Steinberg Cubase 7 User Manual
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251 Audio effectsInstalling and managing effect plug-ins Exporting plug-in information files You can also save plug-in information as an XML file, e. g. for archiving purposes or troubleshooting. The Export function is available for VST, MIDI and Audio Codec plug- ins. Proceed as follows: 1.Right-click on the desired tab in the Plug-in Information window to open the context menu and select “Export”. A file dialog opens. 2.In the dialog, specify a name and location for the Plug-in Information export file and click OK to export the file. •The Plug-in Information file contains information on the installed/available plug-ins, their version, vendor, etc. •The XML file can then be opened in any editor application supporting the XML format.
252 VST instruments and instrument tracks Introduction VST instruments are software synthesizers (or other sound sources) that are contained within Cubase. They are played internally via MIDI. You can add effects or EQ to VST instruments, just as with audio tracks. Some VST instruments are included with Cubase, others can be purchased separately from Steinberg and other manufacturers. This chapter describes the general procedures for setting up and using VST instruments. The included VST instruments and their parameters are described in the separate PDF document “Plug-in Reference”. ÖDepending on the VST version the instrument is compatible with, an icon may be displayed in front of the instrument name, see “About VST 3” on page 227. VST instrument channels vs. instrument tracks Cubase allows you to make use of VST instruments in two different ways: •By activating instruments in the VST Instruments window. This creates a VST instrument channel, which can be played by one (or several) MIDI track(s) routed to it. •By creating instrument tracks. Instrument tracks are a combination of a VST instrument, an instrument channel, and a MIDI track. You play and record MIDI note data directly for this track. Both methods have their advantages and should be selected according to what best suits your needs. The following sections describe the two approaches. VST instrument channels You can access a VST instrument from within Cubase by creating a VST instrument channel and associating this channel with a MIDI track. Proceed as follows: 1.On the Devices menu, select “VST Instruments”. The VST Instruments window opens. 2.Click in one of the empty slots to open the instrument pop-up menu and select the desired instrument.
253 VST instruments and instrument tracksVST instrument channels 3.You will be asked if you want to create an associated MIDI track connected to the VST instrument. Click Create. The instrument is loaded and activated, and its control panel opens. A MIDI track with the name of the instrument is added to the track list. The output of this track is routed to the instrument. 4.If you now look in the Project window track list, you will find that a dedicated folder for the chosen instrument has been added, within a “VST Instruments” folder (where all your VST instrument channels will be listed). The separate folder for the added VST instrument contains two types of automation tracks: one for automating the plug-in parameters and one for each MixConsole channel used by the VST instrument. For example, if you add a VST instrument with four separate outputs (four separate MixConsole channels), the folder will contain five automation tracks. To keep the screen less cluttered, you may want to close the folder for the VST instrument until you need to view or edit any of the automation tracks. For details about automation, see the chapter “Automation” on page 279. •When you select the MIDI track routed to the VST instrument, you will see that the Inspector contains a separate section for the instrument. This section contains the audio channel settings for the VST instrument (inserts, EQs, Sends, and fader settings). The tab has two buttons for opening the Channel Settings window (for the VST instrument channel) and the Edit Instrument button which opens the control panel for the VST instrument. 5.Depending on the selected VST instrument, you may also need to select a MIDI channel for the track. For example, a multitimbral VST instrument can play back different sounds on different MIDI channels – check the documentation for the VST instrument for MIDI implementation details. 6.Make sure that the “MIDI Thru Active” option is activated in the Preferences dialog (MIDI page). 7.Activate the Monitor button for the MIDI track (in the track list, Inspector, or MixConsole). When this is activated (or when the track is record enabled), incoming MIDI is passed on to the selected MIDI output (in this case the VST instrument), see the chapter “Recording” on page 110. 8.Open the MixConsole. You will find one or more channels for the audio outputs of the VST instrument. VST instrument channels have the same features and functionality as group channels, with the addition of an Edit above the faders for opening the VST instrument control panel. To open the VST instrument control panel, [Alt]/[Option]- click the Edit button, or click the Edit button and hold the mouse button pressed until the VST instrument control panel opens. You will also find Output Routing pop-up menus, e. g. for routing the VST instrument channels to output channels or groups. Opens the Channel Settings window. Opens the control panel for the VST instrument.
