My Bettie Page video - Using XO, Evolution Series Bronte, Realitone Blue, etc.

[Reid Rosefelt]

Here's my new video.  I was trying to make music out of my comfort zone. 

I've fooled around with XO, but never actually finished any music with it.  Turns out you can't play it into your DAW, you have to output wavs.  The cool thing is that you can output out all the stems.  And because it's XO, I didn't just use Delhia de France's sounds like loops--I was able to put all these noises I've collected into the drum parts.  But definitely XO and de France got this project started.  Once I saw Bettie dancing to her beats, it was a go.

I thought it was worth a shot to try to get Realitone Blue to sing "Beh-tee," and I think it worked out pretty well.  It's hard for me to think of this piece without it.  At the end, I even have two Blues singing harmony.

But the best thing (as with my previous video) is Evolution Series'  Brontë.  This is such a cool VI.  I expect I'll be using it a lot. I think it kicks the ***** of the competition.  So beautiful.

I wondered if I would ever get round to using Boz Digital's El Clapo and Das Boot, but they are in this too.   There's a few bars of Butch Vig at the beginning too.

I did think for a while about making this a  binaural mix, but I decided it was  too complicated for that.  But my experience with binaural led me to make this kind of nutzo spacially.

Edited January 21, 2022 by Reid Rosefelt

[antler]

1 hour ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

I've fooled around with XO, but never actually finished any music with it.  Turns out you can't play it into your DAW, you have to output wavs.

I managed to - my biggest 'problem' with it is that it's limited to 8 sounds per instance. IIRC, there are some MIDI keys somewhere - one for each loaded sound. You can export MIDI (you might need to install an update) from XO to your DAW. You can also sync it to your DAW so that it plays whenever the DAW transport is running. The third option is, as you mentioned, to export wavs.

[Reid Rosefelt]

40 minutes ago, antler said:

I managed to - my biggest 'problem' with it is that it's limited to 8 sounds per instance. IIRC, there are some MIDI keys somewhere - one for each loaded sound. You can export MIDI (you might need to install an update) from XO to your DAW. You can also sync it to your DAW so that it plays whenever the DAW transport is running. The third option is, as you mentioned, to export wavs.

Interesting.  I figured there must be a lot of ways to use XO, but I just settled on exporting wavs so I could get going.  On the export page, you can export MIDI too.

Basically I settled into the method of exporting composite wavs to do my arrangement.  And then when I was done with that, I exported stems  This allowed me to take elements in the stems in and out as the piece developed.  Often what I did was that I heard something I liked in one of the stems, so I redid it myself with another percussion instrument.

So in retrospect, maybe I should have used MIDI stems.  I'll try that next time.  Or a combination of stems and wavs.  It gets VERY complicated when you're using your own sounds and not just the presets.  You have to remember which folders you checked. 

But while I enjoy playing XO live, I think outputting stuff is a better technique for me when I sit down to actually finish a piece. 

 

Edited January 21, 2022 by Reid Rosefelt

[Zo]

3 hours ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

Here's my new video.  I was trying to make music out of my comfort zone. 

I've fooled around with XO, but never actually finished any music with it.  Turns out you can't play it into your DAW, you have to output wavs.  The cool thing is that you can output out all the stems.  And because it's XO, I didn't just use Delhia de France's sounds like loops--I was able to put all these noises I've collected into the drum parts.  But definitely XO and de France got this project started.  Once I saw Bettie dancing to her beats, it was a go.

I thought it was worth a shot to try to get Realitone Blue to sing "Beh-tee," and I think it worked out pretty well.  It's hard for me to think of this piece without it.  At the end, I even have two Blues singing harmony.

But the best thing (as with my previous video) is Evolution Series'  Brontë.  This is such a cool VI.  I expect I'll be using it a lot. I think it kicks the ***** of the competition.  So beautiful.

I wondered if I would ever get round to using Boz Digital's El Clapo and Das Boot, but they are in this too.   There's a few bars of Butch Vig at the beginning too.

I did think for a while about making this a  binaural mix, but I decided it was  too complicated for that.  But my experience with binaural led me to make this kind of nutzo spacially.

Reid , you can play it with your daw (as a sound module) maybe you're talking about the ability ot use the built in sequencer ?

[Reid Rosefelt]

2 hours ago, Zo said:

Reid , you can play it with your daw (as a sound module) maybe you're talking about the ability ot use the built in sequencer ?

 I've been playing with it in my DAW for a long time, but  when I tried to record, nothing happened.   Maybe I was doing something wrong, but for me it was  like Addictive Drums.  You have to generate MIDI patterns and drag them into the tracks.

Anyway, I prefer the control I get from having MIDI patterns and wavs over live play anyway.

[Eusebio Rufian-Zilbermann]

All this talk about the technical details while the video only has 5 likes... c'mon people! listen to the music too, enjoy the nice work in video editing and hit that thumbs up button!

