Steinberg Cubase 7 User Manual

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Audio effectsUsing the side-chain input
6.On the Output Routing selector, locate the Side-Chain node and select the 
PingPongDelay effect that you set up for the vocal track.
This way, the signals from the second (duplicate) track are routed to the effect 
(and do not end up in the mix).
Now every time the signals on the vocal track exceed the threshold, the delay will be 
deactivated. Since the threshold for the delay effect is fixed, you may have to adjust 
the volume of track 2, in this example, to ensure that vocal parts of low or middle 
volume will also silence the delay effect.
Triggering a compressor using side-chain signals
Compression, expansion or gating can be triggered by side-chain signals exceeding a 
specified threshold.
You may run into a situation where you want to lower the volume of one instrument 
every time another instrument is played. For example, you may want to lower the 
volume of the bass guitar during the bass drum hits. This can be achieved by applying 
compression to the bass guitar signal every time the drum signals are present on the 
respective track.
Proceed as follows:
1.Select the bass guitar track.
2.Open the Inserts section in the Inspector, click in an insert slot to open the effects 
selector and select the Compressor effect found in the Dynamics category.
The effect is loaded into the effect slot and the effect control panel opens. 
3.Make the desired effect settings (you will most likely have to adjust them later to 
get the right compression level) and activate the Side-Chain button.
4.Select the bass drum track. 
5.Open the Sends Inspector section, click in a send slot to open the effects selector, 
and from the Side-chains mode, select the Compressor effect you created for the 
bass guitar track. Adjust the Send level.
This way, the bass drum signal triggers the compressor on the bass guitar track.
When you now play back the project, the bass guitar will be compressed whenever 
the signals on the bass drum track exceed the threshold. 
						

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Audio effectsUsing external effects (Cubase only)
Side-chain and Modulation
Side-chain signals bypass the built-in LFO modulation and instead apply modulation 
according to the envelope of the side-chain signal. Since each channel will be analyzed 
and modulated separately, this allows for creating astonishing spatial modulation 
effects. Feel free to experiment with the functions to see what they have to offer!
About drag & drop
When you drag effects from one insert slot to another (on the same channel or 
between different channels), the following applies:
- When you move an effect within a channel (e. g. from slot 4 to slot 6), the side-
chain connections will be kept.
- When you drag and drop an effect between two channels, the side-chain 
connections will not be kept.
- When copying an effect into another effect slot (for the same or a different 
channel), the side-chain connections will not be copied, i.
 e. they will be lost.
Using external effects (Cubase only)
Although this program comes with a top selection of VST effect plug-ins, and 
although there is a huge range of additional plug-ins available on the market, you may 
still have some hardware effect units that you want to use – valve compressors, reverb 
units, vintage tape echo machines, etc. By setting up external FX busses you can 
make your outboard equipment part of the Cubase virtual studio!
An external FX bus is a combination of outputs (sends) and inputs (returns) on your 
audio hardware, along with a few additional settings. All external FX busses you have 
created will appear on the effect pop-up menus and can be selected like the internal 
effect plug-ins. The difference is that if you select an external effect as an insert effect 
for an audio track, the audio will be sent to the corresponding audio output, 
processed in your hardware effect (provided that you have connected it properly) and 
returned via the specified audio input.
ÖCreating and handling of external effects is described in detail in the chapter “VST 
Connections” on page 26.
Editing effects
Double-click the center part of an insert or a send slot to open the control panel for 
the loaded plug-in.
The contents, design and layout of the control panel depend on the selected effect. 
However, all effect control panels have an On/Off button, a Bypass button, 
Read/Write automation buttons (for automating effect parameter changes, see the 
chapter 
“Automation” on page 279), two buttons for comparing effect settings, a 
routing selector, a context menu, a preset selector, and a Preset Management pop-up 
menu for saving and loading effect presets. Some plug-ins also feature a side-chain 
button, see 
“Using the side-chain input” on page 240.
The Rotary 
effect control 
panel 
						

