My in-depth look at using Logic Pro X

What is Logic Pro X?

Logic Pro is a DAW
(Digital Audio
Workstation) and
MIDI (Musical
Instrument Digital
Interface) sequencer
software application.
Logic provides a
variety of software
instruments, audio
effects and recording
facilities in order to
produce high quality
Getting Started with Logic Pro X
To easily purchase and install Logic Pro X disk free, simply head to the App
Store on a Macintosh device. However, before making your purchase you
must check that you have the minimum system requirements in order to
get the most productive use out of the software. These are factors such
as: 4GB of RAM, a display with 1280-by-768 resolutions or higher, OS X
v10.8.4 or later, 64-bit audio units plug-ins, and a minimum of 5GB of
disk space.
The first time you launch Logic, it will ask you whether you are a first time
user or if you have used Logic in the past. If you choose first time user,
when opening a template, Logic will treat you with integrity as first time
user, giving you less to do by simply providing with a the tools needed to
get you started and on your way- this kid-glove stage can be surpassed by
turning on and off the advanced options and settings, which is accessed
through the medium of Logics software preferences. Examples of what
the advanced option can give you are: the solo and mute channel buttons.
Also, when first opening the app, Logic is ask you about installing the
35GB of content, which usually takes several hours to install.
To launch Logic you can click on it on its icon in your dock, which is a black
rectangle with a platinum record in it. When launching Logic Pro X, the
first thing that you are presented with is its template dialogue, with each
template being used for different genres of musical uses. When choosing
and opening a template, you should notice that the window says untitled

at the top. In order to change this, you must save your project, which is
done by heading to the file button and click save. Logic will then give you

options
on where youd like to save your project, how you would like to save your
new project such as how to organize your project and even to the extent
of what files youd like to copy in your project.
When choosing empty template on your template options, you
immediately get this new tracks dialogue. Logic must always have at least
one track opened when opened.

IMAGE1:

IMAGE
2:

If we choose the Software Instrument

track and leave the open library box
checked, the result would look like the
example image shown on the right
image 2. By default, Logic loads up the
Classic Electric Piano instrument as its
open track. As we had the open library
box checked, you can see all of Logics
instrument patches left open on the left

When clicking on a different patch, the channel will change to

that patch change. Logics instrument library contains of a
variety of sounds, ranging from horns and saxophones to
heavy drums. However, these tracks can only contain MIDI
regions on them. One way of creating a MIDI region is by
choosing the pencil tool in the toolbox and clicking once on
the track by default they are coloured green. These MIDI
regions contain sets of instructions called MIDI events, which
tell the software instrument what notes to play and when to

External MIDI tracks are very similar to the Software Instrument tracks, as
they are designed to talk to any external sound modules you might have
connected to Logic. Another type of track type is audio tracks, which hold
digital audio regions. These are tracks you can record into by plugging in a
microphone or connecting your guitar to your audio interface. Additionally,
if you are on a laptop and you click on the I button on the track; youll
see a level coming into the track from your Macs built-in microphone.
Guitar and Bass tracks on the other hand, are identical to the audio tracks.
The only difference between the two is that they come preloaded with
guitar patches.
Lastly, the drummer track is a brand new concept in Logic Pro X. The
Drummer track chooses a virtual drummer, personality and drum kit,
which you can alter the feel and performance through a medium of
controls. As you work you may find it useful to save certain track
configurations that you want to come back to each time you work, as this
process can save a lot of time. This can be done, by choosing File> Save
as Template. The default place it will go to is the My Template folder, as
shown in the image down below.

Software thats part of your Macs operating

system is called Core Audio, and its referred to as
built in input and built in output by Logic. To view
the core audio options, you can go in to
Applications. Utilities> Audio MIDI setup. The builtin audio sound card of your Mac is great, and you
can always use it whenever you go. But for more
professional sounding inputs and outputs, you
should have an external audio interface. External
audio interfaces connect usually via fire wire or

When going into window and pressing Show MIDI Window, this window will
show you all the types of MIDI devices that your computer currently sees.
You can also test them to view whether they are active or not by clicking
on Test Setup and press some keys or pads on your device - if it produces
sound then your gear is connected. All these hardware devices that are
connected do not control Logic, but Logic can be used to control them via
MIDI in a studio. On the other hand, control surfaces use MIDI, not to play
instruments in Logic, but more to control Logics playback system, and
virtual mix console.

