Logic Pro Tutorial How To Create An Audio Slow-Down Effect

Logic Pro Tutorial How To Create An Audio Slow-Down Effect Suzy S. Want to add a cool slow-down effect to your music? Learn how in this Logic Pro tutorial from Brevard, NC teacher John C If youve listened to popular radio in the past several years, and I’m guessing you have, youve heard either a vocal melody line or an instrumental part of a song make a particular effect. Listen to the following Fall Out Boy song and pay attention to the music in the background at 00:27 seconds, again at 1:27, and once again at 2:27: Did you hear it? Thats the effect I will be teaching you how to do in this article. How to Get the Effect Before we jump in, let’s get a couple things out of the way. First, I want you to understand that this is not the only way you can go about making this effect happen, but Apple has made it easy for us Logic Pro users.  This effect we are trying to accomplish is a type of “fade” in Logic, and there are two different areas in Logic where you can accomplish it.  One way is with Automation. To get to the automation area in Logic Pro 9 or X, simply hit the letter A on your keyboard and the editing area will change to look something like this: Automation allows you to draw lines and basically tell the computer when, how fast, and from and to which points to turn a particular knob. That knob could be something as simple as the volume knob on a particular track or something more advanced like the frequency knob of the single band EQ plugin on the track pictured above. But I’m going to stop there because we are NOT going to use automation to do this effect! Thank goodness, right? Instead, Logic has something called the Region Inspector. So what on earth is a region? Well, it’s quite simple, really. These little boxes all over the place in the picture below… those are regions. When you select one or more of these regions, the Region Inspector shows the settings applied to those regions. The Region Inspector is on the left side of the screen and looks like this: IMPORTANT NOTE There is a distinct difference between some of the regions shown above. The ones with the dashed lines are MIDI regions. The others are audio regions. These are the only types of regions. The effect we are trying to accomplish in this article does NOT work on MIDI regions. Final Steps Select one of the audio (not MIDI) regions in your project. Then, in the Region Inspector, expand the “More” section and click on “Fade Out” and change it to “Slow Down”. Double click the zero and type 250 into the field next to “Slow Down” and press Return. Congratulations, you did it! Now listen to your audio and you’ll hear that audio slow-down effect. Bonus Now adjust the “Curve” by dragging up and down on the number next to the word “Curve” (below the “Slow Down” area in the Region Inspector) and notice how the curve of the slow-down effect area changes. Listen to the difference, and then try different combinations of the amount of the slow-down fade and the curve. Have fun! Oh, and what do you think might happen if you click on the word “Fade In” in the Region Inspector? What’s that you say, a “Speed-Up” effect? Oh yea! You’ve just learned a pro producers trick. Now… use it with caution. John C. teaches Logic Pro Software in Brevard, NC.  He earned his degree in Songwriting from Berklee College Of Music and is also an Apple Certified Master Pro in Logic Pro 9. Learn more about John here! Interested in Private Lessons? Search thousands of teachers for local and live, online lessons. Sign up for convenient, affordable private lessons today! Search for Your Teacher Photo by Miguel Mendez