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Audio effectsEffect presets
•All effects can be edited using a simplified control panel (horizontal sliders only, no 
graphics). This generic editor is opened using the context pop-up menu in the top 
right corner of the plug-in panel.
Effect control panels may have any combination of knobs, sliders, buttons and graphic 
curves. 
ÖThe included effects and their parameters are described in detail in the separate PDF 
document “Plug-in Reference”.
•If you edit the parameters for an effect, these settings are saved automatically with 
the project.
Comparing effect settings
You can compare two different parameter settings for an effect.
Proceed as follows: 
1.Adjust the effect parameters for setting A, and activate setting B by clicking the 
“A/B Setting” button.
As a starting point for setting B, the parameters for setting A are copied.
2.Adjust the parameters for setting B.
You can now click the “A/B Setting” button to activate setting A and compare both 
settings. Settings A and B are saved with the project.
You can copy the settings between A and B using the corresponding buttons.
Effect presets
In the MediaBay – or with certain limits in the Save Preset dialog – you can assign 
attributes to presets which allow you to organize and browse them according to 
various criteria. Cubase comes with categorized track and VST presets that you can 
use straight out of the box. You can also preview effect presets before loading them 
which considerably speeds up the process of finding the right effect preset.
Effect presets can be divided into the following main categories:
•VST presets for a plug-in.
These are stored parameter settings for a specific effect.
•Inserts presets that contain insert effect combinations.
These can contain the whole insert effects rack, complete with settings for each 
effect, see 
“Saving insert effect combinations” on page 247.
Setting A active Setting B active
Copy A->B Copy B->A 
						

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Audio effectsEffect presets
Selecting effect presets
Most VST effect plug-ins come with a number of useful presets for instant selection.
To select an effect preset in the Presets browser, proceed as follows:
1.Load an effect, either as a channel insert or into an FX channel.
The control panel for the effect is displayed.
2.Click in the preset field at the top of the control panel.
This opens the Presets browser.
•You can also open the Presets browser from the Inspector (Inserts tab) or the 
Channel Settings window.
3.In the Results section, select a preset from the list.
4.Activate playback to audition the selected preset.
Simply step through the presets until you find the right sound. It may be helpful to 
set up cycle playback of a section to make comparisons between different preset 
settings easier.
5.When you have found the preset that you want, double-click on it (or click outside 
the Presets browser).
The preset is applied.
•To return to the preset that was selected when you opened the Presets browser, 
click the “Revert to Last Setting” button.
•You can also open the Presets browser by clicking the button to the right of the 
preset field and selecting “Load Preset” from the pop-up menu.
ÖThe preset handling for VST 2 plug-ins is slightly different, see “About earlier VST 
effect presets” on page 246.
The Browser sections
The Presets browser contains the following sections:
•The “Results” section lists the available presets for the selected effect. 
						

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Audio effectsEffect presets
•The Filters section shows the available preset attributes for the selected effect. 
This section is similar to the Filters section in the MediaBay, see “The Filters 
section” on page 406. To show the Filters section, click the “Set Up Window 
Layout” button and activate the Filters option.
•The Location Tree section allows you to specify the folder that is searched for 
preset files.
To show the Location Tree section, click the “Set Up Window Layout” button and 
activate the Location Tree option. Note that this is only available if the Filters 
section is also active.
Saving effect presets
You can save your edited effect settings as presets for further use (e. g. in other 
projects):
1.Open the Preset Management pop-up menu.
2.Select “Save Preset…” from the pop-up menu.
The Save Preset dialog opens.
3.In the New Preset section, enter a name for the new preset.
•If you want to save attributes for the preset, click the button below the “New 
Preset” section at the bottom left.
The Attribute Inspector section opens, allowing you to define attributes for the 
preset. For further information about attributes, see 
“The Attribute Inspector” on 
page 410.
4.Click OK to save the preset and exit the dialog.
User-defined presets are saved in the following location:
- Windows: \Users\\AppData\Roaming\VST3 
presets\\
- Mac: /Users//Library/Audio/Presets//
ÖYou cannot change the default folders, but you can add further subfolders inside the 
individual effect preset folders (by clicking the New Folder button). 
						

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Audio effectsEffect presets
Saving a default preset
To define and save a default preset and use it e. g. in other projects, proceed as 
follows:
1.Set up the parameters to your liking.
2.Open the Preset Management pop-up menu, and select “Save as Default Preset” 
from the pop-up menu.
Your default preset is saved. 
Recalling a default preset
You can recall a default preset at any time from the Presets browser by selecting 
“Default” or by opening the plug-in context menu, and selecting “Reset to Default 
Preset” from the “Default Preset” submenu.
Copying and pasting presets
To copy a plug-in preset and paste it in another instance of the same plug-in, proceed 
as follows:
1.Open the plug-in context menu and select “Copy (plug-in name) Setting”.
2.Select another instance of the same plug-in, open the context menu and select 
“Paste (plug-in name) Setting”.
About earlier VST effect presets
As stated previously, you can use any VST 2.x plug-ins in Cubase. For a description of 
how to add VST plug-ins, see 
“Installing and managing effect plug-ins” on page 248.
When you add a VST 2 plug-in, presets for it may be in the old FX program/bank 
format (.fxp/.fxb). You can import such files, but the preset handling will be slightly 
different. You will not be able to use all features until you have converted the old 
“.fxp/.fxb” presets to VST
 3 presets. If you save new presets for the included VST 2 
plug-ins, these will automatically be saved in the new “.vstpreset” format.
Importing and converting FXB/FXP files
To import FXB/FXP files, proceed as follows:
1.Load any VST 2 effect you may have installed, and open the Preset Management 
pop-up menu.
2.Select “Import FXB/FXP…” from the pop-up menu.
This menu item is only available for VST 2 plug-ins.
!All VST 2 presets can be converted to VST 3 presets. 
						