Logic also comes with its own built in mini input device. This comes in
particularly
good use
when travelling
where you
cant take a lot
of gear with
you. The
musical typing
keyboard turns
your keyboard
into a mini
controller. Go
to Window>
Show Musical
Typing to turn
on. By
pressing the R button on your channel track, you will be able to hear the
keyboard play.
Establishing a Workflow
The centre area of Logics main window is the tracks area. This is where
you get to see all of your tracks horizontally laid out in a timeline. The
upper right of the tracks area can manage zooming horizontally and
vertically. Tracks can be selected by clicking on the tracks header,
whereas if you want to select a number of tracks at a time, you can hold
shift and click. Once a track is selected, factors associated with a track
and its content will be given focus up in the inspector column on the
upper left-hand side of the main window.

In the inspector, you shall see two channel strips. These are used in order
to view real-time processors. To add to this, you can also control the

volume and panning from this strip. Of the two channel strips, the left one
is assigned to the region or track that we have currently most selected,
whereas the right one is the projects master output. In order to close the
inspector columns, just press the I button.
The image above is a display of what the tool bar looks like. On the righthand side of the bar we have some buttons to activate the right
windowpanes. In the browser area, you have access to your hard drive
and any files you may want to use within Logic. To the left of this, we have
the Apple loops. This window provides us a cool way of searching the
sampled loops that come with Logic. Next to this, we have the notes,
which enable you to write information about tracks or songs for later use.
After that, we have the lists. This is a list view of important events relating
to specific tracks, or the project as a whole. To close any of the browsers,
all you have to do is click on their buttons.

When you start working on different tasks in Logic, you might find it useful
to save and
recall
different
stress of
windows.
These are
known as
screen
sets. Theyre
accessed in
the pull-down menu with the number 1 on it. You can tell when a screen
sets locked when it has a little dot to the left of the number.

The play head is what you see moving across the screen when playing
your project. This moves in real-time and can be positioned using the
transport tools or can be adjusted by clicking on its wanted destination in
the time ruler. When hitting enters, Logic automatically takes the play
head to the beginning of your project. In the centre of the control bar at
the top, you have the LCD. This is where you can view the current play
head position, set the project tempo, key and time signature. On the left
of the LCD you can change some different display mode views such as:
bars and beats, time etc. In Logic Pro X, musical time is shown as beats.
Beats divide bars, divisions divide beats, and ticks divide divisions. There
are 240 ticks per division. You can click directly in each of these time
scales and drag the mouse up and down to change the values.
On the bottom left or right hand side of a region, the default pointer tool
turns into a trimmer tool in order to adjust the length of a region. On the
top left or right hand side of a region, the pointer tool turns into a loop
tool, enabling you to loop regions when need be. You can choose your
tools with a small pull down menu in the upper middle of the main
window. The menu to its right is the alternate tool, this is a good shortcut,
as when you press the cmd key; you tool will switch to the alternate
tool. Remember, that the amount of tools you have will change depending
on whether you what window you are in.

If you are the type to be sending hours upon end using the Logic software,
I would suggest you learn the key commands in order to make your
workflow easier and a lot faster. These are shortcuts used by an assigned
key in order to provide fluidity in your sessions process. To open the key
commands editor go to Key Commands> Edit. The key command z is

