FXpansion BFD Eco - Manual (Page 4)

4
Ch.1 Introduction to BFD Eco
1:1 BFD Eco basics
BFD Eco is an acoustic drum software instrument which provides multisampled drums, played in a variety of ways (called articulations), and
recorded with multiple microphones including real stereo ambience channels. The stereo ambience provides the actual sound of the drums
within a room, offering a natural alternative to artificial reverb effects. BFD Eco also contains a Groove engine that plays back realistic drum
performances through BFD Eco’s sounds.
More detail about the architecture of BFD Eco’s sounds can be found in chapter 2.
Launching BFD Eco
1. As a standalone application
On Windows, you’ll find the BFD Eco standalone application here:
Program Files/FXpansion/BFD Eco or Start menu/Programs/FXpansion/BFD Eco
On Mac, launch BFD Eco from your Applications folder.
Once you start the application, you may need to set up its audio and MIDI settings. See chapter 11 for details on making these settings.
2. As an instrument plugin within a host
BFD Eco can be launched in a VST/AU/RTAS-compatible host in the same way as any other plugin instrument. See your host documentation for
details on this subject, or see chapter 11 for a guide to launching BFD Eco in most major hosts.
BFD Eco’s interface
BFD Eco’s interface mainly consists of 3 pages, along with a mixer that is always visible. Switch between the pages using the 3 page buttons at
the top-left of the BFD Eco interface.
Kit page
Mixer
Mixer (section 4:2)
The mixer lets you blend between all 12 kit-piece channels, OverHead and Room ambience channels, 2 aux channels and a master channel. You
can also perform a number of routing and parallel processing functions.
The kit-piece channels are also ‘slots’ in which to load kit-pieces – double-click on the channel image or right-click on the channel and use the
Load kit-piece function. This displays the kit-piece browser for loading a kit-piece into the slot.
Kit page (section 4:1)
The Kit page shows a graphical representation of the loaded kit-pieces, and indicates when they are played – the kit-pieces flash whenever their
articulations are triggered. You can also click on kit-pieces here in order to preview them.
Channel page
Channel page (chapter 5)
The Channel page features controls specific to each channel in the
mixer. The controls for the currently selected channel are shown.
• Kit-piece channels: Controls for changing the sound and response of a
kit-piece – tuning, damping and more.
• Ambience channels: Controls for changing the stereo width and
distance of the ambience mics.
• All channels: EQ and 2 assignable FX slots.