The Reaper Q&A Thread

[alphacat]

I'm already stuck at the MIDI Hardware Output, it currently says <no output> and so I wanted to change it but I can't choose any option at all.
Don't blame me for being so noobish, only thing I used to do was game on my PC and that didn't really educate me on stuff like this.

Awesome thread however, in fact I love this whole website. So MUCH usefull information stomped into such a tiny spot :p
Haven't read this much in ages!

Regards

Good to have you aboard!

Pardon the silly question, but - you do have a piece of MIDI hardware plugged into your PC somehow, don't you?

[Nielsfest]

Thanks And whilst I'm not even fully aware what a MIDI Hardware Output is my answer to that is that I probably don't have that.

Mind me for BEING stupid

[briskisgoodforu]

Well my input would be... (and I've never done this so it's theoretical)

create a new track (B)

Route stereo audio from the first track (A) onto track B and turn off parent/master send of track A.

Set Track B recording setting to "Output:mono"

Record the section of Track A onto track B as mono (hopefully).

See if that works...

haha don't need a plugin
reaper can change the stereo image

Edit>Item Settings>Item Channel Mono (downmix)

You can also render midi to audio in the daw by right clicking on the midi data and click apply FX to item as new take. This also gives you an option of mono.

I'm on a mac btw, so I'd imagine this would apply to windows users as well as the mac version is usually behind.

[briskisgoodforu]

Oh, duh!

Yeah - just double click the MIDI clip itself; when you're in the piano roll/step editor, just move the end bracket wherever you like.

Now go read that manual and get crackin'!

for some reason there's an error when i try to open the manual. but manual's for beginners anyway innit? i guess this thread will have to do for a manual. but huge thanks anyway bruv you're been great help

EDIT: I know i'm asking an awful lot in this thread so apologies..
but the great thing about acid was that all samples imported into the project were transformed into the project tempo automatically. how does this work in reaper? for example, i mounted a tambourine sample in 130 bpm into readrums, but the project is 140bpm, how do i make it faster? thanks a lot and excuse my stupidity

if you want audio to match your songs bpm go to project settings, then the time base settings, and you have the option of time, beats, and beats(position, length, rate). Beats (position, length rate) will morph all items to fit your songs bpm.

[spectrum1]

why doesnt it just say thattttttt
so many things in reaper are called some complex thing, that could just as easily be called something simple like in FL or ableton, without losing the ability to describe everything that function does

[alphacat]

why doesnt it just say thattttttt
so many things in reaper are called some complex thing, that could just as easily be called something simple like in FL or ableton, without losing the ability to describe everything that function does

Funny - their naming scheme seems pretty intuitive to me. Hell, everything about Reaper is easy to learn, esp. compared to, say, Logic or - god forbid - ProTools.

================

So I asked the question here earlier if anyone knew how to do batch sample replacements, and it turned out that this isn't supported in Reaper (yet... v4.0 is supposed to though.)

But there's an easier and arguably more precise way of doing it that I just discovered:

1) Open the .RPP song file in Notepad or another text-only editor;
2) Find & Replace the old wav with your new sound, like "c:\wav\kick1.wav" with c:\wav\kick2.wav" -

Done.

Easy as pie!

[frank grimes jr.]

Ah dude, you are a wizard. Thank you.

[futures_untold]

how to do batch sample replacements

1) Open the .RPP song file in Notepad or another text-only editor;
2) Find & Replace the old wav with your new sound, like "c:\wav\kick1.wav" with c:\wav\kick2.wav" -

Very nice!

I wonder if this will also work with other DAWs?

[alphacat]

how to do batch sample replacements

1) Open the .RPP song file in Notepad or another text-only editor;
2) Find & Replace the old wav with your new sound, like "c:\wav\kick1.wav" with c:\wav\kick2.wav" -

Very nice!

I wonder if this will also work with other DAWs?

Suppose it depends on what character sets are required for their data files. Making .RPP files formatted as standard ASCII was a stroke of brilliance, because I can see this approach working in some other interesting ways too.

[futures_untold]

how to do batch sample replacements

1) Open the .RPP song file in Notepad or another text-only editor;
2) Find & Replace the old wav with your new sound, like "c:\wav\kick1.wav" with c:\wav\kick2.wav" -

Very nice!

I wonder if this will also work with other DAWs?

Making .RPP files formatted as standard ASCII was a stroke of brilliance, because I can see this approach working in some other interesting ways too.

Pray, do tell these other thoughts of yours for (mis)using a text editor with .RPP files..!

[hudson]

Hi, I just registered, but I've been hanging around here for a while trying to pick up everything there is to know about making Dubstep. This forum has been a huge help and I've definitely learned a whole lot in the week or so I've been lurking, but I've got a couple questions.

First off, I'm using mainly Massive and Reaper, and I was wondering if there's any way to automate wobbles with what I've got. I've been fooling around with the LFO/Performer in Massive, but I can't seem to get the seemingly random and spastic sound I've been hearing in a lot of tracks.

Secondly, how can I make my drums swing in Reaper? I know that some drum machines have a "swing" or "accent" button, but I don't have a drum machine or a sampler, I'm just dragging samples into Reaper. I've tried changing volumes of individual samples accordingly, but it's still not quite doing it.

