Quick Welcome from Steven

Quick Welcome from Steven
Hello to you, the newest member of the Steven Slate Drums family.
You have just purchased six years of hard work, dedication, passion,
persistence, and determination…all with one goal in mind: to make you
the absolute best drum software on the planet. It is my hope that you will
soon believe that we achieved this goal.
But despite the fact that my name appears on the box, I am far from the
only person responsible for the making of this software. Here are just a
few of the people who helped make this software possible. Some helped
by physically making the software, others helped test and perfect it, and
some just inspired me to make it better:
Dan Kirk, Alex Simechev, Alex Siegel, Marty Long, Joel Adkins, Jay
Baumgardner, The NRG Recording Staff, Scott Reinwand, Jeff Juliano,
Andy Sneap and the Sneap forum boys, Joel Adkins, Jerry Lyons, Adrian
Ost, Chris Lord Alge, John Shepherd, Nathanael Lew, and all the loyal
customers and fans over the years who have made it all worthwhile. It’s
because of your encouragement that this product has evolved into the
massive monster that accompanies this manual. I hope you make great
music with these drums, and I thank you for purchasing, and not pirating
this software.
Steven Slate
CREDITS:
Produced, Recorded, and Mixed by Steven Slate
Technical Director and Sample Programming: Daniel Kirk
Algorithms, Programming: Alex Simechev
Drummers: Jerry Lyons, Adrian Ost, Joel Adkins, Steven Slate Graham Mueller, Terry Capote, Jim Aaarons, Craig
McCain
Editors: Joel Adkins, Marty Long, Steven Slate, Nathanael Lew
Warehouse Studio Crew: Joel Adkins, Jeff Parton, Sam Rodriguez
NRG Recording Engineers: Dave Colvin, Sean Curiel
The “Castle” Crew: Joel Adkins, Jeff Parton, Craig “The Mouth” Fellows
Table Of Contents
I. Introduction ............................................................................................................... 6 System Requirements.................................................................................................
II. Getting Started ......................................................................................................... 6 SSD 3.5 (Standalone Application)..............................................................................
- Setting Up Audio and Midi .................................................................................................
SSD 3.5 (Plug-in) .........................................................................................................
III. Using Steven Slate Drums 3.5 ..........................................................................12 - Selecting a Drum Kit (Multi) Using the LIBRARY Tab .....................................................
- Selecting a Drum Kit (Multi) Using the LIBRARY Tab Cont ............................................
- Replacing a Drum or Cymbal in a MULTI..........................................................................
- Hybrid Sounds ....................................................................................................................
- Replacing Toms and Cymbals...........................................................................................
IV. Drum Instrument Settings and Features ....................................................16 Universal Features of All Instruments.......................................................................
- Overhead Mic Settings .......................................................................................................
- Room Selection Drop-Down Meny ....................................................................................
- Character Settings ..............................................................................................................
- Direct Mics Settings............................................................................................................
- Room Mics Settings............................................................................................................
Using the SSD 3.5 Effects and Envelope Pages for Instruments...........................
-
Effects Page.....................................................................................................................
Envelope Page.................................................................................................................
Instrument Specific Features ....................................................................................
- Kick Drum Instruments ......................................................................................................
- Snare Drum Instruments ....................................................................................................
- Tom Instruments.................................................................................................................
- Hi Hat Instruments. .............................................................................................................
- Ride Instruments.................................................................................................................
- Crash Cymbal Instruments ................................................................................................
- Add-On (X-Slot Splash/China) Instruments......................................................................
- Add-On (X) Rides ................................................................................................................
- Snare Articulation Instruments .........................................................................................
V. Using Overall Features in Kontakt Player and Kontakt 3.5 ....................28 Using the SSD 3.5 Channel Output Mixer.............................................................
Using the SSD 3.5 Master Editor (Master Volume) ..............................................
Saving Changes to Kits and Instruments ............................................................
VI. Discretely Routing Drum Channels into your DAW .................................34 Pro Tools.................................................................................................................
Cubase ....................................................................................................................
Logic........................................................................................................................
VII. Advanced Settings ..............................................................................................46 Humanizer....................................................................................................................
Instrument Remapping ...............................................................................................
Velocity Curve Assignment ........................................................................................
Resetting the Instruments Mixer Settings.................................................................
Advanced Midi Remapping ........................................................................................
VIII. V­Drum Set­up and Optimization by Dan Kirk........................................54 Not So Obvious Reasons Your V-Drums May Have Issues with SSD ....................
- Drum Head Tuning..............................................................................................................
- Striking Position and Placement of Hits...........................................................................
- Suggestion On Where and How to Hit Certain Drum Pads.............................................
- Time and Hardware Malfunction........................................................................................
- Not Accurately Monitoring Your Drums ...........................................................................
- Suggestion On Where and How to Hit Certain Drum Pads.............................................
Roland TD-20 Set-Up...................................................................................................
- Suggested Settings for the Roland TD-20 ........................................................................
