Drum quantizing

[Downtuned]

Hey folks,

I'm really getting into proper editing and mixing of projects and I'm very interested in quantizing of acoustic drum tracks but some things confuse me about how it works.

From what I gather the close miced tracks are easy enough, you create hitpoints in the audio then auto slice and move the start of the points to the grid. Now whether this is done by auto quantize or by hand is a different matter because I tried an auto quantize on the bassdrum of a black metal drummer who is overall a bit out from the click and it was all over the place but that's a separate question.

What really confuses me is how do you go about dealing with the overheads/room mics? Someone told me you just select and cut the overheads with the part you're editing and move it with them but won't that create big gaps in the OH track and and when I get to do the snare or toms the OH counterparts will be out of alignment?

Very confusing and I've heard it's a pretty tricky business anyway especially with Cubase which I use but I think the results from learning the graft of it will be worth it.

There are a few video's on youtube but most are for Cubase 6 or aren't very clear.

Thanks!

 

[Ericlingus]

What version of cubase do you have? Cubase 6 has group editing which makes it so you can quantize all the drum parts together which is what you need to do when editing drums. As for the gaps, you just crossfade and it'll take care of that problem.

 

[Downtuned]

Thanks for the reply, I'm using Cubase 5 ATM but I do want to upgrade to 6 if I make it through the winter and stop giving money to the electricity and gas companies.

How would I go about it in Cubase 5 then? I just don't get how you can cut and quantize one track and it's overhead counterpart and then move on to another track and expect it's overhead counterpart to be in the same place after the previous tracks editing?

Sorry if I sound thick but this is really frying my brain.

Should I do the detecting and chopping for bassdrum, snare and toms first then quantize or stick to doing it one at a time?

 

[Trevoire520]

You HAVE to cut and move ALL of the mic's in the kit together otherwise you end up with flamming between the spot and room/oh mic's.

The only exception is that sometimes it can be beneficial to edit the kick drum seperately from the rest of the kit, as after high passing your overheads etc the kick is practically inaudible. Also editing the kick seperately has the benefit of not chopping your overheads into 16th notes on fast double bass parts, which messes with cymbal decay.

TLDR:
ALWAYS edit drums together as one group. With the exception of 16th notes on the kick drum, which you can edit seperately to the rest of the kit.

 

[006]

Check video in my signature "Cubase Slip Editing Tutorial Video" for a quick rundown. Everything in it works the same in C5 as it does C6. Slip editing is very easy and simple to do.

 

[botus99]

Check video in my signature "Cubase Slip Editing Tutorial Video" for a quick rundown. Everything in it works the same in C5 as it does C6. Slip editing is very easy and simple to do.

That video got me started with editing multi-tracked drums

It can take a long time with this method, but it gets easier and easier each time

 

[Downtuned]

Great tips guys and I'll be watching that video when I get home tonight.

I don't mind if it's tricky and will take time to get used to, I'm prepared to put in the work to get the result and I think it'll improve the feel of my mixes a lot.

 

[006]

PM me if you need more help.

 

[Ericlingus]

when slip editing, how far do you zoom in? I find myself zooming in quite a bit but in the tutorial, your not zoomed in much. I don't have the confidence that I'm aligning the transients to the grid enough otherwise. Also, when I have auto crossfades on, I don't see any of the crossfades like I would if I were to add them myself. Does this happen to anyone here?

 

[Downtuned]

Thanks once again for all the help and tips.

Just if anyone's interested there is another video I found on youtube which shows how to edit drums using markers to slice audio then quantize.

It's in Slovenian and I think it was taken from a SOS article but it's still very easy to follow and I think it's really good. Not sure how the auto quantize would work with blast beats or fast double kick but still.



Between this and 006's excellent slip editing video there's now more than enough choice of techniques to try out.

 

[006]

when slip editing, how far do you zoom in? I find myself zooming in quite a bit but in the tutorial, your not zoomed in much. I don't have the confidence that I'm aligning the transients to the grid enough otherwise. Also, when I have auto crossfades on, I don't see any of the crossfades like I would if I were to add them myself. Does this happen to anyone here?

I zoom in to different levels depending on whatever I am working on. You don't need to line it up 100% to the grid, in fact the best results are when you aren't zoomed in all crazy, this avoids making it sounds like a robot too much.

The auto-fades are there, you just cannot see them. Only manual fades are visible.

 

[006]

Thanks once again for all the help and tips.

Just if anyone's interested there is another video I found on youtube which shows how to edit drums using markers to slice audio then quantize.

It's in Slovenian and I think it was taken from a SOS article but it's still very easy to follow and I think it's really good. Not sure how the auto quantize would work with blast beats or fast double kick but still.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j8CI1HwcBQQ

Between this and 006's excellent slip editing video there's now more than enough choice of techniques to try out.

Yes, that is one way to do it, and I use a similar technique (C6 now has a Beat Detective style tool that does that) for simple things. But it does not work as well as slip editing for more technical drums. Between all of the techniques I have ever used, slip editing is by far the best method that yields the best results, without question.

 

[Downtuned]

I've had a short go at it on my laptop using a pretty basic drum session but will be having a proper go tonight with some extreme metal drums when I get back to my main desktop computer.

Just to clarify I have this right in regards to editing individual tracks with their overhead/room mic counterparts, after I activate auto crossfades then give myself the editing margin I need by moving everything to the left then slipping it back I've been selecting everything then cutting using the bassdrum transients and correcting them and then I've been de-selecting the corrected bassdrum track from everything and then doing the same thing with the snare and so on until I reach the last tom.

Have I got it right or have I missed the point completely?

 

[006]

You need to edit everything together. Here is a quick video showing me editing for a couple of minutes using the slip editing method:

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VZCwL8sdO-8&hd=1[/ame]

Also, once you click on "As Default" for auto-fades, they are on all the time from then on. You don't need to turn them on every time, they are already on.

 

[Downtuned]

Ahh I see!!!

This video is EXACTLY what I was looking for. Most of the time I learn best by example and this is perfect, thanks. I'll be using this as a hefty reference when I'm not sure what to do.

If it's ok, could I request to see a similar video but with an extreme drum pattern like a blast beat or fast kick or (dare I say it) some sort of nested polyrhythm but If it's too much and you can't be bothered than I understand. What you've given me already is more than generous and I'm quite happy with that!

 

[Downtuned]

Actually it's ok, forget that last request I'm really getting the hang of it now.

Just one final question, how do you deal with hits that fall on the same beat that are slightly out from each other? Like if a bassdrum hit is slightly ahead of a snare that are both meant to be played on the same beat, how would you correct the bassdrum without also moving the snare which is ok?

Thanks once again for all the help, this is a brilliant techneque!

 

[006]

If they are close enough I just straddle the grid line (you can see me do that with kick and hi hat in the last video I posted). If they are really off I will put snare where it should be and then slice on both sides of the kick and just move that one kick hit by itself.

 

[Downtuned]

Great thanks. I was having problems with fast double bassdrum under a sort of thrash beat (like a speeded up power metal beat) where the snare and bassdrum are meant to hit at the same time after every 3rd or 4rth bassdrum hit but the kick track is quite messy and didn't know how to sort it.

I'll be trying that technique out but boy is it going to be surgical!

Thanks!

 

[006]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2SgNb9cWbw8&hd=1[/ame]

 

[006]

I'll be trying that technique out but boy is it going to be surgical!

Yeah, that's just how it is. Just depends on how bad the drummer is and how tight you need/want the drums (depending the style of music, etc.).