 

 

(to be clear, I do enjoy the technical conversation too. I'm just pointing out that it should go together with an appreciation for the arts...)

[Reid Rosefelt]

8 hours ago, Eusebio Rufian-Zilbermann said:

All this talk about the technical details while the video only has 5 likes... c'mon people! listen to the music too, enjoy the nice work in video editing and hit that thumbs up button!

 

 

(to be clear, I do enjoy the technical conversation too. I'm just pointing out that it should go together with an appreciation for the arts...)

This is a gear-oriented forum, so that makes sense .  And maybe they didn’t like it!  ?  That’s okay.  
I’m just trying to work on musical video projects every day and finish them all.  The important thing is the learning. I try to do a good job but I have no idea what the response will be. 

I don’t know about all of you, but when I buy something, I don’t always make music with it. 

I think one problem I’ll never be able to fix is mastering.   I listened to this on different speakers and headphones.  All sounded decent, although the Beyerdynamic phones made it sound much better. But then I tried earbuds.  Awful and totally unlistenable.  ? And people use them a lot.

I also have to say that Sonarworks is not working for me.  Going from phones to speakers, I find I’m better off without it.

Edited January 22, 2022 by Reid Rosefelt

[Zo]

8 hours ago, Eusebio Rufian-Zilbermann said:

All this talk about the technical details while the video only has 5 likes... c'mon people! listen to the music too, enjoy the nice work in video editing and hit that thumbs up button!

 

 

(to be clear, I do enjoy the technical conversation too. I'm just pointing out that it should go together with an appreciation for the arts...)

You're right , i totally forgot , here we go !!//..

[Zo]

1 hour ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

This is a gear-oriented forum, so that makes sense .  And maybe they didn’t like it!  ?  That’s okay.  
I’m just trying to work on musical video projects every day and finish them all.  The important thing is the learning. I try to do a good job but I have no idea what the response will be. 

I don’t know about all of you, but when I buy something, I don’t always make music with it. 

I think one problem I’ll never be able to fix is mastering.   I listened to this on different speakers and headphones.  All sounded decent, although the Beyerdynamic phones made it sound much better. But then I tried earbuds.  Awful and totally unlistenable.  ? And people use them a lot.

I also have to say that Sonarworks is not working for me.  Going from phones to speakers, I find I’m better off without it.

Reid , good to have another pair of ears for that (feel free to share and we will double check also on or side next time )

And you absolutly can use it on DAW like a regular vsti's and sound module by recording your sequence in daw .

 

I cover some stuff here , can't recall if it was covered but you'll learn a thing or two i guess 

AT 31min 39 you can see i use it wit midi clips in studio one , be sur to stop the playback of sequencing withing Xo 

 

 

Edited January 22, 2022 by Zo

[Zo]

Reid if ya wanna use it in maschine ....

 

 

[Reid Rosefelt]

@Zo   Thanks!   I will get to these soon.

[Zo]

3 hours ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

@Zo   Thanks!   I will get to these soon.

no problem , and thks for sharing , you're reminded me this great tools that i snobed since i got into roland stuff !

[Magic Russ]

On 1/21/2022 at 11:45 AM, Reid Rosefelt said:

I thought it was worth a shot to try to get Realitone Blue to sing "Beh-tee," and I think it worked out pretty well.  It's hard for me to think of this piece without it.  At the end, I even have two Blues singing harmony.

I thought they were saying "Batty" or "That's Me"  But the harmony on the Blues is pretty nice.

Edited January 26, 2022 by Magic Russ

[Christian Jones]

That's really cool Reid, I dug that a lot. Do you find Realtone Blue to often be useful and realistic for you? It definitely sounded like she/it was saying "Bet-tee" to me anyway, aside from my brain already knowing that it's saying that because of the video and you saying so. 

[Reid Rosefelt]

9 hours ago, Christian Jones said:

That's really cool Reid, I dug that a lot. Do you find Realtone Blue to often be useful and realistic for you? It definitely sounded like she/it was saying "Bet-tee" to me anyway, aside from my brain already knowing that it's saying that because of the video and you saying so. 

Thanks, Christian!  

This was the first time I've found a way to use Blue in an actual finished piece. ( I've used Realitone's Ladies.)To be honest, my main use up until this piece was to have Blue sing rude things to amuse me and my wife.  Blue is so off my normal workflow that it was a sudden inspiration that came in late:  "Why don't I see what Realitone Blue" can do for this?"  

She is not designed to sing any lyrics you want like  a Vocaloid or Synthesizer V or Emvoice or anything like that.  She can only make limited sounds.  But Blue can sing "Beh" and Blue can sing "Tee"  Those sounds are on the short list of what she is able to do.  The issue is whether people hear that--some apparently do, some apparently don't.   For me the issue is that she doesn't sound like a  real singer. Close.  As you say, I can get away with it because the video is about a Bettie.    Or is realism an issue?  Some "real singers" are so autotuned nowadays that they sound more machine-like than Blue does.