Steven Slate Drums 3.5 Keyboard Mapping .......................................................... I. Introduction
Steven Slate Drums 3.5 is an extensive drum instrument library that uses
Native Instrument’s Kontakt 3 software sampler as a host.
To get Steven Slate Drums 3.5 up and running on your computer you must
open the Kontakt 3.5 software sampler as a “Standalone Application” on
your computer or run the Kontakt 3.5 software as a “Plug-in” in a (Digital
Audio Workstation (DAW for short) such as Apple Logic, Digidesign
Protools, Calkwalk Sonar or Steinberg Cubase.
System Requirements
Mac: OS 10.4.x, G4 2gHz or higher, 2GB RAM - samples must be on at least
a 5400 RPM hard drive, eSATA, Firewire 800 recommended
PC: Windows XP SP2, 2gHz or higher, 2GB RAM samples must be on at
least a 5400 RPM hard drive, eSATA, Firewire 800 recommended
II. GETTING STARTED
SSD 3.5 (Standalone Application)
To use the SSD Player live with a midi interface (such as a keyboard or vdrums), you can open the “Standalone” Version of Kontakt 3.5 on your
computer. To do this, simply open the Kontakt 3.5/Kontakt Player 3.5
application that was installed on your computer.
(PC)
During installation, a “Kontakt 3” shortcut was added to you desktop (PC)
after installation. If not than you will find the Kontakt 3 or Kontakt Player 3
program located in C:\Program Files\Native Instruments\Kontakt 3, and
you can manually make a shortcut and drag it to your desktop.
(MAC)
You will find the Kontakt 3 application in the “Application” folder found
in your user directory
Setting Up Audio and Midi
Upon the first time loading of Kontakt 3 on your computer you should be
presented with a pop-up box asking you to set-up your midi and audio
interface settings. If this pop-up box doesn’t show up then you must do
this in the Kontakt 3 Options (Cog wheel button at the top of the Kontakt
interface).
You’ll be presented with an options pop-up box with various tabs located
on the left side of box. to set up your midi interface and routing (Midi
Keyboard, Midi Controller) for use in Kontakt please click on the “MIDI”
tab at the bottom left of the Options interface.
Choose the Inputs button (Shown above)
Make sure that whatever midi keyboard or midi controller you are using
(Akai MPD32 in this case) is set from “Off” to “Port A”. In this case I’ll click
where it says “Off” next to “Akai MPD32” and the following drop down
menu will show up
Move your mouse over and click “Port A”
The resulting dialog;
At this point, don’t worry about the Output Midi Options.
Next, you will set up your Audio Interface or Audio Card
In OPTIONS menu, click on the Audio Tab on the bottom left.
The first option you see is the Driver selection drop down menu.
Here you should see ASIO or DirectSound if your using a PC setup. If your
using a MAC Setup you will see CoreAudio. Click the driver that you wish
to use.
ASIO for PC and CoreAudio for Mac are your best bet here for most setups.
The next option you see is the Device selection drop down menu
Here you should highlight and choose which Audio Interface you are
using for Audio Output and Audio Recording. In the example above, we
have chosen the Duet. It shows that there are a total of 2 inputs and 2
outputs which is correct.
You should see “Running” Next to “Status” in the Audio Options Box. This
confirms that it is running correctly.
The next thing to do is select the Sample Rate you wish to use
Click the drop-down menu and you will see a list of sample rates to use
Click on the sample rate that you wish to use.
Sometimes you will see this dialog pop-up after you select your sample
rate.
Just click Ok and re-start Kontakt and go back to the Kontakt Audio
Options.
The next option that you can change in Kontakt’s Audio Options is the
Latency.
You can move the horizontal slider to the left and right.
The farther left that you push the slider, the less overall latency you will get
but your system will be pushed harder.
The more right you push the slider, the more overall latency you will get
but your system won’t be pushed as hard.
(Hint: It’s a rule of thumb to try and have your system have an overall
latency less than 10.0 ms. You’ll want to try and get the lowest latency
without hearing computer glitches and audio artifacts on playback. Play
with this option until you find a good balance for your set-up.
With your midi, audio drivers, and latency, set, you are now ready to load
drum kits. (see III Using Steven Slate Drums)
SSD 3.5 (Plug-in)
Steven Slate Drums 3.5 should be automatically added to your DAW plugin directory and will be available to be selected and/or inserted into a
Software Instrument Track. All audio preferences and Midi preferences
should be taken care of by your DAW.
Please consult your DAW software manual to learn how to incorporate
virtual instruments. To learn how to discretely route all the outputs from
SSD into your DAW, please visit the video tutorial section of the Steven
Slate Drums website. This manual will also explain how to discretely route
the drum channels into your DAW in
III. Using Steven Slate Drums 3.5
With Kontakt 3 and Steven Slate Drums 3.5 now installed on your
computer you should now be able to load a kit and start playing around
with the many features SSD 3.5 and Kontakt have to offer. The following
describes the use of SSD, both in standalone or inside your DAW.