auto-track zoom, meaning that if you have a track selected, type Z and
the track zooms out to full screen. Type it again and it reverts back to
normal size. The forward slash button lets you go to a position. Also, c is
used to turn on and off cycle mode. If we type the key X, we can see the
mixer panel at the bottom of our arrange window. The key f shows our
file browser on the left. Type o, as in a loop and we get the loops
browser. Lastly, if we select a track, we can type m to mute that
particular track, whereas ctrl+m is used to mute that specific region.
These are just a few key commands mentioned above, as there are 590
key commands assigned in Logic Pro X, not to mention that you can add
your own key commands to those that do not have any. This is done in the
key commands edit window shown above.
You can rename tracks by double clicking on its
default name in the region header, as shown in the
image to the left. However, by selecting the text tool
in the toolbox, you can name individual regions.
Renaming your work is a good habit to get into, as it
allows your work to stay organised. To add, it
reinforces you to have the ability to easily find what
you want within a matter of seconds, rather than
minutes if your track was not named appropriately.
Making Music with Logic
The libraries contain tons of already made and incredible sounding
patches. So a patch contains the instrument, effects and routing settings
that control the sound of a track.

Did you know

that you could
also save your
own patches
in Logic? This
is simply done
by making
sure that you
have the
patch that you
want to save
is selected
only. After this,
press save
and it will
automatically
direct you to the patches folder, as shown above. Once filling out the vital
information, save your patch and you shall see it when opening our
patches in your library. You can alternatively save patches on your hard
drive to
bring
them to
another
studio!
Smart
controls
(as seen
on the
bottom of
the
image) can
be mapped
to

instrument parameters, audio effects and even sounds. The key benefit of
this tool is that when in use you dont have to even get involved in the
minor details of all the effects on that channel, as they are already
mapped for you. However, if youd like to customize Smart Controls, first
click the I icon on the inspector panel. Now, the next step is to click on
the parameter youd like to map. You can tell when its mapped, as it will
circle with a blue halo. After, click on the parameter you want to map it to,
then click on the learn button the halo will then show red. The final step

is to simply click on the parameter you wish to map this knob to. Another
thing you can customize for
Smart Controls is the look of it
and actually what knobs or
buttons are available. When set
to automatic Smart Controls,
Logic chooses what type of
knobs and what the look your
Smart Controls have. When
selecting the Automatic Smart
Controls, a list of controls to
choose from appears. This is
where you can change what you
want your Smart Controls to look
like.

As you can see, this patch is a little different to the ones shown above.
When opened, you should notice that the patch is made up of subordinate
patches. To sum up what is happening here the track stacks are being
combined, and the outer layer is acting as an auxiliary track. One thing
that you can do with a track stack is disconnect all the tracks. You just
right click on the track itself and press flatten stack. This will then put
both of these sub tracks into their own tracks in order for you to record
separate MIDI performances on them. If you ever wanted to create your
own track stack, all you have to do is right click on the tracks selected and
click create track stack. The dialogue then gives you two options, on
whether to folder stack or summing stack. The concept of a folder stack is
more to do with if you have a lot of similar sounding audio recordings,
whereas summing tracks
is for when you have two
different sounding
recordings that youd like
to combine. Click the one
you want and then
proceed.
MIDI
When recording MIDI,
theres some, messages
that can be transmitted besides just notes. These are things like the Mod
wheel or a Pitch bend or after touch, which means you press down the
note harder. All the notes
that you record are always
going to be in horizontal
lines. However, as you can
see from the image below,
there are also some
vertical ones. These are
actually what they call
continuous controller
messages. This particular
continuous controller
message modulates the
output of the signal that
we are hearing, meaning
it wobbles.
To move on, punch-in recording is when you replace a section of a
recording. However, there are a couple of settings you have to set-up to

make Logic do that. Because if you try to record over a section, by default
Logic will just add your new notes to the old region. First step is to go up
in the control bar to right-click to say customize control bar and display.
Under modes and functions, choose the auto punch box. Once clicking,
the auto punch lane should appear then click the replace button to the
left of the auto punch button. Move the auto punch lane to wherever youd
like to punch in and start recording your new notes. Also, Logic Pro X has
this awesome way of
remembering the
last MIDI sequence
you played when
youre just jamming
along to the music.
Just the press the
shift+r command
and your notes will
be in your channel.
When setting up a
multiple takes
recording you need

