Reaper as an Instrument

[mschnell]

Just to let you know:

I very successfully use Reaper as a VST player (i.e. "Midi to Audio converter") "on stage", by means of several VSTi's (sample player, physical modeling, virtual hardware-synth) and some effects such as EQ and Reverb.

Now I was able to make the stuff that comes with reaper to play a role in something that takes place within an instrument.

I use the free "Dexed" DX7 - VSTi to create the sound of a vibrating metal plate (i.e. Metallophone). To do a vibraphone from this, I used the "3 Band Splitter" JSFX, ran the low band through the "Tremolo" JSFX, and of course mixed the channels using the "3 Band Joiner".

With some EQing this results is an (IMHO) rather realistic Vibraphone sound.

(BTW.: I did not do this yet, but with Dexed in Reaper it's easy to do a 12 or more Operand FM to create more sophisticatedly tweaked FM sounds.)

Reaper rocks !

-Michael

[martifingers]

Sounds cool... could we hear an example?

[mschnell]

Sounds cool... could we hear an example?

http://www.bschnell.de/test_vib.mp3

-Michael

[Fergler]

I HIGHLY recommend this plugin for you:

http://www.kvraudio.com/product/phybes_by_xoxos

Totally synthesized mathematic model of vibraphone and it is AMAZING quality. Some of Xoxos stuff is insanely cool but also unfortunately sounds like a simulation - this is one of his exceptional ones that sounds better than the real thing.

[Tod]

I HIGHLY recommend this plugin for you:

http://www.kvraudio.com/product/phybes_by_xoxos

Totally synthesized mathematic model of vibraphone and it is AMAZING quality. Some of Xoxos stuff is insanely cool but also unfortunately sounds like a simulation - this is one of his exceptional ones that sounds better than the real thing.

Humm, they say free download but when I clicked on the "download" I couldn't find it anywhere. Must be hidden, at least to me, but then maybe it's just me. :)

[Mordi]

Here's the download-page on the xoxos site:
http://www.xoxos.net/vst/vst.html#models

[Tod]

Here's the download-page on the xoxos site:
http://www.xoxos.net/vst/vst.html#models

Okay thanks Mordi, I had a set of Vibes that I used a lot for recording back in the 70s & 80s.

I'm just curious as to what these sound like.

@mschnell, from what I could tell from the short mp3, your's don't sound to bad, The tremolo is a little slow and rather heavy though. :)

[mschnell]

sounds better than the real thing.

:) :)
Great !

I'll give it a try.

Thanks,
-Michael

[mschnell]

The tremolo is a little slow and rather heavy though. :)

Yep. The speed can be adjusted with a physical vibe, as well.

Of course the reaper thingy can easily be set to any tremolo speed or depth. (in fact I modified the JSFX to be adjustable in 1/10 Hz steps instead of the original 1 Hz steps).

-Michael

[martifingers]

Thanks for this. It sounds rich and very musical to my ears.

[Banned]

Just to let you know:

I very successfully use Reaper as a VST player (i.e. "Midi to Audio converter") "on stage", by means of several VSTi's (sample player, physical modeling, virtual hardware-synth) and some effects such as EQ and Reverb.

Now I was able to make the stuff that comes with reaper to play a role in something that takes place within an instrument.
Calling that "within an instrument" is merely semantics. All you did there was using an effect, which affects the sound - as effects do by definition. There's absolutely nothing special about that, imho.

[mschnell]

Regarding the software (i.e. the simulation of the real instrument this of course technically is an effect.

What I meant is that the "wheel" within a real Vibraphone is not an "effect" that is applied after the sound wave left the instrument, but that it's part of the sound generation.

And here, usually Reaper is not involved, so I thought this might be interesting for someone as a proof of concept.

-Michael

[mschnell]

from what I could tell from the short mp3

The mp3 was just meant as an example showing that (like with a real vibe) the attacks of all notes are not noticeably affected by the tremolo, while the tail of the sound decently "hovers".

This can't be done by a simple tremolo.

I also tried two identical but detuned sound sources, Phaser, Flanger, and Chorus. But using the splitter and a tremolo produced the most realistic sound.

-Michael

[Hindu Stan]

I thought it sounded really good

[mschnell]

I HIGHLY recommend this plugin for you:

http://www.kvraudio.com/product/phybes_by_xoxos

Phybes does sound excellent. Especially the res/run ("rotor") modulation is perfect! Unfortunately Phybes does not answer to MIDI Note-On Velocity and Damper Pedal. So I don't think I can use it.

To me the simple FM algorithm for the "bars" and the "resonators" does not sound that much worse in a certain note-range.

I suppose some kind of sweeping highpass filter instead of the tremolo might provide some improvement to my vibe simulation. Using a Phaser here sounds slightly less authentic than the tremolo, but extremely "pleasant". I'll try to do a "sweeping resonant highpass" JSFX, or a synchronized "Tremolo-and-Phaser" thingy.

I'll be back with a sound example when I think I got an improvement.

-Michael

[mschnell]

I found that Phybes did not work reliably for me. So I stayed with the "Dexed plus Reaper effects" vibe.

Maybe somebody likes to hear another example of a "Dexed plus Reaper effects".

Here a little "classical" impro on a virtual Flute register of a pipe organ with convolution reverb (two instances of Dexed and two instances of Reaverb using different stereo Impulse files, plus some ReaDelay.

http://schnellphoto.de/boa-sorte/mp3/x/sinnfrei.mp3

-Michael

[Paul99]

I found that Phybes did not work reliably for me. So I stayed with the "Dexed plus Reaper effects" vibe.
-Michael

Your imitation of a vibraphone sounds great to me.
Is it possible for you to create a track template?