This is what Kontakt 3 User Interface will look like initially.
Selecting a Drumkit Using the LIBRARY Tabs
Click the Library Tab on the left browser screen.
This will load the SSD Library Icon. This icon contains two sub tabs
labeled “INSTRUMENTS” and “MULTIS”. Think of “instruments” as
drum kit pieces like an individual kick, snare, tom, etc. Think of
“MULTIS” as full drum kits. In this case the Multis are preset drum kits
made by Steven Slate and tested and tweaked by some of the world’s top
producers and mixers.
Selecting a Drum-Kit (Multi)
To select a drum kit, hit the Multi Sub-Tab, and then select from either the
V-drum or Keyboard preset menus. The V-drum presets have now been
universalized to work with all Roland V-drum modules. To see the
keyboard key map, please visit the appendix section following this manual.
This will lay out the keyboard midi notes so you can understand which kit
piece is on a certain note. This key map will also load when you hit the
INFO button (the little “i” icon next to the MULTIS tab). After the list of
drum kits is listed, double click on one to load the kit.
When you first load a kit, the player will always ask you if you want to
“replace the multi”. Simply hit “YES”.
Your drum kit multi will now load. Please keep in mind, the first time you
load a kit in your session it will take longer then when you load additional
kits. This is due to the fact that Kontakt Player will place kit pieces into
ram cache, allowing it to load kit pieces faster.
Replacing a Drum or Cymbal in a MULTI
Once you load your drum kit, you can customize it by adding or replacing
drum pieces “instruments” from the SSD library. To replace a drum piece,
first “x” it out by pressing the “x” button in the top right corner of the
drum piece. Then go to your SSD library icon and select
“INSTRUMENTS”. Navigate to your desired kit piece, and double click it.
The new kit piece will replace the previously deleted piece.
Hybrid Sounds
The SSD Player in Kontakt allows the user to make hybrid drum sounds by
using more then one kit piece, such as using two snares to create a new
snare sound.
To do this, simply follow the directions above regarding kit piece
replacement, but do not “x” out the first kit piece. Instead of the new kit
piece appearing in place of the deleted kit piece, it will appear at the
bottom of the kit pieces (you may have to scroll down to find it). If you run
out of slots in the first page, you can add kit pieces to the 17-32 page by
pressing the “17-32” button on the upper right. When using two drum
pieces in the same output channel (such as two snares), you may have to
attenuate the volume so as to not overload the channel (see Direct Mic
Settings to learn how to adjust kit piece volumes).
Replacing Toms and Cymbals
When replacing a tom, make sure that you replace it with a corresponding
tom number. For instance, you must replace Birch Tom 1 with Maple Tom
1. If you do not do this, you will have a hybrid tom sound, and when the
particular tom midi note is triggered, both tom sounds will play. For
Cymbals, you will find two different crash slots, A and B. When replacing
an A slot crash, choose from the list of other A slot crashes, and same for B
slot crashes.
IV. Drum Instrument Settings and Features
Universal Features of All Instruments
There are 5 Universal features found on the Main Mixer Page of each
Instrument that can be used to alter the sound and playability of these
loaded instruments in SSD 3.5. Here’s a rundown of those features.
1. Overhead Mic Settings
Overheads: On
Overheads: Off
By clicking on the overhead button, you will add the overhead mic to the
close mic, giving the drum a three dimensional air and warmth. All kicks,
snares, and toms, and rides have this option. Since the crash, china, hi hat,
and splash cymbals only use an overhead mic with no close mic, this
option does not change on those instruments. If you desire a very tight and
dry sound, you can experiment with turning the overhead to “off” on the
drum kit pieces.. Most default preset kits have the overhead buttons “on”.
2. Room Selection Drop-Down Menu
Room: Off
Selecting “Room: Off” will leave only the close mic (and overhead mic if it
is engaged) on, and there will be no room ambience on that particular
drum.
Room: NRG
Selecting “Room: NRG” adds the famous sound of NRG Recording’s
studio A room. This room is very three dimensional and has a large sound
with medium decay and smooth highs. It is great as is, but can be
compressed and eq’d to customize its sound to your mixes.
Room: SSD
Selecting “Room: SSD” will add what is known as the “SSD ROOM”. This
room is a large concrete warehouse with very reflective walls that producer
a bright, shimmery sound that was enhanced via heavy compression and
eqing. The result is an extremely rich and deep sound that is somewhat
reminiscent of a Lexicon reverb patch that has come to life. This room is
particularly great on cymbals and snares.
3. Character Settings
Dynamics Knob
This knob will change how much dynamics the instrument will have. The
higher the knob is set, the more you will hear a difference in volume from
high-velocity hits to low-velocity hits. The lower the knob is set, you will
hear less of a difference in volume from high-velocity hits to low-velocity
hits. Think of this knob as an absolutely transparent dynamic compressor.
