Newby question - sorry - Velocity/volume confusion - my head

Well, for MIDI regions, Velocity and Volume are the same thing. However, you have correctly identified that you can't use cross-fade on MIDI regions.

However, the easiest way of doing this is to get into Automation - a very powerful tool and one that's worth looking at quite early on in your exploration of Logic.

View > Track Automation
You'll see the current volume as a grey line marked 0dB
Select the pencil tool using Escape-2
Draw your drop in automated volume from the current volume line

Just to help you understand what's going on here, when you draw automation lines in, you are affecting the track as a whole - in this case drawing the path that the fader will take. As you play the song, you'll see the fader move.

That's all - nothing to it!

Pete

PS: even if you're not much of a reader of manuals, the Logic Getting Started book is excellent and should have you going WOW! from time to time. If you haven't had much of a chance to explore the world of non-linear editing, it's quite an eye-opener.

Velocity is how you are going to change the volume of MIDI more or less. It refers to the "strike force" of a note and is what gives it the dynamics.

Most of what you've asked to do refers to audio. So why not make it be audio when you're happy with the performance?

That is to say:

1) Play or enter the performance you want as MIDI. This can be done with any number of MIDI instruments, or you can write it in in the +piano roll+ section, or you can use Logic's notation interface. For that matter you can use Finale or Sibelius' interface for notation, exports as MIDI.

2) At that point you'll fine tune the performance to your liking using velocity. You can also at this moment adjust the length and pitch of the performance in the +piano roll+ editor. At his point you can also quantize, which imposes an adjustable grid for timing to your performance. This is good if you were a little off in you performance, among other things.

3) So at this point you've got the MIDI part down, and it's time to make it be audio. You send the MIDI track's output as something like "bus 1" and create an audio track which will accept "bus 1" as the input. Keep the audio track's output to "Output 1-2" so you can hear it.

4) Record the track, you are recording the MIDI performance as audio. Sometimes I like to record it as several tracks of audio, so I can have options later of mixing it together.

5) Audio is the easiest way to crossfade and do fadeouts, for me, anyway. Now that it's audio, do your automation and mixing, etc.

I should mention that this is a method I use, others will be telling you how they work. It's all good. And listen to them- I'm no genius with Logic myself, I've only been using it for about 2 months.

Anyway, I hope this was of some help, and Merry Christmas.

Velocity and volume are NOT the same. In many patches velocity will effect not only volume, but timbre and envelopes (pitch and loudness) as well.

Hi DSS - thanks for the opportunity to debate the topic.

I stand by what I said, though I always welcome debate so do fire away...

For a MIDI region, the only way to change the volume is to change the velocity. For tracks (and that of course means a channel), we can change the fader (directly or through automation) and do a bunch of other dynamics related processing via inserts/sends. The only region based automation is MIDI, which changes velocity so that, effectively, velocity and volume are inseparable within a MIDI region.

As for whether velocity changes tone, of course it does and that's the case for all well constructed instruments. Good EXS24 instruments will crossfade between samples for different velocities, filters will be shaped based on velocity and duration and envelope will change as well.

Within the context of a self-confessed newcomer to Logic, I thought it best not to complicate matters. If I over-simplified, apologies to the OP. It's safer to assume that you cannot change volume alone unless you done through a fader or an insert

Pete

For a MIDI region, the only way to change the volume is to change the velocity.

Nah, enable hyperdraw on controller 7, and edit the MIDI volume of that channel in a similar way to automation...

The only region based automation is MIDI, which changes velocity so that, effectively,
velocity and volume are inseparable within a MIDI region.

Velocity and volume are two different concepts, which in some circumstances can behave similarly, but not always. If you have a synth patch where velocity is routed to, say, opening the filter, then the velocity will have no bearing on the volume of those notes at all.

Velocity should be used for note dynamics, and then if you need to control the volume of that part, use controller 7 (or in some cases, controller 11). There are lots of ways to control and edit controllers on a per region basis.

