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Old 02-28-2017, 07:12 PM   #1
Rico Sergeant
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Default Folders that work like a VCA but still pass audio

This is probably my number one request.

At the moment a folder track fader brings down the audio going through it, but why not have a hybrid folder track that whilst still being able to send the audio through it and add plugins, the actual fader is really just a VCA that controls the tracks within the folder, surly this can't be that hard to do and would make using folders so much easier to use, and would allow us to put our receives outside of the folder and still be able to keep the relative balance when bringing down the folder track fader, which as I say is acting as a VCA.
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Old 02-28-2017, 07:16 PM   #2
Coachz
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It would need to scale to nested folders

Guitars
...AC gtrs
...El gtrs
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Old 02-28-2017, 07:45 PM   #3
Rico Sergeant
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Originally Posted by Coachz View Post
It would need to scale to nested folders

Guitars
...AC gtrs
...El gtrs
Yes your right it's difficult, I will need to think about it some more, it sure would be great if a solution could be found.
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Old 02-28-2017, 08:04 PM   #4
James HE
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One way to achieve this is to disable the master/Parent send of the Folder, and send it pre-fader to some other track (I often make a sub-master track for this type of routing - I would love to be able to send directly to the master pre-fader for this, but...). Then you are free to make the folder track the VCA master - the folder fader is just the VCA at that point.


* for nested folders you simply send pre-fader up the hierarchy. It's only when you need to get to the Master that you need an extra track for this trick.
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Old 03-01-2017, 03:45 AM   #5
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This is a frequent request.

I made a script to deal with this, does work, but there are some necessary musts for it to work properly - you have to have the parent track selected - because of current Reaper API limits.

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=176312
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Old 03-01-2017, 06:29 AM   #6
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Originally Posted by bFooz View Post
This is a frequent request.

I made a script to deal with this, does work, but there are some necessary musts for it to work properly - you have to have the parent track selected - because of current Reaper API limits.

http://forum.cockos.com/showthread.php?t=176312
Thanks bFooz I will check that out, I must say though I think this should be something we don't have to think about on a modern daw, it should just be baked in and need no concern at all, it's such a pain the way it is, This is definitely my number one request.

How do you guys that run big mixes and use folders work? just don't use folder volume at all? Do you run a VCA inside every folder as control? It would be a bit of a slow down making all those VCA's and also clog up the mixer a bit, so how do you experienced guys do it, bear in mind I'm new to Reaper and am still learning, and i have to say other than this annoyance I am totally loving it, I wouldn't want to use anything else at this stage.
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Old 03-01-2017, 06:32 AM   #7
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The biggest problem in my mind is sends. My solution is to just put my fx in each folder. Put a verb fx in they acoustic guitars folder and one in the electric guitars folder and one in the bg vocals and one in the lead vocals etc..... that's the only way I have found to have my fader track controls also control the sends properly.

If I put a saturation plugin on the guitars folder then adjusting guitars fader after FX will have no change on the tone which is what I want. So that's my solution. Lots of folders but lots of duplicated fx and no vcas.
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Old 03-01-2017, 07:17 AM   #8
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Rico Sergeant View Post

How do you guys that run big mixes and use folders work? just don't use folder volume at all? Do you run a VCA inside every folder as control? It would be a bit of a slow down making all those VCA's and also clog up the mixer a bit, so how do you experienced guys do it, bear in mind I'm new to Reaper and am still learning, and i have to say other than this annoyance I am totally loving it, I wouldn't want to use anything else at this stage.

Folder volume is used minimally for me and usually just as a trim of a few dB on the overall level of the group.

For things like vocals, I'm generally sending from the folder track instead of from the children. For something like a drum kit, I'll often have disparate sends from the children - however most of that volume automation will happen at the track level anyway, so again send levels relative to folder levels are not generally anything to worry about. I'll do the setup the folder as a VCA trick sometimes here.

When I do want to have some sort of automation on a folder and do have child sends to worry about, I will setup the routing to achieve the effect that I want. Often I would want the send levels to actually stay the same (for reverb sends as an example). This is a pretty old school approach - as you pull the fader down the sound starts to sound further away since the reverb gets relatively louder. If I'm doing a fade out or something, I actually want separate control of reverb and dry levels.
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Old 03-01-2017, 08:00 AM   #9
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Originally Posted by Coachz View Post
The biggest problem in my mind is sends. My solution is to just put my fx in each folder. Put a verb fx in they acoustic guitars folder and one in the electric guitars folder and one in the bg vocals and one in the lead vocals etc..... that's the only way I have found to have my fader track controls also control the sends properly.

If I put a saturation plugin on the guitars folder then adjusting guitars fader after FX will have no change on the tone which is what I want. So that's my solution. Lots of folders but lots of duplicated fx and no vcas.
This is the conclusion I have come to as well, it's certainly very workable this way, and the great thing about reaper that I found out yesterday is the ability to freeze receive tracks, which means having lots of separate reverbs etc won't be a problem if the CPU use goes up, This is just one of the many things I have found out about in reaper over the last couple of days, I have bruises all over me where I keep falling of my chair I can' tell you how much I am loving this daw, how did I not know before? People need to understand what reaper can do and I'm sure most would feel the same way I do, I am even really liking the look of the default theme.
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Old 03-01-2017, 08:04 AM   #10
Rico Sergeant
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Originally Posted by James HE View Post
One way to achieve this is to disable the master/Parent send of the Folder, and send it pre-fader to some other track (I often make a sub-master track for this type of routing - I would love to be able to send directly to the master pre-fader for this, but...). Then you are free to make the folder track the VCA master - the folder fader is just the VCA at that point.