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Audio effectsEffect presets
3.In the file dialog that opens, locate the FXP file and click Open.
If you load a bank (.fxb), it will replace the current set of all effect programs. If you 
load a single program, it will replace the currently selected effect program only. 
Note that such files exist only if you created your own .fxp/.fxb presets with a 
previous version of Cubase (or any other VST
 2 application).
4.After importing, you can convert the current program list to VST presets by 
selecting “Convert Program List to VST Presets” from the Preset Management 
pop-up menu.
After converting, the presets will be available in the Presets browser, and you can 
use the Attribute Inspector to add attributes and audition the presets. The 
converted presets will be stored in the VST3 Preset folder.
Saving insert effect combinations
You can save the complete insert effect rack for a channel together with all parameter 
settings as an inserts preset. Inserts presets can be applied to audio, instrument, FX 
channel, or group tracks.
Proceed as follows:
1.Select the desired track in the track list and open the Inserts Inspector section.
2.Load a combination of insert effects and adjust the parameters (or select effect 
presets) for each effect.
3.At the top of the Inserts tab, click the VST Sound button to open the Preset 
Management pop-up menu for the inserts and select “Save FX Chain Preset…”.
This can also be done from the Channel Settings window using the VST Sound 
button at the top of the Inserts section.
4.In the dialog that opens, type in a name for the preset.
5.Select the track (audio/group/instrument/FX channel) you wish to apply the new 
preset to, and open the Preset Management pop-up menu.
As you can see, the new preset is available at the top of the pop-up menu.
6.Select the preset you created from the pop-up menu.
The effects are loaded into the Insert slots of the new track, and the control panels 
for all effects are opened. 
						

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Audio effectsInstalling and managing effect plug-ins
•Note that when loading insert combination presets, any plug-ins that were 
previously loaded for the track will be removed, regardless of whether these slots 
are used in the preset.
In other words, saving an inserts preset means saving the states of all insert slots.
•You can use the Preset Management pop-up menu to save your settings as 
preset, or to rename or remove the current preset.
Extracting insert effect settings from track presets
You can extract the effects used in a track preset and load them into your inserts 
“rack”: 
•On the Preset Management pop-up menu, select “From Track Preset…” to open a 
dialog where all track presets are shown.
•Select an item in the list to load the effects used in the track preset.
Track presets are described in the chapter “Working with track presets” on page 422.
Installing and managing effect plug-ins
Cubase supports two plug-in formats; the VST 2 format (with the file name extensions 
“.dll” on the PC and “.vst” on the Mac) and the VST 3 format (extension “.vst3” on 
both platforms). The formats are handled differently when it comes to installation and 
organizing.
Installing VST 3 plug-ins on Mac OS X systems
To install a VST 3.x plug-in on Mac OS X systems, quit Cubase and drag the plug-in 
file into one of the following folders:
•/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3/
This is only possible if you are the system administrator. Plug-ins installed in this 
folder will be available to all users, for all programs that support them.
•/Users//Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3/
“” is the name you use to log on to the computer (the easiest way to 
open this folder is to go to your “Home” folder and use the path 
/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST3/ from there). Plug-ins installed in this folder are only 
available to you.
When you launch Cubase again, the new effects appear on the effect selectors. In the 
VST 3 protocol, the effect category, subfolder structure, etc. are built-in and cannot 
be changed. Therefore you will find the effects in the corresponding category folders.
Installing VST 2.x plug-ins on Mac OS X systems
To install a VST 2.x plug-in on Mac OS X systems, quit Cubase and drag the plug-in 
file to one of the following folders:
•/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/
This is only possible if you are the system administrator. Plug-ins installed in this 
folder will be available to all users, for all programs that support them.
•/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/
“” is the name you use to log on to the computer (the easiest way to 
open this folder is to go to your “Home” folder and use the path 
/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/ from there). Plug-ins installed in this folder are only 
available to you.
When you launch Cubase again, the new effects appear on the effect selectors. 
						

