Download
Share
Print this page
DigiDesign Pro Tools LE & Mbox 2 Getting Started Manual
  1. Manuals
  2. Brands
  3. DigiDesign Manuals
  4. Recording Equipment
  5. Mbox 2
  6. Getting started manual

DigiDesign Pro Tools LE & Mbox 2 Getting Started Manual

Version 8.0
Hide thumbs Also See for Pro Tools LE & Mbox 2:

Advertisement

Quick Links

Download this manual See also: Basic Manual, Getting Started Manual

Getting Started

®
Pro Tools LE & Mbox
2
Version 8.0

Advertisement

loading
Need help?

Need help?

Do you have a question about the Pro Tools LE & Mbox 2 and is the answer not in the manual?

Questions and answers

Subscribe to Our Youtube Channel

Related Manuals for DigiDesign Pro Tools LE & Mbox 2

Summary of Contents for DigiDesign Pro Tools LE & Mbox 2

  • Page 1: Getting Started

    Getting Started ® Pro Tools LE & Mbox Version 8.0...
  • Page 2 Welcome to Pro Tools LE ® Read this guide if you are new to Pro Tools or are just starting out making your own music. Inside, you’ll find quick examples of how to record, compose, mix, and produce your own music in Pro Tools. One quick question: Have you installed Pro Tools yet? If not, follow the Quick Setup instruc- ®...
  • Page 3 Pro Tools Installer disc ® For best performance Digidesign recommends using an external hard drive for Pro Tools recordings. But if you don’t have an external hard drive yet, it’s OK to put the Demo Session on your system drive.
  • Page 4 5 Choose File > Open Session (click the File menu to choose Open Session), then open the file “Filtered Dream” (it’s inside the folder “Filtered Dream Demo Session.”) Toolbar Edit Window Tracks Play and Listen To play the Demo Session: 1 On the front of the Mbox 2, do the following: •...
  • Page 5 2 To start and stop Pro Tools, press the Spacebar, or click the Play and Stop buttons on-screen. (These buttons are located at the top of the Edit window; you can also have them appear in their own Transport window by choosing Window > Transport.) Stop Play Stop Play Stop and Play controls in Edit window (left) and Transport window (right)
  • Page 6 5 Next, click the Window menu and choose Mix (Window > Mix). The Mix window shows tracks in vertical channel strips. Mix window Tracks The Edit window and the Mix window are the two main work areas in Pro Tools. Throughout the rest of this guide, you’ll see examples of both windows being used for different types of production work.
  • Page 7 Bring in a Song from a CD This section lets you see how to create a new Pro Tools session and then import a song from a CD. You can create a new session after you launch or when you first launch Pro Tools. To create a new session: 1 If you already have a session open, choose File >...
  • Page 8 5 After Pro Tools opens the new session, choose Window > Edit so the Edit window is displayed. It will look something like this: Transport window The Edit window, with the Transport window showing in the foreground To import a song from CD: 1 Put the source CD into your computer’s CD/DVD drive.
  • Page 9 4 Click an item (track) to select a song on the CD. Tip: Click the speaker icon to audition a selected song; press he Spacebar to stop. 5 Drag the item from the Workspace to the Track List at the left of the Edit window. Track List Tip: You can drag and drop video, plug-ins, and MIDI, too.
  • Page 10 Make an Audio Edit In this example we’ll show you how to do a simple edit to change where a song starts. To show this, we used a song where the drummer is heard “counting off” the tempo (“1...2...1.2.3...”) before the song starts. Here’s what this song looks like in Pro Tools. countoff song start waveforms...
  • Page 11 Record Yourself This section shows how to connect a microphone and record yourself singing or playing an in- strument. Connect a Mic To hook up a microphone: 1 Plug a mic into the one of the Mic inputs or one of the DI inputs on the back panel: •...
  • Page 12 2 On the front panel, set the Mic/DI switch in or out, depending on your connection: • If you’re using XLR, press the Mic/DI switch (Mic position) until the Mic LED is lit. • If you’re using the DI input, press the Mic/DI switch (DI position) until the DI LED is lit. Mic/DI Source selector Input 1 Source selector and LEDs...
  • Page 13 Create a Track Pro Tools tracks are where audio, MIDI and other elements get recorded and edited within a session. Before you can record, you need to create one or more tracks. To prepare an audio track for recording: 1 In a Pro Tools session, choose Track > New. 2 To record a single mic or instrument (as in our example), set the New Track dialog for 1 Mono Audio Track, in Samples, and click Create.
  • Page 14 4 In the middle of the new track’s channel strip, notice where it says “In 1 (Mono).” This shows which Input channel (Input 1 or Input 2) is assigned to this track. (To specify a different input channel, click the Input Path selector and choose the other channel.) Input Path selector Record a Performance to a Track To record an audio track:...
  • Page 15 4 Sing into your mic, and watch the meter in the Pro Tools track while you raise the Input 1 gain knob on the front of the Mbox 2. Turn it clockwise until you see the on-screen track me- ter show green most of the time, or yellow for your louder passages. •...
  • Page 16 6 Choose Window > Edit so you can watch what happens when you record. 7 When you are ready to start recording, click Play or press the Spacebar. To stop, press the Spacebar or click Stop. Here’s what Pro Tools looks like while it’s recording a track. Recording a vocal track If you want to use a click track/metronome, see the “Using a Click (Metronome)”...