* for nested folders you simply send pre-fader up the hierarchy. It's only when you need to get to the Master that you need an extra track for this trick.
Thanks James HE I will check this method out, Reaper really is very customisable it's amazing.
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Old 03-01-2017, 08:46 AM   #11
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I either put a send track inside the folder or I put a faderles track layout on a parent. I actually don't use that script of mine, since it has limitations.
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Old 11-22-2017, 12:16 AM   #12
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Mods, could you join this other thread here:

https://forum.cockos.com/showthread....ght=folder+vca
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Old 03-28-2018, 10:01 AM   #13
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Originally Posted by Rico Sergeant View Post
This is the conclusion I have come to as well, it's certainly very workable this way, and the great thing about reaper that I found out yesterday is the ability to freeze receive tracks, which means having lots of separate reverbs etc won't be a problem if the CPU use goes up, This is just one of the many things I have found out about in reaper over the last couple of days, I have bruises all over me where I keep falling of my chair I can' tell you how much I am loving this daw, how did I not know before? People need to understand what reaper can do and I'm sure most would feel the same way I do, I am even really liking the look of the default theme.
lol im going through this same enlightement now haha. viva la revolution de reaper
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Old 03-29-2018, 03:10 AM   #14
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My solution was to stop using folders faders. I now have 9 color-coded Master VCA tracks as default and toolbar buttons for each color to create new tracks and automatically set them up as VCA slaves of the corresponding color. Works great.

I even made a folder panel layout with all the controls removed so it's obvious that folder tracks are purely for organization.
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Old 11-30-2019, 09:52 AM   #15
rick
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Originally Posted by foxAsteria View Post
I even made a folder panel layout with all the controls removed so it's obvious that folder tracks are purely for organization.
okayyyy.... A folder panel layout with no controls--
How did you do that?

So they have no function other than visual organisation? And they don't get weird when you try to make them into a subproject?

Do your VCA Masters receive any audio or are they just VCA? So you'd go ahead and buss your stems 'normally' (?)

R
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Old 11-30-2019, 08:39 PM   #16
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I even made a folder panel layout with all the controls removed so it's obvious that folder tracks are purely for organization.
Please advise how you made folders without controls. Thank you
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Old 12-01-2019, 02:51 AM   #17
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Originally Posted by lokey View Post
Please advise how you made folders without controls. Thank you
You need to dive into theme files.

1) in Reaper, run "Show Reaper resource path"
2) in the subfolder "/ColorThemes" find a theme you want to tweak
3) unzip the theme file with a regular unzipper. You will have a folder and a ".ReaperTheme" file. You will probably need to rename both to the same name
4) in the new folder, open "rtconfig.txt"
5) find the layout you want to tweak or create a new one
6) delete stuff

If you want to see the change in Reaper, you need to reload the theme by "Switch to next color theme" followed by "Switch to previous color theme".

There may be some caveats along the way, it was a long time since I did this.
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Old 12-01-2019, 12:58 PM   #18
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Quote:
Originally Posted by rick View Post
okayyyy.... A folder panel layout with no controls--
How did you do that?

So they have no function other than visual organisation? And they don't get weird when you try to make them into a subproject?

Do your VCA Masters receive any audio or are they just VCA? So you'd go ahead and buss your stems 'normally' (?)

R
I don't know what you mean about subprojects (don't really use them). VCA tracks do not ever do anything to the audio, but I guess they would get weird if you also used them as folder tracks or made sends to them. "Normally?" What's that? Just don't change the volume of the parent or put fx on it and it can't affect the child audio.

I work like this:
Post fader sends for project fx like reverb/delay receiving all tracks (except other sends, usually).
Pre-fader group busses for instrument "glue" groups (selected tracks only).
VCA for controlling all same instrument track volume in the project.
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Old 12-03-2019, 08:34 AM   #19
Buy One
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Quote:
Originally Posted by bFooz View Post

If you want to see the change in Reaper, you need to reload the theme by "Switch to next color theme" followed by "Switch to previous color theme".
there's a very handy Lokasenna's script "Refresh current theme"

Quote:
Originally Posted by lokey View Post
Please advise how you made folders without controls. Thank you
Just recently was tinkering with this, here's the code

Quote:
Layout "Blank folder"
clear tcp.*
set tcp.size [400 100 80 .]
set tcp.foldercomp [382 0 18 19 1 0 1 0]
set tcp.folder h<32 [0] [382 86 18 14 1 1 1 1]
EndLayout
to force folder button remain visible in fully collapsed state remove condition h<32 [0], might want to also comment out tcp.foldercomp function (to hide button which cycles through children collapse levels) so it looks prettier

Last edited by Buy One; 12-03-2019 at 09:42 AM.
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