The Beginners Guide To Logic 9 Express

8/10/2019 The Beginners Guide To Logic 9 Express

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The Beginners

Guide to

By Ned Flaherty


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Introduction to Logic Express 9:

Logic Express 9 is one of the most popular and powerful DAWs (Digital Audio

Workstations) available today. Used by many for the diversity of sounds it canhelp deliver, Logic Express 9 is also incredibly easy to use, and this booklet aims

to help those who need pointers in the basics of the program to get going in

producing a wide range of sounds.

Creating your first project:

When creating your first project you should be met with the screen below. It

gives a few options on how you would like to begin your Logic experience. For

example the electronic template will come with a few electronic drum kits

(909, 808 etc.) as well as some lead and rhythmic synths to start to form the

basics of an electronic style song. Depending on the template you choose, you

will have different sounds/instruments.

An empty projectallows you to start

from scratch with a

blank slate.

All of these templates will

come with differentelectronic instruments that

can be played via MIDI

devices. They may also

come with effects to make

sure you get the right

sound youre going for.

The produce collection has great

templates for mastering tracks,

with some great effects as well as

access to Logics great Mixer.


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If you have started with a blank project, then you should be met with the following

windows. These allow you to add new tracks to the project so you can start to record in

either MDI software instruments, or pure audio recording from real instruments, vocals etc.

You can select how many of a

certain track you would like. This is

great for when you know you may

need 5 software instruments for

what you have to do, so they can

all be placed into the project at the

same time.

Output settings can be

changed with software

instruments in case you

have more than 1 output.

Each type of track is used for different

purposes. Audio is for pure audio

recordings and will not support MIDI.

Software instruments are virtualinstruments that logic comes bundled

with that can be played via MIDI, but

will not support any audio recordings.

External MIDI is used to record MIDI

instruments you have that are not part

of Logic.

With audio, you also have the choice of

which input you want to use for your

microphone to record the audio, a

format type depending on whether you

want to record in Mono or Stereo as

well as the choice of which output you

want to use.


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The Logic Project:

The Logic project page consists of many key areas, all of them being extremely

important in the production of any form of work created in Logic. From the

arrange area to the inspector and even the transport bar, its important to have

a good understanding of everything to achieve the best results from Logic.

Whole overview of a standard Logic project


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The Arrange Window:

The arrange window is the largest and will probably be the most frequently

used section of Logic. The arrange area is Logics sequencer, and is used to

arrange different audio or MIDI regions to the required locations to make

sure everything sounds right.

Track Overview:

Firstly there is the track overview section. This shows you

all the tracks that are currently in your project, and tell

you which ones are recording, muted and soloed.

If the box is coloured in, it

means that this track is either

being used to record (the R

box), is muted (the M box) or

being soloed (the S box).

The track will also give info such as

what instrument is on that track

for software instrument tracks, or

the name of the track for audio

tracks. It also gives the tracknumber.


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The Arrange Area:

The arrange area is the primary section of the arrange window. It where all

your sound regions are placed, edited, moved around etc. and is probably the

most important part of Logic.

This is the bar ruler, which

shows you how many bars

into the song you are.

This is a cycle. A cycle is

creating by holding down and

dragging left on the bar ruler. It

means only that section of

your project will be played by

the play head starting at the

left most position.

The white line with a little arrow on

top is the play head. It shows you

which part of the song is playing as

it goes over certain regions.

This is an audio region

currently sitting in the

arrange area. When the

track is expanded (Ctrl + Z)it will show the waveform

of the audio in that region.

Audio tracks will have different images showing a waveform, as

well as the name you give the track instead of the instrument

name found on software instrument tracks. They also have the

ability to support inline monitoring.

You can also change colours of regions

to help identify what each region

contains.

This is a MIDI region

currently sitting in the

arrange area. When the

track is expanded (Ctrl + Z)

it will show the MIDI notes

in that region.


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These two boxes show the 2

tools that are in use with the

arrangement. The one on the left

hand side is the left click tool,

and the one on the right is usedwith Command + Click.

There are various ways in which

you can snap regions so that

they are in the exact place you

want them to be. Smart snap will

snap to where Logic thinks is the

right place, whether that be on a

certain bar or directly after

another region. Other snap

divisions can be found below.