[mschnell]

Here you are

http://www.bschnell.de/Vibes.RTrackTemplate

have fun,
-Michael

[Paul99]

Wow, that was fast, thank you!!
Is this the same sound as in your demo posted at 04-26-2015?
And I don't quite understand the use of ReaControlMidi?

[mschnell]

Wow, that was fast, thank you!!
Is this the same sound as in your demo posted at 04-26-2015?
Not necessarily. I did some experiments with different effects. You might try to switch on one of "Phaser", "Sweeping", or "Tremolo" and modify the parameters.

And I don't quite understand the use of ReaControlMidi?This is used to control the Volume parameter of "Dexed" via the Volume Foot controller of my Master keyboard.

-Michael

[Paul99]

Okay thanks for clearing that up Michael.
I will experiment further until I get the sound from your mp3 because to me that sounds awesome!

[dea-man]

Just to let you know:

I very successfully use Reaper as a VST player (i.e. "Midi to Audio converter") "on stage", by means of several VSTi's (sample player, physical modeling, virtual hardware-synth) and some effects such as EQ and Reverb.

Now I was able to make the stuff that comes with reaper to play a role in something that takes place within an instrument.

I use the free "Dexed" DX7 - VSTi to create the sound of a vibrating metal plate (i.e. Metallophone). To do a vibraphone from this, I used the "3 Band Splitter" JSFX, ran the low band through the "Tremolo" JSFX, and of course mixed the channels using the "3 Band Joiner".

With some EQing this results is an (IMHO) rather realistic Vibraphone sound.

(BTW.: I did not do this yet, but with Dexed in Reaper it's easy to do a 12 or more Operand FM to create more sophisticatedly tweaked FM sounds.)

Reaper rocks !

-Michael

That's some cool shit! I love how people use Reaper in unique ways. I love this forum. Lot's of really cool stuff!

I HIGHLY recommend this plugin for you:

http://www.kvraudio.com/product/phybes_by_xoxos

Totally synthesized mathematic model of vibraphone and it is AMAZING quality. Some of Xoxos stuff is insanely cool but also unfortunately sounds like a simulation - this is one of his exceptional ones that sounds better than the real thing.

Xoxos is a trippy company.

I know what you mean how some of their stuff sounds artificial. You know what I like, (even though it sometimes strikes me as artificial, too)? Their very weird VST's for nature, wind, insects and other noises. Slightly bizarre but, I like them.

[mschnell]

Okay thanks for clearing that up Michael.
I will experiment further until I get the sound from your mp3 because to me that sounds awesome!
I seem to remember that I used "Tremolo" for that recording. Now I mostly use "Phaser" that to me sounds slightly less "realistic" but more "pleasant".

I modified the "tremolo" JSFX to offer a higher resolution for the tremolo speed. You might want to replace the sourcecode with that one:


// This effect Copyright (C) 2004 and later Cockos Incorporated
// License: GPL - http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html

desc: Tremolo
//tags: guitar tremolo gain modulation
//author: Cockos

slider1:4<0,100,1>Frequency (Hz*10)
slider2:-6<-60,0,1>Amount (dB)
slider3:0<0,1>Stereo Seperation

@slider
adv=$pi*0.2*slider1/srate;
sep=slider3*$pi;
amount=2 ^ (slider2/6);
sc=0.5*amount; amount=1-amount;

@sample

spl0=spl0*((cos(pos) + 1) * sc + amount);
spl1=spl1*((cos(pos+sep) + 1) * sc + amount);
pos+=adv;

[mschnell]

I love how people use Reaper in unique ways.
In fact I mainly use Reaper for live playing with my Masterkeyboard (Piano, E-Piano, Organ, E-Organ, Vibes, ...) and my TEC BBC (Sample Modeling Swam Flutes).

I found Reaper a lot more versatile and reliable (and cheaper - in fact Zero $$ if using Reper for it's original purpose anyway) for this than the dedicated software I tried, (OK: I did not yet buy/test the new masterkeyboard-software combinations by Native Instruments and Alesis that seem to be just great, and usable for this purpose without needing a lot of configuration). For this, I use SWS "LiveConfigs and I did some small special purpose JSFXes.

A friend of mine uses Reaper for live playing all available SWAM instruments with a real Wind Controller ("EWI"). For him, I did a set of JSFXes that allow to control "LiveConfigs" (and other Midi Instruments' sound switching) via keyboard shortcuts in a very versatile way (including setting up set lists for a gig; see -> http://www.bschnell.de/patch.pdf ).

Another friend of mine is about to start to sell a Midi to DMX (and other interfaces) hardware box ("ADMX2"), bundled with a lot of JSFXes that allow Reaper to be used for very sophisticated and easily synced to a music production stage lighting automation (and much more cool stuff).

Reaper decently rocks !

-Michael

[Paul99]

I seem to remember that I used "Tremolo" for that recording. Now I mostly use "Phaser" that to me sounds slightly less "realistic" but more "pleasant".

I modified the "tremolo" JSFX to offer a higher resolution for the tremolo speed. You might want to replace the sourcecode with that one:
[/code]

Thanks again. I created a new version of the tremolo, called tremolo-mschnell. ;-)

[mschnell]

tremolo-mschnell. ;-)
But in fact it is not faster ("schnell") but slower :) :) :)

-Michael

[Paul99]

But in fact it is not faster ("schnell") but slower :) :) :)

-Michael

Ah, so tremolo-mschlow or tremolo-mschlangsam... :)