If, for instance, the ghost notes on your snare are coming in too loud, than
turn up the knob and those ghost notes will decrease in volume.
4. Direct Mics Settings
Direct Mic Volume Knob
Changing this knob will result in an increase or decrease in the direct/mic
sample’s volume for the given instrument. This includes the overhead if it
is engaged. It is independent of the room volume.
Direct Mic Panning Knob
Changing this knob allows you to change the placement of an instrument’s
direct/mic samples in the stereo field of the entire kit. This includes the
overhead if it is engaged.
5. Room Mics Settings
Room Mic Volume Knob
If a room is turned on in a particular drum instrument, changing this knob
will amplify or attenuate the level of the room mics.
Room Mic Panning Knob
If a room is turned on in a particular instrument, changing this knob allows
you to pan the instruments room mics within the stereo field of the entire
kit. Playing with this knob can give you very dramatic and unique
characteristics of a given instrument.
Using the SSD 3.5 Effects and Envelope Pages for Instruments
Each Instrument included in Steven Slate Drums 3.5 has an Effects Page
and Envelope Page that allow you to adjust different audio characteristics
for a given Instruments. You can switch to these different “Pages” by
Clicking on the
button located on top of an instrument’s
picture and selcting “Page: Effects” for Distortion and EQ effects or “Page:
Envelope” to adjust envelope settings for room and direct samples.
Effects Page:
Envelope Page:
Each kit piece has a distortion/tube saturation, and equalizer. Switch to
the various bands of the equalizer by hitting the “band” button. Make sure
the bypass eq button is not activated so that you can hear your eq changes.
The envelope section has separate envelopes for the direct mics and room
mics. These settings are useful to tame the decay of a long tom, or for
special effects like cutting off all snare decay or cymbal decay.
Instrument Specific Features
Each type of drum instrument in Steven Slate Drums 3.5 has unique feature
settings that allow you to enhance certain characteristics that are
dependent to that specific instrument type.
Kick Drum Instruments
Deep Knob Setting
By Increasing this Knob you can add more low end characteristics of a Kick
Instruments. This effect is subtle, but can be useful on some mixes.
Snare Drum Instruments
Tune Knob Setting
By Increasing or Decreasing this knob you can subtly change the tune of
your snare.
Hi-Hat Instruments
Clamp: V-Drum Button
Clamp: Regular Button
Switching this button between Clamp: V-Drum and Clamp: Regular allows
you to choose how the hi-hat’s clamp function works in Kontakt.
If your using a V-Drum Hi-hat such as the Roland VH-11 or controlling hihat openness and pedal function with an V-Drum Pedal such as the PD-7
or PD-8 you are going to want to use the Clamp: V-Drum setting.
If you are using a Keyboard Controller than you will want to use the
Clamp: Regular setting although the Clamp: V-Drum setting should also
work as well. Play around with this setting to find out which setting you
like the most when using a Keyboard Controller.
Clamp Knob Setting
Changing this knob will increase or decrease the volume of the overall foot
clamp hit over all of its velocities. This is useful when your drum part
features a lot of foot clamp hat work and you need to customize its volume.
Ride Instruments
Bell Knob Setting
By Changing this knob you can Increase or Decrease the Overall volume of
the Ride’s Bell articulation with ease. This setting is dependent on playing
style, just like the hi-hat’s Clamp Knob, and should be changed according
to your taste. For the most part you won’t have to change this setting.
Crash Cymbal Instruments
True Swells: On
True Swells: Off
By turning this feature to “True Swells: On” you’ll notice more natural
cymbal swells or builds when using Crash Instruments.
Cymbal (A Slot or B Slot) Positions
In a Full Keyboard or V-Drum Kit there are two positions that crash, splash
or china cymbals can go; The (A-Slot) position and the (B-Slot) position.
A Crash Cymbal, for instance, in the (A-Slot) position always has a (A)
following its name. EX:
The (A) Cymbal Slot refers to the left panned Crash Cymbal
This (B) Cymbal Slot refers to the right Crash Cymbal
You can have a Splash Instruments or China Instruments take over the (A)
slot cymbal position in a kit as long as you select a Splash or China with an
(A) at the end of its name:
Or
IMPORTANT: You can only have one (A-Slot) Cymbal and only one (BSlot) Cymbal per Drum-Kit. Please visit the advanced section to learn how
to void this restriction.
Add-On (X-Slot Splash/China) Instruments
You’ll notice that there are four different suffixes at the end of some of the
Splash and China Instruments. These are what we call X-Slot Cymbals.
Each different X slot is mapped to a particular midi note.
In the case of Splash Cymbal Instruments and China Cymbal Instruments,
there are four interchangeable slots to mix and match different variations
of Splash/China Cymbals.
