Launching and quitting

When using ReWire, the order in which you launch and quit the two programs is very important:

1. First launch Logic.

2. Activate at least one ReWire channel as the input source for an audio channel.
See "Activating ReWire audio channels" below for details.

3. Launch Reason.
It may take slightly longer for Reason to start when you are using ReWire.

When you are finished, you also need to quit the applications in a special order:

1. First quit Reason.

2. Then quit Logic.


Routing Audio

Activating ReWire audio channels in Logic

ReWire2 supports streaming of up to 256 separate audio channels. The number of available ReWire audio channels in Reason is 64. To activate the desired inputs from Reason in Emagic Logic Audio, proceed as follows:

1. Open the Audio Mixer window from the Audio menu.
Locate the first channel that you want to use for ReWire input and select it by clicking at its name at the bottom of the channel strip.

2. In the Instrument parameter box to the left, pull down the "Cha" menu and select the desired ReWire input from the "ReWire" submenu.
In the list that appears, all ReWire inputs are listed one after the other. This list does not display the name of the application, so if you have more than one ReWire application installed (for example both Reason and ReBirth) be careful to select the correct input.

3. Continue to select more channels and activate ReWire inputs for these.
Logic presents all ReWire inputs as mono, so to set up a stereo pair, like the Left and Right Mix outputs from Reason for example, you need to use two channels. These channels should also be panned left and right.

 

The ReWire channels as they appear in Emagic Logic 6. Here, the Reason Mix channels L and R are connected to audio channel 1 and 2 in Logic's mixer window.


How the ReWire audio channels are handled in Logic

When you activate ReWire channels in Logic Audio, as described above, channels in the Audio Mixer will play the audio coming in via ReWire. These channels have the following properties:

* Above the pan control you can see the name of the ReWire input.
* Apart from not having Input buttons, these channels are identical to regular audio channels. That is, they have all the fx, bussing and automation facilities provided for regular hard disk recording channels.
* The ReWire channels are all in mono. To set up a stereo pair, use two adjacent channels and set pan for the respective channels to hard left and right.
If you want to make identical settings for the two channels (for example perform a stereo fade), select both channels by holding down [Shift] and move the desired control on either of them.
* For information about how to set levels, panning, eq, fx and bussing, and how to create automation, see the Logic Audio documentation.



Preparations for routing audio from Reason

When you route audio from Reason to Logic Audio, you make use of the Hardware Interface at the top of the rack. Basically, each output in the Hardware Interface is connected to a separate ReWire channel. Therefore:

* To take full advantage of the mixing features in Logic Audio you need to connect the different Reason devices directly to the Hardware Interface.


For example, if your Reason Song contains eight different instrument devices and you connect these to separate inputs on the Hardware Interface, they will appear on separate ReWire channels in Logic's Audio Mixer. You can then use the mixing facilities in Logic to adjust volume and pan, add effects and equalizing etc. - individually for each Reason device!
If you instead connect all your Reason devices via a Mixer to the stereo input pair on the Hardware Interface, all sounds will appear mixed on a single ReWire stereo channel pair. While this works perfectly fine, you won't be able to mix and process the devices separately in Logic.



Using the transport and tempo controls

When you run ReWire, the transports in the two programs are completely linked. It doesn't matter in which program you Play, Stop, Fast Forward or Rewind. However, recording (if applicable) is still completely separate in the two applications.


Loop settings

The Loop in Reason will be completely linked to the Cycle in Logic. This means that you can move the start and end point for the loop or turn the loop on or off in either program, and this will be reflected in the other.


Tempo settings

As far as tempo goes, Logic is the Master. This means that both programs will run in the tempo set in Logic Audio.


Routing MIDI via ReWire2

In Logic all the different MIDI tracks must have an associated Instrument/Object in the Logic Environment. Unless you have created an Instrument for a MIDI device in Logic you won't be able to establish a MIDI communication through the device. This goes for ReWire MIDI as well.

The following description assumes that you have Logic 6 and Reason already running under ReWire, and that the current Reason song contains at least one instrument device.

