Understanding Drums While Quantizing?! Some help!

[SkybluestudiosBEN]

Every so often I end up quantizing drums, usually using beat detective or by hand. I used to use Elastic time till I found out that it fucks the quality.


Anyways heres my question:

Im a guitarist and sometimes become stumped because I dont know if I need to quantize in triplets or in normal! And then ill change the grid to triplets and it will all line up....then I listen and realize FUCK! It is messed up and needs to be in normal time.....


Are there any tips or ways that you guys learn to know what is what as far as the drum timing gos?

I know how to count triplets.....just sometimes with super super tech drums and if they are doing some odd breakdown it can just get confusing for me.:zombie:

 

[jeid]

I can't answer your question, I'm straight out retarded when it comes to time signatures/triplets/16th/32's etc... I just figure it out by eye/ear and then keep trying. Works.

 

[SkybluestudiosBEN]

hahaha yea thats how ive managed thus far......But I imagine if I knew what the fuck was going on like right away....it would save me shitloads of time

 

[jeid]

Good luck man. Your studio looks sweet btw

 

[Everybody]

It honestly is just trial and error to my knowledge, I think once you start doing it more, youll remember a beat from a past editing session and be like "oh I remember that kick drum pattern, thats triplets for sure!" and your either right and you move on, or you just have to redo it!

Im a drummer and I was editing some stuff I played and I came across this same question haha, but there is no secret method (to my knowledge) us drummer sometimes go in and out of triplets and 16th notes etc on the fly.

One thing MAYBE you could do is see how many (for instance) kick there are in a group your trying to edit. and if theres 6, 9, etc, its most likely an implied triplet feel. groups of 4, 8, etc its probably 16th notes, or 8th notes.

I hope this helps!

...and yea your studio is amazing haha

 

[Metaltastic]

...and yea your studio is amazing haha

Indeed, and I love the random fisheye pic of a dirty-ass bong mixed in with all the other beautiful gear shots How do you like those JBL LSR monitors, btw?

And sorry, but drum quantization is pretty much my weakest AE ability (except for drum tuning, I suppose ), so I can't be of help there

 

[SkybluestudiosBEN]

Thanks guys for the compliments on the studio!

The JBL monitors are cool but I find my self using our DYNE audios much more.....right now im in the process of saving up for some genelecs lol.....but fuck they EXPENSIVE!

 

[Charlie E.]

Just remember that triplet = 12.
It's not always so obvious and not usually covered in theory classes

 

[darthjujuu]

itt'l just click and you'll magically have a feel for it after a bit. all triplet means is ... for every two hits, now there's 3. .....er..... think of it this way. if you're doing a straight 1/8th note roll, that means you're hitting a drum 8 times per whole note. a whole note being the metronome clicking 4 times. (a default metronome clicks on every 1/4 note.) confused yet? a fill of 1/8th note triplets, is actually TWELVE hits per whole note. and then a straight roll of 16th notes is 16 hits per whole note, etc. you really just need to get an ear for it... quantizing an 1/8th note triplet fill (kinda weird) for the first time will make it click in your head and from there it's all gravy.

 

[SkybluestudiosBEN]

Sick! Im slowly catching on. I appreciate the help guys

 

[JeffTD]

Work on your rhythm theory... it's most guitarists weak point, anyway.

 

[Josh M.]

Learn to drum?

But yes, as Jeff said work on rhythmic theory. Once you understand all of that it will become second nature understanding a drum part (as long as the drummer is playing somewhere NEAR the beat).
I find it pretty easy to understand drumming since I am an all round musician, experience directly with the instrument would certainly help. But time and money are obvious limiting factors. You can't always do everything.

 

[egan.]

Honestly drum programmming by hand in PT is a great way to really sharpen your skills on what division is what. It all becomes second nature after a while. When I first started programming drums I was doing it in standard notation and using GM playback so I'm a heavy nerd on that stuff.
The other thing is that IME sometimes quick triplets pickups etc. sound dumb when perfectly in time.

 

[greyskull]

Ive started Editing the first part of my Beat detective Video tutorial and will touch on that in this.
they are very Long and quite intense; but i want to leave no stone unturned, so bear with me.

 

[SkybluestudiosBEN]

Awesome, It would be nice to actually watch someone put up a beat detecting METAL video up. I hate when I see people posting videos of them beat detecting some pop song that its in 4/4 and super simple beats all the way through. We wanna see the tech shit! haha, so if thats what your up to, im stoked to check it out.

 

[greyskull]

its not Super duper tech... i haven't got an unedited session of that left as i clear out my sessions to just the final files in the mix after a few months.
It's more of a hardcore thing with a bit of metal in there, but its got triplets, tempo changes and ahead of the beat drumming, so pretty relevant for the stuff we do.
will work on editing it tonight and see how i get on.
ive recorded A LOT of footage here, and still haven't done much through the song because im doing my best to explain everything.

 

[The Front Studio]

I have no idea on how to quantize drums... I don't even know what it means. Can someone help me w/ that?

 

[demirichris]

@firetune:

Quantizing drums is basically snapping them perfectly to the grid, or at least extremely close to the grid (tempo map.) It's used to give the drums that ultra-tight feel that we are now becoming so accustomed to with modern music.

It's difficult to do correctly because of the phase relationships of all the mics on the kit, amongst other things.

 

[soundsunderground]

Awesome, It would be nice to actually watch someone put up a beat detecting METAL video up. I hate when I see people posting videos of them beat detecting some pop song that its in 4/4 and super simple beats all the way through. We wanna see the tech shit! haha, so if thats what your up to, im stoked to check it out.

Actually, it really doesn't matter what meter the song is in. If you can BD a simple pop song, you can BD a metal song. Every hit is going to be a triplet, 1/4, 1/8th, 1/16th, or even 1/32nd (really depending on the tempo) notes.

What makes BD difficult in the metal genre is shit drummers that are lazy and sloppy with the kick drum, flamming hits that aren't supposed to be (like kick and snare on double kick patterns), and things like that.

 

[chdrummer]

If I didn't understand music theory and how to read music I would be totally lost with programming and quantizing. I would just read up on basic notation and some theory. A little will go a long way!