Here are four of the same splash cymbal in the four different “X-Slot”
positions:
X-Slot A
X-Slot B
X-Slot C
X-Slot D
IMPORTANT: You can only have one Cymbal of any type in any one XSlot. So you can’t have Splash 8A (X-A) and China Small (X-A) in the same
Instrument
Add-On (X) Ride
Instruments
One of the main differences you will see between most V-Drum and
Keyboard kits is that the Keyboard kits will always have two rides
included in the full kit. On the second ride you find in the kit there should
be an “(X)” which gives you the option to use a second ride cymbal.
(Please see the key map to reference which notes the various x slot cymbals
appear on.)
Snare Articulation Instruments
Above you can see the snare articulation instruments. The sidestick is an
all purpose side stick sample set that can be used on keyboard, or can be
mapped for vdrum (please see mapping sidestick on vdrums).
Every snare in a keyboard preset comes with a “Snare Rolls” articulation.
This articulation is a real “drag” roll played by a drummer while the drum
was being sampled. This articulation makes it very easy to do convincing
drags and ghost notes on a keyboard.
V. Using Overall Features in Kontakt Player and
Kontakt Player 3.5
Using the SSD 3.5 Channel Output Mixer
With Steven Slate Drums 3.5, you not only have the ability to modify and
change various controls on each individual kit piece, but you also have the
ability to easily mix the final outputs of each drumkit using the OUTPUT
MIXER.
To open Kontakt’s Channel Output Mixer, press the button located at the
top of Kontakt’s Interface that has a picture of three small faders on it.
(Second button to the left)
Using the output mixer, you can control the overall levels of each kit piece
and room piece. This is especially useful to control the global room
ambience volumes (NRG and SSD).
Each output fader has four inserts (hit SHOW INSERTS) where you can
load one of numerous internal effects such as compressor, limiter, and
distortion.
Using the SSD 3.5 Master Editor (Master Volume)
To change the Overall Volume of the entire kit use the Master Editor knob
found in the Master Control section found towards the top of Kontakt’s
Multi-Rack Pane. (Shown Below)
To Open the Master Control section (if not open already) please click the
fourth button from the left located at the very top of the Kontakt 3.5
Interface that has a metronome and tuning fork pictured on it.
The Master Control Pane also allows you to alter the overall master tuning
(or pitch) of all the instruments in the kit by using the “Master Tune” knob.
Saving Your Changes to Kits and Instruments
After customizing your own drumkits, it’s important that you save it.
Saving Changes to Kits
To save an entire kit, please click on the big button located on the very top
of the Main Kontakt 3.5 User Insterface that has the picture of a diskette on
it.
This will open up a drop down menu with a few options to scroll through
Move your mouse over and click the “save multi as...” option
A dialog box will pop up simular to this;
The current name of the loaded kit will be displayed and highlighted in the
Save As: text field (Absolute Rock Kit.nkm is this case). Do not click save.
If you click Save now you will be asked if you want to replace the currently
existing multi.
IMPORTANT NOTE: If you proceed and click replace, this will replace the
default preset that comes stock with SSD. It is important to make a backup
of your library folder including the MULTI and INSTRUMENTS folder so
that this can never happen.
To avoid replacing the default kit, just rename the multi to something else
and click save.
Saving Changes to Instruments
You can also save individual instrument customizations in a similar
fashion. Press the save icon.
This will open up a drop down menu with a few options to scroll through
Move your mouse over and click the “save as...” option
a drop down list will pop-up showing all of the instruments you currently
have in the loaded kit. Click on the Instrument in the list you wish to save.
(Snare 13A for example shown below)
A dialog box will pop up simular to this;
The current name of the selected Instrument will be displayed and
highlighted in the Save As: text field (Snare 13 A.nki is this case). If you
click Save now you will be asked if you want to replace the currently
existing instrument.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Change the name of the kit piece so that you do not
replace the original preset default. The click save.
VI. Discretely Routing Drum Channels into your DAW
In many cases, you will want to route individual drum channels discretely
into your DAW so that you can take advantage of your DAW’s automation,
plugins, and routing. This can be done with all DAWs, but the method in
which to do so changes from DAW to DAW. This section will illustrate
how to properly route channels in several of the most popular DAWs. This
section will also accompany our new video section at
www.stevenslatedrums.com/video.html which will have updated video
tutorials showing discrete routing procedures in several DAWs.
Discrete Channel Routing – Pro-Tools 8
To start, Load In the Kontakt 3 plug-in Into a Software Instrument track.
After the plug-in loads, select a drumkit from either the Vdrum or
Keyboard preset from the Steven Slate Drums 3.5 Library.
After your kit loads, by hitting the output mixer button, you will notice 12
channel outputs are now present at the bottom of the Kontakt 3.5 GUI.
They are labeled as follows; Kick, Snare, Tom 1, Tom 2, Tom 3, Tom 4, Hi
Hat, Rides, Crashes, Splash/Chinas, NRG Room, SSD Room.
(Configuration Shown Below) This is the preset output configuration for all
available kits in Steven Slate Drums 3.5.
In Pro-Tools 8, create 11 Aux Input Tracks via the Add Track from the ProTools menu bar, under the “Track” tab. This Pop-Up (Shown Below) box
will appear.