There are many tools that

can be used for

arrangement in Logic.

Pointer is used to select

and move regions around

the arrange area. Pencil is

used to draw MIDI notes

into MIDI regions. The

eraser can be used to

delete MIDI notes or

regions as a whole.

Scissors re used to split/cutregions into different

segments, and glue is used

to put 2 separate regions

together to make one. The

can all be used in the

command click box above.

These 2 sliders found in the bottom right

corner of the arrange area are used to zoom

your view of the area both vertically and

horizontally. This is great for whether you want

to have an overlook of your whole project or

want to zoom into certain parts of it to tweak

things.


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The Transport Bar:

The transport bar is also in frequent use when using Logic. It combines a lot of

the key functions such as playing your track, recording, output volume and thetempo of your song.

These buttons found furthest to the left

controls they play head, and allows you

to record either MIDI or audio into

regions.

The whole transport bar

Stop Button

Returns playhead to start of

song.

Play Button

Record Button This section of the transport

bar gives information on time,

tempo and much more.

Shows what note is

being input by aMIDI controller.

The time at which

the play head is

sitting in the track.

Shows the tempo of the

song.

Output volume can

be controlled with

this slider.

The metronome and its

settings can also be found in

the transport bar. This helps

you to keep to time while

recording in MIDI or audio


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The Inspector:

The inspector is also a major part of Logic. It compacts a lot of information

about the track you have selected, and allows you to perform a range oftweaks and changes to it such as changing audio levels or adding effects. It also

contains the track parameters section and information of the master output of

the project.

This is the effects section of

the inspector. If an effect is

in blue, it means its active

and effecting the audio, but

if its grey it means it is beingbypassed.

Effects can also be used on

the master output of the

project to affect the wholesong.

The inputs and outputs

(I/Os) of each track can be

changed in the inspector in

case more than one mic or

output is in use.

If an EQ is being used on the

track, this window is here to

show how it is being used to

save you from opening andclosing the EQ itself

constantly.

This circular dial is used to

pan the track either to the

left or right. With Logic you

are able to pan all the way in

either direction, and this can

be done on an individual

track or on the master

output.

Levels can also be changed in

the inspector so that if an

individual track is too loud or

quiet it can be altered tosound right. This can be

changed on either the

individual track or the master

output.

Some of the effects that Logic

allows you to choose from


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This is the track parameters section that can be found in the

inspector. It allows you to add a fade in or out of the track it

controls or even to loop a region within it.

Looping is an imporant part of sequencing music, especially

in electronic music which tends to be more repetetive.

Below you can see a before and after of what should

happen if you tick the loop box in the parameters.

Before looping is enabled

After looping is enabled


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The Library and Loops:

As mentioned before, Logic comes with a wide range of virtual instruments

that can be played through a MIDI controller. All of these intruments can befound in the library found on the right hand side of Logic.

The first menu gives a

rundown of the general

sounds you will find

within that folder.

This will lead to another

menu that will start to

get more specific about

the kind of sounds you

want, in this case

electronic, acoustic or

single drums.

This will eventually lead

to a folder with the kit,

instrument or sound

you can use and record

into your project.


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If you are in need of a certain sound and are unable to find it within the library,

or you need to fill a gap in your project with a short clip of audio, then you can

look into the loops to find something you want.

If you are looking for a

particular sound then

you can whittle down

your option by selecting

tags that relate to what

you need. In this

example Im looking for

a clean electric bass clip

to add to my project.

You can find the loop

section by clicking th

Loops tab next to the

Library one.

Logic will filter through

the tags you haveselected and give you

what match your

criteria. It will tell you

how long the clip/loop is

in beats, the key it is in,

the tempo it is played at

and how well it matches

with your criteria.


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Saving and Bouncing your project:

Of course its important to save you work as you go, and this is done by going

to File > Save and then ensuring that the Include Assets and Copy External

Audio Files to Project Folder checkboxes are selected. You can use the further

options to save more to your project folder, but it means the folder size will

increase.

Bouncing you song is also a very easy process that allows you to export your

song in a number of ways.

You can select a name for your

bounced file, and choose

where it gets saved.

Logic allows you

to select which

format your songis saved as, the

resolution,

sample rate and

much more.

Documents

The Beginners Guide To Logic 9 Express