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Audio effectsInstalling and managing effect plug-ins
ÖIf an effect plug-in comes with its own installation application, you should use this. As 
a general rule, always read the documentation or readme files before installing new 
plug-ins.
Installing VST 3 plug-ins on Windows systems
On Windows systems, VST 3 plug-ins are installed by dragging the files (with the 
extension “.vst3”) into the VST3 folder in the Cubase application folder. When you 
launch Cubase again, the new effects appear on the effect selectors. In the VST 3 
protocol, the effect category, subfolder structure, etc. are built-in and cannot be 
changed. Therefore you will find the new effects in the corresponding category folders.
Installing VST 2 plug-ins on Windows systems
On Windows systems, VST 2.x plug-ins are installed by dragging the files (with the 
extension “.dll”) into the Vstplugins folder in the Cubase application folder, or into the 
Shared VST Plug-in folder – see below. When you launch Cubase again, the new 
effects will appear on the effect pop-up menus.
ÖIf an effect plug-in comes with its own installation application, you should use this. As 
a general rule, always read the documentation before installing new plug-ins.
Organizing VST 2 plug-ins
If you have a large number of VST 2 plug-ins, having them all on a single hierarchy in the 
effects selector may become unmanageable. For this reason, the VST 2 plug-ins 
installed with Cubase are placed in appropriate subfolders according to the effect type.
•On Windows systems, you can organize VST plug-ins by moving, adding or 
renaming subfolders within the Vstplugins folder. 
When you launch the program and open the effects selector, the subfolders are 
represented by nodes, each listing the plug-ins in the corresponding subfolder.
•On Mac OS X systems, you cannot change the hierarchic arrangement of the 
“built-in” VST plug-ins.
However, you can arrange any additional plug-ins you have installed (in the 
/Library/Audio/Plug-Ins/VST/ folders, see above) by placing them in subfolders. In 
the program, the subfolders are represented by nodes, each listing the plug-ins in 
the corresponding subfolder.
The Plug-in Information window
On the Devices menu, you will find an item called “Plug-in Information”. Selecting this 
opens a dialog listing all the available VST compatible plug-ins in your system 
(including VST instruments), along with all MIDI plug-ins.  
						

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Audio effectsInstalling and managing effect plug-ins
Managing and selecting VST plug-ins
To display all available VST plug-ins, open the “VST PlugIns” tab.
•To enable a plug-in (make it available for selection), put a checkmark in the left 
column.
Only the enabled plug-ins will appear on the effect selectors.
•The Instances column indicates how many instances of the plug-in are currently 
used in Cubase.
Clicking in this column for a plug-in which is already in use produces a pop-up 
showing exactly where each use occurs.
ÖA plug-in may be in use even if it is not enabled in the left column. 
You might for example have opened a project containing effects that are currently 
disabled on the menu. The left column only determines whether or not the plug-in 
is visible on the effect selectors.
•All columns can be resized by dragging the divider in the column header.
The other columns show the following information about each plug-in:
Update button
Clicking this button will make Cubase re-scan the designated VST folders for 
updated plug-in information.
VST 2.x Plug-in Paths button
This opens a dialog where you can see the current paths to where VST 2.x plug-ins 
are located. You can add/remove folder locations by using the corresponding buttons. 
If you click “Add”, a file dialog opens, where you can select a folder location.
About the “shared” plug-ins folder (Windows and VST 2.x only)
You can designate a “shared” VST 2.x plug-ins folder. This will allow VST 2.x plug-ins 
to be used by other programs that support this standard.
You designate a shared folder by selecting a folder in the list and clicking the “Set As 
Shared Folder” button in the VST 2.x Plug-in Paths dialog.
ColumnDescription
NameThe name of the plug-in.
VendorThe manufacturer of the plug-in.
FileThis shows the complete name of the plug-in (with extension).
CategoryThis indicates the category of each plug-in (such as VST instruments, 
surround effects, etc.). 
VersionShows the version of the plug-in.
SDKShows with which version of the VST protocol a plug-in is compatible.
LatencyThis shows the delay (in samples) that will be introduced if the effect is 
used as an Insert. This is automatically compensated for by Cubase.
Side-Chain 
InputsShows the number of side-chain inputs for a plug-in.
I/OThis column shows the number of inputs and outputs for each plug-in.
PathThe path and name of the folder in which the plug-in file is located.
ASIO-GuardLets you activate/deactivate ASIO-Guard for each plug-in.