After creating the 11 Aux tracks, label the first one Snare, then Tom1,
Tom2, Tom3, and so forth. Label the INSTRUMENT channel Kick.
Now open up the Kontakt 3 Interface, expand the OUTPUT MIXER, and
click the “RESET OUTPUT MAP, and then hit “MAKE DEFAULT”. Then,
REMOVE KONTAKT FROM THE INSERT TAB. This is very important.
Now, re-insert Kontakt on to the insert of the Instrument channel. Choose
any drumkit from the library tab, and then hit “RESET OUTPUT MAP” on
the output mixer.
Route the INPUT of each Aux track to “Kontakt3” and then choose the
appropriate instrument channel, for instance, for the Snare Aux, it will be:
Kontakt3/Snare, for Tom1, its Kontakt3/Tom1. Please note, the Kick
drum ALWAYS stays in the Instrument Channel.
When you are done manually selecting the inputs on each Aux, it’ll look
like the diagram below.
This procedure only needs to be done once, and for every other kit loaded
in Pro Tools, simply hitting the RESET button on the output mixer in
Kontakt will allow you to route the drums to the Pro Tools channels with
ease.
Dicrete Channel Output Routing – Cubase 5
To get started, Make sure the “Connect Sends Automatically for each
newly created Channel” option box is checked. You can find the option in
the Cubase 5 VST Preferences. (Shown Below)
Now, create a new VST Instrument track within your Cubase 5 Project by
going to the Devices menu tab, located at the most top of your screen
(Shown Below) and choose the “VST Instruments” option from the drop
down menu. You can also Push F11 to bring Up the “VST Instruments”
Panel.
When The VST Instruments Panel Opens, it will look like this:
Click in the insert area which loads the plugin selection dialog. Select
“Kontakt 3” Plug-in from the list.
After the Plug-In Loads, it will ask:
Click the Create Button.
Load the VST Instruments Panel (F11). You will see that Kontakt 3 is
button. Click on
loaded. Immediately to the left of this will be a small
this button to produce a window that should look similar to the figures
below.
From the Drop down Menu Choose “Activate All Outputs”
Now open the Kontakt interface and load a drumkit from either the
Keyboard or Vdrums preset.
Click on the OUTPUT mixer icon to load the output mixer. Hit the RESET
OUTPUT MAP button followed by the red button labeled “Make Default”.
Now REMOVE the Kontakt 3 plugin from the Instrument insert, and then
replace it, AGAIN, hitting the little
Outputs”.
and choosing “Activate All
Now you will see that Cubase has automatically made new output
channels labeled Kick, Snare, Tom1, Tom2, etc.
Last, hit the “CONFIG” buttons under each channel in the Kontakt output
mixer. This will allow you to route each channel to the Cubase mixer
channels. So for instance, route the Kick channel to “kick”, Snare to
“snare”, replacing each channels default which will be “kick”.
For the Snare Channel
For the Tom 1 Channel
Etc..
Discrete Channel Routing – Logic 8 - 9
To begin, add a new Software Instrument track into the currently loaded
Project.
Insert the Kontakt 3 - Multi-Output (16xStereo) version of the Plugin to the
newly created Software Instruments I/O Insert slot. (Shown Below)
Once the plug-in is loaded, load the kit you wish to use into Kontakt via
the keyboard or Vdrum presets.
Hit the outputs button to load the OUTPUT MIXER. Hit the RESET
button. Now take Kontakt OFF of
OUTPUT map and then the
the instrument insert. Replace it back ON the insert. Load another
drumkit.
Now go to Logics Mixer and press the little + button (11 times) on the
lower bottom right of the Software Instrument Channel that Kontakt has
been inserted.
This will create the 11 auxillary channels that will correspond to the
channel outputs from Kontakt..
The Aux channels should already be routed correctly.
The initial Software Instrument track now handles the Kick Channel output
from output from Kontakt, (i.e. Kontakt 3 1-2)
Each additional Aux track will correspond and control each respective
Kontakt channel output. For Instance, the first auxillary (Aux 1) channel
you added to your Logic Mixer will now control the snare channel output
(Kontakt 3 3-4), the next added auxillary (Aux 2) after that will contol Tom
1’s (Kontakt 3 5-6)Kontakt Output volume, and so on a so forth.
To make things easier, it’s good practice to name the Software Instrument
track and attatched auxillary tracks to what Kontakt Channel they control
after initial set-up. Your naming should look something like this. (Fig
Below);
VII. Advanced Settings And Features
Each drum instrument in Steven Slate Drums has various advanced
settings to customize the drum’s sound and response. To get to these
customizing settings, simply click on the settings button found at the
bottom/middle of each instruments user interface mixer. (Shown Below)
Once this Settings button has been selected your Instruments User Interface
will change to look like this;
Depending on the type of Instrument your changing the settings for, you
will be presented with different options that you can change that is unique
for that type of Instrument.
