Real sounding drums.

[3tuxedo]

hey guys what is the best way to make programmed drums sound like a real kit? ive heard a lot of things like if they aren't quantized perfectly on the beat they will sound more realistic. any other tips?

 

[ahjteam]

velocity and timing

 

[Folkrav]

• Give it a feel by tweaking the timing - for an example, laid back a bit is what I tend to do, or with some blast-beat-shit-too-fast-omg, I make it sound like it was a bit rushed but not too much
• Play with velocities, especially with fills and blast-beats
• Important to have some good multi-samples to avoid "machine-gun" effect
• Think like a drummer - I "air-drum" a lot when I humanize my programmed drums, thinking of what is physically doable. Think of a fill - fast multiple hits can't be as hard as a single hit.
• Some shits is actually specific to your drum sample set, especially velocities on cymbals. On Addictive Drums I had to play a lot with velocities, on SD2 I now tend to keep them pretty high all the time.

Pretty much all I can think of right now.

 

[Fandus]

what they said sums it up in terms of the programing side of things. reverb etc if the samples are too dry, can help to ad a bit of a 'live' feel to the kit.

 

[Joel4662]

Velocities are huge man
Right hand hits harder than left
Velocities go down as the fill is longer
Also writing is important. Super-fast cymbal hits (quarter notes at 200 bpm) and a ton of fast fills never help
Also I try to make sure I get all my cymbal samples in a song from the same source (o-heads and preamps) and I keep them all level, and use plugins as a group. If it sounds like cymbals are from the same source, they sound more real imo.

 

[Sixstringmayhem]

if its midi drums, what I do is just Randomize the velocities between about 110 to 127 for all of the hits individually and it turns out pretty realistic sounding to me. I suppose you wouldn't go all the way up to 127 unless you want it to sound like a really hard hitting drummer. Like this http://dl.dropbox.com/u/23702650/Drums.mp3

 

[mstone564]

I agree with everyone else in here, but I'll add that you need a good bit of room in the background for a "real" sounding kit.

 

[Seth Munson]

To be honest, imho its all in the cymbals.

if the cymbals sound fake, it all sounds fake.
And always do it by hand. How can you let a computer "humanize" drums?

 

[Joel4662]

To be honest, imho its all in the cymbals.

if the cymbals sound fake, it all sounds fake.
And always do it by hand. How can you let a computer "humanize" drums?

+1 cymbals are important
But could you tell me/link me a tutorial on how you do it by hand? As far as timing, do you drag or rush the notes and most importantly roughly how many ms do you go off the grid?
I always do velocities by hand but I can't do timing that way :\

 

[Seth Munson]

the number of ms doesnt mean shit. if you want it to sound real make it so its not perfect because no human is.
just remember, which hands would a right handed drummer be hitting first? more than likely it will be the right hand.

I dont want to baby you through it, but that should be a good start. obviously its subject to change but everyone needs to figure that out on their own with time

EDIT: I must admit, having my engineer (who is a drummer) around has helped me a tremendous amount in asking situational questions. So maybe it would be a good idea to have some of your drummer friends come over and just talk about technique stuff with them.

 

[Joel4662]

the number of ms doesnt mean shit. if you want it to sound real make it so its not perfect because no human is.
just remember, which hands would a right handed drummer be hitting first? more than likely it will be the right hand.

I dont want to baby you through it, but that should be a good start. obviously its subject to change but everyone needs to figure that out on their own with time

EDIT: I must admit, having my engineer (who is a drummer) around has helped me a tremendous amount in asking situational questions. So maybe it would be a good idea to have some of your drummer friends come over and just talk about technique stuff with them.

Well I'm a drummer primarily, and I honestly have no problem with velocities cause I understand how that kinda thing works.
My problem is just timing
Usually I just stick the kick to the grid and use reaper "humanize" on other drums by about 5% and cymbals by 10%, but it just isn't right like you said.
But I'd like to know how anyone does timing by hand

 

[wetpenny]

fwiw my $0.02 : personally i steer well clear of "humanize" functions and dont "grid" .. i generally add my drums over guitar parts that have been recorded to a click track , i`ll tap in my kick and snare with a controller keyboard and then go to town with my mouse until its grooving, adding cymbals and fills/rolls as i go along.. i never take ms into account and just drag or rush hits til it sounds right... same with velocities, i`ll just alter them accordingly to how the track/passage dictates.. admittedly it can be a slightly painstaking process..... sorry i cant offer anything more helpful but this is the only way that seems to work for me..

 

[3tuxedo]

here's another thing, i recorded a drum line, and i have 8 separate tracks, (kick, bottom snare, top snare, 3 toms, and 2 overheads) but the only tracks that i can replace with samples are the snare or toms. either there are too many transients to fit on one midi line, like the kick. or there is way to much going on for logic to find the correct transients, like the overheads. did i not mic the drums well enough? or is there something else i can do?