254 VST instruments and instrument tracksVST instrument channels 9.Play the VST instrument from your MIDI keyboard. You can use the MixConsole settings to adjust the sound, add EQ or effects, etc., just as with regular audio channels. Of course, you can also record or manually create MIDI parts that play back sounds from the VST instrument. •VST instrument channels give you full access to multitimbral instruments. You can have several MIDI tracks routed to the VST instrument, each playing a different part. •Similarly, you can route channels to any available output provided by the VST instrument. In the Preferences dialog (VST–Plug-ins page), you can specify what happens when loading a VST instrument in an instrument slot. Open the pop-up menu “Create MIDI track when loading VSTi” and select one of the available options: - When you select “Always”, a corresponding MIDI track will always be created. - When you select “Do not”, no track will be created and only the instrument will be loaded. - Select “Always ask to” if you want to decide whether a MIDI track is created whenever you load an instrument. You can also use modifiers to specify what happens when you load a VST instrument (overriding the Preference setting): - When you hold down [Ctrl]/[Command] while selecting a VST instrument for an instrument slot, a corresponding MIDI track with the name of the instrument is automatically created. - When you hold down [Alt]/[Option] while selecting a VST instrument for an instrument slot, no MIDI track will be created for the instrument. •If you do not want the plug-in control panels to open every time you load a plug-in, open the Preferences dialog (VST–Plug-ins page) and deactivate “Open Effect Editor After Loading it”. You can open a plug-in panel at any time by clicking the “e” button of the corresponding plug-in slot. The VST Instruments window When a VST instrument is loaded, six controls are displayed for this slot in the VST Instruments window. •The button on the far left is used for the Freeze function, see “Instrument Freeze” on page 258. !You can have multiple VST instruments activated at the same time, either different instruments or multiple instances of the same instrument. However, software instruments can consume a lot of CPU power – keep an eye on the VST Performance window to avoid running out of processor power (see also “Instrument Freeze” on page 258). Instrument on/off Instrument FreezeActivate outputs Bypass instrument Open instrument panel Event received
255 VST instruments and instrument tracksInstrument tracks •The On/Off button is used to activate or deactivate the VST instrument. When an instrument is selected from the instrument pop-up menu, it is activated automatically, i. e. the On/Off button is lit. For some instruments you may also bypass the instrument by clicking the Bypass button to the right of the On/Off button. •Click the Edit (“e”) button to open the control panel for the VST instrument. •Below the Edit button is a small LED that will light up when MIDI data is received by the instrument. •The rightmost button allows you to activate the desired output for the instrument. This is useful when you are using VST instruments that have a large number of audio busses, which may be confusing. Click one of the entries in the pop-up list to activate/deactivate output busses for this instrument. Instrument tracks An instrument track is a combination of a VST instrument, a MIDI track, and a VST instrument channel, in other words: it is a track coupled with a sound – it allows you to think in terms of sounds rather than in terms of track and instrument settings. Adding instrument tracks To open and use an instrument track, proceed as follows: 1.Open the Project menu, open the Add Track submenu and select “Instrument”. You can also right-click the track list and select “Add Instrument Track” on the context menu. 2.The Add Instrument Track dialog opens. You can select an instrument for the track from the pop-up menu (but you can also leave this until later if you wish). Specify the number of instrument tracks you wish to create in the “Count” field. If you click the Browse button, the dialog expands to show the Presets browser, where you can browse for sounds, see “Using the Presets browser” on page 261. 3.Click the Add Track button. If you have selected an instrument in the Add Track dialog, the new track gets the name of the instrument. Otherwise, the track is named “Instrument track”. Properties Each instrument track has a corresponding channel in the MixConsole. •In the Inspector, you can select a VST instrument from the Instrument pop-up menu. When you select an instrument from this pop-up menu, its control panel will open automatically. •You can also exchange the “sound” of an instrument track (i. e. the VST instrument and its settings) by extracting these data from another instrument track or a VST preset, see “Extracting sound from an instrument track or VST preset” on page 426. •On the Input Routing pop-up menu, you can select a MIDI input. Instrument tracks have only one MIDI input.
256 VST instruments and instrument tracksInstrument tracks •To open the control panel for the VST instrument, click the “Edit Instrument” button in the Inspector. •As with MIDI tracks, you can perform the usual MIDI editing procedures on the instrument track, like duplicate, split, or repeat the track, drag and drop the MIDI parts of an instrument track, etc. For more information, see the chapter “MIDI realtime parameters and effects” on page 449. •As with the MIDI track inspector and track controls, you can adjust track delay, choose MIDI input, work with VST instrument panels, etc. For more information, see the chapter “MIDI realtime parameters and effects” on page 449. •Instrument tracks have all options that VST instrument channels have, i. e. inserts, sends, EQ, etc. ÖVST instruments used in instrument tracks do not appear in the VST Instruments window. For an overview of all used VST instruments, open the Plug-in Information window via the Devices menu. For further information, see the section “The Plug-in Information window” on page 249. Restrictions •Instrument tracks have no MIDI sends. •MIDI volume and pan cannot be controlled (there is no “MIDI fader” tab in the Inspector); instead, the VST instrument volume and pan are used (via the “Channel” tab in the Inspector). This applies also to the respective automation parameters. ÖDue to there being only one volume and pan control for the instrument track, the Mute button will mute the complete track including the VST instrument. (As opposed to a MIDI track with an assigned VST instrument, for which muting the MIDI track still allows you to monitor and record the VST instrument.) •Instrument tracks always have one stereo output channel only. This means that VST instruments that do not provide a stereo output as their first output channel cannot be used with instrument tracks, and must be loaded via the VST Instruments window. •Due to the limitation to one output channel, instrument tracks play only the first voice of a multi-timbral VST instrument. If you want to use all voices, you have to load the instrument via the VST Instruments window and set up a MIDI channel to play it. Import and export options Importing MIDI loops You can import MIDI loops (file extension .midiloop) in Cubase. These files contain MIDI part information (MIDI notes, controllers, etc.) as well as all the settings that are saved in instrument track presets (see “About track presets and VST presets” on page 260). This way, you can easily reuse instrument patterns you really like in other projects or applications, for example.
