Production

This is my first drum beat i produced in Logic. The kick is on the first beat and alternating snare and clap on the 2nd and 4th. I then quanitised this beat to 16th notes to ensure that it is in time. I used a MIDI keyboard for an initial recording and then used the piano roll to add on things like the second snare and the crash. This is not my first time working with MIDI drums although i have never used the piano roll before, I think it helped a lot with the quality of this beat. If I were to change something about this beat I would use a different kit. I just think this one is a bit strange for what I was trying to do. This is an essential skill I will be utilising in most of my future tracks and there is a lot of room for improvement for me.

I used the previous drumbeat I made in this second production idea, the drumbeat is identical except the bpm has been increased from 76 to 105. I added a MIDI arpeggiator bass in, it is very basic but I think that it is a decent second step for me. I utilised the piano roll again for the MIDI bass after I recorded it using a keyboard in real time, again quantising to 1/16th notes. The track is in time and doesn't have anything immediately concerning about it. However, there is a lot of room for improvement and overall I'm just not happy with how the track sounds. I had an image in my head but my abilities were not able to achieve it at my current level. This just means I need to keep practicing and improving.

This is my first track where I utilise the audio interface to plug in my own guitar and record it in Logic. The chords for this track are A minor, D minor, F, and C. To record audio in Logic utilising the audio interfaces you must plug in your guitar, create a Logic audio track, and then switch which input the track receives the signal from. Switch the input from 1 to 2. To go with this chord progression I created 2 different MIDI basslines. I quantised both of these to 1/16th notes and used the piano roll to ensure it was even and relatively perfect. I trialed both of these basslines and settled on the second one because I think it sounds better compared to the first. I have recorded audio in Logic many times before this so this isn't a new skill to me however compared to previous audio recordings I've done in Logic this one stands out as being of higher quality. I think this is because I am more experienced. This is a skill I will be using constantly in the future.

This is a track of simply testing different effects, I made this during a lesson with Owen where the task was to put different types of effects such as reverb, delay, HPF, LPF, chorus, and phaser onto tracks. Doing this helped me gain a better understanding of not only the different variety of effects available to use in Logic but also the nuances within the effects. Like the difference between a little bit of reverb and a big reverb and the different levels in between. Though I likely will not be doing something like this again it has given me the necessary knowledge to be able to utilise these effects more effectively in the future. MIDI FX is an essential skill for producing a good track that I will be putting to use in the future.

This was a track I produced during a lesson with Rhodri where our task was to download a MIDI track of any song and sample it in Logic, the goal being for nobody to be able to tell what track you sampled from. I chose Rappsnitch Knishes by MF Doom for my track. I chopped up the bass and guitar and turned the guitar track into two separate keyboard tracks, I then used Logics drummer for a drum track converted it to a MIDI track, and utilised the piano roll to edit it to suit my needs. I also added a synth sound to make it harder to discern what it was. I believe the techniques I used during this task are a good representation of how my skills have developed in Logic thus far. However, I could not make this track "work" no matter how I attempted to make it fit the track didn't sound good, and it was obvious where I sampled it from, this is only because of my inexperience though. This is I believe my weakest area in producing and I need to practice sampling to improve. I am sure I will need to use this technique again in the future. 

This is an example of the different kinds of beats that Logic's drummer can make. I made this during a lesson with Rhodri. Drummer is an extremely useful tool because it can instantly make a drumbeat that is perfectly in time. To use drummer you just have to add a new track and select it and it will auto-generate a beat, you can change the beat by selecting the track. You can change which drums are used, complexity, intensity, fills, swing, and more. Not only this but you can also change the genre, the kit, and the style of drumming. In my opinion, the beats the drummer makes are great and they're the best way to quickly record audio in time along with a metronome. The drummer's high level of customisation makes it very accessible for any kind of track. On top of this, you can convert the drummer's track to MIDI and alter it in the piano roll. The drummer is something I use and will continue to use regularly for recording in time and for my tracks.