  • Page 17 Hard drives are one of the most important components of your Pro Tools system. For best per- formance, Digidesign recommends using an external hard drive for Pro Tools recording. Also, hard drives cannot be formatted as “FAT32” (this format does not support the kind of performance required for audio recording and editing with Pro Tools).
  • Page 18 To create a track for beats and composition: 1 Choose Track > New. In the New Track dialog, click the pop-up menu that says Mono and choose Stereo, then click the pop-up menu that says Audio Track and choose Instrument Track. Leave the other settings as they are and click Create.
  • Page 19 4 Now let’s load a sound. Click the Librarian menu (<factory default>) and choose a preset from the Loops sub-menu. Presets are pre-configured settings files, and they’re a great way to see examples of what a plug-in can do. Click the Librarian menu to see the list of presets, then choose an item from a sub-menu.
  • Page 20 Make Beats and Compose Without a MIDI Controller You can make beats and compose in Pro Tools using just the mouse. To create a note: 1 Close or move the Xpand! plug-in window, then choose Window > Edit so you can see the Instrument track in the Edit window.
  • Page 21 The small horizontal bar created with each mouse click is a MIDI note. The location and length of each note determines when, and for how long, you’ll hear the sound. Since we’re using a Loop preset in this example, we need to lengthen this note so we can hear the complete loop of the Xpand! preset.
  • Page 22 To compose a beat from scratch: 1 Repeat the previous steps to create a stereo Instrument track and insert Xpand! on it. 2 Instead of choosing a Loop preset, choose something from the Drums sub-menu. 3 Now, pencil some notes in on the new drums track. Here’s what our example session looks like after we added another Xpand! track to the loop track we set up previously.
  • Page 23 4 In the Click plug-in window, click the Librarian menu and pick a sound. You can pick a cow- bell, sidestick, and other common click sounds. Librarian menu Creating a Click Track 5 Select View > Transport > MIDI Controls to view the MIDI controls in the Transport Window. 6 Click the Metronome Click button so it’s highlighted blue.
  • Page 24 Changing the Tempo You can change the session tempo to speed up or slow down your song. To adjust the tempo do the following: Choose View > Rulers > Tempo. See where it says “Tempo” in the Edit window? Click on the plus symbol (+) that appears next to it.
  • Page 25 Using a MIDI Controller/Keyboard to Compose What’s MIDI? MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) data isn’t audio, so it has no sound of its own. MIDI is just a way for musical devices, such as virtual instrument plug-ins, MIDI controllers, and MIDI sequencers, to talk to one another. It helps to have a MIDI controller/keyboard when creating a MIDI recording (or MIDI se- quence).
  • Page 26 8 Click the Record Enable button to enable the Instrument track for MIDI recording. 9 In the Transport window, click Return to Zero to start recording from the beginning of the session. You can also record to a selection in a track or from the cursor location in the Edit win- dow.
  • Page 27 Mix and Change Your Sounds Your Pro Tools LE system comes supplied with a wealth of plug-ins that you can use to change the sounds you’ve recorded. This section shows two examples of how to use plug-ins to pro- cess your sound. (The plug-ins used in this chapter are part of the DigiRack suite of plug-ins) We’re going to show you how to use compression on one track, then we’ll apply reverb to a bunch of tracks.
  • Page 28 3 Press the Spacebar to start playback. 4 In the plug-in window, click the Librarian menu (shown below) and choose an available Set- tings File (preset) from the list. Librarian menu 5 Choose other presets and you can hear what their settings do to your sound. Try out differ- ent plug-ins to start learning about the different colors you have at your disposal.
  • Page 29 2 Click the Send selector on your vocal track as shown below and choose Bus 1-2. Send A Selector 3 Choose Track > New, and set it to create 1 stereo Auxiliary Input track, then click Create. 4 On the new Auxiliary Input track you just added, do the following: •...
  • Page 30 5 Click the Send assignment on your vocal track to open the Send Output window. Send Raise the Send fader 6 Press the Spacebar and slowly raise the small fader in the Send Output window. This adjusts how much of the vocal track you are sending to D-Verb. 7 Keep playing and listening, and check out different D-Verb settings.
  • Page 31 2 In the Mix window, click the Automation Mode selector (auto read) for a track and choose Write. Automation Mode Selector 3 Press the Spacebar and use your mouse to lower the fader level and fade out the song. Let playback continue for a couple extra seconds (after “last sound”), then hit the Spacebar again to stop playback.
  • Page 32 Get Your Music Out to the World After you’ve finished recording and editing tracks in a Pro Tools session you’re ready to mix down. In these last few pages you’ll see how to do this using the Pro Tools Bounce to Disk fea- ture to combine all the tracks that make up a session into a single “master”...
  • Page 33 • Choose 16 for the Resolution and 44100 for the Sample Rate. Digidesign also offers an MP3 Option that lets you bounce directly to MP3 format. Check the DigiStore on our website (www.digidesign.com), or contact your Digidesign dealer if you’d like more information.

  • Page 34: Learn More

    Avid. Product features, specifications, system requirements, and availability are subject to change without notice. Avid, Digidesign, and Pro Tools are registered trademarks of Avid Technology, Inc. in the U.S. or other countries. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

This manual is also suitable for:

Pro tools le