to set the locators to cycle over a

set amount of bars. As a result,
Logic will keep cycling as we play
the part over and over again. You
can tap the c key to turn on and
off the cycle mode. In order to set
up how Logic deals with multiple
MIDI recording takes we have to go
into File> Project Settings under
Recording. In the overlapping
recordings section, it should say what Logic is going to do if we record
again and again. Change this to the
preference of your choice, but for
this example we are going to go with
Create Take Folders.
When recording three times, this is
what it made (as seen to the left).
This region is different to others as it
has a disclosure triangle in the top
left called a Pact Takes Folder. When

opened, you can see that there is a top region and then three sub regions.
When clicking on other takes, the new active take pops up in the top
region, as it is now the focus region. The order in which the takes place,
are the most current take to the least current take. By hovering over your
regions, you can see that the marquee tool appears, enabling you to take
certain bits from different takes in order to get the sound that you are
looking for. By right clicking on the region, you have the option to unpack
the folder to a new track. This then would give you three tracks with all
three takes on it, no longer giving you your sub regions. However, when
attempting to mute or solo one of the tracks, they all solo, as theyre all
using the same instrument. However, if you press ctrl+s, then youll
able to hear just one region (this
being the one selected).
A useful way of recording individual
parts over time can be done when
going to File> Project Settings under
Recording. By having your
overlapping recording setting in Join
when Cycling, you can perform this
technique. When activating cycle
mode, you can start recording your
individual parts. This tool is
particularly good for users that are
unable to perform well on the keyboard or whatever MIDI they have set up
to Logic, as they can focus on one important part at a time, as the beat
cycles. Another way you can record individuals parts is if you select
Create Tracks when Cycling, as you can record individual parts, but
instead Logic will put these parts on separate regions in order for you to
edit.

Step input media recording gives you the freedom to step in each media
event
one at a
time, without playback occurring in real
time. Step input can be performed with
or without an
external keyboard. This is done by going
to
Window>
Show
Step Input
Keyboard.
Across the
top left
of the
keyboard,
you have your
note lengths represented. On the top
right, you have velocities represented in musical notation. Once adding a
region on the channel by using the pencil tool you can simply press on the
notes you want to play and where from. To use the step input keyboard
through your MIDI keyboard, all you have to do is bring up the piano roll
that you wish to edit and press the MIDI input key on the top left of the
window - then go to Window> Show Step Input Keyboard and start
playing.Remember that you have to change the note length and velocity
to get variation, if thats what you want.
One very unique MIDI effect to explore is the arpeggiator. Arpeggiators go

back to the
beginnings of
electronic music
in which they provide a way to alter a group of notes held as a chord into
a rhythmic sequenced arpeggio of notes. When opening the smart tools,
you should notice in the top right there is a little button this is the
arpeggiator. When clicking this button the arpeggiator automatically is
loaded into the MIDI effects. When playing your project and pressing your
MIDI keyboards notes, you shall notice that the arpeggiator calculates the

BPM of your project and how it sounds, resulting in its timings to be

accurate.
Quantization is the rhythmic adjustment of audio or MIDI events to a
specific time grid. Logics quantization is a really good tool, as it is nondestructive, meaning that no matter how much you quantize, you can
always get back the original feel.
This image
preserves the hithat when not
quantized. By
selecting the notes
that you want to
quantize you can
change the rhythm
of your notes by
their values. This is
can really change
the feel on the
song being
produced.
However,
sometimes it can
also ruin it, as you
really need to
know what you are
looking for out of
quantization in
order to make it
sound nice and
angelic. As you can
see, to the left is
the change of hihats when
quantizing them to
a 1/16 Swing C
note. By adding
swing to the notes,
it causes them to
sound more human-like rather than staggered. Changing the velocity of
the notes also does this.Quantizing is performed in the regions list as well.