Every Instrument Settings User Interface will have;
“Humanizer”
Column
and an “Options”
Column
Humanizer
The
Column of settings will be the same for all Instruments and
will look like this;
Advanced AMG (Anti Machine Gun) Setting
Intelligent This setting is a physically modeled mode, and will apply a unique sample
selection algorithm that allows the SSD engine to choose the best samples
to use, based on prior used samples, in order to produce the most
humanized, and natural feel to the drum or cymbal.
Humanized This will apply a more traditional sample selection algorithm that allows
the SSD engine to choose the most random samples to use, based on
velocity and sample articulation, when the instrument is played in a series
(like a snare fill). You will never hear the same sample consecutively play.
Use this setting if the Intelligent setting isn’t suited to your taste.
Round Robin This will have the SSD engine cycle through all of the samples, according to
velocity and articualtion, in a preset pattern that eventually repeats. This is
the least advanced algorithm and isn’t recommended for natural response.
Velocity Random:
Min Value:
This is the velocity value in which the Humanizer will start working.
Variance:
This is how strong the humanizer will affect the volume or velocity
while it is on.
The
Column of settings will change according to
instrument but for the most part Includes three main features.
Instrument Remapping
The Head remapping menu allows you to customize the note in which
certain articulations appear. From the drop down menu, you can change
which midi note that you want the instrument and it’s particular
articulations to play on the current key map. Just choose which note (or
key) from the drop down menu you wish to have play the instrument and
It will be automatically remapped to that location on your keyboard or key
map.
Velocity Curve Assignment
Change this setting to increase or decrease how your instrument plays
from it’s lowest velocity to it’s highest velocity. This setting is useful due
to the fact that different keyboard and edrum manufacturers have different
velocity sensitivity. Use this function to customize the response so that it
feels right to your needs.
Reseting the Instruments Mixer Settings
This simply resets all of the settings and options of the entire instrument to
“Factory” values. IMPORTANT: This will not reset the settings and
options of the whole instrument to the current kit’s default values. This is
basically a last resort feature so be careful when using this setting.
Advanced MIDI Remapping
1. Kicks
Using mapping options you can easily make Double Kick with two
different Kicks.
How to make this:
1. Set this for first Kick:
2. Set this for second Kick:
2. Snares
Snare mapping options allows you to map Snares articulation. You can
turn off and on all Snare articulations and you can map any articulation
individually.
Some examples…
If you are using V-Drums without cross stick support, but you want to use
Sidestick, you can map the Sidestick to Snare Rim note. Just set this in
Snare mapping options:
And set this settings in Sidestick mapping options:
3. Toms
Toms mapping options allows you to turn on and off the main Tom note
and map the additional Tom note. So you can use up to 6 different Toms at
the same time.
For example, you can create 5 Toms kit using New Maple Toms set with
these mapping settings for Tom 1:
And Tom 1 from Maple set with these settings:
Also you can create 5 and 6 Toms sets by tuning Toms and mapping them
to notes you want.
5. Crashes
Crashes mapping options also gives you a great possibilities.
Some useful mapping settings…
1. With Crash mapping options you can map the Choke hit to Bow of
Crash. If you’ll map the Choke hit to Bow note, you’ll get a very realistic
Choke if you’ll make a very easy shot on Bow of Crash. Also you can play
full Sampled Choke if you’ll make very hard shots on Bow.
How to map the Choke hits to Bow note of the Crash Cymbal:
2. Also if you need more Cymbals you can map Crashes to Toms notes, like
this:
5. Ride
There some useful mapping options in Ride. For instance, if you are TD-3
user, you can map the Ride Edge to Crash Bow:
VIII. V-Drum Set-Up and Optimization by Dan Kirk
Steven Slate Drums 3.5 provides V-Drum users with the enjoyable
experience of playing the SSD drum kits via their Roland V-drums. The
new 3.5 V-drum preset drum kits have been optimized to work with all
Roland v-drum brains and pads. Most users will find that all of the drum
kits sound and play great right out of the box. With that said, it’s
impossible to have the perfect default v-drum response that will please
everyone. There are many reasons for this including the obvious examples
of personal preference, sensitivity levels, or threshold levels. However
there happen to be a large amount of “not so obvious examples” that will
cause problems for both a 500-dollar V-Drum kit and 5000-dollar V-Drum
kit alike. In the following paragraph these “not so obvious examples” will
be explained and how to fix the problems associated with them.
Not So Obvious Reasons Your V-Drums May Have
Issues with SSD
Drum Head Tuning
If you don’t use V-Drums with mesh heads you can skip this section but for
the users who use electronic drum pads with mesh heads you will want to
make sure to read on.
Unfortunately one of the main advantages of using mesh head V-Drums is
also responsible for a large amount of problems associated with V-Drum
playability issues. The advantage mentioned above is the ability to tune
mesh heads.