Creating a Rewire MIDI Instrument in Logic 6

1. Select "Open Environment" from the Windows menu in Logic.

2. Pull down the "New" menu, and select "ReWire" from the "Internal" submenu.
A ReWire icon is created along with the rest of your MIDI instruments that exist in your Environment. You can now close the Environment window.

The next step is to configure a ReWire MIDI Instrument to communicate with Reason devices.

3. Open the Arrange window in Logic.

4. Click and hold on the icon of an unused track in the track list.
A pop-up menu appears.

5. Select "ReWire" from the "MIDI Instr." submenu.
You have now created a Rewire MIDI track!


Routing MIDI from Logic to Reason

1. Select the newly created ReWire track.
If you open the "Cha" pop-up menu, all devices in the current Reason Song are listed.

2. Select a Reason device from the "Cha" pop-up menu.
The output of the MIDI track is now routed to that device.

* If you now play back a MIDI part on the track, the MIDI notes will be sent to the Reason device - just as if the track were connected to any regular MIDI sound source.
The sound of the device will be sent back into Logic via ReWire - which channel it will appear on depends on how you have routed the device to the Hardware Interface in Reason, as discussed earlier.


 

The MIDI outputs for a Reason song. Here, each output goes directly to a device in the Reason rack.

Logic uses a concept of MIDI "buses", with 16 MIDI channels per bus. By default, the first 16 devices in Reason (in the order created) are assigned to Bus 6 MIDI channels 1-16. Thus, if you have more than 16 Reason devices in your Song, the devices created "after" the 16th device will appear on Bus 7 MIDI channels 1-16 and so on.


Note for OS X users

When routing MIDI via ReWire under OS X it is possible to trigger more than one Reason device in the rack simultaneously if Reason and the host application are configured to use the same MIDI interface. If you select a Reason device to play via ReWire MIDI from the host application, and then (from within Reason) select MIDI input for a track connected to another device, both devices will be triggered when you play, one via ReWire and the other via the MIDI interface. This is due to how CoreMIDI, Apple's own specification for handling MIDI under OS X, is implemented. If you want to control Reason via ReWire only, simply select "No MIDI Input" in Reason's MIDI preferences.



Rendering Audio

Most often, there is no need to convert individual ReWire channels to regular audio tracks! The channels already appear in Logic's Mixer, and you can typically perform the same kind of real-time processing as with regular audio channels (effects, EQ, volume, pan and mute automation, etc.).

Still, you may need to convert the ReWire channels to audio tracks, for example if you want to continue working in Logic only. Proceed as follows:

1. Make sure Reason plays back properly via ReWire.

2. Activate solo for the ReWire channel(s) that you wish to bounce down (render) to an audio file.
When you play back you should only hear the ReWire channels, including any effects and/or processing added in Logic Audio. What you hear is exactly what you will get in the resulting file.

* Note that if you have several ReWire channels (i.e. more than a stereo pair) soloed, you will not be able to process these channels individually using the file produced by the Bounce operation.
If you wish to preserve the individual ReWire channels instead of mixing them down, you should perform a bounce separately for each individual ReWire channel.


3. Open the Audio Mixer from the Audio menu, and locate the master fader, i.e. the output object that your ReWire channels are routed to.

4. Click the "Bnce" button in the lower right corner of the master fader.

5. In the Bounce dialog that appears you can set the length of the file (e.g. the start and end positions for the region that will provide the rendered file), the file format and resolution etc.
If you tick the option "Bounce & Add", the rendered file(s) will be added to the audio file list of the Audio window after performing the Bounce operation. See the Logic Audio documentation for more details about the Bounce dialog.

6. When you have set the options in the dialog to your liking, click "Bounce".
Another dialog appears allowing you to name the new file, and to select a folder path in which to store it.

7. Click OK.
The bounce is performed in real time, and all soloed tracks are played back. When the specified end is reached, playback stops automatically.

8. Import the bounced file(s) into Logic and activate playback.
Remember to first deactivate the corresponding ReWire channels.

* For information about how to set levels, panning, EQ, fx and bussing, and how to create automation, see the Logic Audio documentation.