The piano roll is a useful window as it allows you to edit individual notes
one at a time. On the top of the piano roll window you have this little blue
icon, which is called Catch button. When this is on, the screen will update
as the play head moves off the screen, when turned off, it will bring us to
that current location. To the left of the catch button, we have the MIDI in
and MIDI out button. The MIDI In button, lets us input the piano roll editor.
On the left of the piano roll editor, we have a representation of a piano
keyboard showing what notes correspond to the horizontal lanes in this
window. You can actually click on them and play notes. You can also the
piano roll to select a bunch of notes that happen to be in that lane. The
little rectangles that you see are the MIDI notes they vary in lengths and
are also colour coded. The colour coding shows the velocity of the notes.
To create a note, you can right click and choose Create Note, or you can
use the pencil tool. Now, to edit a note, the pointer tool is really the most
effective. When moving to the outside edge of a note, the pointer tool
turns into the trimmer tool, meaning that I can edit the length of the note
to whatever value I want. If you want to move the MIDI note, simply click
right in the middle of the note and your pointer turns into a little hand that
can pull the note up or down to make it play different keys. Notice that
when you are moving the note, its sliding around. In order to constrain
this movement, just hold the shift key and drag.
When using velocity, each note colour determines velocity, but also inside
the note theres a line and the longer the line is to the edge of the not, the
higher the velocity is. When changing the velocity, the velocity slider in
the bottom left of the piano roll is changing. So you can use the V tool or
you can keep it on the pointer tool and just select the note and change its
velocity that way. In the edit menu of the piano roll, there is a whole
arsenal of different options you have for editing. For example, if you go to
Select> Equal Coloured Notes, any note of the same velocity will then be
selected.

Pitch shifting and

modulation can be
edited using MIDI draw.
When you see grey
marks on MIDI regions,
it symbolizes that the
region contains
continuous controller
MIDI data as well as the
notes that we see
horizontally. Within the
piano roll, there is a
bottom that shows
three lines positioned
on top of one another
to the upper left hand
side of the window, click on this to view the MIDI draw data. The data that
you see is your continuous controller data. On the left it shall tell you what
you are looking at. MIDI Draw is really effective because you can edit each
individual node (this being the little dots of effects). Pulling them up or
down or sliding them across can edit these nodes, whereas double clicking
on a node can delete it. Using the pencil tool, you can draw in different
values of nodes.

The Step Editor allows you to view and edit multiple continuous controller
MIDI messages at a time in the Piano Roll editor. When clicking on a lane,
the lane inspector shows up to show us information about that lane. This
shows us the values of each lane when selected.

The
provides a
editor for
Logic
regions in
and MIDI
these
the
can
any track.
on a
Events
to show
happening inside.

Events List
non-graphical
events in your
project, both
the timeline
events within
regions. Using
Events List, you
change the
positioning of
When clicking
region, the
List will update
you whats

Audio
In order to import sound into Logic, you can do this through the medium of
dragging from your finder into Logic, or you can go to File> Import> Audio
File. The good thing about importing from your file options is that you get
to see more information about the file, as it tells you its sample rate, time
etc. You can also audition the file from this area as well. Lastly, you can
import audio by going to All Files.

In order to open the loop browser, click the

loop button to the top right of your edit
window. In the middle of the loops shows the
keyword search, providing a whole bunch of
words to help us search and sort through
these thousands of Apple Libs to find the one
that fits your song. To audition these Apple
Loops you can click on them and Logic will
automatically play back the loop. As you can
see, all the loops are assigned to a certain
tempo, however, when auditioning a loop, it
will seamlessly play back not in the tempo of
its Native Tempo but rather our own Project
Tempo. When hearing a loop that you like,
simply drag it into your edit window. You can also search
for specific loops that you want. Some apple loops are
green with a note icon, whereas others are blue with an
audio form icon. The green apple loops are MIDI
information, whereas the blue is audio. When you drag
the greens into your main window, you can actually load
up an instrument patch and bring in MIDI information.
However, when dragging a green apple loop into an
audio track, Logic will automatically flatten the MIDI into an audio file. You
can view whether not a region is mono or stereo due to its sign to the
right of where the name of the region is. If the sign has two intertwined
circles then it is a stereo region, whereas if it is one circle with a line at the
bottom of it, then it is a mono region.
Files that are not apple loops do not automatically conform to your
projects tempo. To figure out the tempo of an unknown tempo region, you
can (with the region selected) go up to Edit> Tempo>Detect Tempo of
Selected Region. After that, in order to change the tempo of this region,
make sure that you have a loop around your region. When the region is
selected, go to the Edit Menu> Tempo> Adjust Tempo using Region Length
and Locators. Another way of changing the regions tempo is by going to
Edit> Time Stretch> Time Stretch Region Length to Locators. There is also
a way to create loops out of regions in order for you to have access to
them in any song. With the region selected go to File> Export> Region to
Loop Library.
Flextime can be used to conform an out of time audio recording to your
song. It uses slice technology, as it allows you to slice up your audio into
rhythmic slices, and then retime those slices without any resampling or
destructive processing. In order to enable flex mode, double click to pull