If you have been is the nasty situation where you can’t seem to get a certain
v-drum pad to respond like it should even after a large amount of time is
spent going back and fourth between sensitivity, threshold and other
settings with no effective result being produced in the end, one of the most
likely reasons behind this problem is that your V-Drum is tuned
incorrectly.
Head Is Too Loose
When the tension over the head of a v-drum is displaced, the ability for the
internal drum sensor to respond to hits accurately is dramatically hindered.
If the head is too loose you run into the problem of actually hitting the
delicate sensor to hard which can cause miss-triggers, unrealistic trigger
response and most detrimental of all, your sensor being permanently
damaged.
It’s hard to know when this happens so when the sensor does become
damaged a lot of time may be wasted troubleshooting other possible
reasons to the drum pads malfunction until your head eventually explodes.
You also run the risk of ripping your mess head. So it’s a good idea test
how easy it is to push the sensor down through middle of the mesh head.
The sensor should always barely be touching the head at all time and is
normal.
Head Is Too Tight
Alternatively, you can tune a head so tight that the sensor isn’t even being
triggered when hitting the drum. This happens mostly new drum pads or
pads with new heads on them more than. The reason this happens can be
hopefully explained with this horrible analogy:
Striking Position and Placement of Hits
A common issue that affects the playability and output response of the VDrums for some people, is that the position in which they hit a certain
drum or cymbal pad is incorrect.
This is not to imply that they are playing drums incorrectly, but rather that
they are missing sensors found in certain areas of a drum pad or
accidentally hitting sensors they didn’t know were there. Following is a list
of suggestions with regard to this problem
Suggestion On Where and How to Hit Certain Drum Pads.
Roland PD-100/105/120/125
Some of these Snare/Tom Pads have the Rim-Shot sensor location on only
one side of the drum and can only trigger accurate Rim-Shots when played
on this side. To fully utilize the rim-shot you may have to have your vdrum rotated differently than you or your snare stand is used too. Your
logo on the head may not be going the correct direction but at least you’ll
be hitting those rim-shots correctly.
Certain Cymbal Pads That Have a Bell Sensor
Some Ride and Crash V-Drum Pads have the bell sensor located only in a
particular area of the bell, usually directly facing you, which could be a
problem for some people whose playing style or Cymbal placement has
them hitting the far right, far left or even the back. One thing to remember
is that for the most part, the sensor is usually found directly across the
cymbal from the Roland Logo. This goes for Crash Cymbal Sensors.
In general try to make it a habit of reading the manuals that are associated
with your V-Drum pads. This could save you hours and hours of time
troubleshooting problems as well as open your eyes to certain features of
the pads you were not currently aware of.
Time and Hardware Malfunction
Like all things, over time v-drums and certain parts within them where out
and won’t work as well as they should or stop working all together.
The cones or padding that are found over the sensors in most v-drums are
very delicate and will over time be grinded down due to the constant
beatings as well unseen environmental factors. Fortunately this padding
can be easily replaced yourself and is fairly cheap (20 dollars or so from
Roland).
Mesh-heads also wear out and stretch over time and need to be replaced.
Once these things have been replaced on your old V-Drums, they should
play like the day you purchased them.
Not Accurately Monitoring Your Drums
The last thing to mention is monitoring. How you hear the sounds
produced while performing with your V-Drums is very important and is
often forgot. V-Drum produced sounds whether through SSD 3.0 tend to be
monitored at much quieter volume than a standard acoustic drum kit.
Because of this, some people that are used acoustic drums and then switch
to V-Drums tend play much harder than they need to.
The mind expects loud noises and when it doesn’t get them when playing
V-Drums, the mind unconsciously tries to compensate by telling your body
that you must play harder to achieve the volume levels normally expected.
This is mainly a bad habit to have because it could mess up your technique
if not careful and also because of the extra force exerted, your V-Drum
hardware takes more abuse than it normally should. Just being aware of
this problem should help keep it from happening and for most users, will
never become a problem
Roland TD-20 Set-Up
To make set-up a snap we suggest you do a “Reset to Factory Settings” on
your TD-20. The following Suggestions are what we found to be the
quickest and easiest way to maximize the V-Drum Playability using Steven
Slate Drums 3.0. If you enter the settings below and are still not getting the
feel you want, we suggest that before you go into the drum-brain settings,
that you instead browse the “Not So Obvious Reasons Your V-Drums May
Sound and Play Like Crap”. Remember these are just suggestions.
Suggested Settings for the Roland TD-20
GLOBAL SETTINGS
SETUP
- GLOBAL (F2)
- Local Control (OFF)
SETUP
- CTRL (F3)
- HH Note# Border (80)
HI-HAT SETTINGS
TRIGGER
- ADVANCE (F5)
- HH Retrig - (10)
- Mask Time - (8)
TRIGGER
- BASIC (F2)
- Threshold - (12)
TRIGGER
- HI-HAT (F3)
- Foot Splash Sens (-10)
- Noise Cancel (2)
FOR TD-9 VDRUM BRAINS, set hi hat to “EXTERNAL”.