We welcome a new name to Pro Tools Expert, community member Don Crees who has offered to share some of his experiences, tips & tricks with the community. Over to you Don.....
When FXpansion announced BFD ECO, their streamlined acoustic drum machine, would not be supported in AAX, many Pro Tools 11 users were left disappointed. With the latest version of PatchWork 1.7, Blue Cat’s VST/AU hosting plug-in, BFD ECO outputs can once more be routed into Pro Tools 11 (and higher) by the way of the auxiliary inputs. This effectively allows the user to refine each routed ECO output directly in Pro Tools.
The kind of setup required depends on the BFD ECO drum kit selected and how the user wishes to handle the outputs to Pro Tools. In this typical example we will be using one stereo Instrument Track and seven stereo Aux Inputs.
In Pro Tools, open the New Tracks dialog box (Control+Shift+N (Win) or Command+Shift+N (Mac)). Select “Stereo” and “Instrument Track” from the respective dropdown menus. Click on the Add Row button (+) to add a new row. Type [7] in the Create Input. From the drop-down menus, select “Stereo” and “Aux Input”. Press Return or Enter.
As the tracks just created in Pro Tools are already selected, this is a good time to name them. Right-click on the instrument track name [Inst 1] and choose Rename from the menu. In the Name and Comments dialog box rename the track [BFD ECO] and press return/enter. Rename each Aux Track as listed below:
- Aux 1 to Kick
- Aux 2 to Snare
- Aux 3 to Hi-Hat
- Aux 4 to Toms
- Aux 5 to Cymbals
- Aux 6 to OH
- Aux 7 to Room
Load the PatchWork Synth on the BFD ECO instrument track by clicking on the first insert and navigating through the menus to: multichannel plug-in / Instrument / Blue Cat’s PatchWork Synth (stereo).
When PatchWork Synth appears, click on the first slot where it says “no plug-in”, below the “PRE”, and select “Load VST” from the menu. In the system window, double click on BFD ECO to open the VST (usually in the 64 bit VST folder). Once BFD ECO has loaded, select a preset or kit from the drop-down menu. Play BFD ECO and note how the signal is only outputting through the instrument track. To utilise the auxiliary tracks, we need to select the unique channel outputs for BFD ECO and correctly route them into Pro Tools via PatchWork.
BFD ECO has fixed stereo outputs on each channel. To change the output for any individual channel, click on the desired output drop-down menu (normally set to “Master”), and select the stereo numerical pair for the output as follows:
- Kick to 11-12
- Snare to 13-14
- Hi-Hat to 15-16
- All the Toms (Floor Tom, Mid Tom, Hi Tom) to 17-18
- All the Cymbals (Crash, Cymbal, Ride) to 19-20
- OH to 3-4
- Room to 5-6
By default, the individual BFD ECO outputs are routed through a possible sixteen (eight stereo) corresponding outputs in PatchWork, shown in the table below where in the left column of the table lists BFD ECO channel outputs, and in the right column, the PatchWork outputs they are routed to.
BFD ECO
Outputs |
PatchWork Outputs |
Master |
Instrument Track |
OH |
PW Aux 1 |
Room |
PW Aux 2 |
Aux 1 |
PW Aux 3 |
Aux 2 |
PW Aux 4 |
Kick |
PW Aux 5 |
Snare |
PW Aux 6 |
Hi-Hat |
PW Aux 7 |
We shall set each auxiliary track in Pro Tools ready to receive PatchWork outputs. Click on the track input and navigate through the menus as follows:
- Kick: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [Kick] - Insert a / PW Aux 5
- Snare: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [Snare] - Insert a / PW Aux 6
- Hi-Hat: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [Hi-hat] - Insert a / PW Aux 7
- Toms: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [Toms] - Insert a / PW Aux 3
- Cymbals: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [Cymbals] - Insert a / PW Aux 4
- OH: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [OH] - Insert a / PW Aux 1
- Room: Plug-in / Blue Cat's PatchWork Synth - [Room] - Insert a / PW Aux 2
If you hit a kick, a snare, or a hi-hat, you should see it is now routed to the correct auxiliary inputs. However, if you play the toms or cymbals, notice they are not outputting on their own tracks.
As shown in the above table, one option is to route these two channels through Aux1 and Aux2, in BFD ECO, but we can do better than that in PatchWork.
Click on the BFD ECO slot in PatchWork and choose “Audio I/O” from the menu. On the Audio I/O dialog box, change “Automatic 22” from the Audio Outputs drop-down menu to “22 Outputs”.
We need to redirect BFD ECO outputs above sixteen. We know the toms are 17-18, so from the 17 drop-down, substitute output 17 for 7, and on output 18, switch it to 8. Similarly with the cymbals on output 19 and 20, swap 19 for 9 and 20 for 10, respectively.
If you require the remaining Perc outputs (1,2, & 3), they can be routed through the Master of the BFD ECO instrument track. Another option would be to route 21-22 to an unused PatchWork output (e.g. if cymbals were not being used).
Once the BFD ECO outputs are routed into Pro Tools’ auxiliary inputs, one can add any desired effects, automation, or bounce to audio as desired.
One final thought, I strongly recommend saving your own PatchWork preset to save time in new projects. Click on “Default” and select “Save As…” from the drop-down. A nice touch with this is the settings in BFD ECO will also be preserved. However, Pro Tools auxiliary input settings cannot be kept. In this case, it is worth saving a BFD ECO Pro Tools template and you can learn more about custom templates here.