Hey,
I write metal/hardcore music, and I’ve been using EzDrummer Metal Machine for my drum tracks. I’ve been composing the drums in TuxGuitar (as opposed to guitarpro 6) and then exporting the midi to be triggered through the plug-in, then recording live guitar over it. With each drum hit you need to set the velocity by selecting each note’s piano/fortissimo (ppp, pp, p, mp, mf, f, ff, fff).
I am unsure about exactly how to produce the most natural sound. For basic verse stuff, where it’s supposed to be pretty straight-forward, I’ve been setting the fortissimo to max (‘fff’) on the snare and bass drums, which seems to work best in the mix. I’m wondering about the cymbals though; I’ve been setting them lower (“ff”) but only recently have I been thinking that that makes the velocity sound unnaturally low.
I would like to know, if I set the velocity on the cymbals at the highest (“fff”), is that unnaturally loud, as though the drummer is hammering every cymbal as hard as physically possible? Or is that a reasonable velocity for a cymbal hit in a standard verse/chorus drum track? I know that I can alter the velocity after the fact in the piano-roll but would prefer to write them as-close-to-finished as possible, and then tweak them later.
Also, does anyone else out there write drums this way? Or is there an infinitely better way to write drums than that that I’ve just completely missed?
Thanks
