Question about Drum Triggering

[Lord Fear]

have you considered triggering samples using sound replacer or drum a gog? Or for the truly adventurous, and if you are super serious about making the samples sound perfect, just use tab to transient in pro tools and just place the samples by hand its time consuming but its worth it in the end.

[timotheus]

Looks like reccommded max length for MIDI cable is 50 ft.

I would say, if there is any way you can reduce that distance to 50 ft. that's your best bet.

How is your Midi interface connected to your PC? COuld you extend the USB or Firewire connection? could you move the drum kit closer?

Are we talking about a set of virtual drums, or a set of real drums with some king of acoustic trigger on each piece?

http://www.midilite.com/midilink.html ($250 plus an off the shelf Cat 5 cable, not too bad)

http://www.wb5mrn.com/midi/midixtnd.htm
for the Do-it-yourselfer

Don't really have much experience with MIDI, but I suppose, Like all digital transmissions, you will likely get all or nothing.

[Kenny Gioia]

Originally Posted by Lord Fear

have you considered triggering samples using sound replacer or drum a gog? Or for the truly adventurous, and if you are super serious about making the samples sound perfect, just use tab to transient in pro tools and just place the samples by hand its time consuming but its worth it in the end.

Better then Tab Transient is Beat Detective.

Don't use it to move the beats. Just use it to separate every hit into individual regions.

Then turn tab to transient off.

Make a quickey that will tab (to next region start) go up a track (for the sample track) paste your sample and back down again.

Then you could hit or hold down that quickey until all the samples are added.

Then tab tru your sample track quickly and make sure all the phase lines up.

[Oroz]

Originally Posted by Lord Fear

have you considered triggering samples using sound replacer or drum a gog? Or for the truly adventurous, and if you are super serious about making the samples sound perfect, just use tab to transient in pro tools and just place the samples by hand its time consuming but its worth it in the end.

You got my vote. I used to go through all the trouble of using triggers with acoustic drums, did a lot of research about how to set them up right (I used them mostly for recording metal bands, so the kick drum triggering had to be "perfect" and fast) and never had 100% the resaults I was looking for. Now with Sound Replacer and/or Tab to Transient I can get exactly what I need and my ddrums triggers never get used jeje.

[jbuntz]

I don't get bothering with tabbing in samples. Set drummagog to the lowest "accuracy" (dynamics tracking messes up the timing by enough samples that it can mess with phase) and time align one hit and almost every hit will be in phase and if they aren't just nudge them. You will hear the weaker hits.

[cajonezzz]

Originally Posted by Produceher

Better then Tab Transient is Beat Detective.

Don't use it to move the beats. Just use it to separate every hit into individual regions.

Then turn tab to transient off.

Make a quickey that will tab (to next region start) go up a track (for the sample track) paste your sample and back down again.

Then you could hit or hold down that quickey until all the samples are added.

Then tab tru your sample track quickly and make sure all the phase lines up.

Kenny, I remember following a thread a few years ago before I got on the HD bandwagon that dealt with your use of Quick Keys.

Would you consider bringing that thread back to life and maybe doing a little tutorial for us guys that use PT on a daily basis?

I think it may have been at PSW--- or the DUC ( probably the DUC?) I'd really like to see you break it down again, and I'm sure there are a number of cool things you've discovered since then....

I'll buy the beer!


cz

[Yukon]

I know of a way to get your samples "phase accurate". After using this technique, you can cram as much sample in there and I doesn't sound like a sample. Mike Gillies (Bob Rock's PT guy) talks about it on the digidesign website:

http://www2.digidesign.com/digizine/...iques/gillies/

[Bishbashbosh]

Just to add to this.....
I use both DDrum and KAT triggering (which are pretty much the best acoustic drum to MIDI trigger interfaces) for live work, and there is absolutely no question in my mind- Drumagog, Sound Replacer or the Tab to Transient method are all significantly better than the results you can achieve with a dedicated trigger/MIDI converter......

They work much quicker, and are significantly much more accurate.

This is something I've been involved with for a long while (since way back using Marc MX-1 triggering)........ It's an absolute godsend to have plugs like Drumagog which do this job SO well, and with so little fuss!!!

To the original poster...... If you MUST use MIDI triggering, the main consideration here (as has already been mentioned) is the length of MIDI cable.

In my experience MIDI information starts to become unreliable after about 10 metres (with innaccurate passing of some information, specifically note-off information)..... Definitely keeping MIDI cabling to this length is going to give the most accurate representation of the drummer's performance.

[egan]

You could just record the triggers directly (i.e. no trigger brain--plug them in just like mics). Then you can use drumagog (or whatever) to 'trigger' after the fact. IMHO this is more accurate than using the mic tracks (at least if you have much bleed). Plus the trigger tracks can be useful for sidechaining gates even if you don't want to use samples.

[Kenny Gioia]

Originally Posted by cajonezzz

Kenny, I remember following a thread a few years ago before I got on the HD bandwagon that dealt with your use of Quick Keys.

Would you consider bringing that thread back to life and maybe doing a little tutorial for us guys that use PT on a daily basis?

I think it may have been at PSW--- or the DUC ( probably the DUC?) I'd really like to see you break it down again, and I'm sure there are a number of cool things you've discovered since then....

I'll buy the beer!


cz

I'm actually thinking about making a complete video tutorial of all my stupid pet tricks.

I'm using 6 controllers simultaneously at the moment. (C24 - Contour Pro Shuttle - Intuos Pen - Griffin Wheel - Standard Keyboard with QuicKeys - X-Keys)

I'm actually considering getting an X-Keys foot controller as I'm typing this.

But every time I start to plan out the tutorials I get another gig and forget.

Hopefully soon.

Thanks

[dwdrummer]

Sound replacer works wonders!

[Kenny Gioia]

Originally Posted by egan

You could just record the triggers directly (i.e. no trigger brain--plug them in just like mics). Then you can use drumagog (or whatever) to 'trigger' after the fact. IMHO this is more accurate than using the mic tracks (at least if you have much bleed). Plus the trigger tracks can be useful for sidechaining gates even if you don't want to use samples.

I thought this too, so I ran out and put triggers on all my drums in addition to miking them.

After awhile I realized that the mic was more accurate and threw away the triggers.

YMMV.

[EduardoApolonia]

Originally Posted by egan

You could just record the triggers directly (i.e. no trigger brain--plug them in just like mics). Then you can use drumagog (or whatever) to 'trigger' after the fact. IMHO this is more accurate than using the mic tracks (at least if you have much bleed). Plus the trigger tracks can be useful for sidechaining gates even if you don't want to use samples.

For me this is the way that works better. I learned it from Andy Sneap.
I use Ddrum triggers, record the signal through a preamp and then replace the Ddrum click signals with the sounds you want.
It's very accurate

[TheSweetener]

Hi!
I do the following:

Kick.
I often use a pad directly (especially for metal stuff). The signal from this pad goes 20 meters until it comes to the Ddrum4. Works great.

Kick, Snare and Toms.
I use gates (yes, while tracking)! The sidechain of the gate is triggered by Ddrum trigers on the drums while they're normally recorded by mics. This is the most acurate gating you can have. No more editing afterwards. What you get is some really "clean" tracks that are very easy to be replaced by whatever (Ddrum, Drumagog) if needed.



If you really wanna have a long midi line, then there are little boxes available (I think there was one from JL Cooper) that convert your midisignal so that it can be send through normal balanced cables. With these little helpers long distances are less of a problem.