up the audio file editor and click the twirling icon on the upper left of the
browser. Once turning on flex pitch, you shall see the slices that I was
referring to earlier on your audio region. The flex pitch menu gives you a
variety of options on what elastic audio youd like to select when slicing
your audio region. Your choice of elastic audio is dependent on your genre
of audio. These elastic audio genres consist of: monophonic, slicing,
rhythmic, polyphonic, speed (FX), and tempophone (FX). Monophonic is
usually used for low frequency algorithms, e.g. baselines. When you use

Monophonic flex, your recording should be relatively dry without any

audible reverberation. The slicing mode on the other hand, is really good
for percussive non-tonal audio material like drums. Slicing cuts up the
audio material at transient markers, and then shifts the audio when
playing each slice at its original speed.
Theres also the Polyphonic mode, which is really good for chordal or
complex material. It uses a process called phase vocoding, meaning that it
does not affect the pitch. Rhythmic time stretches the material looping
audio between slices in order to fill in any gaps. Lastly, tempo phone is
the effect of a historical tape based time stretching device. However,
when your elastic audio is on Flex Time Automatic, Logic will select
what flex pitch it believes is best to use for your audio region. Once
choosing your elastic audio, you can conform your slices to your particular
tempo by pulling and dragging them.
Groove tracks are not enabled by default, to enable them you want to
right click in the Track header and choose Configure Track Header. Make
sure that the Groove Track button is ticked. Once that is done, if you go to
the left-hand side of the track headers and hover over the track numbers,
all of a sudden each track number has a star appear. This lets us set any
track into our Master Groove track. Unfortunately, you can only have one

master groove track per Logic project. Once deciding what track youd like
to be your starred groove
track, a box appears at the
side of each regions header.
This box is ticked for any tracks
that you want to match the
groove of your starred groove
track. When a box is ticked,
youll see that the waveform
moves, this happens in order
for the region to rhythmically
conform to match the feel of
the starred groove track.

When bands/musicians
play instruments live in
the studio, they have
tendency to not be
exactly on beat all the
time. In
order to fix this minute
problem, Logic has a
built in beat mapping
detector, allowing for
bands to perform better
once editing them within
the software. The result
of beat mapping is that
the beat is going to be
right on the metronome and the metronome itself will be the timing grade
of Logic, as it will be pulling and pushing to match. By heading to the
global tracks view, make sure that the beat mapping box is ticked. You
normally have to zoom in quite a lot to use this technique finely. What you
want to do when the beat is in front or behind the timescale grid is to grab
the line and drag it over, so it sort of matches the beat. Although it looks
like you are retiming your beat, you are not; you are simply retiming the
background grid. This is quite a time consuming method, as you have to
edit each individual beat, however, once complete you will never look
back the results are astonishing.

Before recording audio, you need to decide on three options for the audio
files that youll be recording. Go to Global Preferences> Logic Pro>
Preferences> Audio in order to view your file type, sample rate and bit
depth. The default bit depth is 24, when un-ticking the box it will
automatically change to 16 bit. However, I would recommend you leave it
at 24 bit, as its the best quality you can record to in Logic. It will take up
for space, but it will not have as much dynamic range. Now, go to the
Project Settings> Global Press> File> Project Settings> Audio, in order to
view your sample rate. Remember, the higher the sample rate when
recording is the higher the quality. The only trade off is disk space, but
hard disks are really cheap nowadays. Once this is done, the next thing
you should do is check your input, to make sure that all your hardware set
up is connected to Logics interface.

