted along with it and its difficult to get back. So don't delete tracks unless you really plan to not use them. You can however, reassign them to NO OUTPUT and then delete them, which will not delete the inner underpinnings.

  • If you want a smaller template to start out with, just delete some tracks and presto you'll have a smaller template.

  • I have added a so called MIDI version per @dgburns suggestion. This makes the tracks as raw midi tracks. There are pros and cons, let me know which version of hte template you like working with better.
Let me know if any questions. I will shortly provide a short tutorial for how to expand to more tracks if 1270 is not enough.

Download found here now: https://vi-control.net/community/threads/logicpro-vep-and-au3.82898/page-8
 
Last edited:
Alright, here is an updated VEP AU3 template with 1270 tracks feeding 10 VEP instances. Thanks to @agarner32 for contributing some time to work on it also.

Notes
  • The VEP plugins are instantiated in their stereo mode, in order to make sure they will open in LPX 10.4.4 without problems. If you plan to use multi-audio-outs, just swap the plugins on each of the 10 instrument channel strips to the 16 or 25 stereo channel multi-out modes.

  • Note that the tracks can be rearranged in any order you like and moved in or out of folders in any fashion you wish

  • Note also that if you DELETE a track, the inner environment underpinnings will be deleted along with it and its difficult to get back. So don't delete tracks unless you really plan to not use them. You can however, reassign them to NO OUTPUT and then delete them, which will not delete the inner underpinnings.

  • If you want a smaller template to start out with, just delete some tracks and presto you'll have a smaller template.
Let me know if any questions. I will shortly provide a short tutorial for how to expand to more tracks if 1270 is not enough.
Thanks for all your work!
 
Top Bottom