Automation in Logic

In Logic Express and Pro you can automate almost anything you like. Want the volume of a track to fade in? No problem! Want to control the frequency cutoff of your low pass filter? You got it!

Just enable automation mode: (keyboard shortcut A)

and choose what you would like to automate:

Then with the arrow tool, click to add new automation anchor points and drag them around as you like:

If you want to get all fancy, choose the automation curve tool and change the slope of the automation line:

Access more automatable parameters by going to the Arrange window View menu, and open the Hyper Draw drop down menu.

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Drag Dashboard Widgets onto Your Desktop

Liberate your widgets from the Dashboard--place them on your desktop instead.
One of the most interesting Terminal tips enables you to drag your widgets out of the Dashboard and onto the desktop, where they float above open applications and Finder windows, akin to the Gadgets in Windows Vista’s sidebar. To activate it, type: defaults write com.apple.dashboard devmode YES
You must then log out and log back in, or restart your machine. You can now capture a widget by clicking and holding it, and pressing F12 to dismiss the Dashboard and drop it on your desktop. By capturing a widget that’s on your desktop and pressing F12, you can return it to your Dashboard too. Widgets placed on the desktop function just like they do on the Dashboard.
To disable this feature, repeat the command, replacing YES with NO. Again, you must log out and log in again or restart your Mac for the change to take effect, after which widgets that are already on the desktop can be returned to the Dashboard, but there they must remain.
More Terminal Tips at:
http://www.maclife.com/article/howtos/25_top_os_x_terminal_tips?page=0,2

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"Discovering Reason"

This week is Reason week at the Learning Center, so the blog posts this week will all be offering useful tips, tricks, and resources for beginning through advanced Reason users.

A great place to start learning Reason (other than the Learning Center's Training Sessions!) is Propellerhead's website.  Besides video tutorials ranging from basic to in-depth explanations of each device in Reason, the tutorials section offers a 36 article series entitled  "Discovering Reason."  These articles are great for people with a fairly good understanding of the devices, but who want to amp up their understanding of Reason, and learn new techniques and effects.  

There are tutorials on advanced and creative uses of common devices such as Dr. REX and Redrum, as well as tips on using the less used and understood devices like the Combinator, Matrix, and Spiders.  There are also 16 articles on "Thor Demystified" because who couldn't use some help with that one!

Check out "Discovering Reason" and start exploring the abundant possibilities to make your Reason projects more interesting and unique.

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Finale Formatting- Part 2

The systems in Finale can be rearranged however you choose. For most types of page/music formatting, you will use the Page Layout tool. When selecting the tool, you may notice a lot of "gray boxes" on the page- these are the individual "margins" for each system.


One of the most useful menu items under the Page Layout menu is "Space Systems Evenly..."



In the window that pops up, you can choose to place the maximum number of systems on the page without overlapping system margins. The systems are spaced based on a "top margin" and a "bottom margin" on the page.


You could also force a specified number of systems, and you can specify whether you which pages you want to affect.

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