VST & REASON - rewired 2

Author: admin
Date: 05-Sep-01

Ok, this is a further article about Rewire use. In this one we'll go into how to use REASON in rewire mode using the REASON rack sound generators in VST as if they were VSTI's... selecting REASON rack generators inside VST on the midi tracks, sequencing them from VST and monitoring & mixing their output on the VST mixer.




SETTING REWIRE CHANNELS


With REASON opened, or before you open it, choose VST's PANELS menu & select: 'REWIRE'...

You'll see REWIRE/Reason has a potential 64 signal feeds or channels. You can have as few or as many of these 64 Reason channels as you like feeding into the VST mixer for further integration into your VSTi and/or audio-tracks mix... or to add VST mixer EQ & plugin-FX to REASON sounds...
Read the other VST/REWIRE article for how to use the rack in more depth - remember, the TAB key on your qwerty keyboard flips the rack front-to-back.

You can see the selection in the REWIRE panel offers activation of a master L/R - ('Reason Mix L'  -&-  'Reason Mix R') - these are the L/R master OUT feeds from the REASON Mixer, so if you want to just feed the main REASON Mix OUT into the VST mixer as a stereo feed from REASON's own mixer, then simply select those two & the REASON Mix will appear in the VST mixer as a 'REASON MIX L&R' stereo 'Rewire' channel on your VST mixer.

With that method, you are mixing the REASON mix on it's own mixer and simply integrating that mix int VST's onboard mix. - In this example we are bypassing/discarding the REASON Mixer and just using the REASON rack sound-generators as sound-modules.

We can totaly bypass and not use any of REASONS mixer or FX rack features, and simply input the REASON sound-generating items into a totaly VST mix and work with them as if they were VSTi's... This also reduces alot of REASONS cpu requirements, so it all runs very light, as simple as using a bunch of VSTi's in fact.

So on the VST REWIRE panel image above I've activated channels 3 - 12 - giving me 10 dedicated mono channels on my VST mixer - I can route the REASON sound-generator outputs direct to those VST mixer channels in REASON. - Using 10 mono channels I can get one ReDrum drumbox with 8 mono drum channels using 8 of the Rewire channels, and I have two more channels for two Subtractor synths - one bass & one lead. - total = 10 channels.

Ok.... so we have VST open.. we've activated 10 mono channels of Rewire.. we can now open REASON if it isn't open already... The next thing to do is to setup the sync & offset between the two...... Remember, in REASON's Preferences/AUDIO settings there should have NO audio soundcard output selected. It is NOT neccessary to switch anything ON in REASON's Preferences for Rewire to work properly...

SYNC OFFSET CORRECTION

When you have REASON open as rewire, you'll see that the VST L/R marker on the VST Arrange-Page will move so that it look like this...

VST defaults to startup with an offset of -2 bars to give the audio playback/song start time to buffer-up... when REASON is sync'd it shows as a 2 bar retard of the bar_count, so VST Arrange & Transport both visibly shifts to start at the -2 offset.

Go into OPTIONS/ syncronisation in VST........



and set the BAR-DISPLAY to '0'

SETTING REASON TRANSPORT & CLOCK

Now go to REASON and we'll set it's transport settings so that they are right to use REASON as a sound module rack. - First off i should note again we should be starting with a REASON - 'NEW' song file so there is no patterns in the REASON sequencer. - So, we can use the devider bar which is adjustable to drop down and only show us the REASON Transport-Bar and hides the rest of the Sequencer section.... We can Start/Stop Forward & Rewind etc using the REASON Transport as it is sync'd to VST - So when composing our REASON sounds to their VST sequenced patterns, the Transport will control VST making it start & stop etc or loop as yoi tweak your sounds & samples in REASON.

So grab that devider bar, drop it right down so just the Transport is showing, and turn OFF the PLAY lamp on the REASON Transport too so it's own sequencer doesn't actualy play.




This is what the Transport should look like for working with vst & using REASON as a rack of sound-modules like VSTi's. Whatever sound-generators are visible above the Transport-Bar in the rack is whatever items we use in our track... So let's add & remove some item's to get just what we need in the rack... When using REASON with VST this way, think of REASON as a VSTi-Rack that we are loading up as we would our VSTi-Rack in VST itself.

REASONS RACK - ADDING & REMOVING BITS

Well, next we want to setup REASON with ONLY the items we want to use so that we save CPU. - Remember in this tutorial page we are setting up REASON for use as a rack of sound-generating modules. - We create our sounds & kits etc with REASON gear, but sequence it with VST as we would VSTi's... the output of all the REASON gear is also being fed via REWIRE into our VST mixer as well...


We can reduce any device in the rack so it is minimised... Here we can see the REASON 'Hardware-Interface' rack which always appears at the top of the rack by default... we only need this device maximised if we are setting up patches to the interface so as to route them thru to VST's mixer, so most times this can be minimised so we see more of our rack gear that we setup.

we don't need the REASON Mixer for this working method... all the REASON items we sequence will feed direct into the VST Mixer... so if we right-click over any item in the rack you can select CUT DEVICE...



For a simple first demo of the way this setup works, we'll try using just the REASON drumbox and a couple of the 'Subtractor' analog style synths and have all those on dedicated VST Mixer channels - So cut the mixer and the Rexplayer & the Matrix analog sequencer and all the effects until we have just the Redrums & a couple of Subtractor synths...