Thanks in advance

[futures_untold]

Hello Hudson, welcome to DSF!

1> Use the track envelopes to automate controls on any plugin including Massive. There are multiple methods of activating an envelope, but the easiest is perhaps to select the track your plugin is loaded on, then press the 'env' button on the track controls (by the FX button) and place a tick next to the parameter you want to automate.

Remember to assign envelopes (LFO's, ADSR's etc) to the actual LFO controls etc. For instance, try using an ADSR to speed up the rate control of an LFO (which could be tied to any other number of controls). Massive has a fair amount of flexibility here, so refer to Massives manual for details on assigning envelopes to controls etc.

2> 'Swing' is another term for 'moved'. If we have a 4x4 beat, then applying swing would shift the beats slightly so they are no longer accurately 4x4. Reaper has a 'swing' function within the quantise pop up window. I don't remember the keyboard shortcut, but if you press 'Shift-?' you can use the filter function to find the exact controls.

[alphacat]

Pray, do tell these other thoughts of yours for (mis)using a text editor with .RPP files..!

It takes less CPU time to save and re-open a text file in Notepad (even a 7or 8 MB text file) than it does in Reaper where all sorts of other processes sitting on top of it, like talking to audio drivers and whatnot. So: batch scripting for rapid demo'ing - i.e., a script to easily & quickly swap samples, plugs, envelope curves, MIDI automation, eq settings, pan positions, etc - and much more quickly than you could by actually going through the GUI in a hundred clicks to set up and configure every little thing just so - to demo many different sounds in a song file more quickly and easily, in essence.

You could extend this approach to identifying problem bits, such as envelope-overlap clicking, and running a script to automatically remove or rewrite those specific chunks of data, provided that such artifacts are relatively algorithmically simple and easy to identify by a 'simple' string.

And stuff.

[futures_untold]

Any time savings would of course be counteracted with learning which strings do what no?

(I don't know how humanly readable .RPP files are as I haven't taken the time to open one in a text editor yet.)

[slyman]

any of u guys ever try out NINJAM? i was looking thru the reaper plugins and saw it. u can use it to jam with ppl over the net.

[futures_untold]

I haven't tried it.

[Ongelegen]

Does Reaper have MIDI out? If yes, then it brings up the next questions.

The reason i'm asking is because I have a Nord Lead 2 and I'm using Reason & Record, which as you may know doesn't have MIDI out. I was well aware of this when purchasing the Nord Lead. What I've been doing is recording the audio on a audio track and at the same time fiddling with the knobs to get some automation. The problem is I only have one hand free for the knobs as I have to play the melody with my other hand. And when trying to do more complicated melodies I need two hands, which leaves me with none for the knobs.

I have almost zero experience with reaper and MIDI out, so correct me when wrong. I was thinking I could use MIDI out from Reaper (if it has it in the first place) to let my Nord Lead play a melody by sequencing it in Reaper. Then I would use the outputs from the synth to record the audio into a track Record thru my interface. This way I would have both hands free for the knobs. Is this possible? With or preferably without rewiring?

The second question which would make my life even easier is, does MIDI out also work for the parameters on the synth. So could I just make a automation track in Reaper and let it control, for instance, the cutoff on the synth?

What is your opinion on on achieving this the best? Thanks in advance!

ALSO, I don't want to switch to Reaper or any other daw, so don't bother recommending that

[Depone]

Does Reaper have MIDI out? If yes, then it brings up the next questions.

The reason i'm asking is because I have a Nord Lead 2 and I'm using Reason & Record, which as you may know doesn't have MIDI out. I was well aware of this when purchasing the Nord Lead. What I've been doing is recording the audio on a audio track and at the same time fiddling with the knobs to get some automation. The problem is I only have one hand free for the knobs as I have to play the melody with my other hand. And when trying to do more complicated melodies I need two hands, which leaves me with none for the knobs.

I have almost zero experience with reaper and MIDI out, so correct me when wrong. I was thinking I could use MIDI out from Reaper (if it has it in the first place) to let my Nord Lead play a melody by sequencing it in Reaper. Then I would use the outputs from the synth to record the audio into a track Record thru my interface. This way I would have both hands free for the knobs. Is this possible? With or preferably without rewiring?

The second question which would make my life even easier is, does MIDI out also work for the parameters on the synth. So could I just make a automation track in Reaper and let it control, for instance, the cutoff on the synth?

What is your opinion on on achieving this the best? Thanks in advance!

ALSO, I don't want to switch to Reaper or any other daw, so don't bother recommending that

I'm really surprised rason doesn't have this feature.. are you sure??

Most modern DAW's have external Midi out as standard, as that's all the programs used to do; sequence midi to hardware.
And reaper is fairly new, i personally dont use it but have tried it out, and got it to trigger my hardware synth fine. in the I/O tab, just select which midi channel, port etc.. and your away.

[Ongelegen]

Yeah I'm positive it doesn't have midi out, one of its biggest flaws imo. Alot of people were hoping Propellerheads would introduce midi out with Record, which then didn't happen.

Thanks I'm gonna look into it tomorrow!

[Ongelegen]

Ok I got it hooked up nicely and it's working as I expected! It's a silly workaround but it will have to do till Reason & Record get MIDI out, which of course will take forever or maybe wont happen at all