257 VST instruments and instrument tracksInstrument tracks Proceed as follows: 1.Open the MediaBay window via the Media menu. 2.In the Results section, open the “Select Media Types” dialog and select “MIDI Loops & Plug-in Presets” (see “Filtering according to media type” on page 399). This is not necessary, but will help you locate your MIDI loops more quickly. 3.In the Results list, select a MIDI loop and drag it to an empty section in the Project window. An instrument track is created and the instrument part is inserted at the position where you dragged the file. The Inspector will reflect all settings saved in the MIDI loop, e. g. the VST instrument that was used, applied insert effects, track parameters, etc. ÖYou can also drag MIDI loops onto existing instrument or MIDI tracks. However, this will only import the part information. This means this part will only contain the MIDI data (notes, controllers) saved in the MIDI loop, but no inspector settings or instrument parameters. Exporting MIDI loops Exporting MIDI loops is a great way of saving a MIDI part together with its instrument and effect settings. This allows you to easily reproduce patterns you created without having to search for the correct sound, style, or effect. Proceed as follows: 1.Select the desired instrument part. 2.Open the File menu, open the Export submenu, and select “MIDI Loop…”. A file dialog opens. 3.In the “New MIDI Loop” section, enter a name for the MIDI loop. •If you want to save attributes for the MIDI loop, click the button below the “New MIDI Loop” section at the bottom left. The Attribute Inspector section opens, allowing you to define attributes for your MIDI loop. 4.Click OK to close the dialog and save the MIDI loop. MIDI Loop files are saved in the following folder: - Windows: \Users\\AppData\Roaming\Steinberg\ MIDI Loops - Mac: /Users//Library/Application Support/Steinberg/MIDI Loops/ This default folder cannot be changed, but you can create subfolders within this folder to organize your MIDI loops. Simply click the “New Folder” button in the Save MIDI Loop dialog. Exporting instrument tracks as MIDI file You can also export instrument tracks as standard MIDI files, see “Exporting MIDI files” on page 692. Please note the following: •As there is no MIDI patch information in an instrument track, this information is missing in the resulting MIDI file. •If you activate “Export Inspector Volume/Pan”, volume and pan information of the VST instrument will be converted and written into the MIDI file as controller data.
258 VST instruments and instrument tracksWhat do I need? Instrument channel or instrument track? What do I need? Instrument channel or instrument track? •If you need a particular sound without knowing which VST instrument to use, create an instrument track and use the preview features of the Presets browser to find the sound you want. •Do likewise if the instrument track restrictions described above do not matter. •If you are planning to create an instrument track preset, complete with inserts and EQ settings, you have to use an instrument track. •If you need to use multitimbral parts and/or multiple outputs, set up a VST instrument channel. Instrument Freeze Like all plug-ins, VST instruments may require a lot of processor power. If you are using a moderately powerful computer or if you are using a large number of VST instruments, you may come to a point where your computer cannot handle all VST instruments playing back in realtime (the CPU overload indicator in the VST Performance window lights up, you get crackling sounds, etc.). Enter the Instrument Freeze function! This is how it works: •When you freeze a VST instrument, the program renders an audio file of the instrument output (taking into account all unmuted MIDI parts routed to that VST instrument). This file is placed in the “Freeze” folder within the Project folder. •All MIDI tracks routed to the VST instrument, or the instrument track associated with the VST instrument, are muted and locked (the controls for these tracks will appear “grayed-out” in the track list and Inspector). •When you start playback, the rendered audio file is played back from an “invisible” audio track, routed to the VST instrument’s MixConsole channel. Thus, any effects, EQ, or mixing automation will still be applied. •You can also freeze the MixConsole channel of the VST instrument. This freezes any pre-fader insert effects for the channels, just as when freezing audio tracks (see “Freezing (rendering) insert effects for a track” on page 234). The result of the Freeze is that you get exactly the same sound as before, but the computer processor does not have to calculate the sound of the VST instrument in realtime. Performing the freeze The instrument freeze function is available in the VST Instruments window, the track list, and the Inspector for instrument tracks. 1.Set up the project so that the VST instrument plays back the way you want it to. This includes editing the MIDI tracks routed to the VST instrument, or editing the instrument track, and making parameter settings for the VST instrument itself. If you have automated parameter changes for the VST instrument, make sure that the Read (R) button is activated. 2.Open the VST Instruments window from the Devices menu, or, if you are using an instrument track, select the track and open the top Inspector tab.
