# Best effective way to program grooves by hand in Superior Drummer 2/Pro Tools 8 LE?



## Tritono (Aug 29, 2010)

Hi guys,

I need some opinions. I have used the Ezdrummer and DKFH software some time and the way that I used to program my drums was with Guitar Pro. I make a drum groove in GP, export the midi and then I put it in a midi track in my Daw.

Now I have Superior Drummer 2 working in Pro Tools 8 LE. But I dont know the best way to do my drums. In PT, I have a Midi Editor but is not comfortably like Guitar Pro. In Guitar Pro, you work with keys, like writing. In PT is only mouse. How you program your drums? I heared about templates? they are useful? what I can do to improve the effectiveness?

Thank you in advance! 

J.P.


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## Tritono (Aug 30, 2010)

Superior 2 users, how do you program your drums by hand?


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## Lon (Aug 30, 2010)

hm i'm working with superior drummer (dunno if 2?) and metal foundry and there is a whole preset browser where you can just drag and drop pre-made midi patches into your DAW channel. these grooves are to be seen as "the standard". 

they're useful to preview something, but usually at the end i get to programming drums by hand. for a whole song gp-pro is pretty awesome, for small bits i just use the built in midi editor (i use reaper). 

if i do something for my band, the drummer programs all the beats in guitar pro and i just extract it


so in short:
for a lot of programming, use guitar pro, the transfer time will be less than the time you need more to do everything via mouse.

for small touch ups, just use the built in midi editor


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## petrucci_dude (Aug 30, 2010)

i usually program in guitar pro or to a grid, then i have to go through and move things around a bit to make them more realistic.


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## Fred (Aug 30, 2010)

I'd highly recommend just getting used to using the piano roll in your DAW as opposed to continuing with GP, at least if you're looking to program some natural-sounding drums. It'll definitely seem a lot slower than using GP at first, because you're used to GP and not to the piano roll, but you can get seriously fast once you get used to it. Otherwise, if you have a MIDI keyboard and a decent sense of rhythm, try the method that a few people favour (including myself), and use the keyboard to program your drums in real time.

The reasons I recommend moving away from GP are partly because it makes more sense to use everything you've got available to you in SD2.0 instead of sticking to the basic General MIDI setup (ie all of the various note triggers for flams, rolls, etc). The main reason is that it seems somewhat counter-intuitive to me to spend however long programming the drums in GP only to then have to go and manually edit every note velocity to get a vague sense of realism - if you use the piano roll or a MIDI keyboard, you can fix the velocities whilst you're programming and so cut out an unnecessary extra step (obviously aside from final tweaking when the drums are fully written-out). Of course, you can edit the velocities to a certain extent within GP, but not as precisely or quickly (once the learning curve's out of the way) as you should be able to in a piano roll.

Obviously what works for me won't necessarily work for you, I just think it makes more sense to move away from GP. I highly doubt you'll find the GP method being used in many proper studios!


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## S-O (Aug 30, 2010)

Or get cubase!  and use the drum editor.

Then, export the midi file, put in pro tools, and use it to track/mix the rest of your project.

Or just use cubase


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## -Nolly- (Aug 30, 2010)

Fred said:


> I'd highly recommend just getting used to using the piano roll in your DAW as opposed to continuing with GP, at least if you're looking to program some natural-sounding drums. It'll definitely seem a lot slower than using GP at first, because you're used to GP and not to the piano roll, but you can get seriously fast once you get used to it. Otherwise, if you have a MIDI keyboard and a decent sense of rhythm, try the method that a few people favour (including myself), and use the keyboard to program your drums in real time.
> 
> The reasons I recommend moving away from GP are partly because it makes more sense to use everything you've got available to you in SD2.0 instead of sticking to the basic General MIDI setup (ie all of the various note triggers for flams, rolls, etc). The main reason is that it seems somewhat counter-intuitive to me to spend however long programming the drums in GP only to then have to go and manually edit every note velocity to get a vague sense of realism - if you use the piano roll or a MIDI keyboard, you can fix the velocities whilst you're programming and so cut out an unnecessary extra step (obviously aside from final tweaking when the drums are fully written-out). Of course, you can edit the velocities to a certain extent within GP, but not as precisely or quickly (once the learning curve's out of the way) as you should be able to in a piano roll.
> 
> Obviously what works for me won't necessarily work for you, I just think it makes more sense to move away from GP. I highly doubt you'll find the GP method being used in many proper studios!



Yeah, this. Once you get the hang of it you'll be able to rip through drum tracks in no time, and they'll come out fully formed, rather than needing lots of adjustment.


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## Kheros (Aug 30, 2010)

Fred said:


> if you have a MIDI keyboard and a decent sense of rhythm, try the method that a few people favour (including myself), and use the keyboard to program your drums in real time.!



