Is this truly the fastest way to do this-import midi to audio tracks

[b mcgibney]

Was trying to do a quick bed track for a friend. He sent me a 10 track midi file of a cheesy 70's song. The file loaded find into PT including the names of the instruments. I created 10 audio tracks, and inserted the appropriate instruments in the inserts. i.e piano, drums etc. the mid tracks were bussed to the appropriate virtual instruments and they played just fine until I went to record them. They still could be heard but the audio was not recorded.

I then tried it again this time bussing the midi tracks to aux tracks with the insertion of the virtual instruments into the inserts and then bussing that track to 10 audio tracks. It works but it sure seems cumbersome.

So my simple question is . Is this the easiest way to take midi tracks and convert them into audio files or is there a easier way. I rarely work with virtual instruments (or midi ) so sorry if this is a silly question.

thanks ever

Brian

[DonaldM]

Brian,

I do this sort of thing a lot. There are few ways to do this. Here's my suggestion and how I do it.

Import your MIDI tracks
Set up an INSTRUMENT track for each MIDI track.
Instantiate whatever VI you're going to use for the part onto each instrument track. ( I don't know what VI's you're using. On some, like Structure, you can actually have 1 Instrument track playing several parts, each on their own separate MIDI channel and be able to send the AUDIO outputs of each part to its own AUX or AUDIO track for processing and mixing- there are others like that as well)
Now, assign the MIDI OUT of each MIDI track to the correct INSTRUMENT track. It helps if you name the instrument tracks first...then the name will show up as a MIDI out option. OR-option two...just slide the MIDI track notes from the MIDI track to the INSTRUMENT track. Either will do.

Start playing with the sounds to get the ones you want. Mix...rinse and repeat.

A couple of things to be aware of. Much of the time, there is more than just MIDI note data on the MIDI track. You may also get panning, volume, mod wheel, etc. You might need to do some editing of that depending on how you want it all to sound in the mix. I often just go into the MIDI data list on the MIDI track and delete all the panning and volume stuff. Usually you can find it right at the top of the list as most of the time the pan and volume are set right up front by whoever created the MIDI track. Sometimes, though, changes to some of that come later on in the track. You can scroll down through the MIDI data list and find any non-note data you want to delete. Its up to you.

Another way to do all this is if you have some kind of external hardware workstation, like a Yamaha Motif XS of XF series. (That's what I have), you can assign the MIDI outs of the MIDI tracks to play the parts on the workstation and route the AUDIO out of that to the AUDIO tracks in PT to lay them down. With the MOTIF I can do up to 16 tracks digitally via firewire that way. It depends on what workstation you have and what options for audio output you have etc.

Hope all that helps.

[musicman691]

Originally Posted by b mcgibney

Was trying to do a quick bed track for a friend. He sent me a 10 track midi file of a cheesy 70's song. The file loaded find into PT including the names of the instruments. I created 10 audio tracks, and inserted the appropriate instruments in the inserts. i.e piano, drums etc. the mid tracks were bussed to the appropriate virtual instruments and they played just fine until I went to record them. They still could be heard but the audio was not recorded.

I then tried it again this time bussing the midi tracks to aux tracks with the insertion of the virtual instruments into the inserts and then bussing that track to 10 audio tracks. It works but it sure seems cumbersome.

So my simple question is . Is this the easiest way to take midi tracks and convert them into audio files or is there a easier way. I rarely work with virtual instruments (or midi ) so sorry if this is a silly question.

thanks ever

Brian

The easiest is to put the MIDI into Instrument tracks. You just can't import directly into Instrument tracks though. Nice thing with Instrument tracks is they're a combo of MIDI and Aux tracks; they host the MIDI and will let you hear the audio from the vi just like an Aux track would. Here's the way I'd do it:
Open PT
Create a new session
Import the MIDI tracks to new MIDI tracks
Create as many Instrument tracks as you have MIDI tracks
Move as a group the MIDI tracks to the Instrument tracks
Delete the now empty MIDI tracks
Assign vi's to the Instrument tracks as needed
Then when you're satisfied with the sound route the output of each Instrument to a new Audio track, enable record on the Audio track, press f12 and you're on your way (don't forget to make a timeline selection of the length you want recorded and leave a little at the end for reverb tails). If many or all the tracks are the same length you can do a group record to individual tracks.

If you have PT11 you can take advantage of offline bounce for the Instrument tracks, although in non-HD PT you can only offline bounce one track at a time.

You found out the hard way that even though PT can host vi's on Audio tracks you still need a separate Audio track to receive the audio.

[Shan]

Originally Posted by b mcgibney

So my simple question is . Is this the easiest way to take midi tracks and convert them into audio files or is there a easier way.

Do a track freeze:

http://duc.avid.com/showpost.php?p=2135648&postcount=9

http://duc.avid.com/showpost.php?p=2135447&postcount=6

Shane

[DonaldM]

Originally Posted by musicman691

...Here's the way I'd do it:
Open PT
Create a new session
Import the MIDI tracks to new MIDI tracks
Create as many Instrument tracks as you have MIDI tracks
Move as a group the MIDI tracks to the Instrument tracks
Delete the now empty MIDI tracks...

Jack - I disagree about deleting the MIDI tracks. Instead of moving the MIDI data from the MIDI tracks to the Instrument tracks, I would COPY it and then just mute and hide the MIDI tracks. That way, if you edit stuff...which I ALWAYS do anyways...you always have the original to go back to if you get too far out in left field!

I can't tell you the number of times I've been so glad to have the original MIDI tracks to go back to. They don't take up but a smidge of resources anyways, so best to just mute and hide, IMHO!