How To Make Logic Loops

How-to Create Green Apple Loops in 3 easy steps in Logic If you've ever used Garageband or Logic you will undoubtedly have encountered Apple Loops that can be time stretched and transposed to fit int  

How-to Create Green Apple Loops in 3 easy steps in Logic

If you've ever used Garageband or Logic you will undoubtedly have encountered Apple Loops that can be time stretched and transposed to fit into your songs. The Apple Loops format has become one of the big players in the world of samples and loops.

It's the format of choice in Apple's Pro Apps and across home & pro studios worldwide. The Loop Browser in Logic is a great way to quickly find and sift through musical elements, preview loops and sound effects and then add them to your project.

Apple Loops come in two flavors, blue and green. In this quick tip we're going to create our own Green Apple Loops in 3 easy steps.

Green Apple loops are like super-charged Blue Apple Loops. Both types contain audio data but Green Apple Loops also contain a MIDI region and channel strip settings.... so the possibilities in manipulating them in any MIDI editor and their plugin settings are
endless!

Step 1

For this example I've created a Software Instrument Track and placed a 2 bar MIDI region created in Ultrabeat on that track with some plugin effects to taste.

Simply drag the region from the Arrange area into the Loop Browser (in your Media Area).

Step 2 

From the Add Regions to Apple Loops Library window you can choose to give it a name and add some descriptors too. Taking an extra 30 seconds now to describe your loop may save you a lot of searching later!

Type: Select Loop for musical or rhythmic loops or One-shot for a non-looping sound effect.

Scale: My loop is beat based so I could select 'Any', 'Good for Both' or 'Neither'.

Genre & Instrument Descriptors: These will help you use the filter buttons in the Loop Browser to narrow down your search for an Apple Loop that fits your project.

When you're done describing your loop to Logic click Done.

Step 3 

A quick way to find your own Apple Loops is to choose My Loops from the View menu in the Loops Browser. Click on the All Filter button and your green apple loop will be displayed.

You can now click on the loop to preview it at the current project's tempo, or change the project tempo to speed up or slow down the loop. Dragging your green Apple Loop to a Software Instrument track will create the MIDI region and insert all the effects and instruments used to create your loop. Now that've created one loop you'll be able to access it from any project in Logic, Garageband or even Soundtrack Pro!

Check out our logic video tutorials for more info.

Rounik is the Executive Editor for Ask.Audio & macProVideo. He's built a crack team of professional musicians and writers to create one of the most visited online resources for news, review, tutorials and interviews for modern musician and producer. As an Apple Certified Trainer for Logic Pro Rounik has taught teachers, professional... Read More

Discussion

Eric
Nothing is better than a quality "Green" Apple loop. Dragging a region in to the loop browser is extremely intuitive and quick. Thanks for the tip! I only wish that Logic 9 allowed me to make the loops more complex... i.e. by letting me draw plug-in automation data over the region and have that data saved within the loop once it's created. I know it can be done with MIDI data but I'm hoping in Logic X we will be able to more completely embed track automation into the actual MIDI regions we create. That would be awesome!!!
Eric
I just realized that Green Loops can be created with third party software instruments as well. I just made one with Absynth 5 and it worked flawlessly. Very cool!
Ron
I frequently get clicks at the looping points of the loops i make in Logic. Can you please explain the best way to solve this problem. I've tried many approaches. Sometimes the result is ok, but i need to get a around this once and for all.
Rounik
Hi Ron

It's really important to cut or edit an audio region where the waveform crosses the zero point. If you zoom in to the waveform to almost sample level, you'll see where the waveform is crossing the horizontal line. Make your cuts on this line. In Logic's Arrange areas you can ask Logic to "Snap Edits to Zero Crossings" from the local Audio menu.

You can also use the same Snap to zero crossings in the Sample Editors 'Edit Menu'.

This should solve the issue... If not then a small crossfade on the region can help! I like to bounce crossfaded regions to a new audio file and then add them to the Loops Library.

:)
Gary Hiebner
That's cool that Apple Loops can be created with 3rd party plugins as well. That opens the door for even more possibilities with Logic

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