You can also I think set the automation mode to "MIDI" and use track automation to send MIDI volume, but I haven't used that for a while so can't remember whether that works or not...

Fader automation would be the best way to control volume.

As far as velocity and volume are concerned, volume will only follow velocity changes if volume is mapped to velocity in a given patch. For example, if you bring up the *Basic Synth Det* patch in EXS24, playing a note with a velocity value of 127 will not be much louder than playing at note with a velocity value of 12, because the volume is not programmed to vary according to velocity.

Given another example, if you bring up the *Reso King MW* patch in EXS24, changing the velocity value will provide little change in volume, but a big change in the filter mapped to the velocity.

One can tweak these patches to tie the volume to velocity, but one can't say that velocity and volume are the same.

The biggest difference between MIDI velocity and MIDI volume is that velocity is triggered at the start of a MIDI note, whereas the volume controller values can be raised or lowered before, during and after a key is struck. You might say volume is "continuous" MIDI data and does not even rely on a single note being struck (which makes for very uninteresting music, but I digress). This is the fundamental reason why you can't have a "volume value" for a given note--the volume is not dependent on the note, because it's continuous.

Given a real-world scenario, consider the difference between a drum patch and a string patch. With a drum patch, it makes sense (in arguably most cases) to map the volume level to velocity, so that the harder you strike the key, the louder the sound is. In the case of a string patch, you may want to control the volume levels over time, for example, holding a chord, fading out a bit, then in, then back out again. Well, because the the volume changes over time, you can't assign a single value to the "note-on" as you would velocity. You need to draw the volume swells over time (or use a controller to control the volume levels).

That said, if you look at your piano roll editor, click on View->Hyper Draw, you can see the various MIDI parameters you can control, including Volume and Note Velocity. Now that I think of it, you should check this out anyway because you can see the difference between drawing velocity changes and drawing volume changes. Velocity is based on the attack of each note so each note has its associated velocity value (a dot with a little line extending from it), whereas volume is a continuous line that extends from left to right.

To close this long-winded speech, if you want to control volume, do so with automation. If you want to control volume as you would velocity (i.e. by notes), (re-)program your patch so that volume changes with velocity.

Andrew Tokuda wrote:
Fader automation would be the best way to control volume.

By that, I mean either track or region-based automation.

Velocity and volume are most certainly not the same thing. Velocity can control anything that doesn't require continuous control; it's something that only gets controlled at the onset of a MIDI event, or if off velocities are employed, something can be controlled at the instant of note off. For this reason, it cannot effectively be used to create something like a fade or decrescendo. You can assign velocity to control the amplitude of each note and in this way have a succession of notes be gradually lower or louder.

However no amount of velocity control in the world can make a sustained note or chord grow softer or louder.

Velocity can be used to control LFO speed, pitch, envelope depth, the introduction or subtraction of oscillators or samples. A single key can be played repeatedly and depending on the velocity it will sound an entirely different pitch every time you strike the key. Or similarly, a different spoken word with each key strike, depending on the velocity.

While it's true that velocity can be used to control the volume of the onset of a single note, to say that "velocity and volume is the same thing" is altogether incorrect and quite misleading.

I don't know if anyone has suggested using controller 11 or "expression," but it's a useful way to make volume changes to MIDI regions. (Of course it can be routed to control other things as well.) It can be used with any continuous controller such as a pedal, slider, or modwheel. It can also be drawn graphically directly onto the midi region, in the hyperdraw area. I especially like it because it functions independently of the volume control used by mix faders and automation. I typically use it with a pedal to play dynamically, so that a part can have small and constantly changing musical dynamics that pertain to the performance, as opposed to the broader volume moves that pertain to the mix.

Expression can function like automation, but with actual automation in use, the expression moves would be contained within the automation moves. So, for instance, your tune is fading down while maybe your violins are swelling. Very important to have - and distinguish - these two different kinds of dynamic control.