I arranged this track using a tool in Logic called Apple Loops, Apple Loops are copyright-free samples that you can use in your track. This track was made in a lesson with Rhodri where he taught us what apple loops are and how to use them, our task was to make our own track just using apple loops. This is my attempt at that. This is a funk song using multiple slap bass, drums, synth, and guitar samples. The most important part of arranging a track out of apple loops is making sure all the loops are in the same key, aside from this making a track is extremely easy compared to trying to make an original one yourself. These loops are already mixed a lot so not much work is needed for them to work together in a decent track. Overall I see no issues with this track. It sounds good and is a good demonstration of my knowledge of structure in music. Although if I were to do this track again I would add more instruments and moving parts.

 This is a microphone test I made during a lesson with Rhodri. Our task was to test many different kinds of microphone and record it in a logic track. This was an opportunity to learn about how to plug in and record using different types of microphones, these include dynamic, compressor and boom microphones. I also learnt about phantom power and how some microphones require it and some do not. To use a microphone that requires phantom power you must press the phantom power button on the audio interface then plug the microphone in using an XLR cable. For microphones that do not require phantom power you just plug it in utilising an XLR cable. One mistake I made during this test was not having the gain up high enough, you can tell by the audio being too tinny and the transients on my test tracks being pretty much flat for almost all of them. However aside from this these are skills I will be using in the future whenever I may need to record vocals.

This a track that I did not make but mixed instead with Rhodri over 3 separate lessons. Mixing is an essential skill needed for producing a listenable track. The first thing I did to this track is create track stacks out of all the instrument groups, those being drums, guitar, bass, lead vocals, chorus backing vocals, and verse backing vocals. I did this to make the track more manageable and tidier while I worked through mixing each individual track. I worked from the top down which means that I started with the drums. For the drums, I set an appropriate audio level for each then went through the utilised Logic's EQ to take out the frequency ranges that I didn't need, for example, on a kick drum you don't need top-end and for a high-hat, you don't need any low-end. After this, I boosted the low-end on the kick slightly and boosted the gain a tiny bit to give it a deeper sound because I thought it was too shallow of a noise for a kick. Also using the EQ I swept the drum tracks and used it to remove any tones or ringing that disrupted the track. Once all of the drums were mixed I moved onto the bass guitar which didn't need a lot of mixing on it because it was recorded extremely well. However, I took out the top-end of the bass and again swept it using the EQ to remove any tones or ringing that disrupted the track. For the guitars, I made the distorted guitars quieter because they were overpowering every other instrument in the track. I then panned 2 guitars all the way left and right, two guitars half-panned left and right, and two guitars unplanned. This adds so much more texture to the guitar tracks, especially in the chorus. For the rest of the tracks I leveled and EQ'd them repeating the same steps I took with the previous tracks. I then began adding compression on all the tracks via Logic's bus system. After this, the track sounded much smoother. I also utilised the bus system to add reverb, delay, and distortion to the appropriate tracks.  Overall I think I completed this task well considering that this was my first time mixing. there is definitely room for improvement, especially with my drum mixing. The effect b,[usses really bring this track together in the final stage. If I were to do this task again I would 

  This lesson was our introduction to the studio with Rhodri. We discussed the rules of the studio and how to use it. This studio is a small room with a desk Imac, audio interface, microphone, MIDI keyboard and monitors. Recording audio in Logic in the studio differs from in the classroom because of 2 things, 1 the audio interface is different and 2 there are studio monitors. The most important thing to remember while using the studio is that the monitors must be turned on last and turned off . This is because if you do otherwise the monitors make a popping noise that damages and eventually causes the monitors to break. So ensure you do this and make sure that the master volume on the audio interface is all the way down until everything is good to go and you're in a Logic session. The audio interface is a two channel with combined XLR and jack ports, the interface also has phantom power, 4K audio boost and some other features which the audio interfaces we use in the classroom do not. Some of the rules of the studio are as follows. No food or drink is allowed in the studio whatsoever, take careful care of the equipment in the studio and finally nobody except for those on the music course and the tutors can access this room.