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AES 2006, San Francisco
As many of you know, AES (Audio Engineering Society) recently held their yearly fall convention, where all the recording nerds and engineering geeks get to skip the 80’s rock star madness of the NAMM show and get down to business with what’s important to them. For the recording junkie, AES has it all: mic’s and pre’s as far as the eye can see, new software goodies, tons of free swag, and dreamy analog consoles that cost more then your home. Plus, if you pay a little extra you can get yourself into the panel discussions and seminars where some of the industries legends talk about their work and answer questions. So for all of you that couldn’t make it out to the show, this installment of the Pro Tools corner will look at some of my favorites from this year’s AES convention in San Francisco.
A breath of fresh A.I.R.
At NAMM 2006, Digidesign announced the birth of a new development department named A.I.R. or Advanced Instrument Research. Rising from the ashes of Wizoo, The goal behind A.I.R. was to provide state-of-the art creative plug-ins for Pro Tools users, with unsurpassed sound quality and user friendliness as their guiding light. Since then, Digidesign’s A.I.R. has shipped a total of 4 RTAS instrument plug-ins in 2006, including: Xpand, an all around great sounding instrument with tons patches that ships free with Pro Tools 7 (see the PT corner look at Xpand here). Hybrid, a classic analog style synth with a twist (see the PT corner look at Hybrid here). Strike, a virtual drummer and drum sound module. Plus, just announced at AES, Digidesign’s brand new electric piano, Velvet..
Smooth as Velvet
TThe first thing that came to mind when I read the press release on Velvet was, oh great another EP plug-in, I already have like 5 of those. But I must say my skepticism disappeared when I got a chance to play with it in person at this year’s Digiworld, during AES.
Velvet features four models of classic electric pianos including the Fender Rhodes MKI and MKII stage pianos, Fender Rhodes Suitcase and the Wurlitzer A200. Capturing the best of both worlds, using a hybrid sampling/modeling engine or what A.I.R. calls “dynamic modeling,” Velvet is able to produce amazingly accurate reproductions of these analog favorites while providing the action and playability of a physical modeling type synth. Velvet ships with over a 100 classic presets and is available for pre-order at a MSRP of $249.
Making Waves
No trade show would be complete without the heavyweight presence of this plug-in giant. Waves showed off their new Mercury bundle sporting an impressive 91 plug-ins total (that’s everything but the SSL stuff). The bundle includes their new Neve emulations, VEQ3, VEQ4 and V Master Buss compressor as well as the new MaxxVolume plug-in. Although Waves doesn’t publicly claim that the plug-ins are Neve models, I am sure do to licensing issues, I have heard that the new processors are modeled after the 1073. The new line, dubbed Waves “V-Series,” unfortunately ships only with the Mercury bundle for now, so get ready to pony up the big bucks if you want to play.
If you gotta have it LOUD, the folks at Waves certainly have you covered. Their new dynamics super-plug, MaxxVolume, also ships exclusively with the Mercury bundle (I asked a sales-rep if it was going to be available separately and it is un-known at this point). I demoed the plug at the Waves booth and it seemed like a combination of Renaissance VOX, Renaissance Compressor, C1 and an L2 with auto-makeup gain. Mercury bundle is shipping soon at a MSRP of $12,500 TDM and $7,500 Native.
World Grooves
Now just so everyone knows, I am a huge fan of FXpansion’s BFD plug-in. Every time a new expansion pack comes out I just can’t wait to buy it and put it to immediate use (my current favorite, is the Deluxe expansion). This year at AES, FXpansion was previewing their brand new Percussion pack for BFD and it sounded amazing. It seemed very playable from a midi drum pad (like a M-Audio Trigger Finger or Korg Pad Kontrol) and with over 26 gigs of samples, the new pack is sure to cover all your acoustic percussion needs.
Instruments from all over the world are featured, including all the standard congas, bongos, shakers, and tambourines, even household items like pots and pans are thrown into the mix. The new expansion was produced by percussion recording specialist, John Emrich and features the same level of quality everyone has come to expect from a BFD expansion pack (lots of velocity layers and dynamics, multiple mic positions, midi grooves, etc).
On a different note related to BFD, FXpansion has licensed Platinum Samples to create third party expansion packs for BFD. Available now is Andy Johns classic drums with more expansions from different celebrity engineers in the works. At any rate, BFD Percussion and the new third party expansions are sure to be on my Christmas list for the holiday season, if I can wait that long :-).
In Closing:
There is always just so much to talk about after a trade show. So many exciting new products and companies, tons of super smart people all coming together in one place, it is what makes this industry so amazing. I apologize if I missed your favorite AES find from San Francisco, I am curious to hear what made you jump at this years show.
Pro Tip #2: Muting Regions
This weeks Pro Tip is one of my absolute favorites, not only will it make your editing workflow more organized, but it is a killer way to play around with your arrangements with almost no hassle.
The mute region command in Pro Tools always you to mute a section of track on a region-by-region basis, without using automation.
To mute a region in Pro Tools:
- Select the region (double click with the selector tool or single click with the grabber tool).
- Choose REGION>Mute/Unmute or use the key command: CMD+M (Mac) or CNTRL+M (PC) to toggle the region between muted and un-muted status. Remember “M” for Mute.
- The muted regions will appear “ghosted” or “grayed” out in the playlist.
- To un-mute, re-select the region and use the same key command or menu item.
Tip: If the area you want muted is part of a larger region, select the area within the region using your selector tool and choose: EDIT > SEPARATE REGION or CMD+E (Mac) CNTRL+E (PC). This will break your selection into a new region. If you want to mute a midi region, first switch the midi tracks view to Regions from the track view selector.
I use mute region all the time to try out different arrangements, muting sections that I am not sure about but don’t want to delete them from the track just yet. You can even move and re-arrange muted regions just like any other region. You can also try using mute region on the fly, during playback.
Muting regions is also a great when collaborating. Let’s say I am not quite sure if a certain harmony is right for a specific section of the song, if I am collaborating with someone I will just mute out the questionable sections, that way whoever is on the other end can see what I was doing and give it a second opinion.
Muting regions is recommended over using mute automation (it is even part of the NARAS session interchange spec). The problem with mute automation is that once you create even one break point, the mute button for that track becomes useless, since Pro Tools will now follow the automation playlist. The mute regions command completely solves this problem, as it is regions based as opposed to being track based.
Pro Tools Tidbits
- Soundtoys has a public beta program going on for the universal binary versions of some of their plug-ins. Visit their website for more details.
- Native Instrument’s Massive, Absynth 4, Battery 3, FM8 and Komplete 4 are all shipping now.
If you have a Pro Tools related question that you would like me to take a shot at answering or have any feedback, please send it to brian@audioMIDI.com. I will do my best to select the questions that seem to stump the most people.
As always, stay tuned to the audioMIDI.com eNews for the latest reviews and new product info.
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