how to hear effects real time?

[Billy Pettit]

Is it possible to hear the effects on vocals as your singing? If so how do you do it?

[scook]

You will need an audio interface capable of low latency and input echo enabled on the track(s). Input echo is the button to the right of the record button on each track.

 

[Billy Pettit]

ok i have all this. is input echo what makes effect go live?

[Robert Bone]

6 hours ago, Billy Pettit said:

ok i have all this. is input echo what makes effect go live?

Well, for your vocal track, you will need whatever effects you want to use, added to the FX Bin, and/or whatever else you add using the Pro Channel.  Then, when you turn on the Input Echo button for that track, Cakewalk will send the processed vocal track signal, WITH the effects, to whatever track or bus is set for the Output for that track.

There are additional ways of adding effects, such as using an effects send, going to an effects bus you would set up and configure to have effects there - and that is a good approach if you have multiple tracks that essentially are using the same effects - setting those up on a separate effects bus, allows you to route some signal, using effects sends, to be able to have a single instance of those effects (because they are on that single effects bus), for however many tracks you send to that effects bus, and there are lots and lots of videos on YouTube you can watch, to see how to go about doing that.

In the meantime, just make sure you have the desired effects on your vocal track, and click the Input Echo On button, and you should hear your vocals and effects in real time.

Bob Bone

 

[Starship Krupa]

One caution: when doing this, I consider it best practice to go easy on the FX I'm using. Just whatever I or the talent need to hear to get a good performance. Or if I have a rockabilly singer and they need to hear the slapback so they can do the "hug-a-mug-a-huh" thing in the right rhythm or whatever.

If you find that there is a noticeable delay in monitoring, it could be caused by a plug-in. iZotope products are well-known for this. They sound amazing when I use them on mixdown, but I can't use them while I'm tracking because they cause so much latency. The thing to do in that case is only use the FX that you need for the vocal tracking session and disable the rest. Then flip the others back on at mixing time.

[Robert Bone]

@Starship Krupa has a good point - It is important to know that some kinds of effects plugins are made/designed to be used during mixing/mastering, and not during recording.  

Just wait to insert effects like Convolution Reverb, Linear Phase (LP), or any that require a large ASIO Buffer Size to work properly, until you finish recording tracks, and have moved on to mixing/mastering.  (during recording, keep the ASIO Buffer Size of your audio interface fairly small - like 128 samples or less, though too small and you might also induce some audio quality issues, and when mixing/mastering, crank up the ASIO Buffer Size to something like 1024 or even 2048 samples, as that will give enough buffer size for those more 'robust' effects to properly process the audio.  I usually record with my ASIO Buffer Size at 128 samples, and mix at 1024 or 2048 samples.

When considering which effects plugins to use during recording, take a look at the plugin's description, or often the name, to see if the effect says it is designed for mixing/mastering, or says it is a  Convolution Reverb (ising Impulse Responses), or Linear Phase (LP), or uses 'Look-Ahead' processing, then you want to avoid using that one until you begin mixing.

If you want to use a reverb or delay, during recording, there are lots of them available that don't require the large buffer size, and lots of folks use those during recording, and then swap them out for the more robust effects types once they begin mixing.

Bob Bone