Realistic drum set? Am I missing something?

Yes, the best thing is to download or buy new drum kits. You can either get them in the form of a sample library to be played by the EXS24 sampler in Logic, or get a complete instrument such as FXpansion's BFD.

There are a lot of different libraries available - I'm not going to suggest any for you because everybody's tastes and preferences are different, but I personally like stuff like Drumkit from ****, Wizoo Platinum drums, the Spectrasonics stuff (Backbeat, Retrofunk).

However, I do recommend you look on the net to see what's available for free - some kits, like the NS Kit and the GCSW kits are very good indeed - a search you turn those up. They are way better than the small stock library of drum machine-ey type sounds that come with Logic.

You can also take a look at Apple's Jampacks as well, which are reported to be pretty good, though I don't have personal experience of them.

I'm definitely going to agree with BeeJay to a point... Logic's drums are not stellar (they're okay, but that's as far as I go), and forget Ultrabeat if you want a little bit a "realism". However, if all you have to work with right now are Logic's kits (and perhaps the Rhythm Section JamPack), go into the EXS and separate the important groups (kick, snare, toms and hi-hats) into their own aux channels and save the the instrument as a multichannel instrument. Work with the separate aux channels by adding in a bit of EQ and/or compression (or do the New York style mix). As well, send the unprocessed signals to a bus containing a drum room reverb and mix them together.

Another thing you may want to consider is the fact in order to sound like a human, don't play it like a robot. Quantize certain parts, but not every part (and it doesn't have to be at 100% - use lower strengths to bring out a bit of humanness). If you don't have one, get a pad input, such as M-Audio's Trigger Finger. Note the a lot of the kits in the EXS and JamPacks have a few articulations for drums that you need to make use of, such as flams, drags and rimshots to do various beats. Listen to various rhythms and fills and watch how drummers do it (plenty of videos on http://www.drummerworld.com). And, when you make a beat, play the beat.

Back to samples: if you find that Logic's kits still aren't cutting it for you, definitely go for something like BFD, DKFH or whatever. I fell in love with BFD and highly recommend it. As to whether it sounds like a drummer for you will depend on how you play it. For me, it definitely sounds like a drummer. :-D

jord

Hey Jack, if you want some beefy realistic sounding drums and don't mind spending an extra 5 to 700 bucks... I would recommend picking up Reason and purchase the Drums Refill. The sky is the limit with this stuff!! You can even rewire each sequencer drum track into Logic as if it was like a real session. So if you really wanted to you could have your close mic'd drums on separate tracks and you overheads and room sounds on separate tracks as well. Of course this is already done in Reason to begin with.

-Muziq3

He's on a MacBook pro, don't think reason is Uni Bin yet, is it?

Yes.

I have 3 of the jam packs, and the Rhythm Jam Pack specifically is great for the money (as are they all, but this is real-drum related).

If you want a preview, go to my website and click on "smoke."

X

anything at all by Toontracks, i use the drum product on most projects. sorta like "the house drummer" for h*ll.

you could also be missing a "realistic" drummer.

Hi jack

I agree with David, the Toontrack stuff is great. I just got EZDrummer and I like it a lot. I just finished recording some new demo songs for my live band and used EZD on some of them. it is inexpensive and real easy to use, hence the name, and it sounds real good. If you want to hear what it sounds like check out my web site MP3 page http://www.pspartyband.com/MP3.html some of the clips are EZD and others are either live drums or sampled loops, see if you can tell which.

You can also try layering 2 different drum sets on two separate tracks with EXS24. It helps to add more punch to the kick and snares. Also panning the drum kits helps. Last but not least, you have to also think like a drummer. Hi hats should be accented and use different velocity. Maybe accent the up beats and add cool fills etc... A touch of reverb and compression definetly helps too. Check out www.myspace.com/nealnagaoka, I have a few songs uploaded there and they are all sequenced drums. Let me know what you think.

Here are some natural sounding EXS24 drum kits from Germany:
http://www.echochamber.ch/exs24/exs242.html
Scroll down to "Drumsets" and try the 3 kits there.
Drumset1, Drumdry, and Drumroommiks.
Pretty basic, but with Logic's plug-ins you can get some big sounds.
As you find samples you like, try building your own Kit using the EXS24 instrument editor (Chapter 29 in the "Logic Pro 7 Plug-In Reference" manual).

But...

Don't give up on Ultrabeat. Dig in to editing the sounds in the Ultrabeat interface and you'll soon be making your own
percussion instruments.

Well, you could always but a real drumset like this one!
You'll need a few mics...
/Users/ahalatyn/Desktop/images.jpg

the stereo drums in the factory sounds aren't that bad actually. i am using them to mockup a drum track for a recording but honestly i am not that far off it in most places anyway.

here's the trick though:

put a space desginer on it mixed approx 50% wet/dry. use 'wooden room' from 'studios'. put that in your mix and tell me that doesn't sound half bad.

but if you want a real live feel with all the little fills and shaping a live drummer can give, you simply have to use recordings of real players - either record them or buy loops.