Workflow: Creating Film score music (template/setup/workflow)
 

Hi,

This is not really a problem but I'd love to get some tips on how to organize and get a good template for creating and recording film score-like music.
Since I’m pretty new to Pro Tools I’ve begun by using the most basic functions, such as groups, colortracks, different busses etc.

Although I feel that I need some guidance on how to optimize my workflow so that I can fully concentrate on creating the music instead of having to click around the program to find functions.

So if any of you out there is an experienced Pro Tools user doing this kind of symphonic orchestral music I’d love to get some tips on how to create the ultimate orchestral template.

Though most of Pro Tools work absolutely fabulous I’ve run into some questions which I can’t seem to find good answers to…

1. In some parts I use allot of different string sounds at the same time like cellos, violins, pizzicato, basses etc. On many of those occasions I like putting down 2 or more layers of the same instrument which forces me to create several tracks for the same instrument (for example Violins low/rhythm, Violins high/melody). Coming from CW SONAR I was pretty used to being able to record several pararell audio-takes on the same track. Is there any way to do this in Pro Tools?

2. Right now I use different colors and groups for the different instruments (for example Piano, Strings, Brass, Choirs, Bells etc.) Is there any other clever way to arrange these? (like folders)

3. At the moment I’m forced to use two different projects for one song just because of the lack of 64-bit support which limits me possibilities of memory usage and to use several RTAS plugins at the same time. Having to do this I have to move files from one project to the other quite frequently. Right now I use consolidate to create a clean set of audio files that I can import to my primary project but doing this with audio stereo tracks I get these Right and Left files. Is there any way to create just one stereo track when consolidating?

4. I also would like to copy some specific MIDI information from one project to the other and have been trying to do this by selecting the MIDI track I want to export and then File>export>MIDI.
But when loading in the .mid file in the other project I get the wrong miditrack exported. How do I choose which MIDI track to export?

5. A more workflow question would be how to handle MIDI tracks?
Right now I record my MIDI track off my RTAS plugin and when I feel satisfied with the take I bounce it to an audiofile, disable the plugin to free up memory and keep the MIDI track muted. Is there any other way of doing it?

Thanks a bunch for helping out!
Best wishes,
Jhonny Eriksson

Re: Workflow: Creating Film score music (template/setup/workflow)
 

i am gonna follow this post because i love movie scores to :)

Re: Workflow: Creating Film score music (template/setup/workflow)
 

Ok, well this is one of the reasons that I switched to Reaper, which is a lot easier for me in a lot of ways to do film stuff, since I don't have to worry about whether each instrument is compatible or not (since it seems to run just about everything under the sun), and the 64bit version doesn't have any ram limits, so I can host a lot of instruments without running out of ram. As for some of your questions, though:

1 - I'm pretty sure you can't do that with ProTools (unless something major changed in this regard with PT8, since I haven't really used it much after 7.4) You get one sound per track, so if you want more, you have to add additional tracks. To me this makes much more sense than what you are describing, but I come from a background of live rock music recording, so I want everything on it's own dedicated track for adjustment later on.

2 - Groups are your friend here. You can have each track in more than one group, and you can show just the groups you want to see, so you can have your solo violin in the strings group, the violin group, the solo instruments group, and the orchestral group, and it will show up for all of these.

3 - You could always rewire another program which hosts your instruments (such as Bidule, Vienna Ensemble Pro, or even Reaper), which will allow you to access more ram.

4 - No Idea

5 - This probably isn't a bad way to do things, and then you can just hide the midi track afterwards.


The idea of a template is a good one, but if you don't need all of the tracks up and running from the get go, what you can do to save some RAM is just start a new project from a template which has your reverbs, routing, and anything you always use. Than, you can import session data from another template (which has everything) one track at a time when you need other instruments. This way those instruments have all of your settings already set up, but don't take up any resources unless you add them in. The other option is to have your plugins for the tracks you are not currently using disabled (not just bypassed), which keeps them from using any resources, and then you just enable them when you need them (I believe you hold down the control and windows keys and then click on a plugin in the edit/mix window to do this)

Re: Workflow: Creating Film score music (template/setup/workflow)
 

I know this is an old thread, but if you haven't discovered this yet:

File>Import>Session Data will allow you to import individual MIDI tracks from another session without having to worry about exporting the MIDI first.

Re: Workflow: Creating Film score music (template/setup/workflow)
 

Hey jhonny,

This is probably really late to send you this link but I did a short screen-cast to show how I have my orchestral template setup in Pro Tools 8 Le. As you know, PT is a 32bit based application which means you can only utilize 4gb of ram. There are some work arounds, currently I do not use any, which include Bidule and Vienna Ensemble Pro 5. You most likely use Kontakt 4 or 5 which I show in my tutorial how to tweak the settings so you only use the ram needed for what you write. I hope this helps you out cause I was in need of something like this when I first started on PT. Thought I would help out the community. Good luck. http://youtu.be/Zv0zizoogvo

You can listen to some of my scores that utilized a similar setup as this template here at this link: http://soundcloud.com/christopher-harris

Again, I hope this sheds some light on PT for you. Good luck with your writing.

Re: Workflow: Creating Film score music (template/setup/workflow)
 

Have you had any luck with import session data of Vienna tracks? I find the output to be greyed out.