I had a bit of hard time figuring out how to get Logic 7 and Kontakt 3 to work together. It all came down to just setting things up right. This is something I never really had to deal with when I was using Cubase. In Cubase you just select your VSTi and it automatically creates channels in the mixer. No need to worry about how to set route things. If you try to do it the same way in Logic it just doesn’t work out right. You can assign additional instrument channels in Logic to different MIDI channels in Kontakt. The only problem with this is that Kontakt will have only one output in the Logic mixer..
Here’s the way I setup Logic and Kontakt to work together.
Step 1: Select Kontakt in the input section of your instrument channel.
Step 1.5: Let’s stop here and look at how Kontakt deals with audio. There is a built in mixer in Kontakt. You can assign any of the instruments to any of the channels. If you make any changes, you will be prompted to reopen Kontakt so that the changes can take effect. The reason for this is because Kontakt advertises it’s number of outs during instantiation. Therefore it can not change out configuration during use. Also remember that the Kontakt AU (audio unit) plugin only supports up to 16 mono channels (8 Stereo). As you can see I have 8 stereo channels open.
Step 2: Open the environment by selecting Windows>Environment or press command-8.
Step 3: In the box below the tools on the left of the environment (the layer menu) click in it to open a menu and select create. This will create new layer in the environment titled “unnamed”
Step 3.5: Now lets give our new layer a name. I named my layer Kontakt 3 multi.
Step 4: Select New on the menu bar and then from the drop down menu select Multi Instrument.
Step 5: When the new Multi Instrument object appears, all the numbers will have a diagonal line indicating that the MIDI channel is not active. Click on a number to make a channel active. At this point we can also change the name of the Multi Instrument. In the parameter box, click on (Multi Instr.) to change it.
Step 6: While holding alt, click on the right hand side of the Multi Instrument object to select the instrument channel that Kontakt is on. Select Audio>Audio Instrument> choose which instrument channel your plugin is on. In our example it is on Inst 1.
Step 6.5: You will now be presented with a dialog box about the port and channel settings being set. Choose Remove.
Step 7: Next we will setup auxiliary outs, that Kontakt will connect to, in logic. Click New and in the drop down list choose Audio Object at the bottom.
Step 8: In the Audio Object properties, assign the Audio Object’s channel to Auxiliary by clicking on Channel and select Aux and the Aux channel you desire. In our example we assigned it to Aux 1. If you notice in the picture it only shows 3 Aux channels. When you create more, Logic will automatically add more channels.
Step 9: Click on the input button on the Audio Object to assign it to one of Kontakt’s outputs by selecting the the Instrument channel Kontakt is on. In our example it shows Instrument 1. The available channels will always start at 3 because channels 1&2 are already in use by the instrument channel that the plugin is loaded on. As you can see our picture shows stereo channels. To switch the channel type click on the little button below the fader that has a circle or two interlocking circles. 1 circle = mono, 2 interlocking circles = stereo.
Step 9.5: To add more auxiliary channels repeat steps 7 through 9 until you have enough for all your output needs.
Step 10: After setting up you Aux Channels, click on the Icon on the Multi Instrument object.
Step 10.5: Choose Edit and select Copy from the drop down menu.
Step 11: Close the environment. In the arrangement window, create a new track by clicking Track and selecting Create or command-enter or double click on an empty track.
Step 12: After creating a new track select Edit and Paste or command-v to create the midi tracks that you will use for Kontakt.
Step 13: Now check to make sure that the instrument track that the Kontakt plugin is located on has its MIDI Channel set to ALL.
Now you have Kontakt setup as a multi channel instrument that utilizes multiple outs in Logic that can be accessed from logic’s mixer. But what if you want to do automation on the plugins that you have on the auxiliary channel strips?
Step 14: Create a new audio track or convert an existing one to an auxiliary channel by selecting Channel and choosing Aux and the corresponding channel.
If you have any questions or comments don’t hesitate to ask.
I have to give props to Logic-Cafe.com for their Use Multi Channel Audio Instruments as multi timbre synthesizers and Route separate audio channels from Multi Channel Audio Instruments
Hi AMe, when I reopen Logic 8 after creating a sequence, Logic loads the Kontakt 3 file, but I have to open Kontakt 3 and reload the file via Purge in order to hear it. What is the problem?
Regards,
W.G
Comment by Withnold Green — June 20, 2008 @ 4:44 am
I have not encountered that kind of problem yet. I just recently upgraded to logic 8 so I have not experienced many problems. I’m sure that maybe we can find a solution to your problem.
Let’s start this debugging by answering a few questions.
Which version of logic 8 are you using?
Which version of Kontakt 3 are you using.
What kind of samples are you using? Your own samples, or samples from a sample library?
What kind of sequencing are you doing in this project?
I really hope we can solve your problem.
Comment by AMe one — June 20, 2008 @ 3:21 pm
Could you possibly update these instructions for use with Kontakt 3 + Logic 8?
Comment by Symbiotic — August 15, 2008 @ 8:31 am