What is Multi-Output and how is that different than stereo?
- When adding a Beatmaker or Virtual Drummer plug-in to a track in your DAW, you have the option of Stereo or Multi-Output.
- Stereo provides a traditional left/right mix with all the drums blended. With everything on a single track, any relative mixing must be done within the plug-in.
- Multi-Output allows you to have each drum on its own track which provides more options for processing and mixing.
- This was added in version 2 of Virtual Drummer and Beatmaker.
- Note that with Beatmaker 2 and Virtual Drummer 2, Sending an Instrument to its individual out will remove it from master processing, so be aware that aspects like Reverb, Saturate, Maximize and of course Master Volume will not affect drums routed to their individual outs. Master processing is applied in Beatmaker 3.
- Virtual Drummer 2 also behaves like a real drum kit in a studio where drums are not perfectly isolated from each other (drums are most prominent in their channels but they also 'bleed' into others as well as being included in the overheads and room). Think of each instrument and ambience part in Virtual Drummer as a microphone. If you mute the Kick, you might still hear some of the Kick in other channels, especially the Overheads and Room.
Setting Up Multi-Outs in the Plug-in and DAW
DAWs handle multi-out plug-ins in various ways - to properly use the multi-out functionality in your DAW:
- Insert a Multi-Output (not Stereo) version of the plug-in on your track
- Create AUX tracks for the returns of each part
- Set up the plug-in to send drums/parts to individual outputs:
Virtual Drummer
- Click on each 'mic' and change the Output from Master to Individual – parts are automatically routed to specific outputs.
Beatmaker version 2
- Click on a key to select an Instrument, then click on Individual to change its Output from Master – parts are automatically routed to specific outputs.
Beatmaker version 3
- Go to the Mixer View and change the Output from Int to one of the 15 Ext options. Note: Some DAWs will have an offset in numbering - the first external output in Beatmaker might be the second output (or output pair) in your DAW. e.g. Drums set to Ext 1 in Beatmaker will be heard in BEAT3/4 in Logic, Out 2 in Studio One, etc. The Main output of Beatmaker is always 1 (or 1/2 for stereo).
Examples with specific DAWs
Studio One
Pro Tools
Logic Pro
Ableton Live
FL Studio
Cubase
Reaper
First, start an instance of your plug-in. To do so right-click on the timeline and select “Insert virtual instrument on new track”
A Menu will open up where you can choose your plug-in (for this explanation we’re going to stick with VD-Brute) Double click on the plug-in you want to start. Note that reaper automatically recognizes the multiple outputs. Here you can choose if you want to send all outputs to one master track or to split them - in this case, we want to create multiple tracks so click on yes and continue.
An instance of the plug-in will start and the multiple tracks will be created automatically for you. One last thing to do is to assign the instruments to their individual output. Click on the instrument you’d like to assign and select “individual” in the output section.
Once you assign the instrument to their individual track you can see that the output gets sent to the separated track (just a quick hint you can rename the tracks to the corresponding instrument to get a better overview of your instruments and tracks) Also please note that the Overhead mic and Room also have an individual output you can adjust.
How to group individual outputs into one single channel
The Beatmaker output routes are fixed to the channels and it depends on your DAW how to deal with it. Please have a look at our demonstration videos:
Beatmaker DOPE 2 in Studio One 4:
Beatmaker DOPE 2 in FL Studio 20
Learn how to group Individual Outputs in Studio One 5 with your Beatmaker:
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