Found some plug in presets for Apple’s Logic Pro? This tutorial walks you through the different types of presets for effects there are in Logic Pro, and how to use them as well. This blog post will also cover how to back up all your plug in presets, which isn’t in the YouTube tutorial. Backing up your settings and patches are useful for a number of reasons. One case being, moving to another computer, or another case being should there be a desire to share them. And of course, visit the How To Get That DR. Dre West Coast Whistle Sound tutorial where the presets used in the tutorial were found.
After grabbing the presets used for the demonstration, the tutorial then moves to a discussion of the different presets formats found in Logic Pro; which are .pst, .cst, And .patch. The .pst file is a preset for an individual plug-in. Similar to the .aupreset format for a 3rd party plug-in. These are the presets that show up in the “Manual”, or “Factory Default” pop up buttons inside a plug-in in Logic. The .cst file is a channel strip setting and a .patch is include the settings for multiple plug-ins. The difference being that the .cst file only includes the stuff on the individual channel strip, where as a .patch can include the entire chain including any buses that channel strip is routed to. The .patch also resides in the library, where as the channel strip settings can be accessed from the settings pop up button at the start of each channel strip in the mixer or inspector.
The tutorial then proceeds to a discussion on where to put the files so you can use them in logic. Presets for stock logic plug-ins, Channel strips or Patches are generally placed in the appropriate subfolders in ‘Audio Music Apps” folder. This is found in the music folder inside your home folder. In Finder Press Command Shift H to get to your home folder, then navigate to music > Audio Music Apps. In there find the appropriate folder for “Plug-In Settings”, “Channel Strip Settings”, or “Patches”. Once in each of those folders, you will need to find the subfolder for the appropriate plug in, or track type. Case in point, if its for an audio track put it in the track folder, or if its for a Software Instrument, put it in the instrument folder, etc.
As the tutorial progresses through how to load up the different presets, it will then cover how to save the channel strip settings as a patch so that it could be pulled up from the library. Before saving it as a patch however, the reverb sends that were part of the initial Classic electric piano patch that we started with are first removed. This as I stated is one of the differences between a patch and a channel strip setting. As the Channel strip setting doesn’t include any bus routings, when I changed the Channel strip from the Classic Electric Piano to the Dr. Dre Whistle, it left the bus routings in tact and only changed the instrument and audio effects. But, since when we pull this up from the library we want the channel strip as intended without any other buses, they are removed first before saving the preset.
And lastly, lets cover backing up your settings. The quickest way to make sure you’ve got everything is to just copy the audio music apps folder to wherever you would like to back it up to. When you set up a new machine after installing logic, you can then copy that folder back to the same location inside the music folder. However if you tend to restore from a time machine back-up or use migration assistance when setting up a new machine, you won’t need to worry about this as much. However if you would like to share any presets you made, you will need to navigate to the appropriate folder and subfolders inside the audio music app folder, and find the file you would like to share and copy it or use the share sheet by pressing VO Shift M on the file and choosing an option from the share submenu. Case in Point, lets say there is a preset for the tape delay plug in you would like to share. Navigate to the “Audio Music Apps” folder, then to ‘Plug-In Settings’, then to the ‘Tape Delay’ folder, and in there you should find the preset file or files.
While Patches and Channel strip settings files are the same, whether it’s a stock logic plug-in or a 3rd party plug-in, the Plug-in settings files are a little different for 3rd party plug-ins. Those are usually saved in Library /Audio/Presets/ and in there you will find a folder with the name of the plug in and any presets for that plug in that are saved in the logic .aupreset format. If you are using a 3rd party plug in and wish to save a preset, follow the above method to save it if it doesn’t already have its own folder for saving presets. Unfortunately not all 3rd party plug-ins have their presets in the logic ..aupreset format, but that doesn’t mean you can’t save your own. Some even go as far as to get sighted assistance to save out all the plug in presets found in the inaccessible Editor view of the plug in window into the .aupreset format so they can pull up presets without sighted assistance in the future.
Also, not all plug-ins that do have their preset in the logic format will be found in the aforementioned location, as some plug in’s such as those from Waves, have their own location where they are all saved.