Click anywhere on the Rack-Frame image and choose to ADD any device.... Use CUT & ADD device and get what we need into the rack...

Here's the rack as we might expect to see it working in this way - We have our REDRUM drums & a SUBTRACTOR synth visible at the top of the rack... We might also have a few more Subtractor synths and a sampler or two... In this example there happens to be two REASON FX units in the rack... whatever. - You can if you like with this method STILL pass REASON Sound-Generating gear thru REASON FX in series, and then output the 'Effected' signal by patching the FX-unit output into the VST mixer via REASON's Hardware-Interface ...

SELECTING VST REWIRE MIXER CHANNEL

Ok... as noted we are routing all REASON rack sound-modules to the VST mixer direct in this example. - You can do this by either dragging & dropping the cables between the different gear outputs and the Hardware-Interface, or, by right-clicking on any REASON gear-item Output, and selecting any of the 64 REASON channel Inputs from the resulting vertical list that appears.

In this example we have Right-clicked over the SUBTRACTOR synth's mono output and the resulting list offers us the REASON Inputs or channels...

Here is the SUBTRACTOR synth Audio-Output 'Rewired' into the Hardware-Interface on channel Input 3 - Input 3 is the first mono individual Input after '1 & 2' on REASON's Hardware-Interface - Inputs 1 & 2 usualy act as the Master L/R stereo out which you should use if running your REASON mix thru the REASON mixer and out to VST as a stereo feed.

You have to think in this way with REASON channel/Inputs, counting Input/Channel number_3 as Input_1 because 1 & 2 are fixed stereo - Channel 1 & 2 are always fixed - so to activate 8 individual Redrum channel Inputs, and 2 individual Subtractor synth mono inputs into the VST mixer on their own dedicated channels, that means a total of 10 Inputs on the REASON Hardware-Interface & 10 channels activated in VST's REWIRE panel & mixer -

So to activate 10 channels in Mono from REASON then go to the VST REWIRE panel as described above, and switch on Rewire channels 3-12 - which equals our required 10 mono channels - and in REASON simply wire the rack-gear outputs to the required REASON Inputs on the Hardware-Interface - as shown above.... Each Redrum machine yopu open gives you a possible 8 individual drums - you can open multiple Redrum drum-boxes and just keep wiring the Outputs to more VST mixer channels with REASON's Hardware-Interface.

BACK IN VST SEQUENCER


We simply select REASON synths on our output column as we would VSTi's!!... It's great cos you get the best of both worlds... and you can easily mix & match VSTi's & REASON gear to make layered sounds etc... Also this is great cos it gives you access to use things like Trigger-effects using REASON's Redrum drumbox and the Subtractor synths etc - Lot's of the REASON gear has trigger output's and inputs so you can make gated pad's with Redrum tiggering via VST midi patterns etc...

here for example is Redrum's channel 8 Gate-Out socket wired over to the Subtractor synth Amp-Envelope gate-Input... any pattern being played by drum_8 on the re-drum drumbox will trigger the Amp_envelope on the Subtractor synth... there are many such gating possibilities in REASON, and because all REASON items can be selected as Output's for VST midi tracks, it is very easy to copy for example a hi-hat pattern over from a VST midi drum track to another Dedicated track and then use that to trigger a dummy ReDrum channel to control some aspect of a REASON synth!...

FINAL BITZ......

Well this article is not going to even get into anything to do with programming in VST... you should know that, or read other VST pages on the site instead - and also read the other VST & REASON article on Rewire..... as for REASON when you save your VST Song with the midi data you also need to save REASON drum_kit's and synth sounds etc - also you need to load 'em up and try out generic patches & kit's etc - With ReDrumk you can Load up a kit, then edit the samples, replacuing ones you don't want to keep with your own samples from other drive locations - once you have your composite kit you can SAVE that easily and it'll load each time you need it - Also, it'll load up into REASON as the saved kit when you open the REASON Song-File....




All REASON's sound-generators use this interface for SAVE & LOAD functions... in this image example you can see where the mouse is there is 2 buttons & a pair of UP/DOWN key's below an LCD screen - the mouse is about to LOAD a whole kit - the DISK icon is for saving a kit, and once a bank of kit's is loaded from REASON's library, you can step up and down using the up/down key's next to Load and each time the new drum-kit name appears in the LCD style screen above the three Save/Load/Up-Down key's.

With the sampler & Subtractor synths stepping UP/DOWN with the key's after loading a Bank of sounds obviously selects the patches one by one.

REASON & VST is a surprisingly robust & versatile package - certainly if you don't mind working with a s/w interface & a master keyboard, then it offer's huge power when used in this combination/method price-to-price against the same PC & VST with a selection of outboard hardware - REASON run's very light and a decent Duron 700-800 with 128 minimum of ram is plenty to use this combination setup whcih gives you both a decent full suite of sound making gear combined with a sequencer hosting comprehensive audio recording & manipulating emphasis - add the two and you've got alot of poke - well worth a look, especialy when the forthcoming REASON hardware remote keyboard is released. - all in all i'd say more people should look at REASON as simply a rack of quality synth's, samplers, drums & fx - in that case it stands up VERY well against buying one of those s/w items each individualy.

COMMENTS FOR:

'VST & REASON - rewired 2'


There are a total:  14  comments posted to this page.

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

Last added comment

Article 'ratings' were added September 2008, so most articles have no viewer rating

 [back to top]