259 VST instruments and instrument tracksInstrument Freeze 3.Click the Freeze button for the VST instrument (the button to the left of the VST instrument slot), or the Freeze button in the Inspector for the instrument track. The Freeze Instrument Options dialog opens with the following options for the Freeze operation: •Select “Freeze Instrument Only” if you do not want to freeze any insert effects for the VST instrument channels. Use this if you are using insert effects on the VST instrument channel(s) and want to be able to edit, replace, or remove these after freezing the VST instrument. •Select “Freeze Instrument and Channels” if you want to freeze all pre-fader insert effects for the VST instrument channels. If your VST instrument channels are set up with the desired insert effects and you do not need to edit these, select this option. •You can set a Tail Size time to let sounds complete their normal release cycle. Otherwise, the sound might be cut off at the very end of the freeze file. •When you activate “Unload Instrument when Frozen”, the frozen VST instrument will be removed. This is useful if you are freezing an instrument that uses a lot of RAM, e. g. for pre- loading samples. By unloading the instrument, the RAM becomes available for other plug-ins, etc. 4.Click OK. A progress dialog is shown while the program renders the VST instrument audio to a file on your hard disk. The Freeze button lights up. If you check the Project window at this point, you will find that the relevant MIDI/instrument tracks have grayed out controls in the track list and Inspector. Furthermore, the MIDI parts are locked and cannot be moved. 5.Play back the project. You will hear exactly the same sound as before freezing the VST instrument – but the CPU load will be considerably less! •If you selected “Freeze Instrument and Channels”, any insert effects used by the VST instrument are also frozen (except for the post-fader inserts). However, you can always adjust level, pan, sends, and EQ for frozen VST instruments. The Freeze button in the VST Instruments window……and in the Inspector.
260 VST instruments and instrument tracksVST instruments and processor load Unfreezing If you need to make adjustments (either to the MIDI tracks, to the VST instrument parameters or to the VST instrument channels if these were frozen) you need to unfreeze the VST instrument: 1.Click the Freeze button for the VST instrument again (either in the VST Instruments window or in the Inspector). You will be asked to confirm this operation. 2.Click “Unfreeze”. The tracks and VST instrument are restored and the rendered “freeze file” is deleted. VST instruments and processor load If you are working with VST 3 instruments, another way to relieve processor load is the “Suspend VST3 plug-in processing when no audio signals are received” option in the Preferences dialog (VST–Plug-ins page). This is described in the section “Smart plug-in processing” on page 228. Using presets for VSTi configuration About track presets and VST presets Track presets and VST presets allow you to quickly set up tracks or instruments with all the settings required for the sound you want. Cubase provides various types of presets for various purposes. Two of these are of relevance for VST instruments: •Track presets for instrument tracks save the parameter settings of a VST instrument together with all track/channel settings (applied audio insert effects, etc.). Instrument track presets can only be applied to instrument tracks, not to instrument channels activated in the VST Instruments window. •VST presets save all panel settings for a plug-in (VST instruments and VST effects), but no track/channel settings. Note that you can create instrument tracks from VST 3 presets, i. e. selecting a VST 3 preset will create an instrument track with all settings stored in the VST preset plus an “empty” track. As described in the chapter “Audio effects” on page 227, there are two types of VST presets that can be used: the VST 2 standard FXB/FXP files and the VST 3 preset standard with the extension “.vstpreset”. Some of the included VST instruments use the VST 2 preset standard, and others use the VST 3 standard. All VST 2 instruments can import FXB/FXP files and also convert them to the VST 3 standard. Once converted, you can use all VST 3 features, see “About earlier VST instrument presets” on page 264. ÖFor further information on track presets and VST presets, see the chapter “Working with track presets” on page 422. Browsing for sounds One important and often time-consuming aspect of music creation is the search for the right sounds. You might spend a huge amount of time trying out the presets for a particular instrument only to find out later that the preset for another instrument contains the sound you were looking for. This is why Cubase features extensive browsing possibilities, allowing you to preview all available presets without having to load them first!