eMotion LV1 Tutorial 4.8: Mixer Window – Rack Mode

Mar 01, 2017 | 3,491 Views

Learn how to add, remove, bypass, deactivate and copy plugins, and external inserts in the Rack mode of the eMotion LV1 live mixing console.

The Rack mode displays the plugins rack for each channel in a Mixer Layer. A rack holds a channel’s plugins and external inserts—up to eight in total. Each rack represents the channel’s plugin rack in the Channel window.

This video will show you how to add, remove, bypass, and deactivate plugins and external inserts with the Rack mode plugin menu. You’ll also see how to move and copy a plugin.

To add a plugin to a rack, click on an empty slot or click and hold or right-click on a slot that already has a plugin. This opens the Plugin drop-down menu. Open the Plugin List sub-menu and choose a plugin. External inserts are added in the same manner. Use the drop-down menu at the bottom of the Plugin menu to select an insert.

Once you’ve done that, the plugin name appears and the slot turns blue. Click on a rack slot to open that plugin’s control pane. This is the full view of the plugin.

To get back to where you were, click on the Mixer tab in the Top Bar.

The Plugin menu is also used to manage presets, copy parameters between plugins, and monitor channel latency. We cover this menu thoroughly in the lessons about the Channel window, but for now here’s a description of some commonly-used menu items in the plugin menu.

Bypass, bypasses the plugin while keeping it in the processing chain. A bypassed rack slot is white. The shortcut for bypassing a plugin is Ctrl+Alt + Click.

Disable Plugin removes the plugin from the processing chain without deleting it from the rack. This may reduce rack latency and lower CPU load. When a plugin is disabled, its rack slot becomes grey. When you re-enable the plugin, its parameter settings are unchanged.

Ctrl+Click is the shortcut for disabling or re-enabling a plugin.

Remove Plugin deletes the plugin from the slot. All parameter settings and control assignments are lost. You can also remove a plugin from a rack by dragging it off the left side of the window.

You can insert, remove, bypass, or disable an entire row of plugins by holding ALT while selecting the menu item. This action affects all channels of the same type.

So, if for example, you’re running a 64-channel-session and you choose to globally bypass the plugins in rack slot 1, then the plugins in rack slot 1 of all 64 channels will be bypassed. Not just the visible channels.

Other layers will not be affected.

The on-screen keyboard provides latching ALT and Ctrl modifier keys when you’re on a touch-screen display, and you don’t want to use an external keyboard.

Latency shows the delay introduced by the plugin or external insert.

Rack Latency shows the total latency of all plugins and inserts in the rack. If no latency is declared by any of the plugins in the rack, then both sections will greyed-out.

Latency Compensation On/Off removes the plugin from plugin/buss latency compensation calculations. The plugin remains active, but its latency is no longer reported to the delay compensation engine. This prevents a plugin with a particularly long latency from delaying the entire buss. However, it does not change the plugin’s own latency.

Drag a plugin or external insert to change its position within its rack or move it to another channel’s rack. Select ALT and drag to copy the plugin to a new location. All plugin parameters are moved or copied with the plugin.

An inserted plugin will be mono or stereo, depending on the status of the channel—mono channel, mono rack.

A mono-to-stereo plugin changes the rack status. When inserting a mono-to-stereo plugin in a mono rack, all plugins later in the rack will be stereo. The earlier plugins will still be mono, but the channel itself is now stereo.

When moving plugins between racks, the target rack determines whether the plugin will be mono or stereo.

Move or copy a mono plugin to a stereo channel and plugin’s stereo component will be inserted. Move a stereo plugin to a mono rack, and it becomes stereo.

Adding, removing, disabling, or moving a plugin may result in a short audio drop. Wait for a suitable moment to do these actions.

You can lock the plugin’s rack to avoid accidently changing the framework.

You can bypass a plugin or change its parameters at any time.

The Rack mode gives you access to all of the plugins of a layer, without leaving the Mixer window. You can add, remove, and manage plugins with the plugin drop-down menu.

We covered only a few of the items in this menu. To learn more, watch the videos about the Channel window, where plugins are discussed in detail.

In the next tutorial, we dive into the mixer aux modes.

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