If you are recording a band, what you usually want to do is set up to load
audio tracks with different inputs (which you can do by clicking on
ascending tracks). The next thing that you want to do is to make sure that
the band is able to hear them through their headphone mix. In order to
set up a headphone mix, go to the mix window and select all of your
tracks. Next, go to your sends and choose an available bus (an internal
mix pathway that takes the audio from one place to another within Logic).
Rename the track to whatever you want (e.g. headphone mix), as you
want to keep your project organised, as it enhances your efficiency and
workflow. After this, turn up your bus sends at each individual region
channel, in order for the volumes to be heard.
Once this is complete go to the Logic Pro Preferences and make sure that
in your audio folder, Input monitoring level for record-enabled channel

strips is ticked, as you want to record and input enable multiple channels
at one time.
If you havent noticed already, looping a region that is not lined up with
the background grid causes the region to gradually get out of sync over
time. However, this problem can be solved by using repeat regions; you
can access repeat regions by typing cmd+r.
There are a few ways to slice up a region. You can use the marquee tool
by selecting an area around the part of the region that you wish to slice.
When letting go, a single click will make a slice over the length of the
marquee. Another way of slicing is by placing the play head where you
want to put it and pressing cmd+t. Lastly, you can use the scissor tool
in order to slice as well, as you can cut where you want the slice to
happen. By using the drag modes, you can adjust the way that you slice
regions due to their movement throughout the timeline. The default drag
mode is no overlap its use is for trimming regions once placed over
them, giving reasoning for the name. The next mode is overlap, which
works in a similar way. You have the freedom to move your region around
wherever you want, but if you cover up another region and then pull
away, it actually acted as a temporarily overlap. Also, cross fade drag
mode is interesting because whenever you overlap a region, Logic will
make a cross fade for that length of time. Now, the bottom drag modes
(shuffle right and shuffle left), are a little bit dangerous. It acts as a
magnet, due to it snapping to the next region to its left or right. This
can be a time saver if you want to line up a bunch of regions. However,
when attempting to trim regions, shuffle can be fatal, as if you try to trim,
lets say the right side of a region, the region itself and any preceding
regions will move down by that amount. As a result, your whole track
channel could be out of time with the rest of your project.
Flex pitch can be used as a track based tool. First, turn on flex by pressing
the button in the audio file editor region. At the very top of the flex list, we
can enable flex pitch. Once performed, you shall see MIDI-like blocks for
the audio regions. By moving these blocks up and down, you can change
the pitch of the audio region selected. When zooming in closer to the
blocks, you shall see that the blocks have six dots around them. They all
have different jobs. The upper edge dots enable you to adjust the pitch
drift by moving up and down. The upper middle dot on the other hand,
can adjust fine pitch, making the pitch slightly higher or lower. Also, you
can increase and decrease vibrato by pulling the middle bottom dot. The
bottom right edge dot is used for format shift, in order to move the
formant. Lastly, the bottom left edge dot is used for gain control, causing
you to increase and decrease levels in dB of each individual note.

By using
Snap
mode to

bar, you can

move a
region
forward or
backwards a
whole bar;
moving it
relative to
the time grid
behind it.
However,
when you set the Snap Region to absolute, the region will move to the
nearest bar boundary. This causes the region to be out of sync if you lined
with the background grid. An anchor point always sets to the beginning of
a region. By default, the anchor point is set to the start of where the
region is, but can be placed wherever youd like within your region. By
switching over to the audio file editor, you can see the anchor point at the
bottom of the browser. By moving the anchor point to where the sound
begins, when being moved by bar, it should move and line the region with
the place of the anchor point. When moving back to the editing window,
you shall see that the region has a dot at the bottom, showing that your
anchor point has been enabled.
Notating different arrangement sections of a song can be an incredible
time saver when youre navigating around in your project. In the main
window you can open the global tracks by clicking the down arrow, up
above the track headers. So, with the play head at the beginning of your
project, you can click the plus button on the arrangement track, to start
an arrangement marker. If you click right on your arrangement track