I'd never use mix automation to introduce swells into an organ part, or the small crescendos and decrescendos that form the basis of each note or phrase of a woodwind performance, mostly because I need to hear these in real time during the performance. And while it's possible, I wouldn't generally use my expression pedal to create the fade on the end of a song.

You can simply click on a note and knock it down in volume, particularly when the patch or sample is programmed with velocity controlling amplitude, as is often the case. However in this manner you cannot knock down the volume of a sustained portion of a note.

Wow, this has gotten complicated...

Velocity reflects how hard or soft you play an individual note. Period. How a sound responds to velocity depends on how it's programmed. In the most simple case, velocity varies the level (volume, loudness) of each individual note you play. But many times a sound is programmed so that the level of the note and that note's brightness is affected by velocity. And some sounds don't respond to velocity at all.

Let's say you're playing an synth bass sound that responds to velocity --- play soft and you get a muffled sound, play hard and you get a very bright and buzzy sound. OK... Now you've recorded a part with this sound and overall it's kickin' @ss. But it's way too loud in the mix!!! What do you do?

Well, your first thought should be "turn the volume down" by lowering the fader on the channel strip. Your first thought should NOT be "adjust the velocity". Why? Because, per this example, velocity is controlling the brightness of each note. So if one of the notes is too bright, lower the velocity on that note. If the overall part is too loud (or if you want to fade out a long sustained note, to extrapolate on what Charlie said above), adjust the level via the fader.

You can remote-control the fader (overall level of the track) by using volume automation to move the fader for you. You can also remote-control the fader via MIDI. The faders on each channel strip respond to MIDI controller #7. They will not respond to MIDI controller #11. (Some synths will respond to CC#11 just as Charlie said, but not all).

MIDI Volume/Fader Level/Fader Automation = *controls overall level of the track*
Velocity = *controls the level (and sometimes brightness) of each individual note*

if there is really no way to automate the velocity of a midi note over time, is there a way for one to change the timbre of a sustained note (i.e. string) over time, in logic itself?

i know i can possibly set it in the sampler's envelope portion, but that doesn't give me much flexibility if i need different automations for different held notes.

if there is really no way to automate the velocity of a midi note over time, is there
a way for one to change the timbre of a sustained note (i.e. string) over time, in logic itself?

Yes - as posted above several times in detail, use MIDI controller 7 (or 11 if your device supports it) to control volume swells and rises during a note duration.

If you want to change other instument parameters during a note duration other than the standard MIDI defined stuff like volume/pan etc, then you can use any alternative MIDI controller and map it to the parameter you want to control in your instrument - or use Logic's automation to control any of the instrument's parameters...

Velocity is a static value. Once you play a note, it's velocity can't be changed over the duration of that note. The only way to achieve a change in velocity is to re-strike the note.

However... if you want to change the timbre of a sustained notes, you can do any number of things... Using cutoff frequency of the instrument's filter as a primary way of altering timbre, use an envelope generator to modulate cutoff and dial in a envelope shape that will produce a timbral change over time; automate movements of the cutoff (automation); assign modwheel (or other MIDI CC#) to cutoff and ride it in real time (MIDI 'automation', or hyperdraw), etc.

But if you want individual notes to respond differently to cutoff modulations, you may have to consider having multiple instances of that instrument assigned to separate tracks, and then assign specific notes to those tracks. You'll then have to program (or automate) the cutoff 'shape' for each track separately.

Having said that, there are other tricks you can do to get this same kind of effect using a single instrument. Example: you have a zero-attack, 2-second decay envelope modulating cutoff. Your first note happens on the downbeat, your second note on the next beat. They overlap. You want the 2-second decay for the first note but the second note wants the 4-second decay. Here's the deal... Once an EG starts its decay stage, its time can no longer be modulated -- a behavior that can be used to your advantage in this case. So if you were to set up a MIDI controller (modwheel, etc.) to modulate (increase) decay time, you can bang the modwheel up after your first note plays. The second note will have the longer decay.

You can also achieve this effect by automating the decay time after the first note plays (be sure to have plugin automation switched on).

Message was edited by: iSchwartz