Template Designing

[SaveMidnight]

So I've been at this for a while now, enough to have a firm grasp on my workflow. I'm going to design a template so I don't have to set up stuff every time I make a track.
I've been thinking about this for awhile and I saw that some people actually sell them. Rather than pay someone else I figure I'd just make it myself.
So here's what I'm thinking.
(P.S. -> This is for Ableton)

5 MIDI Tracks
(1 for Drums, 1 for Bass, 1 for a Lead Patch, 1 for Pad/ALT Lead/ALT Bass, 1 Sidechain)

8 Audio Tracks
(1 for Lows, 1 for Mids, 1 for Highs, 1 for VOX, 4 for Resampling)

3 Return Tracks
(1 for Reverb, 1 for Compression, 1 for Delay)

Limiter and Spectrum on the Master (Personal Preference)

How does this sound? I'm asking because this is all I'd use, but I'm not sure if I've done it right. I figure there must be something in those templates that is worth what they are charging. (I think one of them was like $100 for a template )

[NinjaEdit]

Try it and find out? You can always update it.

Try setting the tempo (140 or whatever).

Are you putting plugins on the channels? Like Massive, a sampler etc, set to a patch.

You can group tracks for compression, rather than using a send. Try a distortion send?

Set up a beat?

Take the limiter off the master.

[mthrfnk]

I tried this before in FL, I had around 40 mixer channels setup for all my instruments & drums that I typically use, then I pre-routed everything to busses.

I also laid out some common plugins on each mixer channel and set them up accordingly for the respective instruments. In addition I had a couple of mixer tracks with dummy drums playing to trigger sidechaining on other channels if needed.

At first I did think it was good, because say I chucked in a free piano vst, instead of faffing around to get it to sound nice I just quickly route it to my premade piano mixer channel and bam it sounded okay. The thing is I think it stifled me slightly because I became a little lazy, due to the fact that for a lot of background stuff (pads, pianos, strings, choirs, sweeps etc) I'd just use the same standard mixer states and routing for the sake of being quicker.

In the end I've actually reverted back to creating everything from scratch and ignoring any templating - although I do think it's a good idea and might try it again, but not set as much stuff up, perhaps just routings and busses.

Aside from this I do save a lot of mixer states in FL, so I can just load these up if needed to save time which is an alternative I suppose.

[Triphosphate]

http://qikr.co/files/pics/m/mytemplate57281.png

Here's how I set up mine in FL. I wanted to make my workflow faster without painting myself into a corner. So I set up my template so that all the routing is done, and all those instruments in the pattern window are all just empty sample slots to act as placeholders for my mixer inserts. There are no VSTs loaded, only FPC (FL Studio's Drum Rack) with some generic placeholder drums. All of my busses are the red slots to the left. And the 4 tracks to the right are 2 reverb sends with FL's standard Reverb 2, and a convolution reverb, and 2 delays, one short subtle one and one long feedback one for spot delay. All of my busses already have my bus compressor of choice.

It's very slimmed down, and doesn't make me feel restricted to using the same stuff on every song, but still saves me a lot of time per project, and more importantly, I don't have to stop the creative flow to do some menial routing task.

[mthrfnk]

I think I might set something like that up again and forget about the VSTs.

Also I like how you gave everything an icon haha.

[sunny_b_uk]

http://qikr.co/files/pics/m/mytemplate57281.png

Here's how I set up mine in FL. I wanted to make my workflow faster without painting myself into a corner. So I set up my template so that all the routing is done, and all those instruments in the pattern window are all just empty sample slots to act as placeholders for my mixer inserts. There are no VSTs loaded, only FPC (FL Studio's Drum Rack) with some generic placeholder drums. All of my busses are the red slots to the left. And the 4 tracks to the right are 2 reverb sends with FL's standard Reverb 2, and a convolution reverb, and 2 delays, one short subtle one and one long feedback one for spot delay. All of my busses already have my bus compressor of choice.

It's very slimmed down, and doesn't make me feel restricted to using the same stuff on every song, but still saves me a lot of time per project, and more importantly, I don't have to stop the creative flow to do some menial routing task.

thats a nice template, i don't really use templates anymore but maybe i should get back into it. also i do the exact same thing on my sends for all projects.

[Triphosphate]

I think I might set something like that up again and forget about the VSTs.

Also I like how you gave everything an icon haha.

Haha, picking the icons was almost the most time consuming part of making it!

thats a nice template, i don't really use templates anymore but maybe i should get back into it. also i do the exact same thing on my sends for all projects.

Thanks! I really think templates are worth using to keep the right brain out of the way. I almost forgot to mention, the kick and snare mixer channel on the far left of the drums section receives signal from (you guessed it) the kick and snare but doesn't output to the master, I use it only to sidechain things. Also, the "selected" mixer channel, which I applaud Imageline for implementing, has wavecandy meter stretched real tall for accurate levels analysis (and it stays on top of everything! So handy!) and a FL Parametric EQ2 with a flat curve just to analyze frequency content.

If you guys want it, I'd be happy to upload it somewhere for you FL users.

[mthrfnk]

I actually love the WaveCandy tool, the way you can stretch and shape it for each different mode is quite cool.

[ehbes]

Drum buss with 14 audio tracks

Pads/bass buss 7 audio; 7 midi

Rain/vinyl crackle buss 2 audio 1 midi

Vox buss 1 audio 1 midi

[fv2k]

http://i49.tinypic.com/mmxzqd.png

Here's mine

There's a bunch of groups so that I can collapse things, groups are routed to buses in case I wanna throw in a dummy clip

[arktrix45hz]

never thought of grouping my busses. Any advantages/disadvantages?

[fv2k]

I just do it for organizational purposes, like being able to collapse pretty much everything :p

[twilitez]

Tried it for a while but stopped. For me there is just no set in stone way to route things. Especially using dedicated verb or delay channels for certain sounds my priorities and combinations shift all the time so its just not practical really. The only thing that could stay in any template is possibly some bass splitting channels but otherwise no.