Hello Everyone

I have been following the forum for a couple of months now .

And to be honest was looking to get my self indoors.

I do have a few questions about biab.

Although I have read a lot on the forum, and learned a lot.

I do need to take the next step, which I have done.

To ask a few/a lot of questions/

1st one where can I upload songs too.

not new in any aspect to this ,I have done mostly wav

samples until now.

What seems to me baffling in biab is when you render , why

do you go through a dxi. software, Is that not a midi thing...?

But we have realtracks audio..?


Am I missing something.

Regards

John

You can choose and mix and match what you want.

RealTracks are artists playing audio

MIDI is either
- artists playing MIDI ( we call that MIDI Supertracks)
Or
- computer using patterns and mapping to current chord ( no specific name, so just called MIDI style) ( this is what most consumer keyboard like Casio do)

-----

Thanks Peter

Yes I do know the difference .

What I was asking is why do we render through a midi

device .?


For real audio files.

Thanks


I am just curios knowing so much on wav files, why

should this be.

Hi John,

Welcome to the forums.


Most of the people who use the Users Showcase Forum have a free account on Soundcloud and upload songs to there. That being said, some users prefer Soundclick and others use Youtube. There are are couple of other sites but I can't recall them off hand.


What you say is all correct.

BIAB is not simply Realtracks based, though. A very large component of it is MIDI based. In fact, I find the MIDI side of BIAB very versatile when it comes to providing inspiration for writing songs. In my latest song below (see the link in my signature), I used a MIDI Supertrack for the piano. It is because of the MIDI side of BIAB that the VSTi/DXi softsynth is required for generating wav.

Regards,
Noel

• my latest song : This Road

Yep, RealTracks are already audio, so they will simply mix down to stereo audio (wav); however, if there are MIDI tracks, then you need a way to convert the MIDI performance to audio WAV as well. When you just listen on the computer, you might be listening through a DXi or VSTi, or an externally connected MIDI synth. However, to render the MIDI to WAV you will need to use a DXi or VSTi to do so. You can get the external MIDI synth to so so as well, but you have to actually "record" the output of the synth to capture it and it takes the length of the song to do so. Direct rendering with DXi or VSTi takes seconds, because everything happens inside the computer (you don't have to play through the song to get the output).

What seems to me baffling in biab is when you render , why

do you go through a dxi. software, Is that not a midi thing...?

In the old days, before VSTi and DXi, which are virtual instruments, we would have the midi player play the hardware synthesizer and we would connect audio cables from the synth to the recording device. The audio recording time would be the length of the song. Ex; 4 minutes 20 seconds. That was the only way to get the sound of the synthesizer recorded to a track on the tape.

Since DXi and VSTi are software synthesizers being processed inside the computer we can now "render";(cause it to become) an audio or wave file internally without the need to route cable/s from the synth back to the recording device/computer. And, without the need to wait for the entire song to play back each midi track to separate audio tracks.

Of course it can still be done the old fashioned way when you want the sound of your favorite hardware synth on a track. You would connect a midi cable from your computer to your hardware synth, connect audio cables back to your computers soundcard or audio interface. BIAB or RealBand becomes the midi player and also the recording device.

Does that help explain it?

As jford and Noel96 covered already; RealTracks are not midi and therefore not playing through a software synthesizer. But, if you have RealTracks and non-RealTracks BIAB and RealBand will render the RealTracks and midi via DXi/VSTi simultaneously along with any recorded audio tracks.
You can also render one track at a time so you will have all your individual tracks in the same format. YOu can then import each one into a DAW such as RealBand.

Well Big John.... Welcome.

Come on in, pull up a chair and stay a while.

Your question about where to upload your song files was answered. Most sites need MP3 formatted files. If you can, use the 320kbs sample rate. Back off that only if the song site has a maximum file size and 320kbs puts you over the limit. And upload the higher kbs mp3 even if the site says they compress to 128. Trust me on that one.

Sites like Box and Dropbox let you load waves. I haven't used either of those in a while so I'm assuming they still allow wave audio.

Next... you need a synth because midi by itself doesn't make any noise. You need the synth to change that data into music. Most folks use either TTS or Coyote depending on which one you have on the machine already. Both are about equal in sound quality, meaning they're not the worst but there's a bunch of better options. HOWEVER... I have TTS set as my default midi synth for BB. I use my better synths in my DAW in the production stage of the process.

As far as real tracks.... yes... they are audio, not midi. Depending on the style you selected, you may have a totally midi style, you may have a totally real track style, or you might have a combination of both in the style. You need that synth loaded so that if the style you selected has midi in it... perhaps the bass line or drums are midi, it will play like it's supposed to play and not be missing the midi tracks. In those sorts of combo tracks, you can opt to load a real track in place of the midi. It's just that the RT didn't fit with the style so midi was selected for that style.

Hopefully I splained that good and clear.

Soundcloud accepts WAV files now. Upload your WAV's there.



Regards,


Bob

Hi

Thanks for all the replies.

I was talking about biab I have a song finished all real tracks.

Now wanting to take it all into my daw.

Do I render ,If so why do I have to render through dxi midi yea.

when all my tracks are real tracks no midi.

I am curios to know if I am going along the best route for this.


I'll get there eventually with a little help.

Oh... in that case....

You can export the tracks one at a time....I'll tell you how I do this.

So you have a song finished in BB. Save the file....close BB and open Real Band and then open the file from BB.

All the tracks will populate with the real tracks. Click on a track to SELECT the entire track. Export the track to a folder or simply drag and drop into your DAW. I like to export the tracks to a folder for the song on my desktop. This keeps all the tracks in one place and everything connected to that song, including finished mixes and lyric sheets are all in one place. I also save the BB & RB files there. Later, I move that folder to a spare drive for storage.

I then open each track from my DAW to import them in one by one. (I'm old fashioned and tend to do things the long way around.)

That's how I do it. Just one of many paths to get the job done. You will eventually find the work flow that works best for you.

There are several ways to accomplish this.

You may be referring to the "Render To Audio File" dialog... which does have a button that says "DXi - Direct Render" - which is a bit confusing... but, Yes, that is the button to click to render all your tracks to a folder so you can then use them in your DAW.

MAKE SURE you select the right folder - the "Choose" button - to put them where you want them...

BTW... it may depend on what version of BIAB you have (year) and what operating system you are using... so you might indicate that...

Here is another way....

Open the folder where you want the files in the Windows File Manager (assuming you are using Windows.)

From the main BIAB screen, click on one of the green track names along the top - like "Drums" or "Guitar"... while holding the mouse down (right-click button), drag to the folder and drop it.

Repeat for each track.

Also let us know what DAW you are using. I use Sonar and I can drop n drag RTs directly to Sonar.

Welcome to the asylum.

Along with the very informative tutorial videos (http://www.pgmusic.com/videos.bbwin.htm) all here are very helpful.
I've watched and revisited most of them.

It's great software....dig in....enjoy the ride.

Carry on....