I also do this, though I don't have a midi keyboard yet. I'm running EzDrummer in reaper and pull up the virtual midi keyboard and I'll lay down the basic beat for the track in real-time with my computer's keyboard. Then I go in on the piano roll and add fills/adjust velocities. 

I've tried all of that GP stuff but I definitely favor the above. I'd also recommend getting familiar with your piano roll.


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## beefshoes (Aug 30, 2010)

How do you connect your keyboard to Reaper to use DKFH?
I have a Yamaha with a MIDI input and I have a MIDI/USB cable but I have no clue how to connect it and the Virtual keyboard seems as if it is lagging.


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## randomshredder (Aug 31, 2010)

Connect the keyboard via the USB cable, open up your DAW, create a MIDI track, and then select your USB/MIDI device as the input. From there you should be able to press a MIDI key and that'll trigger a response. 

About the whole GP vs. Drum Roll discussion, I find it easier to compose in GP because there is less clutter than the DAW interface. I like having a digital composition tool and an actual recording tool. It's good to get acquainted with your drum roll if you're a studio engineer but as far as a home recording artist, nothing wrong with the good ol' G-Pro.


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## Fred (Aug 31, 2010)

beefshoes said:


> How do you connect your keyboard to Reaper to use DKFH?
> I have a Yamaha with a MIDI input and I have a MIDI/USB cable but I have no clue how to connect it and the Virtual keyboard seems as if it is lagging.



If it only has a MIDI _input_, not going to be much use I'm afraid! You want the MIDI going _out_ from the keyboard, not into it.

And no, of course there's nothing outright wrong with Guitar Pro - like I said, what works for me is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. If it works for you, go for it! I'm sure there's even more to be said for learning how to play the drums and investing in a V-Kit, but much as I'd love to have the time and money to do that I'll stick to my piano roll and MIDI keyboard for the time being, haha.


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## beefshoes (Aug 31, 2010)

Fred said:


> If it only has a MIDI _input_, not going to be much use I'm afraid! You want the MIDI going _out_ from the keyboard, not into it.
> 
> And no, of course there's nothing outright wrong with Guitar Pro - like I said, what works for me is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. If it works for you, go for it! I'm sure there's even more to be said for learning how to play the drums and investing in a V-Kit, but much as I'd love to have the time and money to do that I'll stick to my piano roll and MIDI keyboard for the time being, haha.




No, it has an input and output slot on the back near the power input.
How exactly do I plug the MIDI/USB cable in for it to work?


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## Tritono (Sep 1, 2010)

hey! Thank you very much 

I want to learn the best way to do it. GP is comfortably but is a fact that you lost possibilities. I will buy a midi keyboard when I have money without doubt!. Im experimenting with the Score Editor and the Piano Roll. Im learning the piano roll but is uncomfortable in some aspects. Some sounds are very distant. For example, the default snare sound seems to be compound of two snare sounds and they are distant. I think that the Piano Rolls in any daw are similars, do you have some recommendation about? some tips and tricks ? any opinion is welcome, about everything in this subject.

beefshoes: I cant gelp you because I dont have much experience with midi controllers :\. One option is recommend to you the midi editor in GP because is easy and you can understand the basics concepts, seems that the best way is to get used to a midi controller and piano roll, try to make it work, but if you dont have experience, GP is a good start point


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## Metalus (Sep 1, 2010)

Arent velocities still adjustable regardless of the general midi of guitar pro?


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## Splees (Sep 11, 2010)

seriously i hate programming in pro tools. I usually just go ahead and do most of the drums in logic.


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## Allo1010 (Jul 28, 2013)

Sorry for the necro but... I'm having a problem trying to do what you guys are talking about and I can't seem to fix it.

I'm trying to import some drums I wrote a while back in GP5 onto Pro Tools 10 HD using MIDI under a Superior Drummer 2.0 plug-in track but playback it doesn't play anything.


Initially I thought that perhaps the Midi port messed up so I started using the MIDI editor in Pro Tools to try write in the drum parts but it still doesn't play back anything.

I can go on the Superior Drummer 2.0 construct window and click on the drums and it plays the sound but when I used the MIDI editor or score editor it doesn't play anything.


I made a video showing what I'm talking about, the link is here 
Problems with Pro Tools + Superior Drummer - YouTube


I'd really appreciate any help you guys could give as at the moment everything in my life is just on hold or I can't seem to progress without 10 problems showing up that I can't seem to fix, or I end up having to rely on people that aren't reliable at all and I feel myself slipping into this depressed state and I don't want that to happen. I just want to start working on my E.P. and actually complete something.


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