Logic Rewired through PT?!

[KingAce]

Quick question to those in the know. Can i Rewire Logic into Pro Tools and utilize it fully? The main thing i'm trying to do is use the soft synth's in Logic, using PT as the sequencer, and track it all out in PT for mixing and what have you. Maybe even fiddle with some MIDI in Logic and have it all Rewired into PT. Thanks.

[Phil Ogden]

AFAIK both PT and Logic have to be Rewire masters i.e one will not slave to the other.

As you intend using PT for Midi sequencing (and for the sake of simplicity), is there a RTAS VI equivalent that you could use in place of the Logic soft synth?

If we're talking about a sample based VI, can these be loaded into a RTAS sampler?

What about using a second Mac as a 'sound module' routing midi out of the PT machine and into the second running the VI in standalone.

[KingAce]

Well i have a few soft synth's already, i.e. Xpand, Hybrid, some Korg stuff, Structure, but i was looking to add to that collection. Since i've heard so many good things about Logic and the stock synth's i figured i'd give it a try. But since they don't play nice with each other, i guess that's a no go. On to find another nice soft synth elsewhere...

[Premo]

I've considered picking up a newer g4 or old g5 and using it strictly for Logic Studio VI's. I don't know what Logic Studio min requirements are off hand, but that would be pretty fun and open the box to all kinds of new sounds pretty easily. You could slave the two rigs with MTC. I've seen detailed post on the DUC on exactly how to do this.

[Stiff]

I'd pick the AIR teams synths and instruments over Logics any day if that's any consolation.

I just wish Digidesign would allow Soundflower inputs and outputs and we could all forget about this Rewire nonsense.

[KingAce]

I actually have Xpand, Hybrid and Structure already. Xpand and Hybrid i absolutely love but Structure was somewhat of a let down for me. The sound variety out the box wasn't that extensive or great in my opinion. I rarely even use it. And i'm really not to excited about shelling out another $400 for Goliath after already spending $500 just for the plug. For almost $1,000 for one product i'd better get a lot more sounds than what they're offering.

What about Kontakt?! Does anyone have experience with Kontakt in Pro Tools. Since Logic is a can't do, i was thinking about Kontakt as my next soft snyth. I really don't care much for the sampling side of it as i have a few samplers already, but it's the sounds i was most interested in. What does the house think? Is it worth the $500 primarily for the sounds, and does it work well within PT?!

[Skyflash2]

There IS a way to use Logic's synths with Pro Tools! I tried this last week
and I'm still testing it out. You use Mainstage as the 'synth rack' and
use the IAC buss to transmit midi data from PT to Mainstage. The only
drawback is that you have to use another audio interface to route the
audio,or so at least I've found so far. This is how I set it up.

1) open the Audio/Midi setup. Click on the IAC buss and activate it.
this will allow it to act as an internal midi interface within OSX.

2) open a PT session and create a new instrument track.
In the Midi output drop down menu,you should now see
the IAC buss as an option for a midi output. Your midi input
will be coming in as usual from your midi interface(PT interface
or external). You also need to have "Midi Thru" selected in PT's
options menu.

3) Open Mainstage and setup your synth rack,insert whatever VI's
you want to use. Enable the track in PT and you should now be able
to play into the PT instrument channel, and the midi should be
sending out through the IAC buss and into Mainstage.

4) You need to setup another interface to run the audio from Mainstage.
You can set up and use your Mac's built in output although you will
only have one set of stereo outputs and record one VI at a time.
Then just use whatever cables and patch into your PT interface.

I tried this and successfully recorded output from EVB organ and
EVP 88 as audio into my PT session,triggered from a midi sequence
on an instrument track. I routed the audio back into my Project Mix.
I plan on trying this with my Presonus Firebox running audio out
from Mainstage.

You may have to play around with buffer settings in both PT and
Main stage to achieve optimal latency. What I had setup wasn't
even noticeable. If you run a digital output from this second interface
it could cut down at least on converter latency. Running analog outputs
could allow you independant,lower buffer settings to get better
latency in Mainstage. I should also note that on a Macbook CD 2.0
with 2 gig RAM, the CPU was doing fine in both PT and MS.

The only quirk I've found so far is that Mainstage automatically senses
midi coming in and for some reason I have difficulty setting up midi
channels for different channel strips/instruments. I'm also getting some
kind of wierd midi loop/clock issue as well.

Anyone else interested in this, try it out and let us know how it works.

-Brian

[KingAce]

Excellent information, thanks a lot for the tip. I'll try to look into this and see what i get.

[Skyflash2]

I just tried using Jack OSX audio server to try and route audio between Mainstage
and Pro Tools and failed miserably. I was hoping to avoid the second audio interface
for Mainstage and route audio through Jack server and into the Jack VST plugin
via the VST-RTAS adapter. Absolutely no audio going out of Mainstage to anywhere.
Even if it worked, the signal would drift with no real clock reference. I could synch
via SPDIF but I might as well use the 2nd interface(my Firebox) for true audio
patching if I were to go that route anyway.

Before hand earlier I was able to reproduce the process I described above triggering
the EVB3 from a Pro Tools midi track. Tomorrow I will break out the Firebox and
see how well it works as an output device for Mainstage. I will have 6 outputs
I can mess around with and patch into my Project Mix. I will also do a drum test
and actually measure the latency between the midi and the recorded audio.
I will probably report back on Thursday.....

[JohnO]

Genius idea! I did this without any other interface, just my MBox2 Pro. In Mainstage (or whatever other stand-alone VI) just assign the audio output to 3-4. Create an aux in PT with input 3-4 and voila, done. IAC bus assigned as mentioned above.

I did this with other synths, don't know why I didn't think of Mainstage.. duh!

I have to say the new PT 7 audio driver is great, allowing other apps to play at the same time as PT. iTunes, whatever, even when PT is open. Been waiting many years for that!

JO