name, Logic will give you five things to name your marker: intro, verse,
chorus, bridge or outro. Not only can you use these arrangement tracks to
know where each element is in a song, but you can actually use them to
quickly select across all the tracks and move whole sections.
Mixing and Mastering
Organization is key for when moving into the mixing stage of your project.
In the mix window, they are normally a lot of tracks to look at, giving
reasoning for why you can filter your tracks out by type. So if I
option+click on any type of channel that I wanted to see, that channel
of tracks would appear only. Its good to be consistent about your track
order, as you can sift through your order easily. Once you have your tracks
in order, its good to colour code them by type. This gives you easy visual
access to different track types. Remember, track colours can be different
than region colours. By assigning tracks to groups, you can move faders
and manipulate effects within those groups simultaneously. As a result,
you are cutting back on the time spent mixing, making it better for the
accuracy of your ears. Lastly, in order to navigate quickly through your
project, you should convert your arrangement sections to markers. To do
so, position your cursor at the start of each arrangement, and make a new
marker in the Markers global track lane. Once naming your markers, open
the List menu and go to Markers now when you option+click on a
marker name, the play head will go exactly to that spot in the mix.
Space designer is a convolution reverb
used in Logic Pro X. The Google
definition of what reverb is is an effect
whereby the sound being produced by
an amplified musical instrument is
made to reverberate slightly. By adding
little amounts of reverb, you can add
subtlety to your mix, as it creates
warm. They are mainly known for being
used on vocals, but are also used on other instruments.
Delay on the other hand, is to make
something late or slow. Delay is
basically a held up version of reverb;
shown to the left is an example of
Logics delay tape delay. This is not
only good for creating rhythmic fluidity
in your project but can also cause the

psychoacoustics such as: the cocktail party effect and haas effect. This
creates spatial awareness within the mix.
Gates act as gates...basically they block certain
frequencies from entering, forcing them not to be heard.
The image to the left is an example of a gate used in
Logic called noise gate.

A compressor is used to reduce the

masses of dynamic range of sound signal
within your project. This is a useful tool,
as it deducts loudness throughout your
mix. This also leaves headroom for your
mix, resulting in it being more useful
when in the mastering stage, as it is well
away from peaking levels. To the left is a
Logic compressor.
To the left is an example of an equalisation (EQ)
plug-in. Equalisation is the process of adjusting
the balance between frequency components
within an electronic signal. Many EQ plug-ins are
different as some allow you to move the
frequencies affected whereas others dont. This
example to the left does.
Panning is used to create space within your
project, by putting a region into the stereo
field (left or right) - and can be performed
through automation. Hard pans (LCR) are unusual to come across these
days but can sometimes enhance a mix. Every track is different, so
panning the hi hat on one track may not work for the next, so the only
thing I can say is experiment with this one, as they are no guides/rules.
When recording and mixing, you must make sure that your levels do not
peak, as this will cause a series of distortions to occur, resulting in the
harmonics being lost throughout your project. A constant
challenge/struggle in todays mixing world is the idea of loud being better
sounding, better quality, and overall just a better song. So, in order to
satisfy the consumers needs and wants, make sure that you know how
and where to use limiters and compressors without losing a lot of the
songs harmonics, in the mixing and mastering stages.
Bouncing down your mix

Logic bounces from the

indicated start point of
your project to the end
by the left pointing arrow
in the bar ruler. By moving
in the LCD, you can
change the length of your project.
Leaving the LCD too far from the
end of your project will cause silence to occur when
listening to the final bounce file. But, you also need
to make sure that it isnt too close to the end of
your audio regions
because you dont want
to cut anything off. You also want to make sure that any tracks are not
soloed or muted before you balance, and that nothing is cycling, as it will
bounce only that cycled part of your mix. Now, go to File> Bounce>
Project or Section in order to bounce your project. Once filling out the vital
information, bounce your project to your preferred destination. Once
finished, listen to your finished product.